"That's power, and that's why Goldberg's got all the power now—^because of money. They've got millions and millions of black dollars being spent right down here on 125th Street. That's what you heard me holler about up there tonight. That's what makes me so mad when I see it. And the niggers just keep going in there giving him more of their money, and he's not giving them a damn thing, man. All he's going to give them is some low-quality goods. Shit, it seems as though the nigger would have enough sense by now, man, to see that if he's ever to get anything in this country, he's going to have to start thinking for himself and start being a little selfish.
"The time is now, man, to get together. You see me out here, Sonny, and you see all the other black brothers out here. We've forsaken this white world altogether. I couldn't go downtown and work, man. I couldn't stand to be around white people for one hour a day.
"Do you really think you're out of slavery? Then all you got to do is go down as far as Maryland, brother. Go in some of those restaurants down there and ask them for a cup of coffee. They'll look at you like you're a runaway slave or something. And they might treat you like one.
"Man, we sit down here tonight, and we talk. I'm angry. With you, brother, I think you're one of these complacent niggers out here who managed to get by and not have it bother them directly. So you figure you're not out here. Yeah, I'll bet you're walking around here thinking you're free. When the shit comes down on you, you're going to be one of the angriest niggers out here on this street, man.
"As a matter of fact, I'm gon watch you. I'm gon watch you, because you've been going through all this shit, and you been going through it almost anesthetized. I'm going to keep watching you, because I know, when the shit gets to you, it's gon hit you real hard, real hard, because it's all going to come down on you at once . . . everything that's been piling up. You may not realize it, man, but you're angry.
"Sonny, every black man in this land is angry now, espe-
cially in Harlem. There's no way for them not to be. You look around you, brother. You can't get any money. You come up. a little boy, in this place. You go downtown to work. They want to treat you like you're still a little boy. All the time when you're growing up in this great New York City, man, your childhood is just filled with exploitation by those white devils out there. Ever>'place you go, brother. You got to go to the white butcher shop; you got to go to the white grocer}' store. They've got colored barbershops. That's all they let us have. Sonny. The only reason they let you have a colored barbershop is because those white devils don't know nothin' about cutting no colored hair. They don't really know nothin', man.
'The people ain't got no soul. I'm telling you, brother. They're not even real. Yeah, I'm telling you, man. Those people are behind us. Colored people have got all the feelings, man. You see all these niggers running out here talking about they want some white girl. Damn, I don't want me nothin' but a nigger woman. I don't see how anybody couldn't want one, seeing as how they're the only ones who've got any soul, man. You been around all these people with soul for so long. They're into it with Allah. That's right
"You come up all this time. Sonny, all your life in Harlem. And there is the white landlord, man, who your folks got to be worried about paying the rent to. There is the white grocer, who your moms got to be going down pleading with that mother-fucker to give her some credit so she could feed her kids. They got to be going and taking their stuff to the pawnshop to some damn white pawnbroker, who they got to beg for a few dollars, because he knows they're up tight and need the money, and he's gon try and take their shit for nothing at all.
"They got to be going to a white fish market, that's gon be gypping them. They got to go to the white butcher, who's gon be selling them some old dried-up mother-fucking neck bones and pig tails and pig feet. They wouldn't even think about selling that shit in any white neighborhobd. They don't even sell it for dogmeat in white neighborhoods. You go to the movies, the movies are owned by the white people. Everything here is white.
"If you're not mad, I feel sorr>' for you. Sonny, because you're crazy, and you're lost, man. So there, black man, you've got to be mad, brother."
"Alley, man; you can get mad about this shit, but if you
can't do anything about it, it's gon fuck with your mind, you know? Unless you stop being mad because you realize you have to stop, for your own good."
"How the hell are you gon stop bein' mad when you've got a foot up in your ass?"
I said, "Look, man, if you're going to live, you got to try and take the foot out of your ass. There's some things, man, that anger doesn't mean a damn thing to. You can get mad if you want to, but why bother if nobody's going to pay any attention to you? Alley, the way I feel about it is that we—you, me, the cats we came up with, probably all the cats that were in jail with you—we were angry all our lives. That's what that shit was all about. We were having our revolution. The revolution that you're talking about, Alley, I've had it. I've had that revolution since I was six years old. And I fought it every day—in the streets of Harlem, in the streets of Brooklyn, in the streets of the Bronx and Lower Manhattan, all over—when I was there stealing, raising hell out there, playing hookey. I rebelled against school because the teachers were white. And I went downtown and robbed the stores because the store owners were white. I ran through the subways because the cats in the change booths were white.
"I was rebelling every time I went to someplace like the Children's Center, like the Youth House, like Wiltwyck, like Warwick. I was rebelling, man. And all I met in there were other young, rebellious cats who couldn't take it either.
"But nobody was winning. That revolution was hopeless. The cats who had something on the ball and they could dig it in time, they stopped. They stopped. They didn't stop being angry. They just stopped cutting their own throats, you know? That kind of revolution was impossible. It was doomed to fail, right from the word go.
