Gay rights pioneer Bayard Rustin, mentor to Martin Luther King Jr., came out to fight homophobia
In the battle against racism and homophobia, Bayard Rustin the openly gay, trailblazing civil rights leader who mentored Martin Luther King, Jr. refused to sit at the back of the bus.
Despite his amazing leadership and organizing skills Rustin was the architectural genius of the 1963 March on Washington Rustin was relegated to the shadows by other principals in the Civil Rights Movement because they thought his sexuality was a liability.
INTERSECTIONAL IDENTITY
Rustin, however, believed the struggle against discrimination and prejudice was intersectional and must be fought at the same time.
In a recently released audio interview conducted with the Washington Blade in the mid 1980s, Rustin, who died in 1987, said he decided to publicly come out in the 1940s after refusing to sit at the back of a segregated bus in the South, where Jim Crow laws flourished.
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