Why Was Malcolm X Killed and by Whom?

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More than three accurate gunshots echoed through the halls of the Audubon Ballroom…Malcolm X was dead. As a child growing up in Harlem, New York, Malcolm was very smart. Top of his class and nominated as class president, he felt he had nothing to lose; so he mentioned to his teacher the dream of becoming a lawyer. His teacher denounced this dream, asking him to look towards more “realistic goals.” [Malcolm X] This, and many other childhood events, may have caused the behavior Malcolm portrayed as he got older. After dropping out of school in the 8th grade, he formed his own gang and became a drug user and a thief. After getting caught, he went to jail to serve 6 years where one of the inmates happened to convert him to Islam. Malcolm was changed. In 1948, Malcolm X joined the Nation of Islam, a black supremacist group for Muslims, led by Elijah Muhammad who became Malcolm’s hero. Learning that white men were bad examples of human kind, Malcolm swore not to date their women, use their liquor or drugs. Seventeen years later, Malcolm X was assassinated by three black Muslims from this same organization. Although no one really knows who hired these men to kill Malcolm, or if they were hired at all many theories have been made up. The three most common suspects are: the Nation of Islam, the American Government, or the black people of Harlem, New York. Each suspect had its own reasons that could have been seen as reason enough to kill Malcolm. “We didn’t want to kill Malcolm! His foolish teaching would bring him to his own end” (Begum, Hnn.us)! These words, taken directly from the mouth of Elijah Muhammad imply a lot more than what it looks like. By saying that they (the Nation of Islam) didn’t want to kill Malcolm, implies that they felt they were compelled or had to. The Nation of Islam had a lot of reasons to kill Malcolm. For example, the three men who killed Malcolm

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