"Now, look at it realistically. Alley. How the hell are you gonna come in here and say, 'Look, white man, we're living in your world, but I want you to let us have a revolution'? This is what it would amount to, because the black man's just in no position to revolt against anything here. You know what that's all about, Alley. You've been around; you've heard of this before. People have always been talking that shit, but nobody's gotten up and started any revolution. In the old days, in the slave uprisings, these people were ready to die."
Alley said, "Wait a minute! Wait a minute. Sonny, I'm
ready to die too, man. Shit, I don't feel as though I've got any more now than the folks in slavery had. I don't feel that their pain is any more than mine. Shit, why shouldn't I be ready to die?"
"Look, Alley, if you just want to die, why bother to go out there and do it in the name of freedom?"
He said, "Man, because I want everybody to know that they're not free. I want you to know; I want my sisters to know; I want my brothers to know; I want the whole generation to know that we're not free."
"Alley, man, didn't you find out anything when you were in jail? Didn't you find out anything about the rebelHon or the revolution and why we were losing all that time? Why all those cats in there lost?"
He said, "Yeah, I found out why. I found out why, because half of those mother-fuckers in there was goin' to church on Sunday, praying to a white god."
"Listen, Alley, the rebellion has gone along the wrong lines."
"Yeah, it's goin' along the wrong line. Sonny, because it's stiU going along that white line. Those mother-fuckers don't even know what they're fighting in there. Half of those cats in jail, they were out here stealing from colored people. Now, ain't that a fuckin' shame? They were out in the street stealin' from black people. You know, you've got niggers up there who've hit black men on the head and taken their wallets. You know why? It's because all other Negroes see the way that the white man is treating the black man. He's just got to try and treat them the same way too. Everybody's down on Negroes because of what the white man has made this s
ociety think of Negroes. . . .
"I'm damn surprised at you, Sonny. Man, all the way up, since the time I met you, you were a real hell raiser. As a matter of fact, the last time I got back to Harlem, I was looking for you, and I was hoping that you had gotten the message from Muhammad . . . because I knew you'd be good in this thing. But now, man, I don't know. If anybody had ever told me that Claude Brown was talking that peaceful shit and he's not angry, I would have said they were lying. I think one day, it's gon come out, brother . . . the same shit. It's gon come out in you too, and I think it's gon come out so strong I'm gon be afraid to be around you. I think that stuff is gonna come out . . . that violent stuff in you, like that riot that you started up at Warwick."
I said, "Man, *I told everybody I never started all that stuff." -'
He said, "Yeah, but you didn't have to tell me. When they told me it was a riot between the Puerto Ricans and the colored cats, I just knew you had to be behind it, you know. That's the way you are, Sonny, and I think when you get the message from Muhammad, Hariem's gon move, brother. We gon have fire on the streets, man."
"I've already got the message. Alley. And it's not from Muhammad. As a matter of fact, I'm hoping I can give it to you, but I think I'll have to wait until you become a little disenchanted with Muhammad."
He said, "Look, brother, I've got to go. I'm going to see you. I want you to stay out of these bars and stop giving that white devil our money."
"Yeah, Bashi, I just might think about that. All I've got to do is find me a good colored-owned bar."
Alley said, "Salaam aleichem."
"Salaam aleichem, Bashi."
It seemed as though over the next few years, say from 1955 through 1959, just about everybody who came out of jail came out a Muslim. By 1959, I had come to the conclusion that few Negroes could go to any of the city prisons in New York and not come out a Muslim.
There was one common thing that I noticed about all the cats in the Muslim movement. They seemed to be the cats who were very uncertain about where they were, who they were, or what they were going to do, the cats who had never been able to find their groove. The guys who went to jail, they just knew they were criminals, and that's all there was to it. They were never going to do anything to be good. They weren't going to do anything halfway good. Nobody could tell them anything. They were guys who were messing up because they just didn't know of any other way to let ofif steam. So the Muslim faith seems to have been just the thing for them.
But the real cold criminals, none of those guys came out Muslims. After a while, this was a way you could tell cold hoods. If a guy was a real stickup artist, he was a real stick-up artist. He didn't mess with drugs; he didn't mess with the Muslim faith; he didn't mess with anything but crime.
In a way, it was a good thing that the Mushm faith was gaining ground in Harlem, because it gave something to the
junkies and to the prostitutes. When a junkie came out of jail or when he came back from getting a cure, it was the rule to just come back on the streets and do the same things that he had been doing all along. Now it was different.
All the time before, the junkie never had anyplace to go when he came out of jail or out of the hospital. Now the junkies had a place to go, those who could accept the teachings of the Muslims. It wasn't hard to accept, not for most of the junkies. Junkies weren't cold criminals at heart, not Harlem junkies. Maybe this was why they became junkies— because they couldn't see going into the crime life. I've seen very few real criminals that ever dabbled in drugs. If a guy was criminally inclined and started messing with drugs, he usually became a junkie and no longer a criminal. There was a difference. The junkie was a junkie first and above all other things. His criminal activities were merely means to an end.
