Josh Clark

the philosophy and the viewpoint of that group started to shift away from the establishment that had been there up to that point to this much more radical, much more politically active version of the Nation of Islam that was the Malcolm X brand of Nation of Islam.

Yeah.

He also would do things like debate white people.

He did at Oxford.

He did at Harvard on like race relations.

He would take questions from white reporters.

All of this stuff was like not what Elijah Muhammad was was jibing with.

But Malcolm X was getting such results that Elijah Muhammad would just kind of be like, I don't want you doing that.

But then when Malcolm went ahead and did it, there wouldn't be any real consequences for it, right?

So as he's doing this, he's becoming more and more emboldened.

And one of the things he sets his sights on, Chuck, is the American, essentially the racial struggle in the United States that was...

really beginning to become part of the American preoccupation at the same time.

In the 50s, it was really civil rights movement was really starting to take shape.

And this again, this is totally opposite from what you were saying Elijah Muhammad wanted, which was isolation, separatism, not just from white America, from non-black Muslim black America, too.

Like he had no inclination to join the civil rights movement.

Elijah Muhammad to join the civil rights fight because they weren't black Muslims, so therefore they were essentially lesser versions of black Americans.

Yeah, that's why they were also really highly critical of the NAACP is because they essentially said white people had, they'd allowed white people to join and the white people had taken over and were now steering the boat.

So you could not be white and be, join the Nation of Islam.

Sorry, they would not let you in, still won't as far as I know.

Yeah.