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Bayard Rustin

Bayard Rustin Quotes

Activist

Bayard Rustin was a prominent African American civil rights activist who played a significant role in the American civil rights movement. He was a strategist and advisor to many civil rights leaders, including Martin Luther King Jr. Rustin was a key figure in the organization of the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, one of the largest political protests in U.S. history. He was also a leader in the gay rights movement and advocated for nonviolent protest and civil disobedience.

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Famous Bayard Rustin Quotes

“You have to join every other movement for the freedom of people. Therefore join the movement as individuals against anti-Semitism, join the movements for the rights of Hispanics, the rights of women, the rights of gays. In other words, I think that each movement has to stand on its own feet because it has a particular agenda, but it can ask other people.”

People Thinking Asks Individual Rights Feet Movement Particular Gay Agendas Anti Semitism

Author:Bayard Rustin

“If people do not organize in the name of their interest, the world will not take them as being serious. And that is the chief reason that every person who is gay should join some gay organization. Because he must prove to the world that he cares about his own freedom.”

People Ifs World Should Persons Reason Care Names Interest Serious Gay Prove Organization Chiefs Organize

Author:Bayard Rustin

“People will never fight for your freedom if you have not given evidence that you are prepared to fight for it yourself.”

People Ifs Fighting Given Evidence Prepared Your Freedom

Author:Bayard Rustin

“Every gay who is in the closet is ultimately a threat to the freedom of gays. I don't want to seem intolerant to them and I think we have to say that to them with a great deal of affection, but remaining in the closet is the other side of the prejudice against gays. Because until you challenge it, you are not playing an active role in fighting it.”

Thinking Want Seems Fighting Sides Challenges Deals Roles Gay Prejudice Threat Affection Active Closets

Author:Bayard Rustin

“Black gay activists should try to build coalitions of people for the elimination of all injustice.”

People Should Trying Black Gay Injustice Activist Coalitions Elimination

Author:Bayard Rustin

“If we want to do away with the injustice to gays it will not be done because we get rid of the injustice to gays. It will be done because we are forwarding the effort for the elimination of injustice to all. And we will win the rights for gays, or blacks, or Hispanics, or women within the context of whether we are fighting for all.”

Ifs Want Done Fighting Winning Effort Rights Gay Injustice Elimination We Will Win

Author:Bayard Rustin

“If anyone thinks they're going to get anything out of the Reagan administration for any particular group, they're wrong! You have to all combine and fight a head-on battle - in the name of justice and equality - and even that's going to be difficult. But if we let ourselves get separated so that we're working for gays or school children or the aged, we're in trouble.”

Ifs Thinking Children School Fighting Names Difficult Justice Trouble Groups Particular Gay Battle Administration Equality And Justice

Author:Bayard Rustin

“When an individual is protesting society's refusal to acknowledge his dignity as a human being, his very act of protest confers dignity on him.”

Humans Individual Human Beings Society Dignity Human Rights Acknowledge Protest Refusal Disobedience Civil Disobedience Acknowledge You

Author:Bayard Rustin

“To be afraid is to behave as if the truth were not true.”

Author:Bayard Rustin

“My activism did not spring from my being gay, or, for that matter, from my being black. Rather, it is rooted fundamentally in my Quaker upbringing and the values that were instilled in me by my grandparents who reared me.”

Matter Values Black Gay Spring Activism Rooted Grandparent Upbringing Being Gay Quaker

Author:Bayard Rustin

“We need, in every community, a group of angelic troublemakers.”

Needs Peace Community Groups Ubuntu Angelic Troublemaker

Author:Bayard Rustin

“God does not require us to achieve any of the good tasks that humanity must pursue. What God requires of us is that we not stop trying.”

Trying Doe Humanity Peace Achieve Tasks Pursue Ubuntu Stop Trying

Book:Time on Two Crosses: The Collected Writings of Bayard Rustin

Source: Time on Two Crosses: The Collected Writings of Bayard Rustin

“When I say I love Eastland, it sounds preposterous a man who brutalizes people. But you love him or you wouldn't be here. You're going to Mississippi to create social change and you love Eastland in your desire to create conditions which will redeem his children. Loving your enemy is manifest in putting your arms not around the man but around the social situation, to take power from those who misuse it at which point they can become human too.”

People Men Humans Children Desire Social Sound Situation Enemy Conditions He Man Arms Manifest Inspirational Love Social Change Loving You Mississippi Misuse Loving Your Enemies

Author:Bayard Rustin

“The proof that one truly believes is in action.”

Believe Action Proof

Author:Bayard Rustin

“Every indifference to prejudice is suicide because, if I don’t fight all bigotry, bigotry itself will be strengthened and, sooner or later, it will return on me.”

Ifs Fighting Return Prejudice Suicide Indifference Bigotry Sooner Or Later

Author:Bayard Rustin

“The only weapon we have is our bodies, and we need to tuck them in places so wheels don't turn”

Needs Body Turns Weapons Wheels

Author:Bayard Rustin

“Bigotrys birthplace is the sinister back room of the mind where plots and schemes are hatched for the persecution and oppression of other human beings.”

