Between the hustle-and-bustle of classes and fretting over my comps exams coming up at the end of the month, I haven't had much time nor stomach for watching videos. I did set two (both LGBT-related) aside, however, and I watched them both today. I was happy I set them aside. They're both thought-provoking and uplifting in their own ways, and they both deserve an audience outside of the LGBT community. In lieu of writing a substantive diary (another thing I don't have much of a stomach for and likely won't until December), I thought I'd share them below.
Follow me below the fold for the videos and for some thoughts...
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The first is a video that has been rapidly making its rounds on social media very recently. I'll be honest, I normally skip TED talks, but this one appeared in my Facebook newsfeed so many times that I finally gave in and decided to watch it. Give it a watch, or if you can't, save it for later follow me below the video for the rundown of the important parts.
In the video, LGBT advocate and lesbian Ash Beckham (who was launched to prominence in part because of this talk she gave about reclaiming the word "gay") talks about the closet and her own coming-out experience. She begins with a heartwarming story about her experience as a server at a diner, during which time the short-haired and generally gender-nonconforming Beckham was asked by more than one small child, "Are you a boy or a girl?" After seething in silence many times, she finally decided to have the "hard conversation" with one particular four-year-old girl who posed the question.
I look down, and staring back at me is a four-year-old girl in a pink dress. Not a challenge to a feminist duel, just a kid with a question: "Are you a boy or a girl?" So I take another deep breath, squat down next to her, and say, "Hey, I know it's kind of confusing. My hair is short like a boy's and I wear boys' clothes, but I'm a girl, and you know how sometimes you like to wear a pink dress and sometimes you like to wear your comfy jammies? Well, I'm more of a comfy jammies kind of girl." And this kid looks me dead in the eye without missing a beat and says, "My favorite pajamas are purple with fish, can I get a pancake, please?"
She uses the story as a way to establish the importance of being "real" with others and to break out of one's closet.
Beckham does not limit the importance of coming out to LGBT people. A theme of this particular talk is the universality of coming out. She says:
So like many of us, I've lived in a few closets in my life, and yeah, most often, my walls happen to be rainbow. But inside, in the dark, you can't tell what color the walls are--you just know what it feels like to live in a closet. So really, my closet is no different than yours or yours or yours. Sure, I'll give you a hundred reasons why coming out of my closet was harder than coming out of yours, but here's the thing: Hard is not relative, hard is hard. Who can tell me that explaining to somebody you just declared bankruptcy is harder than telling somebody you just cheated on them? Who can tell me that his coming-out story is harder than telling your five-year-old you're getting a divorce? There is no harder, there is just hard. We need to stop ranking our hard against everyone else's hard to make us feel better or worse about our closets and just commiserate on the fact that we all have hard.
There is a great deal of truth in Beckham's words. I've never been a fan of the Oppression Olympics. Frankly, deciding how where I stand in the matrix of oppression (and/or just the matrix of shitty life situations) is worse or better than where another human being stands is not only impossible, it is pointless. Beckham's points are for everybody to ponder, whatever life situation or circumstance has led you to your particular closet. Her broader argument is that the closet is no place for anybody to live and, in her words, when you keep who you are a secret, you are holding a "grenade."
One of my favorite parts of the talk is when Beckham talks about how, when she finally came out as a lesbian, she attended her sister's wedding shortly after. It was the first time she had been around a crowd of people who all knew that she was a lesbian. When she approached one table, a woman blurted out, "I love Nathan Lane!" and another asked if she had been to the Castro. It then became a battle for "gay relatability," leading one desperate woman to exclaim, "Well, sometimes my husband wears pink shirts!"
I love this part because I've been there, so many times. I remember when I was in the process of coming out, I was an intern at my congresswoman's office. It was a very LGBT-friendly office, as the congresswoman was very LGBT-friendly herself, but I was still scared to let on that I was gay. One staffer, a really wonderful woman who was probably my favorite part of interning in the office, took me home one day since I didn't have a car at the time. She asked what my plans were for the weekend, and because I trusted this person, I finally decided to throw my "grenade." I told her that I planned to hang out with my boyfriend. She paused and then exclaimed, "Oh, you have a boyfriend! You know, my uncle was gay!" I've experienced similar conversations at other moments when I've come out. But Beckham's words really put it into perspective for me. The women battling to relate to her were possibly throwing grenades of their own, going out on a limb they hadn't gone out on before. The talk has made me appreciate, even more than I had before, the straight people in my life who have--sometimes awkwardly, but always with the best of intentions--made a point to be an ally.
The talk winds down as Beckham introduces what she calls "The Three Pancake Girl Principles": Be Authentic, Be Direct, Be Unapologetic. Principles that we would all be better to live by. Many people, of course--I'm thinking of LGBT youths in non-accepting homes and LGBT people who need to stay closeted to keep their job security--can't take advantage of these principles, which the video does not address. In general, however, breaking down the closet door--all closet doors, as Beckham emphasizes--should be something we strive toward.
The second video I'd like to share is also uplifting: Children responding, on camera, to videos depicting gay wedding proposals. It's totally worth watching all fifteen minutes. As you might imagine, you will come away from the video very optimistic for the future. It's Friday--optimism is a good way to end the week.
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November 8, 2013
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From Crashing Vor:
I wish I'd had someone like jayden to talk to my junior high principal.
From your humble diarist:
In Jen Hayden's diary about a 13-year-old boy who was suspended for wearing a handbag to school, bastrop offers some important insight and analysis.
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November 7, 2013
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