Rustin and prison counselor Key Hansen expose how white liberals and the media distorted Eldridge Cleaver into a militant caricature, obscuring his real threat to the state: his capacity to inspire organized resistance within a brutal prison system.
Integration or Separation: Bayard Rustin Debates Malcolm X at the Community Church of New York
In this electrifying 1962 debate, Rustin championed integration and coalition-based nonviolence, while Malcolm X advanced a vision of Black separation and self-determination outside a hypocritical white society. The encounter distilled two competing strategies for identity, power, and survival in America.
