Chances are, if you go into any black neighborhood in any American city, you will see well dressed black men selling copies of the Final Call newspaper, along with bean pies (damn good, by the way), along with various perfumes and instances. My Christian grandmother buys one every time she sees “a Muslim”. Go into any black barbershop and you will see copies of this paper scattered around and people discussing what’s in it. Every working class black person, particularly if they’ve been to prison, knows somebody who has joined the Nation of Islam or at least claims to have joined. In essence, this organization which fits all the classical definitions of a religious cult has a larger mass base than Communism among the masses of black people. White Communists notice this and listen to the sometimes hilarious tirades of Minister Louis Farrakhan and approach me asking me what I think of them and Farrakhan. Personally, I’m not a fan of Farrakhan and the Nation of Islam, they’re metaphysicians, anti-Semites, and idealists. Farrakhan considered the death of Malcolm X a “good thing”. What I think doesn’t matter, though, what matters is what the masses of people think of the Nation and its leader, and by and large they don’t care about the pearl clutching and hand-wringing of white America or its Communists. Farrakhan has no power over white people and the fact that white leftists pay so much attention to this man and his organization which is a direct consequence of the brutal oppression that white America has visited upon the New Afrikan people shows that they still don’t have their priorities in order. Instead of taking concrete and effective steps to eradicate the order that gave rise to a NoI and a Farrakhan, they piss and moan and whine endlessly about this or that figure that has a following in the black community. So, why does the Nation of Islam have a mass base?

1.) It speaks to conditions faced by the multitude of black people, albeit in a metaphysical and idealist way. Black people don’t give a shit about Gonzalo or Stalin or Lenin, at least not at this stage. Huey Newton and the Black Panther Party realized this early on, and began organizing in the Black community as Black revolutionaries, first and foremost. People followed the Black Panther Party because they addressed actual contradictions and issues within our communities and successfully tied them into our concrete conditions in a clear and coherent way, understandable to people who had dropped out of high school. If someone can not relate to an experience, they will not embrace it. This is why black people don’t join white Communist organizations in droves or listen to them. Black people booed Bob Avakian off stage in Harlem because they came to see and hear Dr. Cornel West, not Bob Avakian discussing Chinese people they’ve never heard of. To get black people into something, we have to relate it to our actual conditions, and they need to hear about it from someone who looks like them. White people trying to sell us shit has been going on for 400 years, white people using us as pawns for their various opportunisms has been going on for 400 years, and Communism comes off as just another product that is being pushed on our people. Thus, it doesn’t “catch” the attention of our masses. The Nation of Islam’s metaphysical screeds are popular and Farrakhan’s speeches are listened to and well attended because Black people can relate to them and to him. Of course, he’s wrong on many things, but there’s a grain of truth in things that he says that resonates with the masses of black people.

2.) It addresses the demand for self determination, again, in a metaphysical and idealist way. Of course, the US government is not giving any land to the Nation of Islam. But, the Nation still addresses the demand of black people for self-determination, meaning the freedom to decide our own destiny and our own affairs. This is of utmost importance to exploited and colonized people, more than any pipe dream of some multiracial uprising or electoral sweep.

3.) It doesn’t have white people intervening and meddling in its internal affairs and isn’t led by white people. If a black person walks into a room and sees nothing but white people, they’re going to leave. We get enough of white people on our jobs and at school, we don’t want to look at them in our day-to-day life because they’re going to say some stupid shit and nobody is going to expose themselves to that shit.

4.) It does productive work in the community, involves the community in its affairs, and organizes in prisons. Most importantly, it involves people from the community in its affairs, helps resolve disputes. People respect them because they feel that the NOI is a just and fair arbiter of affairs and a benefit to the community, so people engage with their programs, read their propaganda, and study their materials. The Nation of Islam has served as a security force in project housing and run successful drug treatment programs.

5.) It has a stance on international affairs pertaining to black people that is to the left of much of the American left. While the US Left was stumbling and mumbling and bumbling over its own feet on the question of Libya, the Caribbean, and the Middle East, the Nation of Islam was patiently and quietly developing ties and developing branches in countries far and wide. Farrakhan was even offered weapons by Gaddafi to organize a black revolution in the United States. Farrakhan declined. The NoI has a more consistent and palatable stance on international affairs that black people can relate to and doesn’t need 70 pages to explain why the United States should get the fuck out of the rest of the world. Farrakhan is the only person alive today who could get an auditorium full of Black people shouting “God Damn America”.

6.) It promotes discipline. People prefer to join things that are both accessible and disciplined. The Nation of Islam’s security teams don’t need to mask up in public because they have the support and respect of the community and don’t go out doing adventurist shit to post on Facebook. The Black Panther Party was the same. Nobody fucked with them in the community (except the pigs) because they earned their respect through work and a correct political line (not saying the line of the NoI is correct!). The NoI literally takes people who are robbing and killing and give them jobs and get them off drugs. This is very, very important. This is mass work except it’s being done by non-Communists and it has developed for the Nation of Islam a strong mass base. People know they can depend on the Nation for support of some shape or form when things happen to them.

7.) It promotes economic development and self determination of the black community. Black people want black control of their economic affairs. I’m not a supporter of the “buy black businesses for the revolution” line, but the key part of self determination is ownership of businesses in one’s own neighborhood. This is a line that pretty much all working class black people agree on.

Until Communists resolve these issues and stop being so useless and white, people in black barbershops will continue to discuss Farrakhan instead of Communism. Of course, you’ll lambast him as an anti-Semite (he is), a racist, and various other things. Guess what? It hasn’t damaged his reputation among Black people because, by and large, black working class people and lumpen (and black people in general) don’t give a shit what white people or anybody else not black thinks or says. If anything, white people attacking him enhances his prestige and makes people like him more. Black people want jobs, pigs out of our communities, and ultimately the destruction of this country which has enslaved and oppressed us. Quit whining to me about him because you’re jealous that the NOI is occupying what you think should be your mass base. Nobody needs or wants you, to be perfectly frank.