“Separation, it seems to me, is the chief sin precisely because violence is automatically the result of separation and ostracism between individuals or groups or nations, and my point was that whenever there is such separation and such automatic violence it is naive to believe that you can deal with…”— Bayard Rustin, blogcitylights.comTagged: Segregation, separation, Violence, Pacifism, jesus
“For example, when we went into the buses of the South, we knew that there would be some violent reactions brought to the surface. Now when we went into that situation, we also had to accept violence unto ourselves’ but unless we were naive, we also knew that the lynch mob at Chapel Hill, which was f…”— Bayard Rustin, blogcitylights.comTagged: The South, Chapel Hill, Lynch Mobs, Negroes, Busing
“Now I tried, secondly, to make it clear that in a sense forcing them into that position did not create violence but rather brought already-existing violence to the surface so that they recognized its existence and were able to deal with it. I pointed out that there are many, many times—and this is a…”— Bayard Rustin, blogcitylights.comTagged: Violence, Pacifism, Nonviolence, Civil Rights Movement, The South
“For example, I have knowingly sat at the table… and in the front of a bus in the South with white people, aware of the fact that when I did so, I was bringing to the surface a fear in them which was in a sense more profound than if I had struck them, and this is in part due to the fact that if I had…”— Bayard Rustin, blogcitylights.comTagged: Segregation, Lunch Counter Protests, Busing, Civil Rights Movement