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This summer I was back
in Ohio for a family wedding,
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and when I was there,
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there was a meet and greet
with Anna and Elsa from Frozen.
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Not the Anna and Elsa from Frozen,
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as this was not a Disney-sanctioned event.
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These two entrepreneurs had
a business of running princess parties.
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Your kid is turning five?
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They'll come sing some songs,
sprinkle some fairy dust, it's great.
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And they were not about
to miss out on the opportunity
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that was the phenomenon
and that was Frozen.
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So get hired by a local toy store,
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kids come in on the Saturday morning
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buy some Disney swag,
get the picture taken with the princesses,
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call it a day.
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It's like Santa Claus
without the seasonal restrictions.
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(Laughter)
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And my three-and-a-half-year-old niece
Samantha was in the thick of it.
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She could care less that these two women
were signing posters and coloring books
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as Snow Queen and Princess Ana
with one 'n' to avoid copyright lawsuits.
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(Laughter)
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According to my niece and the 200 plus
kids in the parking lot that day,
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this was the Anna and Elsa from Frozen.
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It is a blazing-hot Saturday morning,
in August, in Ohio.
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We get there at 10 o' clock,
the scheduled start time,
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and we are handed number 59.
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By 11 o' clock they had called
numbers 21 through 25;
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this was going to be a while,
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and there is no amount
of free face painting or temporary tattoos
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that could prevent the meltdowns
that were occurring outside of the store.
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(Laughter)
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So, by 12.30 we get called,
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"56 to 63, please."
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And as we walk in, it is a scene
I can only describe you
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as saying it looked like Norway threw-up.
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(Laughter)
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There were cardboard
cut-out-snowflakes covering the floor,
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glitter on every flat surface,
and icicles all over the walls.
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And as we stood in line
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in an attempt to get
my niece a better vantage point
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than the backside
of the mother of number 58,
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I put her up on my shoulders,
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and she was instantly riveted
by the sight of the princesses.
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And as we moved forward,
her excitement only grew,
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and as we finally got
to the front of the line,
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and number 58 unfurled her poster
to be signed by the princesses,
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I could literally feel the excitement
running through her body.
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And let's be honest,
at that point, I was pretty excited too.
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(Laughter)
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I mean, the Scandinavian decadence
was mesmerizing.
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(Laughter)
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So we get to the front of the line,
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and the haggard clerk
turns to my niece and says:
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"Hi honey, you're next!
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Do you want to get down,
or you're going to stay
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on your dad's shoulders for the picture?'
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(Laughter)
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And I was, for a lack
of a better word, frozen.
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(Laughter)
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It's amazing that in an unexpected instant
we are faced with the question,
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Who am I?
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Am I an aunt? Or am I an advocate?
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Millions of people have seen my video
about how to have a hard conversation,
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and there one was, right in front of me.
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At the same time,
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there's nothing more important
to me than the kids in my life
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so I found myself in a situation
that we so often find ourselves in,
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torn between two things,
two impossible choices:
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Would I be an advocate?
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Would I take my niece off my shoulders
and turn to the clerk and explain to her
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that I was in fact
her aunt, not her father,
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and that she should be more careful
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not to jump to gender conclusions
based on haircuts and shoulder rides
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(Laughter)
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and while doing that,
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miss out on what was, to this point,
the greatest moment of my niece's life.
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Or would I be an aunt?
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Would I brush off that comment,
take a million pictures,
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and not be distracted for an instant
from the pure joy of that moment,
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and by doing that,
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walk out with the shame that comes up
from not standing up for myself,
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especially in front of my niece.
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Who was I?
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Which one was more important?
Which role was more worth it?
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Was I an aunt? Or was I an advocate?
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And I had a split second to decide.
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We are taught right now
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that we are living in a world
of constant and increasing polarity.
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It's so black and white,
so us and them, so right and wrong,
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there is no middle,
there is no gray; just polarity.
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Polarity is a state in which
two ideas or opinions
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are completely opposite from each other;
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a diametrical opposition.
