New Book Delves into History of Malcolm X

Michael P Jeffries reviews the new biography of Malcolm X, the civil rights leader who became radicalized with the black supremacist Nation of Islam Group before quitting and following an international human rights approach to black liberation in the years before his assassination in 1965.  Entitled “The Dead Are Rising”, Jeffries, writing in the New York Times, explains that the new book by Les and Tamara Payne explore the circumstances that led to Malcolm X’s most celebrated speeches, although he finds it a little lacking in an analysis of those speeches themselves.  The authors note how the Nation of Islam, a bizarre anti-semitic and conspiracy filled group which still exists today, turned on Malcolm when he began to break away from its tenets, and how their leadership ultimately arranged to have him assassinated.  Mr Jeffries concludes “Black Lives Matter isn’t asking for anything. Like Malcolm, it demands everything that Black people deserve, by any means necessary. It does not advocate violence, but will not abide the sick moral logic that condemns destruction of property as “too extreme” a response to the police shooting us in the back. And thanks to the leadership of Black women and Black L.G.B.T.Q. people, the imagination of the current movement is even more expansive than its predecessors in the mid-20th century. This is the promise they keep, and the idea that pushed Payne to write until death took the pen: We will exceed even Malcolm’s wildest dreams.”.  The book “The Dead are Rising” is available now on import: if you’re thinking of getting a copy, why not order through a local independent or LGBT friendly bookstore and live the values of international solidarity that Malcolm came to espouse.