Malcolm X’s daughter speaks in Modesto: His stance on violence was misunderstood
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Ilyasha Shabazz said her father preached self-defense, not violence.
- Shabazz linked civil rights and farm worker movements; noted antiwar ties.
- Event presented MLK Legacy Award to Odessa Johnson for pioneering leadership.
Ilyasah Shabazz was 2 years old when her father, Malcolm X, was slain in New York City in 1965.
She spoke Saturday night at Modesto Junior College about his quest for equality for Black people. And she said he has been wrongly portrayed as favoring violent means toward that goal.
The occasion was the 32nd annual Martin Luther King Jr. Commemoration, sponsored by the Modesto Peace/Life Center. It takes place each year a few weeks after King’s Jan. 15 birthday.
These events usually emphasize King’s belief in nonviolent resistance to racism. Activists heeded his advice as they marched for voting rights and used white-only bus seats, lunch counters and restrooms.
Malcolm X’s critics seized on a 1964 interview where he vows to seek justice “by any means necessary.” His daughter said those words were taken out of context.
“My father preached self-assurance, self-determination and, only if necessary, self-defense,” Shabazz said.
Malcolm X was born Malcolm Little in Omaha in 1927 and later took the Muslim name of el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz. The “X” signified the rejection of a surname imposed during slavery.
Ilyasah Shabazz is a New York-based professor who writes and speaks about her father’s legacy and about empowering today’s women and youth.
She helps run the Shabazz Center in the same Manhattan auditorium where Malcolm X was fatally shot. It happened in the presence of his pregnant wife, Betty Shabazz, and the couple’s six children. Three members of the Nation of Islam were convicted in the killing.
Modesto educator Odessa Johnson honored
Also Saturday, the hosts presented the annual MLK Legacy Award to Odessa Johnson. In 1962, she became the first Black teacher at Modesto High School. She went on to be a dean at MJC and a board member for Modesto City Schools and the University of California. She juggled all three roles for a few years.
Johnson’s health did not allow her to attend Saturday. She watched the presentation online from the Los Angeles home of daughter Sylvia.
Johnson attended all-Black schools in her native Greenville, South Carolina. She went on to get a bachelor’s degree at Tennessee State University and master’s at Columbia University in New York. She specialized in business education.
Shabazz, born the year Johnson arrived in Modesto, 1962, joined in the praise: “With her courage, self-assurance and determination, she said, ‘I belong here.’’’
Shabazz also noted how the Peace/Life Center was founded in 1970 by residents opposed to the Vietnam War. She said King had joined that cause in 1967, a year before his assassination in Memphis.
She also cited Stockton native Dolores Huerta’s work on behalf of farm laborers around the same time. “The farmworker movement and the Civil Rights Movement were never separate stories,” she said. “They were the same stories, told in different fields.”
MJC student president speaks on Malcolm X
Saturday’s program took place in the auditorium on MJC’s East Campus. Earlier in the day, Shabazz met with several students. One of them was student body President Celeste Randolph, who spoke to the evening audience.
“Dr. Shabazz has really tried to enlighten the humanity of Malcolm X, who he was as a person, what he actually stands for, and the actual narrative of it,” she said.
Randolph is an ethnic studies major. So was the emcee for the evening, Superior Court Judge Ruben Villalobos. He recalled taking a UC Berkeley class that combined the teachings of King and Malcolm X.
Shabazz is an adjunct professor of criminal justice at John Jay College in New York. She has written several books about her parents, some of them for young readers. She also has been involved in film projects on the topic.
Shabazz said Saturday that her father was a man of deep faith who loved poetry and jazz. She is pictured as a baby in his arms on the cover of “Growing Up X,” her own memoir.
Shabazz also played the grainy TV interview where Malcolm X talks of racial justice “by any means necessary.” They are four words in a long sentence:
“Any human being anywhere is well within his rights to do whatever is necessary, by any means necessary, to protect his life and property, especially in a country where the federal government itself has proven it is either unable or unwilling to protect the lives and property of those human beings.”
This story was originally published February 9, 2026 at 12:33 PM.