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Which side are you on?
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Are you unequivocally and without question
anti war, pro-choice, anti death penalty,
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pro-gun regulation, proponent
of open borders, and pro-union?
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Or, are you absolutely
and uncompromisingly
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pro-war, pro-life, pro-death penalty,
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a believer that the Second
Amendment is absolute,
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anti immigrant and pro-business?
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It's all or none, you're with us
or against us.
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That is polarity.
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The problem with polarity
and absolutes is that
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it eliminates the individuality
of our human experience
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and that makes it contradictory
to our human nature.
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But if we are pulled
in these two directions,
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but it's not really where we exist,
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- polarity is not our actual reality -
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where do we go from there?
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What's at the other end of that spectrum?
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And I don't think it's an
unattainable harmonious utopia,
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I think the opposite
of polarity is duality.
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Duality is a state of having two parts,
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but not in diametrical opposition:
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in simultaneous existence.
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Don't you think it's possible?
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Here are the people I know:
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I know Catholics who are pro-choice,
and feminists who wear hijabs,
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and veterans who are anti-war,
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and NRA members who think
I should be able to get married.
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Those are the people I know,
those are my friends and family,
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that is the majority of our society,
that is you, that is me.
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(Applause)
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Duality is the ability
to hold both things.
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But the question is:
Can we own our duality?
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Can we have the courage
to hold both things?
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I work at a restaurant in town,
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I became really good friends
with the busser.
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I was a server and we had
a great relationship,
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we had a really great time together.
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Her Spanish was great
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because she was from Mexico.
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(Laughter)
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That line actually went the other way.
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Her English was limited,
but significantly better than my Spanish.
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But we were united by our similarities,
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not separated by our differences.
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And we were close, even though
we came from very different worlds.
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She was from Mexico,
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she left her family behind
so she could come here
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and afford them a better life back home.
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She was a devout conservative catholic,
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a believer in traditional family values,
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stereotypical roles of men and women,
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and I was, well, me.
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(Laughter)
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But the things that bonded us
were when she asked about my girlfriend,
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or she shared pictures that she had
from her family back home.
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Those were the things
that brought us together.
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So one day, we were in the back,
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scarfing down food as quick as we could,
gathered around a small table,
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during a very rare lull,
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and a new guy from the kitchen came over
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- who happened to be her cousin -
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and sat down with all
the bravado and machismo
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that his 21-year-old body could hold.
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(Laughter)
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and said to her,
(Spanish) "Does Ash have a boyfriend?"
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And she said,
(Spanish) "No, she has a girlfriend."
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And he said,
(Spanish) "A girlfriend??"
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And she set down her fork,
and locked eyes with him,
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and said: (Spanish) "Yes,
a girlfriend, and that is all."
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And his smugged smile quickly dropped
to one of maternal respect,
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grabbed his plate, walked off,
went back to work.
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She never made eye contact with me.
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She left, did the same thing
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- it was a 10 second conversation,
such a short interaction.
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And on paper, she had
so much more in common with him:
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language, culture, history, family,
her community was her lifeline here,
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but her moral compass trumped all of that.
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And a little bit later, they were joking
around in the kitchen, in Spanish,
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that had nothing to do with me,
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and that is duality.
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She didn't have to choose
some [politically correct] stance
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on gayness over her heritage.
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She didn't have to choose
her family over our friendship.
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It wasn't Jesus or Ash.
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(Laughter)
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(Applause)
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Her individual morality
was so strongly rooted
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that she had the courage
to hold both things.
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Our moral integrity is our responsibility
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and we must be prepared to defend it
even when it's not convenient.
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That's what it means to be an ally,
and if you're going to be an ally,
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you have to be an active ally:
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ask questions, act when you hear
something inappropriate,
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actually engage.
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I had a family friend who for years
used to call my girlfriend "my lover".
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Really? Lover?
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So overly sexual,
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so '70s gay porn.
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(Laughter)
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But she was trying, and she asked.
