It was May 22, 1962. Los Angeles.
A funeral service for Ronald Stokes, a Black Muslim killed by police, turned into something much bigger than a eulogy. Malcolm X stood before a crowd and asked a series of questions that didn't just challenge the law—they challenged the very soul of the person listening. He wasn't talking about policy. He was talking about psychology.
"Who taught you to hate the texture of your hair?" he asked.
He didn't stop there. He kept going, digging into the skin, the shape of the nose, the very essence of identity. When we talk about Malcolm X who taught you to hate yourself, we are talking about a moment where the mirror was turned toward the audience to show them a reflection they hadn't realized was distorted by centuries of colonial messaging.
He was blunt. Honestly, he was kind of terrifying to the establishment because he wasn't asking for a seat at the lunch counter. He was asking why you wanted to sit at a counter where the people serving you made you ashamed of your own face.
The Anatomy of the 1962 Los Angeles Speech
Most people think of Malcolm X as just a "by any means necessary" guy. That’s a caricature. If you actually sit down and listen to the recording of the "Who Taught You to Hate Yourself" speech, you hear a man performing a sort of public exorcism.
He wasn't just yelling. He was deconstructing.
The core of the argument was simple: you cannot be free if you are trapped in a mind that views your own natural state as a defect. He noticed that Black Americans were spending money to change their hair, lighten their skin, and distance themselves from their African roots. To Malcolm, this wasn't just a fashion choice. It was a symptom of a deep, systemic disease.
He asked, "Who taught you to hate yourself from the top of your head to the soles of your feet?"
It’s a long list. He blamed the educational system. He blamed the media. He blamed the church. He basically argued that the entire American infrastructure was designed to produce a person who felt inferior. And if you feel inferior, you don’t need chains to stay in your place. Your own mind does the job for the oppressor.
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Why This Message Still Hits Different Today
You’d think a speech from 1962 would feel like a museum piece. It doesn't.
Look at social media. Look at the filters that narrow noses and lighten skin tones. Look at the billion-dollar industries built on "fixing" features that are perfectly natural for people of color. The conversation surrounding Malcolm X who taught you to hate yourself is still happening in the comments sections of TikTok and Instagram every single day.
We see it in the "Texturism" debates. We see it in the "Colorism" discussions.
Malcolm was an expert at identifying "internalized racism" before that was a buzzword in sociology departments. He understood that the hardest battle isn't against a guy in a white hood; it's against the voice in your head that says you aren't enough because you don't fit a European standard of beauty or intelligence.
He was incredibly observant about how language plays a role in this. Think about the word "black." In the 60s, and honestly even now, black is often synonymous with "evil," "diry," or "void." White is "pure," "clean," and "good." Malcolm pointed out that when you are told from birth that your color represents everything bad, you start to believe it.
It’s a heavy realization.
The Psychological Shift from "Negro" to "Black"
One of the most radical things Malcolm did was change the vocabulary.
He hated the word "Negro." To him, it was a label of a slave, a person with no history before the plantation. By reclaiming the word "Black" and "Afro-American," he was trying to give people a lineage.
He often spoke about the "erasure of history." He argued that if you don't know where you came from, you'll believe whatever anyone tells you about yourself. He wanted people to see themselves as part of a global majority, not a domestic minority.
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That’s a huge distinction.
When you see yourself as a "minority," you feel small. When you see yourself as part of the vast population of Africa, Asia, and Latin America—which is what Malcolm preached during his later years—you feel powerful. This shift was meant to kill the "self-hate" he saw everywhere.
The Controversy of the "Hate" Label
Of course, not everyone liked this.
Critics at the time, and even some historians now, argue that Malcolm was preaching a different kind of hate. They called him a "reverse racist." They said he was teaching Black people to hate white people.
But Malcolm’s response was always the same: you’ve been taught to hate yourself for 400 years, and when I tell you to love yourself, you call it "hate."
It’s a classic gaslighting move, honestly.
He wasn't interested in integration if it meant disappearing into a culture that didn't value him. He was interested in "integrity." He wanted Black people to have their own businesses, their own schools, and their own standards of beauty. He believed that once you stop hating yourself, you don't actually have time to spend hating anyone else—you’re too busy building.
Practical Steps Toward Self-Reclamation
So, what do we actually do with this? If you’re feeling the weight of the Malcolm X who taught you to hate yourself philosophy, it’s not just about reading a history book. It’s about active unlearning.
It starts with an audit of your environment.
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Audit Your Intake
Stop following accounts that make you feel like your natural features are a "problem" to be solved. If your feed is nothing but surgical "perfection" and Eurocentric beauty standards, you are voluntarily subjecting yourself to the very thing Malcolm warned about.
Diversify Your History
Malcolm’s biggest weapon was his library. While in prison, he literally copied the dictionary to improve his vocabulary. He read about the civilizations of Mali, Songhai, and Egypt. He realized that Black history didn't start with a slave ship. If you feel that "self-hate" creeping in, it's usually because your historical perspective is too narrow.
Language Matters
Watch how you talk about yourself. Small jokes about "bad hair" or "being too dark" aren't just jokes. They are echoes of a 1962 speech that is still trying to wake you up. Malcolm would tell you there is no such thing as "bad hair"—only hair that you haven't learned to love yet.
The Collective Power of Identity
Individual self-love is great, but Malcolm was a communal thinker. He believed that self-respect leads to community respect. When you stop hating yourself, you stop competing with your neighbor. You start collaborating.
The real legacy of the "Who Taught You to Hate Yourself" speech isn't a feeling of anger toward others. It is the profound, sometimes painful, responsibility of loving yourself in a world that hasn't quite figured out how to do it for you.
It's a daily practice.
The work is internal.
Next Steps for Unlearning Internalized Bias:
- Identify the Source: When a self-critical thought about your appearance or heritage arises, ask, "Is this my voice, or is this a voice I was taught?"
- Curate Your Media: Actively seek out art, literature, and media that celebrate diverse aesthetics without centering them as "alternative."
- Study the 1962 Speech: Listen to the original audio of Malcolm X’s Los Angeles speech to hear the cadence and the specific questions he poses; it serves as a powerful diagnostic tool for your own subconscious.
- Support Community Infrastructure: Shift focus from individual success to community building, echoing Malcolm’s call for economic and social self-reliance.
- Challenge Language: Remove derogatory or self-deprecating terms related to race from your vocabulary and observe how it shifts your self-perception over time.