1
00:00:00,616 --> 00:00:03,113
I'm McKenna Pope. I'm 14 years old.

2
00:00:03,113 --> 00:00:05,102
And when I was 13, I convinced

3
00:00:05,102 --> 00:00:06,832
one of the largest toy companies,

4
00:00:06,832 --> 00:00:09,235
toymakers, in the world, Hasbro,

5
00:00:09,235 --> 00:00:11,193
to change the way that they marketed

6
00:00:11,193 --> 00:00:13,443
one of their most best-selling products.

7
00:00:13,443 --> 00:00:14,917
So allow me to tell you about it.

8
00:00:14,917 --> 00:00:16,503
So I have a brother, Gavin.

9
00:00:16,503 --> 00:00:19,023
When this whole shebang happened, he was four.

10
00:00:19,023 --> 00:00:20,543
He loved to cook.

11
00:00:20,543 --> 00:00:22,730
He was always getting ingredients out of the fridge

12
00:00:22,730 --> 00:00:24,885
and mixing them into these, needless to say,

13
00:00:24,885 --> 00:00:26,366
uneatable concoctions,

14
00:00:26,366 --> 00:00:29,269
or making invisible macaroni and cheese.

15
00:00:29,269 --> 00:00:32,449
He wanted to be a chef really badly.

16
00:00:32,449 --> 00:00:35,738
And so what better gift for a kid
who wanted to be a chef

17
00:00:35,738 --> 00:00:37,857
than an Easy Bake oven. Right?

18
00:00:37,857 --> 00:00:39,604
I mean, we all had those when we were little.

19
00:00:39,604 --> 00:00:42,053
And he wanted one so badly.

20
00:00:42,053 --> 00:00:44,503
But then he started to realize something.

21
00:00:44,503 --> 00:00:46,864
In the commercials, and on the boxes,

22
00:00:46,864 --> 00:00:48,252
for the Easy Bake ovens,

23
00:00:48,252 --> 00:00:51,524
Hasbro marketed them specifically to girls.

24
00:00:51,524 --> 00:00:52,922
And the way that they did this

25
00:00:52,922 --> 00:00:56,032
was they would only feature girls
on the boxes or in the commercials,

26
00:00:56,032 --> 00:00:58,561
and there would be flowery prints all over the ovens

27
00:00:58,561 --> 00:01:01,467
and it would be in bright pink and purple,

28
00:01:01,467 --> 00:01:04,516
very gender-specific colors to females, right?

29
00:01:04,516 --> 00:01:06,794
So it kind of was sending a message

30
00:01:06,794 --> 00:01:10,062
that only girls are supposed to cook, boys aren't.

31
00:01:10,062 --> 00:01:11,963
And this discouraged my brother a lot.

32
00:01:11,963 --> 00:01:15,124
He thought that he wasn't
supposed to want to be a chef,

33
00:01:15,124 --> 00:01:17,227
because that was something that girls did.

34
00:01:17,227 --> 00:01:18,870
Girls cooked, boys didn't,

35
00:01:18,870 --> 00:01:21,391
or so the message that Hasbro was sending.

36
00:01:21,391 --> 00:01:23,162
And this got me thinking,

37
00:01:23,162 --> 00:01:25,588
God, I wish there was a way that I could change this,

38
00:01:25,588 --> 00:01:28,624
that could I have my voice heard by Hasbro

39
00:01:28,624 --> 00:01:30,110
so I could ask them and tell them

40
00:01:30,110 --> 00:01:31,415
what they were doing wrong

41
00:01:31,415 --> 00:01:33,059
and ask them to change it.

42
00:01:33,059 --> 00:01:34,655
And that got me thinking about a website

43
00:01:34,655 --> 00:01:36,434
that I had learned about a few months prior

44
00:01:36,434 --> 00:01:37,995
called change.org.

45
00:01:37,995 --> 00:01:41,236
Change.org is an online petition-sharing platform

46
00:01:41,236 --> 00:01:43,530
where you can create a petition and share it

47
00:01:43,530 --> 00:01:45,921
across all of these social media networks,

48
00:01:45,921 --> 00:01:47,255
through Facebook, through Twitter,

49
00:01:47,255 --> 00:01:48,748
through YouTube, through Reddit, through Tumblr,

50
00:01:48,748 --> 00:01:50,571
through whatever you could think of.

51
00:01:50,571 --> 00:01:52,506
And so I created a petition

52
00:01:52,506 --> 00:01:55,735
along with the YouTube video
that I added to the petition

53
00:01:55,735 --> 00:01:57,715
basically asking Hasbro

54
00:01:57,715 --> 00:01:59,639
to change the way that they marketed it

55
00:01:59,639 --> 00:02:02,969
and featuring boys in the commercials, on the boxes,

56
00:02:02,969 --> 00:02:05,027
and most of all creating them

57
00:02:05,027 --> 00:02:07,761
in less gender-specific colors.

58
00:02:07,761 --> 00:02:10,867
So this petition started to take off,

59
00:02:10,867 --> 00:02:14,028
like, humongously fast, you have no idea.

60
00:02:14,028 --> 00:02:18,010
I was getting interviewed by
all these national news outlets

61
00:02:18,010 --> 00:02:21,352
and press outlets, and it was amazing.

62
00:02:21,352 --> 00:02:24,108
In three weeks, maybe three and a half,

63
00:02:24,108 --> 00:02:28,901
I had 46,000 signatures on this petition.

64
00:02:28,901 --> 00:02:31,222
(Applause)

65
00:02:31,222 --> 00:02:32,996
Thank you.