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She could have called her my friend,
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or my "friend", or my "special friend"
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(Laughter)
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or even worse, just not asked at all.
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Believe me, we would rather have you ask.
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I would rather have her say "lover",
than say nothing at all.
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People often say to me:
"Well, Ash I don't care,
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I don't see race,
or religion, or sexuality.
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It doesn't matter to me. I don't see it."
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But I think the opposite of homophobia,
and racism, and xenophobia is not love,
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it's apathy.
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If you don't see my gayness,
then you don't see me.
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If it doesn't matter to you
who I sleep with,
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then you cannot imagine what it feels like
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when I walk down the street,
late at night, holding her hand,
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and approach a group of people
and have to make the decision
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if I should hang on to it,
or I should I drop it
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when all I want to do
is squeeze it tighter.
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And the small victory I feel
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when I make it by,
and don't have to let go.
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And the incredible cowardice
and disappointment I feel when I drop it.
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If you do not see that struggle
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that is unique to my human experience
because I am gay, then you don't see me.
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If you are going to be an ally,
I need you to see me.
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As individuals, as allies, as humans,
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we need to be able to hold both things:
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both the good and the bad,
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the easy and the hard.
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You don't learn how to hold
two things just from the fluff,
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you learn it from the grit.
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And what if duality
is just the first step?
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What if through compassion,
and empathy, and human interaction
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we are able to learn to hold two things?
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And if we can hold
two things, we can hold four,
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and if we can hold four,
we can hold eight,
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and if we can hold eight,
we can hold hundreds.
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We are complex individuals,
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swirls of contradiction.
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You are all holding
so many things right now.
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What can you do to hold just a few more?
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So, back to Toledo, Ohio:
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I'm at the front of the line,
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niece on my shoulders,
the frazzled clerk calls me dad.
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Have you ever been mistaken
for the wrong gender?
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Not even that.
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Have you ever been called
something you are not?
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Here's what it feels like for me:
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I am instantly an internal storm
of contrasting emotions.
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I break out onto a sweat that is
a combination of rage and humiliation,
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I feel like the entire store
is staring at me,
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and I simultaneously feel invisible.
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I want to explode in a tirade of fury,
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and I want to crawl under a rock.
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And top all of that off
with the frustration that I'm wearing
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an out-of-characteristic,
tight-fitting, purple T-shirt,
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so this whole store can see my boobs,
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to make sure this exact
same thing doesn't happen.
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(Laughter)
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But, despite my best efforts
to be seen as the gender I am,
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it still happens.
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And I hope with every ounce
of my body that no one heard:
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not my sister, not my girlfriend,
and certainly not my niece.
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I am accustomed to this familiar hurt,
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but I would do whatever I need to do
to protect the people I love from it.
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But then I take my niece off my shoulders,
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and she runs to Elsa and Anna
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- the thing she's been
waiting so long for -
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and all that stuff goes away.
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All that matters is the smile on her face.
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And as the 30 seconds we waited
two-and-a-half hours for comes to a close
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we gather up our things,
and I lock eyes with the clerk again;
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and she gives me
an apologetic smile and mouths,
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(She mimes) I am so sorry!
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(Laughter)
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And her humanity, her willingness to admit
her mistake disarms me immediately,
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then I give her a: "It's OK,
it happens. But, thanks."
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And I realize in that moment
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that I don't have to be
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either an aunt
or an advocate, I can be both.
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I can live in duality,
and I can hold two things.
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And if I can hold two things
in that environment,
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I can hold so many more things.
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As my girlfriend and my niece hold hands
and skip out at the front of the door,
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I turn to my sister and say,
"Was it worth it?"
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And she said: "Are you kidding me?
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Did you see the look on her face?
This was the greatest day of her life!"
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(Laughter)
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It was worth the two
and a half hours in the heat,
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it was worth the overpriced coloring book
that we already had a copy of,
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(Laughter)
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it was even worth you
getting called "Dad".
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(Laughter)
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And for the first time ever
in my life, it actually was.
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Thank you Boulder, have a good night.
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(Applause)