Return to Video

Coming out of your closet: Ash Beckham at TEDxBoulder

  • Not Synced
    I am going to talk to you tonight
  • Not Synced
    about coming out of the closet.
  • Not Synced
    and not in the traditional sense,
  • Not Synced
    not just the "gay" closet.
  • Not Synced
    I think we all have closets
  • Not Synced
    your closet may be telling someone
  • Not Synced
    you love her for the first time.
  • Not Synced
    Or telling someone you're pregnant.
  • Not Synced
    Or telling someone you have cancer.
  • Not Synced
    Or any of the other hard conversations we have
  • Not Synced
    throughout our lives.
  • Not Synced
    All the closet is, is a hard conversation.
  • Not Synced
    And although our topics may vary tremendously,
  • Not Synced
    the experience of being in and coming out of the closet
  • Not Synced
    is universal.
  • Not Synced
    It is scary, and we hate it,
  • Not Synced
    and it needs to be done.
  • Not Synced
    Several years ago, I was working at the Southside Walnut Café,
  • Not Synced
    a local diner in town,
  • Not Synced
    and during my time there,
  • Not Synced
    I would go through phases of militant, lesbian, intensity.
  • Not Synced
    Not shaving my armpits,
  • Not Synced
    quoting Ani DiFranco lyrics as gospel
  • Not Synced
    and depending on the bagginess of my cargo shorts,
  • Not Synced
    and how recently i'd shaved my head,
  • Not Synced
    the question was often sprung on me
  • Not Synced
    usually by a little kid:
  • Not Synced
    "Mmmm, are you a boy, or are you a girl?"
  • Not Synced
    And there would be an awkward silence at the table,
  • Not Synced
    I'd clench my jaw a little tighter,
  • Not Synced
    hold my coffee pot with a little more vengeance,
  • Not Synced
    the Dad would awkwardly shuffle his newspaper,
  • Not Synced
    and the Mom would shoot a chilling stare at her kid.
  • Not Synced
    But I would say nothing,
  • Not Synced
    and I would seethe inside.
  • Not Synced
    And it got to the point that everytime
  • Not Synced
    I walked up to a table that had a kid
  • Not Synced
    anywhere between 3 and 10 years old,
  • Not Synced
    I was ready to fight.
  • Not Synced
    And that is a terrible feeling.
  • Not Synced
    So I promised myself that the next time
  • Not Synced
    I would say something.
  • Not Synced
    I would have that hard conversation.
  • Not Synced
    So in a matter of weeks, it happens again:
  • Not Synced
    "Are you a boy, or are you a girl?"
  • Not Synced
    Familiar silence.
  • Not Synced
    But this time, I am ready.
  • Not Synced
    And I am about to go all Woman Studies 101 on this table.
  • Not Synced
    I've got my Betty Friedan quotes,
  • Not Synced
    I've got my Gloria Steinem quotes
  • Not Synced
    I even got this little bit from Vagina Monologue
  • Not Synced
    I'm gonna do,
  • Not Synced
    so I take a deep breath, and i look down,
  • Not Synced
    and staring back at me
  • Not Synced
    is a 4-year old girl in a pink dress.
  • Not Synced
    Not a challenge to a feminist duel,
  • Not Synced
    just a kid, with a question:
  • Not Synced
    "Are you a boy, or are you a girl?"
  • Not Synced
    So I take another deep breath,
  • Not Synced
    squat down next to her and say:
  • Not Synced
    Hey, I know it's kind of confusing,
  • Not Synced
    my hair is short like a boy's,
  • Not Synced
    and I wear boys' clothes,
  • Not Synced
    but I'm a girl
  • Not Synced
    and you know how sometimes you like to wear a pink dress,
  • Not Synced
    and sometimes you like to wear your comfie jammies,
  • Not Synced
    well, I'm more of a comfie jammies kind of a girl.
  • Not Synced
    And this kid looks me dead in the eye
  • Not Synced
    without missing a beat and says:
  • Not Synced
    "My favorite pajamas are purple
  • Not Synced
    with fish, can I get a pancake please?"
  • Not Synced
    And that was it, just:
  • Not Synced
    "Oh, OK, you're a girl. How 'bout that pancake?"
  • Not Synced
    It was the easiest hard conversation I have ever had.
  • Not Synced
    And why?
  • Not Synced
    Because Pancake Girl and I
  • Not Synced
    we were both real with each other.
  • Not Synced
    So, like many of us,
  • Not Synced
    I've lived in a few closets in my life,
  • Not Synced
    and yeah, most often, my walls happen to be rainbow.
  • Not Synced
    But inside, in the dark,
  • Not Synced
    you can't tell what color the walls are.
  • Not Synced
    You just know what it feels like
  • Not Synced
    to live in a closet.
  • Not Synced
    So really, my closet is no different than yours,
  • Not Synced
    or yours,
  • Not Synced
    or yours.
  • Not Synced
    Sure, I can give you 100 reasons why
  • Not Synced
    coming out of my closet was harder
  • Not Synced
    than coming out of yours,
  • Not Synced
    but here's the thing,
  • Not Synced
    hard is not relative,
  • Not Synced
    hard is hard.
  • Not Synced
    Who can tell me
  • Not Synced
    that explaining to someone
  • Not Synced
    that you've just declared bankrupcy
  • Not Synced
    is harder than telling someone
  • Not Synced
    you cheated on them.
  • Not Synced
    Who can tell me
  • Not Synced
    that his coming out story
  • Not Synced
    is harder than telling your 5-year old
  • Not Synced
    you're getting a divorce.
  • Not Synced
    There is no "harder:,
  • Not Synced
    there is just "hard."
  • Not Synced
    We need to stop ranking our "hard"
  • Not Synced
    oneagainst against everybody else's "hard"
  • Not Synced
    to make us feel better or worse about our closet
  • Not Synced
    and just commiserate on the fact
  • Not Synced
    that we all have "hard."
  • Not Synced
    At some point in our lives,
  • Not Synced
    we all live in closets,
  • Not Synced
    and they may feel safe.
  • Not Synced
    Or at least, safer than what lies
  • Not Synced
    on the other side of that door.
  • Not Synced
    But I'm here to tell you,
  • Not Synced
    no matter what your walls are made of,
  • Not Synced
    a closet is no place for a person to live.
  • Not Synced
    Thanks.
  • Not Synced
    So why is coming out of any closet,
  • Not Synced
    why is having that conversation,
  • Not Synced
    why is it so hard?
  • Not Synced
    Because they're stressful.
  • Not Synced
    We're so concerned about the reaction
  • Not Synced
    of the other person, and understandably.
  • Not Synced
    Will they be angry?
  • Not Synced
    Sad?
  • Not Synced
    Disappointed?
  • Not Synced
    Will we loose a friend?
  • Not Synced
    A parent?
  • Not Synced
    A lover?
  • Not Synced
    These conversations cause stress.
  • Not Synced
    So let's kick out on stress for a moment.
  • Not Synced
    Stress is a natural reaction in your body.
  • Not Synced
    When you encounter a perceived threat,
  • Not Synced
    (keyword, "perceived"),
  • Not Synced
    your hypothalamus sounds the alarm,
  • Not Synced
    and adrenalin and cortisol
  • Not Synced
    start coursing through your veins.
  • Not Synced
    This is known as
  • Not Synced
    Fight or Flight.
  • Not Synced
    Sometimes you rumble,
  • Not Synced
    Sometimes you run.
  • Not Synced
    And this is a totally normal reaction.
  • Not Synced
    And, comes from a time
  • Not Synced
    when that threat was being chased by a wooly mammoth
  • Not Synced
    The problem is
  • Not Synced
    your hypothalamus has no idea
  • Not Synced
    if you're being chased by a wooly mammoth,
  • Not Synced
    or if your computer just crashed,
  • Not Synced
    or if your in-laws just showed up on your doorsteps,
  • Not Synced
    or if you're about to jump out of an airplane,
  • Not Synced
    or if you need to tell someone you love
  • Not Synced
    that you have a brain tumor.
  • Not Synced
    The difference is
  • Not Synced
    the wooly mammoth chases you for what,
  • Not Synced
    maybe 10 minutes,
Title:
Coming out of your closet: Ash Beckham at TEDxBoulder
Description:

