Two Ways to Righteousness

Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr. are the most famous Black civil right activists who lived, and fought for the same thing, right of Black people. However, their path to the revolution were stand in the extreme end. Martin Luther King Jr. argued for nonviolence revolution as he said in his famous quote, "it is no longer a choice, my friends, between violence and nonviolence. It is either nonviolence or nonexistence," while Malcolm X argued for violence revolution, "the Ballot or the Bullet". And while Martin Luther King Jr. wanted a harmony between different ethnic groups, Malcolm X thought that Whites are devil that Black people should fight against, he argued for the separation of Black and White. And not only that, but their view points were different, Martin Luther King Jr. "have a dream" while Malcolm X "don't see any American dream" but only "see an American nightmare". These differences can be the result of their different earlier days that they have experienced.

Malcolm X, who born in Omaha, Nebraska, lived uneasy and wretched life. Malcolm X's father was the Baptist preacher who was the organizer for Marcus Garvey's black nationalist organization, UNIA, the Universal Negro Improvement Association. This organization's goal was to raise the pride and independence of the black people and the separation of black and white. They also argued that blacks need to know their identity as a Pan-African. His father wasn't having economical problem, but while he was in this organization and because of his preaching and recruiting activities for the organization, him and his family were threatened by Ku Klux Klan and other white supremacist groups. They burnt down their family house when Malcolm X was four and they even murdered Malcolm's father pretending that was an accident when Malcolm was six years old. And even his mother was took by the State Mental Hospital at Kalamazoo because Welfare workers thought "she's crazy for refusing food" (From Nightmare to Salvation, 51). After, he was fostered by the white family, which he initially got on well, but later he one he called that fostering as "nothing but legal, modern slavery" (From Nightmare to Salvation, 51). One large event that helped to form Malcolm's ideas toward white along with all other his family trouble, is when his 8th grade English teacher, Mr.Ostrowski asked Malcolm what was his career plan. When Malcolm answered that he like to be a lawyer, Mr.Ostrowski told him, "Malcolm, one of life's first needs is for us to be realistic...But you've got to be realistic about being a nigger. A lawyer-that no realistic goal for a nigger. You need to think about something you can be...Why don't you plan on carpentry? People like you as a person - you'd get all kinds of work." (From Nightmare to Salvation, 51-52) And Mr.Ostrowski advised to other students, white, when student told him that they wanted to become a farmer, he encourage them to think of more broad things. And the girls who told him that they want to become nurse and veterinarian were encouraged as well. So, Malcolm "began to change - inside" and "drew away from white people" (From Nightmare to Salvation, 52). Then he moved to Boston with his sister, where he got into urban crime and vice. He "was a predatory hustler who pimped, peddled illicit drugs and alcohol, ran gambling, and generally did anything he could to gain money or advantage." (Introduction, 8) When Malcolm finally caught by cops, two girls, white, who committed crimes with him got low bail, their bail wasn't for the crime, but for their involvement with blacks. With all these events combined, when Reginald talked about the Nation of Islam and when he said that "the white man is the devil"(From Nightmare to Salvation, 55), it just sparked Malcolm's mind.

Martin Luther King Jr. was born in Atlanta, Georgia. He was born in middle-class family, where his grandfather and father were both Baptist preachers. Unlike Malcolm X, King was benefited from the higher education at Morehouse College, a black institution in Atlanta, and he even went to Pennsylvania's predominantly white Crozer Seminary and Boston University. And he achieved Ph.D. His father was the kind of person who just wont argue, and he never experienced the feeling of not having the basic necessities of life. And community where he born in was fairly well-being society, with average income and crime rate wasn't high. These kind of peaceful environment and the best educational conditions that he had exposed in this