—Marcus Davis, B1Daily

Khalid Abdul Muhammad was never meant to be comfortable to remember. He did not live to be softened by time, nor to be repackaged into something polite and palatable. He lived — and died — as a challenge. To power. To hypocrisy. To fear. And to the quiet kind of oppression that survives when people choose silence over truth.

To remember Khalid Muhammad is to remember a man who refused to whisper in a world that demanded Black people stay quiet. He spoke with fire because the conditions were burning. He spoke with urgency because Black life, Black dignity, and Black futures were treated as disposable. Whether one agreed with every word he said or not, it was impossible to deny the clarity of his purpose: Black people deserved self-respect, self-determination, and freedom without apology.

In an era when respectability politics were used as a leash, Khalid Muhammad tore it off. He rejected the idea that Black liberation had to be expressed in a tone approved by the same systems that inflicted the harm. His voice carried anger, yes — but it also carried love. Love fierce enough to demand accountability. Love strong enough to name enemies honestly. Love that refused to confuse reconciliation with surrender.

Khalid Muhammad understood something many still struggle to grasp: empowerment begins with truth. You cannot heal what you refuse to name. You cannot build power while pretending injustice is an accident rather than a structure. He forced uncomfortable conversations into the open, not because he thrived on controversy, but because silence had already done enough damage.

His legacy lives not in soundbites or caricatures, but in the countless people who found their spine because he modeled what fearlessness looked like. In young Black men and women who learned that dignity is not something you ask for — it is something you assert. In organizers who realized that liberation work does not require permission from the powerful, only commitment to the people.

Khalid Muhammad was not perfect. He never claimed to be. But movements are not built by perfection — they are built by courage. And courage is what he offered, unapologetically, at a time when too many were willing to trade justice for access.

Today, remembering Khalid Muhammad is an act of resistance in itself. It means refusing to let history be sanitized. It means honoring those who stood unbowed when the cost was high. It means acknowledging that Black empowerment has always required voices willing to absorb the backlash so others could breathe freer.

He reminded us that liberation is not about being liked. It is about being free.

And that truth, like Khalid Muhammad’s voice, still echoes.

—Marcus Davis, B1Daily