Ash discusses the current state of homophobia in our culture challenging even the word "homophobia" itself. There is no fear, just loathing. Hating things we don't understand, people we don't know or anything that is different than our day to day. "Homophobic" people are not scared of anything. We all have a responsibility to live our lives as active activists not passive ones when it comes to protecting our fellow humans from hate of any kind.

Videography credits
Jenn Calaway, Enhancer
Michael Hering, Lodo Cinema
Sarah Megyesy, Side Pocket Images
Satya Peram, Flatirons Films
Sean Williams, RMO Films
Anthony Lopez, Cross Beyond
David Oakley
more » « less
Video Language:
English
Team:
closed TED
Project:
TEDxTalks
Duration:
10:57

  • Ivana Korom

    Hi. I'm returning this transcript for improvement. Please edit the talk description, according to the guidelines. http://translations.ted.org/wiki/How_to_Tackle_a_Transcript#Title_and_description_standard //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// Please break lines, as some are too long in the new editor, you can see the character length of each subtitle, as well as its reading speed (characters/second). For languages based on the Latin alphabet, the maximum subtitle length is 84 characters (subtitles over 42 characters need to be broken into two lines). The maximum reading speed should be less than 22 characters per second. You can access the new editor by clicking "Beta: Save and open in new editor" after opening the task in the old interface. To learn more about line length, line breaking and reading speed, watch this tutorial: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvNQoD32Qqo

  • Mel Teruz

    Hi Ivana, I can't edit the title and description because the spanish version "needs approval". We will have to wait until that's done.

  • Ivana Korom

    Hi Mel, the task was actually returned to the reviewer of the original transcript. And in this case, English is original, and itćs the other way around - Spanish cannot be edited until English is approved, but English can and should be improved.

English subtitles

Revisions Compare revisions

Our website uses cookies for analysis purposes.