The question is how do I see the different struggles (gay rights, women’s movement, anti-Vietnam, Chicano movement) playing out, whether it be through radicalism or assimilation, in social movements. When it comes to the Chicano movement, according to Rodriquez (1996), it seems far from radical and much more passive. Even though the modern Chicano movement started in the 1960’s, it was not unified at the time due to the “lack of historical memory, regionalism and sectarianism, but also government efforts” (Rodriquez, 1996, p. 1). I think this trend will continue if the universities make choices as they have in the past to hire professors that actually hurt the Chicano movement instead of strengthening it (Rodriquez, 1996, p. 5). Through movements like CSU Northridge and their efforts of making change through political action and Proposition 187 demonstrations, the Chicano movement has shown that social protest through non radical means is possible. Today, it is critical that the Chicano movement protest in a non-radical method because of the sensitivity to illegal immigration.
Dr. King and Malcolm X both held different strategies in how they viewed the appropriateness of the social movement for racial equality. It is hard to say that one leader over the other leader had a better strategy because both leaders came from distinct different backgrounds. Malcolm X grew up with white hatred being more prevalent in his family; he was touched and moved by it. His grandmother was raped, his father presumably killed by white supremacists, and he finished his youth years as an black outcast in a white world. King, on the other hand, new love and racial pride and was followed by Christians. The auras of the two are completely different. Although both leaders shared the same “sense of dedication to the struggle for racial advancement” I can understand and feel where Malcolm X was coming from that was the driving force behind his techniques thoughts and views (Carson, 2005, p. 18).
More than King himself or Malcolm himself, it was black people like Rosa Parks and the students who participated in the lunch counter sit-in that ultimately made whites listen that helped promote change. It was not just one leader with his posse; it was blacks everywhere popping up saying that they had enough!
I agree with Carson that the different positions between King and Malcolm are somewhat reconcilable because their end result was in common. Both leaders fought for black freedom and both leaders “recognized that African Americans would never be free until they signed their own emancipation proclamation with the pen and ink of assertive selfhood” (Carson, 2005, pp. 18-19). The only difference was how to go about it; how to get to the result of equality. If the two leaders at some point would have gotten together, they both could have targeted different arenas to get their message across. Carson did say that Malcolm, even though he spoke of violence ends, was not a violent person.
King compromised himself when he chose to physically participate in a protest that landed him in the Birmingham jail. In the long run, this jail time resulted in significant history through his “Letter from Birmingham.” From “do nothingism,” to the complacent white hypocritical leaders calling for unity, to the slogan “injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere,” King’s writings and words are ingrained in our literature and minds today (King, 1963). King’s statements are not only historical, calling people out the way he did was necessary and had purpose.
Carson, C. (2005). The Unfinished Dialogue of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X.
