Okay so most people know the names and fates of the assassins of President John F. Kennedy and Dr. Martin Luther King, as well as the circumstances of the assassinations. However, MOST people (myself included) could NOT name the assassins of Malcolm X OR tell anyone what eventually became of them (are they still in prison?) So why do you think that is? At the time, Malcolm X was considered more inflammatory than the other two but he was no less important. Rumors abounded of CIA influences on the murders of all three men, but none of those rumors were ever conclusively proven. Is it perhaps because the assassination of Malcolm X had more to do with a power struggle within the Nation of Islam itself, and the average American just wasn’t interested? I am interested in the thoughts and opinions of everybody here: why do you believe that most people recognize the names of Oswald and Ray but few people could even name those who assassinated Malcolm X?
I would first challenge your premise that Malcolm X was as important as Kennedy and King.
¿King was better known? Same thing with fewer people knowing who killed Robert Kennedy, I guess.
First, you have to establish that James Earl Ray and Lee Harvey Oswald are equal. Everyone knows the second, not so many know the first.
Second, Malcolm X’s killers (there were actually three, who knew?) were just people angry with his break from the Nation of Islam. He wasn’t killed for a larger cause, but because those other guys were jerks. It wasn’t an assassination as much as Kennedy and King were.
Bingo.
Sirhan Sirhan. I only remember it because as a child I found it interesting that someone had the same first and last name.
Malcolm X was not well known. Most of those who recognized the name had no idea who he was. More people learned of his life following his death than before. And far more people learned who he was following the Spike Lee film than did before that.
I remember the death of Elijah Muhammed in the 70s. Many people at that time were surprised to find Malcom had not been killed by ‘white supremacists’ but by members of the Nation of Islam.
+1
If I may indulge in a minor tangent… When I was a kid, the first several times I came across the name Malcom X in books, I thought he was some king or pope or something. You know, Malcom the Tenth. Confused the hell out of me.
Malcom X’s killers were not angry about his leaving the NOI, they were sent by the Nation to eliminate him as a rival and silence him.
The ironic thing about the 1960s assassinations was that Malcolm X was the most radical in his politics and yet was the only one not killed for his politics. RFK, JFK, and MLK were all killed for their politics and yet the only one who was the victim of a conspiracy was Malcolm X who was killed for personal reasons.
Ditto.
I think many know who Mark David Chapman is and what he did.
Or John Wilkes Booth.
Or Jack Ruby.
And perhaps even Andrew Cunanan.
And the attempt by John Hinckley Jr. - who was not only unsuccessful but not all that smart in determining the sexual orientation of his celebrity fixation and woman he was trying to somehow impress.
I read the book Malcolm X and even vaguely recall when he was killed (I am old)…but in his case, the assassination was not really resolved in the sense that one crazed person could be identified and I always thought it was not 100% resolved whodunit.
No way. Really?
Yeah. I mean, I was in grade school and probabably reading something that wasn’t aimed at grade schoolers. I recall reading something that mentioned him in passing and vaguely realizing he was someone important, but not understanding till later just who the guy was.
In Albuquerque, the Catholic High School is Pious X. The students, parents, alumni have car window/bumper stickers that are just an X in the school colors.
I moved to Albuquerque just after the Spike Lee Movie came out. For years I was amazed at the number of Malcolm X fans in this town, and marveled over the fact that none of them were black. It was seriously about 10 years before I learned what the deal was. In my defense, in normal conversation the school is known only as “Pious” and it is on the other side of town, so it was about that long before I saw it written.
It’s true Malcolm X was a less prominent figure than King and the Kennedys. And you mentioned another big factor here:
He’d left the NOI before he was killed, so he was not struggling for power within the group. The basic problem was that he’d pissed them off and they saw him as a threat. Since he’d offended a lot of people over the years and so had the NOI, many people probably felt he got what was coming to him. Since there were plenty of attempts on his life before he died, the assassination probably wasn’t a shock either.
On top of that, some more trivial factors:
*He was shot by three people, not one.
*I don’t know how else to put this, but Nation of Islam X names are confusing. Two of the convicted shooters were Norman 3X Butler and Thomas 15X Johnson. If you were just following this case casually, would you be able to keep that straight?
*Two innocent people were probably convinced of the shooting. Talmadge Hayer was caught at the scene and I don’t think he ever tried to deny his involvement, but the other two men who were convicted swore they weren’t involved and at least one had a decent alibi. Hayer later gave the names of four other men who he said really were part of the plot, including two of the shooters.
Life imitating art imitating life. Hinckley got the idea from the the movie “Taxi Driver,” and that was inspired by the Arthur Bremer shooting of George Wallace.
Practically no one at that time knew Foster’s actual orientation. She’s not exactly forthcoming on the subject even today.
I think that was a joke, Chuck.
What exactly did Malcolm X do that pissed off the Nation of Islam? Did he have a falling out with Elijah Muhammed, perhaps over rumors of Elijah Muhammed having sex with underage girls? Or was their more to it than that? Is there any evidence that Minister Farrakhan was involved?
Of course, a great many people will also know who these people killed:
– Charles J. Guiteau
– Leon Czolgosz