Malcolm X (1925–1965) was an African American leader whose uncompromising demand for Black dignity and self‑determination reverberated around the world. Born Malcolm Little on 19 May 1925 in Omaha, Nebraska, he witnessed violent racism from childhood – his family’s home was burned and his father killed in a likely KKK attack. These experiences drove him to seek change.
After prison he joined the Nation of Islam and adopted the surname “X” to reject his “slave” name. By the early 1960s he had become a prominent civil rights figure, known for fiery speeches and slogans like “by any means necessary”.
Unlike Martin Luther King Jr’s emphasis on integration, Malcolm often spoke of Black nationalism and pride in a separate Black identity. He called on African Americans to use education, economic power and even self-defence to achieve justice – famously saying “Education is our passport to the future”, meaning learning was essential for empowerment.
A Tour of Britain and Pan-Africanism
By late 1964 Malcolm’s global ideas were on full display. In November he toured Africa and then debated at the Oxford Union in Britain. Oxford’s prestigious “Queen and Country” debate motion that year was “Extremism in the defence of liberty is no vice…” Malcolm spoke passionately in favour, winning extended applause. One Oxford student reported that he argued Black people must “band together and do whatever… is necessary to see that our lives and property are protected”. (Unsurprisingly, the more conservative Union voted down the motion.) Malcolm’s presence at Oxford shocked many Britons. The Sun newspaper warned he was a revolutionary who wanted a separate state “where coloured people could live undisturbed” and might use violence to get it
A few months later, in February 1965, Malcolm returned to Britain for a short anti-racism tour. He visited Smethwick, near Birmingham, notorious at the time for Peter Griffiths MP’s racist campaign slogan – “If you want a nigger for a neighbour, vote Labour or Liberal”. Invited by the Indian Workers’ Association, Malcolm went to Marshall Street to witness housing discrimination firsthand.
There he shocked the world again: telling reporters he came because he was “disturbed by reports that coloured people in Smethwick are being badly treated”, and fiercely warning that he “would not wait for the fascist element in Smethwick to erect gas ovens”
After Smethwick, Malcolm returned to the U.S. and was assassinated just weeks later. But his ideas lived on. By the time of his death he had become a leading Pan-African voice. He had argued that the struggle of Black Americans was directly linked to anti-colonial struggles worldwide.
For example, after touring Ghana, Nigeria and other newly independent states, he told Americans that Africans had won freedom faster than the U.S. had, and he urged studying their example. He insisted the civil-rights movement needed international allies: “It is only in the United Nations, where everyone has an equal vote, that the plight of the Black man can be given a just hearing”.
And he extended his solidarity even further. During a 1964 trip to the Middle East, Malcolm visited Gaza, spoke with Palestinian refugees, and came to see the Israeli–Palestinian conflict as part of a global fight against colonialism.
In September 1964 he wrote a now-famous essay titled “Zionist Logic” (published in the Egyptian Gazette), warning that Zionism was a modern colonial project threatening not just Arabs but “the world” – in other words, any oppressed people. This controversial stance – far ahead of most American politicians at the time – reflected how Malcolm’s anti-racist vision embraced all struggles for self-determination.
Malcolm X’s Legacy for Black Britain Today
What does all this mean for Black Britons, and especially young people, in 2025?
Malcolm X never visited today’s multiracial London, but his lessons cross the Atlantic. He demonstrated that British society was not immune to racism – a point driven home by his Smethwick confrontation. His insistence on self-respect and community control (“We are not human beings unless we band together…” speaks directly to anyone facing prejudice here. His call for education, economic independence and running your own institutions still resonates with community organisers and entrepreneurs. And his demand for justice “by any means necessary” reminds us that while ballots are vital, no one should be left defenseless.
Today’s Black British activists also see their struggles in global context, from solidarity with African and Caribbean diaspora causes to linking with anti-racist movements worldwide, exactly as Malcolm urged. As he prophetically put it, Britain can’t claim to be the “mother country” of Black subjects without facing the truth of Black resistance.
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