What Is The Self-Defense Approach To The Civil Rights Movement

The civil rights movement was a movement which struggled for social justice for African Americans. Officially the movement had been around since the 1950’s but efforts to improve the quality of life for African Americans go all the way back to the 1860’s. During 1861 war broke out between the northern and southern states of the United States over slavery. This war is known as the American Civil War, which freed the African Americans from slavery. Although slavery was officially abolished by the Thirteenth Amendment the ex-slaves did not receive fair and equal treatment. This was especially true in the southern states with them passing what is known as the Jim Crow Laws. These laws served as a way for the southerners to legally enforce racial segregation. Examples of this were that blacks could not attend the same public facilities as whites or even attend the same schools. As a result of these social injustices it motivated many notable figures to stand up, examples of this were Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcom X. Martin Luther King brought about an approach known as Civil disobedience while Malcom X brought in the self-defense approach. Both approaches were used during the civil rights movement, but the civil disobedience approach was more effective in pushing for positive change while the self-defense approach had indeed brought on

Malcom was born in Nebraska in 1925, at that time he went by the name Malcom little. At the age of twenty-one, Malcom was convicted of burglary and was sentenced to prison for eight to ten years. According to D. Sawinski (Malcom X. 2001) during Malcom’s time in prison, he had learned about the Nation of Islam and its black Muslim Leader, Elijah Muhammad (1897-1975). While being influenced by the Nation of Islam’s beliefs Malcom advocated separatism and self-defense. As a result of Malcom’s advocation of separatism and self-defense, the Black Panther Party was