Quotes from African and African-American LGBT folks and heterosexual allies

“We remain a young nation, but in the words of Scripture, the time has come to set aside childish things. The time has come to reaffirm our enduring spirit; to choose our better history; to carry forward that precious gift, that noble idea, passed on from generation to generation: the God-given promise that all are equal, all are free, and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness.”
- Barack Hussein Obama, January 20, 2009

"Cowardice asks, is it safe? Expediency asks, is it politic? Vanity asks, is it popular? But conscience asks, is it right? There comes a time when one must take the position that is neither safe nor politic nor popular, but he must do it because conscience tells him, it is right."
~ Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

"I have the audacity to believe that peoples everywhere can have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for their minds, and dignity, equality and freedom for their spirits."
~ Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

"So the question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate or for love? Will we be extremist for the preservation of injustice or for the extension of justice?"
~ Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Letter from a Birmingham Jail - 1963

"We have a lot more work to do in our common struggle against bigotry and discrimination. I say ‘common struggle’ because I believe very strongly that all forms of bigotry and discrimination are equally wrong and should be opposed by right-thinking Americans everywhere. Freedom from discrimination based on sexual orientation is surely a fundamental human right in any great democracy, as much as freedom from racial, religious, gender, or ethnic discrimination."
~ Coretta Scott King

"I still hear people say that I should not be talking about the rights of lesbian and gay people, and I should stick to the issue of racial justice. But I hasten to remind them that Martin Luther King Jr. said 'Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.' I appeal to everyone who believes in Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream to make room at the table of brother- and sisterhood for lesbian and gay people. Homophobia is like racism and anti-Semitism and other forms of bigotry in that it seeks to dehumanize a large group of people, to deny their humanity, their dignity and personhood. This sets the stage for further repression and violence, that spreads all too easily to victimize the next minority group. Gays and lesbians stood up for civil rights in Montgomery, Selma, in Albany, Georgia, and St. Augustine, Florida, and many other campaigns of the civil rights movement. Many of these courageous men and women were fighting for my freedom at a time when they could find few voices for their own, and I salute their contributions."
- Coretta Scott King, in 1999 at the 25th Anniversary luncheon for the Lambda Legal Defense Fund

"Homophobia is hate, and hate has no place in the beloved community."
~ Martin Luther King III, in August 2003 at the 40th anniversary of the 1963 March on Washington

"Some say let's choose another route and give Gay folks some legal rights but call it something other than marriage. We have been down that road before in this country. Separate is not equal. The rights to liberty and happiness belong to each of us and on the same terms, without regard to either skin color or sexual orientation."
- U.S. Congressman John Lewis, D-Georgia, who was a close associate of Martin Luther King

"Something is happening to the very soul of America. It's more than same-sex marriage. It's more than whether you're gay or straight, black or white. It's about where we are going as a nation. I say this from my heart and gut, as someone who was beaten and arrested on the freedom rides. We've got some real fights ahead of us. But America is ready. So stand up tall and straight. Hold your head high. And do the work. Because we're not gonna go away."
- U.S. Congressman John Lewis, D-Georgia

"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, who organized the 1964 March on Washington at which Dr. King made his “I Have a Dream” speech, in the book Strategies for Freedom, p. 42

"People...do not believe there can be tears between men. They think we are only playing at a game and that we do it to shock them."
- author and activist, James Baldwin, who was African-American and gay

"People should not be discriminated against in the exercise of their civil rights, and the right to marry who you want to marry is one of those rights ... Interracial marriage was regarded with much the same hysteria years ago as gay marriage is today."
- U.S. Ambassador Carol Mosely Braun, who, as far as we know, is heterosexual

"It is not the style of clothes one wears, neither the kind of automobile one drives, nor the amount of money one has in the bank, that counts. These mean nothing. It is simply service that measures success."
- inventor, scientist and educator, George Washington Carver, who was African-American and gay

"Good parents are good parents - regardless of their sexual orientation. It's clear that the sexual orientation of parents has nothing to do with the sexual orientation of their children."
- Former U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Joycelyn Elders, who, as far as we know, is heterosexual

"A family doesn't have to be a man, woman and children. A family can be two men or two women and children. A family can be nearly anything you want it to be as long as it is full of genuine love, respect and care."
- Clarence J. Fluker, who is a staff person at National Youth Advocacy Coalition, Next Generation Editor for Arise magazine, and sits on the Board of Directors for DC Black Lesbian & Gay Pride, the largest annual Black pride festival in the world.

"Silence kills the soul, it diminishes its possibility to rise and fly and explore. Silence withers what makes you human. The soul shrinks, until it's nothing."
- documentary filmmaker, Marlon Riggs, who was an African-American man and who died from complications of AIDS in 1994

"I think that gay rights is a human rights issue like the rights of anyone else. I have said throughout my career, less known this campaign, that unless people are prepared to say that gay and lesbian people are not human -- and I don't know anyone in their right mind that would say that -- then why are they not afforded the same rights as any other human being?"
- former U.S. presidential candidate, Rev. Al Sharpton

"To discriminate against our sisters and brothers who are lesbian or gay on grounds of their sexual orientation for me is as totally unacceptable and unjust as Apartheid ever was."
- Archbishop Desmond Tutu, from a sermon delivered February 2004. Read the text of the sermon at http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/12039.htm

"We have inflicted on gay and lesbian people the tremendous pain of having to live a lie or to face brutal rejection if they dared to reveal their true selves. But oppression cuts both ways. Behind our ‘safe’ barriers of self-righteousness, we deprive ourselves of the rich giftedness that lesbian and gay people have to contribute ..."
- Archbishop Desmond Tutu