malcolm x post 1

Nightmare. 

From the start, things for Malcolm and his family were not very stable.  They were extremely poor and had little clothes. Things even took a turn for the worse when his father was killed. I felt this scene was so powerful and explicative.  It really allowed the reader to understand how the family was feeling, especially Malcolm's mother, and what they were going through.  I really felt for Malcolm's mother for the entirety of this chapter.  She had to work so hard to fight off the Warfare people from coming to her home and would not except any charity from anyone. Malcolm's mom felt the need to do this because she would not let her guard down to show that she needed help around white people. She was already looked down upon by the white society and didn't want to be anymore. At times I was aggravated and wanted her to just except some food from neighbors so she could feed her children, but I know that would have just thrown all her pride away. 

Eventually the welfare people got to Malcolm and his family and literally tore them apart. All the children were sent to different families who were able to care for them. Malcolm's mom was sent to a State Mental Hospital after suffering from a breakdown from everything that had happened; from having no money, no food, no dignity left, and all her children taken away. 

On a different note, Malcolm often being caught between his mother and father really stuck out at me. "Thinking about it now, I feel definitely that just as my father favored me for being lighter than the other children, my mother gave me more hell for the same reason" (Haley 8). Malcolm especially remembers feeling like his father favored him the most when he would take Malcolm to his Garvey U.N.I.A. meetings. He felt that he was special he was able to sit in on these meetings with his dad.  Whereas his mother would beat him harshly.  I felt strongly about how Malcolm was being treated from one extreme to another between his parents because all this was mainly since the way he looked.  Just because his skin was lighter than the rest of his siblings, something he had no control over, didn't change what kind of person he was inside.  Yet, Malcolm was being treated in another way mainly because of just that.