The Muslim movement was cleaning them up, giving them a lot of food for thought, feeding them with a philosophy— if you could call it that—that provided some type of moral fortitude. Now they had a place to go. They went to 125th Street and Seventh Avenue, started preaching the word and saying "Salaam aleichem" to everybody, and growing beards.
It was a new thing, and it was a strong thing too. It was something, I suppose, that most cats in Harlem could accept, because it was an angry thing. I guess any angry organization would have more appeal to male Harlemites than any other kind of organization.
Then, there was this thing in the new name. It was always fascinating to everybody. It was fascinating to the new recruits. It gave them a sense of being somebody, a sense of importance. All the time before they became Muslims, I suppose there was a feehng of insignificance that led them into self-destruction in one form or another. It was just not being anybody. Now they were somebody, a part of something. I suppose that's all they needed.
All the Muslims now felt as though 125th Street was theirs. It used to belong to the hustlers and the sUcksters. They're still there, but Seventh Avenue belongs to the Muslims. I think everybody knows this now. This group just came down and claimed it. They started setting up their stands and giving speeches. People started hstening, and it just became known that if you wanted to hear a good antiwhite sermon
on Saturday nighf, all you had to do was go to 125th Street and Seventh Avenife.
It made everybody feel as though they had something. I suppose there were many people who had been mistreated by the white boss during the day. They could come out on Seventh Avenue and hear something that would be consoling . . . hear some of the "Buy Black" slogans and "hate the white devils" speeches.
The Muslims would try to embarrass people who weren't buying black or boycotting the white people. They weren't gaining too much ground as far as getting the people to stop buying from white store owners, but they got them to start believing this thing about buying from colored, giving the money to colored, and that colored people should stick together.
I recall one evening I had come uptown to see my folks. I had heard on the news and seen in the evening paper something about a riot down at the United Nations earlier that day.
This was about the time that Patrice Lumumba had been killed. Lumumba had come to Harlem the summer before. The Muslims had gotten him to speak on 125th Street. Everybody in Harlem was pretty fond of Lumumba, especially the Black Muslims.
The incident at the United Nations started off as a peaceful demonstration and turned into a riot. It was led by a young light-skinned fellow who— The New York Times said —had features more Arabic than Negroid, and since he was garbed in some royal Arabic attire, the paper speculated that he was most likely a prince or the son of some Arabian prince.
When I got to my parents' house that evening, Dad started telling me that he'd seen "that crazy boy who use to come around here."
I said, "Dad, which crazy boy is this?" because I knew he was always calling somebody crazy. He thought, at one time, that just about all my friends were crazy.
He said, "You know, that crazy light-skin boy who was up at Wiltwyck with you and use to come here and have a party with Suzy Q. He use to kiss the dog all the time, that sort of thing."
"Oh! You mean Alley. I haven't seen him in a little while. He's down on 125th Street most of the time."
He said, "Oh, yeah. Well, I saw him on TV just a little while ago. He was down there at the UN, with some old funny-lookin* clothes on, making some trouble about that man dying down there in Africa, that man Lumumba."
I said, "Oh! So that was Alley who started all that trouble down there at the UN? I wish I'd seen it."
Dad said, "The news will be back on at six-thirty, and they'll probably show it again. So why don't you hang around. You can see it. He was there. I know it was him, because I saw him, as big as day."
When the news came on, there was Alley looking very solemn. I knew he was very fond of Patrice Lumumba, as were all the Muslims who had met him when he was in New York. But I didn't think Alley would go down to the United Nations and start a riot or anything Uke that. But evidently he did.
He came back to Harlem a hero.
The next day. The New York Times ran an article about Alley probably being the son of some Arabian prince. The Harlemites who knew him had a good laugh.
It was a good thing for Alley, I suppose, because he was heard. He made the goddamn white man know that he was angry.
The thing that I noticed about the Muslim faith that seemed to stand out over that of the Coptic was that people didn't leave as soon. I would see guys being members of the Muslim faith for years. It just kept expanding; it was more and more. If I stayed away from Harlem for a few months, when I came back, there were many more people who hadn't been Muslims when I left who were now Muslims, women and men. It was a thing that just seemed to keep expanding, and it also. seemed to hold people.
Then the Muslims started getting places in Harlem. They opened up dry cleaners with lower prices than other places. They opened up their restaurants. They had good food— fried chicken, pies, anything but pork. It was always delicious, because it was home cooking, but without the pork. The prices were very reasonable. As a matter of fact, they were more reasonable than just about any of the places in Harlem except the fish-and-chips joint.
The policemen in Harlem seemed to resent the Muslims, but they also seemed to be afraid of them. Especially the white police. They weren't violent. I'd never seen or heard
of any Muslim violence before 1960. The policemen would come down, and Jhey would watch. Everybody was afraid of the Muslims at^ first, all the politicians and the law-enforcement agents. They weren't advocating overthrow of the government. They weren't advocating riots. They weren't advocating anything but economic boycott of white stores and giving money to colored enterprises. White policemen would stand around, and they would look at these people as if to say, "These niggers are dangerous, but what's gonna happen?"
Manchild in the promised land Page 41