As one of the
most prolific leaders in the civil rights movement, Rustin was
silenced, threatened, arrested, beaten, imprisoned, and removed from
important leadership positions, mostly because he was an openly gay
man in a fiercely homophobic era. Rustin
was an object of suspicion to some leaders of the civil rights
movement. Rivals and adversaries capitalized on
the stigma and shame attached to homosexuality, making Rustin and
fellow leaders vulnerable to attack. A rival black leader of
King’s, Adam Clayton Powell, the minister-congressman from Harlem,
threatened to float a lie that King was one of Rustin’s lovers if
King didn’t exile him from his inner circle. For the sake of the
movement, Rustin offered King his resignation, and in a panic, King
accepted it and reluctantly pushed him away. During the beginning
stages of strategizing the march on Washington, according to
Congressmen John Lewis, “While some felt that there was nobody
better then Rustin to lead the march on Washington, Roy Wilkins, as
head of the NAACP felt that because Rustin was gay, he couldn’t be
the person because it was embarrassing to the march, and it was
embarrassing to the movement. The March on Washington for Jobs and
Freedom, took place in Washington, D.C., on August 28, 1963.
Attended by some 250,000 people, it was the largest demonstration
ever seen in the nation's capital, and one of the first to have
extensive television coverage.
“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.”
― Bayard
Rustin
I try to respect a persons right to
have their own opinions about homosexuality, however I am often
baffled and upset (sometimes bitter) when I think about how Rustin
was so demonized, and viewed as such a symbol of shame to some
members of the very communities he fought for. Rustin was such a
huge part of the mind, heart and soul of the civil rights movement,
yet there were masses of people who just couldn’t get past the
threat of what his sexuality represented to them. If you were to
transport the person I had been eight years ago to the year of 1963,
regardless of Rustin’s advocacy for the gay community, the shame I
had over my sexuality may have made me one of the very people to
demonize him. I believe Rustin’s story is a powerful example of
how shame can impact our relationship to even the best of humanity,
but ultimately with ourselves. We must try to understand how and why
we can turn against even the angelic messengers within our lives.
Amazingly and ironically, Rustin was never ashamed of his sexuality,
and was openly gay during a time when the majority of people were
not. I truly admire and respect Mr. Bayard Rustin, and believe he is
a testimony of great resilience, brilliance and courage.
Shame is a soul eating emotion. –
Carl Jung
Most people are unaware of how shame
affects their personal lives, and is such a major driving force
throughout societies around the globe. While Mr. Bayard Rustin’s
story is a very powerful and poignant example of how shame has played
out in our society, shame plays out in all sorts of shapes and sizes:
Feeling ashamed within and outside of ones own community over the
darkness of their skin tone; parents disowning their gay child out of
the fear of being ostracized within their own community; the shame
and hiding from when someone is trying to cover up how they are not a
part of the “perfect family”; the shame a child carries into
adulthood from having always been told that they are stupid and
worthless; the shame and self-blame of victims of sexual abuse.
Alyson Stack, a M.S. Marriage Family Therapist and Registered Intern,
whose practice largely serves patients with
food and body image issues, as well as addictive and compulsive
behaviors, said “The shame created by engaging in eating
disorder behavior is analogous to parasitic toxicity- it continues to
eat you away.” Her words are applicable to all forms of shame. I
firmly believe that there is nothing positive or productive about
shame, especially for the people who have committed the most heinous
of acts, because it keeps them stuck in old behaviors and unable to
transcend their darkness. I think it is helpful to isolate shame as
a single entity, and understand how its many different forms stem
from the same beast.
In the book,
Psychology of Shame: Theory and
Treatment of Shame-Based Syndromes,
Gershen Kaufman, a contemporary scholar on shame, goes over the
splitting of the self that can occur with shame. Professor Kaufman,
who works in the Counseling Center and Psychology Department at
Michigan State University, said “Contempt turned against the self
is the principle means by which splitting occurs. Splitting is
actively maintained by negative identity scripts that have become so
magnified that autonomous partial selves split off and then coexist
within the same individual.” Kaufman’s words about the
“splitting of the self” definitely spoke to my own journey
towards wholeness. I have learned that it is incredibly important to
understand the various ways of how shame is oppressive and socially
constructed. Through gaining awareness about the roots of shame,
someone can step back and not personalize their shame as much.
The world would be an incredibly
different place without shame being so imbedded within most
societies. We must give ourselves the permission to stop beating up
ourselves and “others,” literally and figuratively, so that we
may live in a more loving and peaceful world.
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