66
00:02:32,996 --> 00:02:35,203
So, needless to say, it was crazy.

67
00:02:35,203 --> 00:02:39,840
Eventually, Hasbro themselves
invited me to their headquarters

68
00:02:39,840 --> 00:02:41,500
so they could go and unveil

69
00:02:41,500 --> 00:02:43,779
their new Easy Bake oven product to me,

70
00:02:43,779 --> 00:02:45,773
in black, silver, and blue.

71
00:02:45,773 --> 00:02:48,347
It was literally one of the best moments of my life.

72
00:02:48,347 --> 00:02:50,790
It was like Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.

73
00:02:50,790 --> 00:02:52,614
That thing was amazing.

74
00:02:52,614 --> 00:02:54,253
What I didn't realize at the time, however,

75
00:02:54,253 --> 00:02:56,134
was that I had become an activist.

76
00:02:56,134 --> 00:02:58,000
I could change something that,

77
00:02:58,000 --> 00:03:00,715
even as a kid, or maybe even especially as a kid,

78
00:03:00,715 --> 00:03:03,483
my voice mattered, and your voice matters too.

79
00:03:03,483 --> 00:03:05,407
I want to let you know it's not going to be easy,

80
00:03:05,407 --> 00:03:06,562
and it wasn't easy for me,

81
00:03:06,562 --> 00:03:09,389
because I faced a lot of obstacles.

82
00:03:09,389 --> 00:03:13,012
People online, and sometimes even in real life,

83
00:03:13,012 --> 00:03:16,014
were disrespectful to me and my family,

84
00:03:16,014 --> 00:03:18,694
and talked about how the whole
thing was a waste of time,

85
00:03:18,694 --> 00:03:20,158
and it really discouraged me.

86
00:03:20,158 --> 00:03:21,968
And actually, I have some examples,

87
00:03:21,968 --> 00:03:23,092
because what's better revenge

88
00:03:23,092 --> 00:03:25,501
than displaying their idiocy.

89
00:03:25,501 --> 00:03:27,751
So let's see.

90
00:03:27,751 --> 00:03:30,383
From username liquidsore29

91
00:03:30,383 --> 00:03:32,361
—interesting usernames we have here—

92
00:03:32,361 --> 00:03:37,588
"disgusting liberal moms making their sons gay."

93
00:03:37,588 --> 00:03:40,942
Liquidsore29, really? Really? Okay.

94
00:03:40,942 --> 00:03:44,643
How about from whiteboy77ags:

95
00:03:44,643 --> 00:03:49,070
"people always need something
to [female dog] about."

96
00:03:49,070 --> 00:03:51,130
From jeffreygutierrez:

97
00:03:51,130 --> 00:03:54,375
"omg shut up you just want money and attention."

98
00:03:54,375 --> 00:03:56,571
So it was comments like these

99
00:03:56,571 --> 00:03:59,203
that really discouraged me from
wanting to make change in the future

100
00:03:59,203 --> 00:04:01,260
because I thought people don't care,

101
00:04:01,260 --> 00:04:04,219
people think it's a waste of time,

102
00:04:04,219 --> 00:04:06,987
and people are going to be disrespectful to me

103
00:04:06,987 --> 00:04:08,065
and my family.

104
00:04:08,065 --> 00:04:10,272
It hurt me, and it made me think,

105
00:04:10,272 --> 00:04:12,998
what's the point of making change in the future?

106
00:04:12,998 --> 00:04:15,519
But then I started to realize something.

107
00:04:15,519 --> 00:04:18,173
Haters gonna hate.

108
00:04:18,173 --> 00:04:19,625
Come on, say it with me, one, two, three:

109
00:04:19,625 --> 00:04:22,662
haters gonna hate.

110
00:04:22,662 --> 00:04:24,159
So let your haters hate,

111
00:04:24,159 --> 00:04:25,858
you know what, and make your change,

112
00:04:25,858 --> 00:04:27,669
because I know you can.

113
00:04:27,669 --> 00:04:29,008
I look out into this crowd,

114
00:04:29,008 --> 00:04:31,157
and I see 400 people

115
00:04:31,157 --> 00:04:33,296
who came out because they wanted to know

116
00:04:33,296 --> 00:04:34,532
how they could make a change,

117
00:04:34,532 --> 00:04:36,980
and I know that you can, and all
of you watching at home can too

118
00:04:36,980 --> 00:04:39,730
because you have so much that you can do

119
00:04:39,730 --> 00:04:40,866
and that you believe in,

120
00:04:40,866 --> 00:04:43,702
and you can trade it across all these social media,

121
00:04:43,702 --> 00:04:44,578
through Facebook, through Twitter,

122
00:04:44,578 --> 00:04:46,403
through YouTube, through Reddit, through Tumblr,

123
00:04:46,403 --> 00:04:48,369
through whatever else you can think of.

124
00:04:48,369 --> 00:04:49,886
And you can make that change.

125
00:04:49,886 --> 00:04:51,261
You can take what you believe in

126
00:04:51,261 --> 00:04:53,703
and turn it into a cause and change it.

127
00:04:53,703 --> 00:04:55,772
And that spark that you've been hearing about

128
00:04:55,772 --> 00:04:56,893
all day today,

129
00:04:56,893 --> 00:04:59,177
you can use that spark that you have within you

130
00:04:59,177 --> 00:05:00,881
and turn it into a fire.

131
00:05:00,881 --> 00:05:02,549
Thank you.

132
00:05:02,549 --> 00:05:04,808
(Applause)