Malcolm #2 (over break reading) ... #1

Chapter Eight

Trapped

The more you read into the bibliography of Malcolm X, the more one can see the devastating life Malcolm is living. He lives a life centered around narcotics and danger.

"The amount of dope I put into myself within the next several hours sounds inconceivable," (Haley 133).

Malcolm always needs to be high. Getting opium and smoking it, next taking benzedrine tablets to make him less drowsy, then smoking marijuana. By now, Malcolm had opium, benzedrine and reefers in his system and when he went to Sammy's house, he soon had cocaine in his system. The way Malcolm describes his high as timeless is unreal. How is someone able to live a life without really being there to live it? How can someone live their life high 24/7? 

Chapter Nine

Caught

Sometimes in order to change your life around, it means having to look over your life and see the bad and the good in it. Malcolm sunk to the very low of the American white man's society before he realized that changing his life was an essential task he had to complete.

"But I am spending many hours because the full story is the best way that I know to have it seen, and understood, that I sunk to the very bottom of the American white man's society when--soon now, in prison--I found Allah and the religion of Islam and it completely transformed my life," (Haley 153). 

When there is nothing left to lose, turing to religion and having faith seems like the best answer. When someone does something that is unforgivable they learn to accept their Lord, turning to them, asking for forgiveness and guidance. I have watched someone turn to their savior in time of need and transform their life into a more religious and preservative way of living. This person completely transformed himself from the dangerous person he was to someone who was so much more spiritual and spiritually guided. I have watched this person who is very close to me change their life around completely by reading the bible. I watched this man rework who he had become over the years and put all his trust, guilt, and sorrow into his savior, God. I watched this man develop year after year asking the Lord for forgiveness for the sins he had committed in his earlier years. It amazes me how someone who had done wrong in the world can change their life around by simply living and learning the life of their Lord. This man learned and saw the importance of changing his life around. He sunk to a time in his life that was very low, but out of it came this whole new life that he is living by today. As bad as making mistakes are, I feel it is necessary for people to make them. If people do not make mistakes, there would never be a chance for someone to seek the change that is needed in order to remold their life. Malcolm's younger years were so non-religion based that I am exited to see where Allah and the Islam religion is going to take him.

In an article I read from the New York Times, I learned that federal prisons nation wide are getting rid of religious books and materials. These prisons nation wide want to suspend religious readings and materials because they do not want to encourage the gatherings of Islamic and other "militant" religious groups. I feel that religion in prisons is important because it gives the prisoners a chance to change themselves into better people. Although having faith and knowing their Lord is always listening, I feel that these people need to read and learn more about their religion in order to really understand and accept it. I do not agree with what has happened in this article because without faith and religion, Malcolm X and the person I know would not be guided in the right direction.