Top Bayard Rustin Quotes - Quotesmemo.com

Bayard Rustin Biography

Bayard Rustin (/ˈbaɪərd/; March 17, 1912 – August 24, 1987) was an American leader in social movements for civil rights, socialism, nonviolence, and gay rights.

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Bayard Rustin Quotes

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

Anyhow, Racism, Right, Wrong

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

Fighting, People, Given, Prepared, Freedom

I believe there are certain types of movements which cannot be married.

Believe, Movement, Married, Types, Certain

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.

Community, Fighting, Gay, Nobody, Thinking

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.

Children, Conditions, Inspirational Love, Men, Mississippi

If we desire a society in which men are brothers, then we must act towards one another with brotherhood. If we can build such a society, then we would have achieved the ultimate goal of human freedom.

Act, Brother, Brotherhood, Build, Goal, Men

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.

Fighting, Freedom, Gay, Gays, Think, Thinking

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.

Fighting, Prejudice, Return, Sooner, Suicide

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.

Character, Gay, Rights, States, Judging

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.

Acknowledge, Acknowledge You, Confers, Dignity, Society

The organizers and perpetuators of segregation are as much the enemy of America as any foreign invader.

America, Enemy, Foreign, Organizers, Perpetuators, Segregation

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.

Building, Democracy, Democratic, Desire, Mean

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.

Crow, Employment, Journey, Peaceful, Services

If I do not fight bigotry wherever it is, bigotry is thereby strengthened. And to the degree that it is strengthened, it will, thereby, have the power to turn on me.

Degrees, Fighting, Strengthened, Turn, Turns, Wherever

Today, blacks are no longer the litmus paper or the barometer of social change. Blacks are in every segment of society and there are laws that help to protect them from racial discrimination. The new ‘niggers’ are gays. It is in this sense that gay people are the new barometer for social change. The question of social change should be framed with the most vulnerable group in mind: gay people.

Blacks, Discrimination, Gay, Law, Mind, People

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.

Cares, Gay, Names, Organization, People, Serious

Since Israel is a democratic state surrounded by essentially undemocratic states which have sworn her destruction, those interested in democracy everywhere must support Israel's existence.

Israel, Support, Democracy, State, Everywhere, Sworn

I am a Quaker. And as everyone knows, Quakers, for 300 years, have, on conscientious ground, been against participating in war. I was sentenced to three years in federal prison because I could not religiously and conscientiously accept killing my fellow man.

Conscientious, Man, Men, Sentenced, War, Years

The real radical is that person who has a vision of equality and is willing to do those things that will bring reality closer to that vision. . .

Equality, Radical, Real, Things, Vision

Surely, I must at all times attempt to obey the law of the state. But when the will of God and the will of the state conflict, I am compelled to follow the will of God.

Attempt, Conflict, Follow, God, Law, States

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