Malcolm X through the ghost writing of Alex Haley has written an interesting excerpt called “Learning to Read,” which explains his experiences of reading while in prison. He states “I knew right there in prison that reading had changed forever the course of my life. As I see it today, the ability awoke inside me, some long dormant craving to be mentally alive”
(X 1007). However, in his rather agitated use of pathos and the time it was published in 1965, right in the middle of the Civil Rights Movement, may keep people from fully embracing his ideas. He has organized the article chronologically, starting with his time as a street hustler moving through his time in prison learning to read and write as a common man. He then becomes a speaker
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The tone was too agitated and thus sounded aggressive. Mainly he uses numerous examples to show how the white man or “white devil” has influenced many cultures mostly as a negative aspect of colonization. For example, he expressed disdain about the white man’s actions in India in 1759 and China in 1901. He perceived white men as a collective group that was nothing more than opportunists who use Christianity as their initial wedge to criminal conquests. How the white’s labeled other nonwhite cultures and civilizations as heathen and pagan. Eventually, the white man would use his weapons of war to coerce the non whites into submission and slavery (X 1005). It most likely would have been better received by whites if it wasn’t so negative towards whites. The inverse of Malcolm X would be Martin Luther King Jr. (MLK), who spoke more of all races coming together, living harmoniously and sharing everything America had to offer. MLK for the most part had the support of whites to a degree, Malcolm X did not. MLK’s tactics were more of peaceful protest to expose maltreatment of the black race (Web). Malcolm X preferred violent protest and separation in order to promote the ideas that he