A man who stands for nothing will fall for anything.
Malcolm XRead
If you stick a knife nine inches into my back and pull it out three inches, that is not progress.
Interpretation
True progress requires more than just partial recovery from harm.
This quote from Malcolm X emphasizes that superficial actions or partial solutions do not equate to real progress or healing. It suggests that if a significant harm or injustice has been inflicted, attempting to address it partially only serves to highlight the extent of the original injury, rather than leading to genuine improvement or resolution.
In practice
In a speech addressing the need for systemic change in society.
A man who stands for nothing will fall for anything.
I have more respect for a man who lets me know where he stands, even if he's wrong, than the one who comes up like an angel and is nothing but a devil.
When you want a nation, that's called nationalism... Black nationalism. A revolutionary is a Black nationalist. He wants a nation.
So over you is the greatest enemy a man can have β and that is fear. I know some of you are afraid to listen to the truth β you have been raised on fear and lies. But I am going to preach to you the truth until you are free of that fear...
Usually when people are sad, they don't do anything. They just cry over their condition. But when they get angry, they bring about a change.
Time is on the side of the oppressed today, it's against the oppressor. Truth is on the side of the oppressed today, it's against the oppressor. You don't need anything else.
Let us not envy some men their accumulated riches; their burden would be too heavy for us; we could not sacrifice, as they do, health, quiet, honor and conscience, to obtain them: It is to pay so dear from them that the bargain is a loss.
Bad company is like a nail driven into a post, which, after the first and second blow, may be drawn out with little difficulty; but being once driven up to the head, the pincers cannot take hold to draw it out, but which can only be done by the destruction of the wood.
Oh, a very useful philosophical animal, your average tortoise. Outrunning metaphorical arrows, beating hares in races... very handy.
Capitalism was the only system in history where wealth was not acquired by looting, but by production, not by force, but by trade, the only system that stood for man's right to his own mind, to his work, to his life, to his happiness, to himself.
Good Morning!β said Bilbo, and he meant it. The sun was shining, and the grass was very green. But Gandalf looked at him from under long bushy eyebrows that stuck out further than the brim of his shady hat. βWhat do you mean?β he said. βDo you wish me a good morning, or mean that it is a good morning whether I want it or not; or that you feel good this morning; or that it is a morning to be good on?
It is the hallmark of any deep truth that its negation is also a deep truth.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.