Mind Humans Human Beings Rooms Oppression Plot Schemes Persecution Sinister Birthplace Birth Place

Book:Down the line

Source: Down the line

“My activism did not spring from being black...The racial injustice that was present in this country during my youth was a challenge to my belief in the oneness of the human family.”

Humans Country Belief Black Challenges Youth Spring Injustice Activism Oneness Human Family

Author:Bayard Rustin

“Conscription for war is inconsistent with freedom of conscience, which is not merely the right to believe but to act on the degree of truth that one receives, to follow a vocation which is God-inspired and God-directed.”

Believe War Degrees Conscience Inspired Vocation Inconsistent Conscription God Inspired

Book:I Must Resist: Bayard Rustin's Life in Letters

Source: I Must Resist: Bayard Rustin's Life in Letters

“Twenty-five, 30 years ago, the barometer of human rights in the United States were black people. That is no longer true. The barometer for judging the character of people in regard to human rights is now those who consider themselves gay, homosexual, lesbian.”

People Years Humans States Character Black United United States Five Rights Judging Gay Years Ago Twenties Regard Human Rights Black People Homosexual Twenty Five Barometer

Author:Bayard Rustin

“Let us be enraged about injustice, but let us not be destroyed by it.”

Injustice Destroyed

Author:Bayard Rustin

“If we desire a society without discrimination, then we must not discriminate against anyone in the process of building this society. If we desire a society that is democratic, then democracy must become a means as well as an end.”

Ifs Wells Mean Ends Desire Process Democracy Building Democratic Discrimination This Society Desire To Achieve Democratic Rights

Author:Bayard Rustin

“I believe in social dislocation and creative trouble.”

Believe I Believe Social Creative Trouble I Believe In Dislocation

Author:Bayard Rustin

“We are all one - and if we don't know it, we will learn it the hard way.”

Ifs Knows Way Hard Hard Way

Author:Bayard Rustin

“You have to join every other movement for the freedom of people.”

People Movement

Book:Time on Two Crosses: The Collected Writings of Bayard Rustin

Source: Time on Two Crosses: The Collected Writings of Bayard Rustin

“Gays are beginning to realize what blacks learned long ago: Unless you are out here fighting for yourself then nobody else will help you. I think the gay community has a moral obligation to continue the fight.”

Thinking Long Helping Fighting Realizing Community Moral Gay Obligation Long Ago Moral Obligation Gay Community

Author:Bayard Rustin

“The moral man is he who is opposed to injustice per se, opposed to injustice wherever he finds it; the moral man looks for injustice first of all in himself.”

Men Firsts Looks Moral Injustice Quaker

Author:Bayard Rustin

“The Journey of Reconciliation was organized not only to devise techniques for eliminating Jim Crow in travel, but also as a training ground for similar peaceful projects against discrimination in such major areas as employment and in the armed services.”

Journey Projects Majors Training Areas Technique Discrimination Employment Peaceful Organized Reconciliation Crow Eliminating Jim Crow Armed Services

Book:Time on Two Crosses: The Collected Writings of Bayard Rustin

Source: Time on Two Crosses: The Collected Writings of Bayard Rustin

“Looking back at his career, Mr. Rustin, a Quaker, once wrote: ‘The principal factors which influenced my life are 1) nonviolent tactics; 2) constitutional means; 3) democratic procedures; 4) respect for human personality; 5) a belief that all people are one.’”

People Humans Mean Belief Careers Personality Democratic Factors Principal Looking Back Tactics Procedures Quaker Human Personality

Author:Bayard Rustin

“Both morally and practically, segregation is to me a basic injustice. Since I believe it to be so, I must attempt to remove it. There are three ways in which one can deal with an injustice. (a) One can accept it without protest. (b) On can seek to avoid it. (c) One can resist the injustice non-violently. To accept it is to perpetuate it.”

Way Believe Political Three Politics I Believe Deals Accepting Injustice Remove Protest Segregation Three Ways

Author:Bayard Rustin

“There is a strong moralistic strain in the civil rights movement that would remind us that power corrupts, forgetting that the absence of power also corrupts.”

Strong Forget Rights Movement Absence Civil Rights Strain Civil Rights Movement Power Corrupts

Book:Time on Two Crosses: The Collected Writings of Bayard Rustin

Source: Time on Two Crosses: The Collected Writings of Bayard Rustin

“When you're wrong, you're wrong. But when you're right, you're wrong anyhow.”

Book:Time on Two Crosses: The Collected Writings of Bayard Rustin

Source: Time on Two Crosses: The Collected Writings of Bayard Rustin

About the Author

Born: March 17, 1912
Died: August 24, 1987
Known for: Activist
Quotes: 82

Related Topics

African Americans Blacks Racism Race Civil Rights Gay Ifs Race Relations People Equality

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Books & Sources

Down the Line: The Collected Writings of Bayard RustinRelated source material

Time on Two Crosses: The Collected Writings of Bayard RustinRelated source material

I Must Resist: Bayard Rustin's Life in LettersRelated source material

Down the lineRelated source material

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