Brothers and sisters, friends and enemies, I want to point out first that I am very happy to be here this evening, I was in a house last night that was bombed, my own. It didn't destroy all my clothes, not all, the only thing I could get my hands on before leaving was what I have on now. So I just ask you to excuse my appearance. I don't [bad word] out in front of people without a shirt and a tie. So before I get involved in anything nowadays, I have to straighten out my own position, which is clear. I am not a racist in any form whatsoever. I believe in Islam. I am a Muslim. Those of you who are Christians probably believe in the same God. But since the white man, your "friend," took your language away from you during slavery, the only language you know is his language. You know, your friend's language. So you call for the same God he calls for. When he's putting a rope around your neck, you call for God and he calls for God. And you wonder why the one you call on never answers you. in Asia or the Arab world or in Africa, where the Muslims are, if you find one who says he's white, all he's doing is using an adjective, so there's nothing else to it, he's just white.. But when you get the white man over here in America and he says he's white, he means something else. You can listen to the sound of his voice -- when he says he's white, he means he's a boss. That's what "white" means in this language. So that when he says he's white he has a little different sound in his voice. I know you know what I'm talking about. But despite the fact that I saw that Islam was a religion of brotherhood, I also had to face reality. And when I got back into this American society, I'm not in a society that practices brotherhood. I'm in a society that might preach it on Sunday, but they don't practice it on no day -- on any day. this society is controlled primarily by racists and segregationists. This is a society whose government doesn't hesitate to inflict the most [bad word] form of punishment and oppression upon dark-skinned people all over the world. They are violent when their interests are at stake. But all of that violence that they display at the international level, when you and I want just a little bit of freedom, we're supposed to be nonviolent. They're violent. They're violent in Korea, they're violent in Germany, they're violent in the South Pacific, they're violent in Cuba, they're violent wherever they go. But when [bad word] time for you and me to protect ourselves against lynchings, they tell us to be nonviolent.

After the Bombing / Speech at Ford Auditorium
Malcolm X, transcribed and edited by the Malcolm X Museum and Noaman Ali

 [bad word] 14, 1965