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What I have to Offer (English subtitled version)

  • 0:16 - 0:20
    So you are here and I am here, spending our time as we must.
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    [Sound of heartbeats, in the background.]
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    I am trying not to spend this time as I spend most of my time,
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    trying to get you to like me.
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    [Laughter.]
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    Trying to control your thoughts, to use my voodoo
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    at the speed of light, the speed of sound, at the speed of thought.
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    It is an ancient pattern of time usage for me
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    and I am trying to move deeper, hoping to be helpful.
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    This pattern of time usage paints over an ancient wound
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    and paints it with bright colours.
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    It's a sleight of hand, a distraction,
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    so to attempt to change the pattern, let me expose the wound.
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    I do know that it is old.
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    I do know that it is a hole in my being.
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    I do know it is tender.
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    I do believe that it is unknowable, or at least, inarticulable.
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    I do believe you have a wound, too.
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    I do believe it is both specific to you
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    and common to everyone.
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    I do believe it is the thing about you that must be hidden and protected.
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    It is the thing that is tap-danced over, five shows a day.
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    It is the thing that won't be interesting to other people if revealed.
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    It is the thing that makes you weak and pathetic.
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    It is the thing that truly, truly, truly makes loving you impossible.
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    It is your secret, even from yourself,
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    but it is the thing that wants to live.
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    It is the thing from which your art, your painting, your dance,
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    your composition, your philosophical treatise, your screenplay, is born.
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    People all over the world spend countless hours
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    of their lives every week being fed entertainment
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    in the forms of movies, TV shows, newspapers, YouTube videos, the internet
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    and it's ludicrous to believe this stuff doesn't alter our brains.
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    And it's also equally ludicrous to believe that, at the very least,
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    this mass distraction and manipulation is not convenient for the people who are in charge.
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    People are starving.
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    They may not know it, because they are being fed mass-produced garbage.
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    The packaging is colourful and it's loud,
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    but it's being produced in the same factories that make Pop Tarts and iPads,
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    by people sitting around thinking, "What can we do to get people to buy more of these?"
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    And they're very good at their jobs, but that's what it is you're getting,
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    because that's what they're making.
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    They're selling you something.
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    And the world is built on this, now.
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    Politics and government are built on this.
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    Corporations are built on this.
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    Interpersonal relationships are built on this.
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    And we're starving, all of us, and we're killing each other, and we're hating each other,
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    and we're calling each other liars and evil,
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    because it's all become marketing and we want to win,
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    because we're lonely and empty and scared and we're led to believe winning will change all that.
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    [Sounds of fight announcer, crowd, from television]
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    The world is very scary now.
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    It always has been, but something grotesque and specific to our time is blanketing us.
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    We need to see that it is not reality.
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    It is a choice we are making,
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    or allowing other people to make for us.
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    Don't allow yourself to be tricked into thinking
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    that the way things are is the way the world must work.
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    [Heartbeats begin again.]
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    What I'd like to express is the notion that by being honest, thoughtful, and aware of the existence of other living beings,
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    a change can begin to happen in how we think of ourselves and the world,
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    and ourselves in the world.
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    We are not the passive audience for this big, messed up power play.
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    We don't have to be.
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    We can say who we are.
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    We can assert our right to existence.
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    We can say to the bullies and con men,
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    the people who try to shame us and embarrass us, flatter us,
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    to the people who have no compunction about lying to us to get our money and our allegience,
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    that we are thinking, really thinking, about who we are
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    and we will express ourselves and with this, other people won't feel so alone.
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    I want to tell you that I have a hope that there is another way to be in this world
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    and that I believe with courage and vulnerability and honesty,
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    that the stuff we put into the world can serve a better purpose.
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    What I have to offer is me.
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    What you have to offer is you.
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    [Crowd sounds, cheering.]
Title:
What I have to Offer (English subtitled version)
Description:

On the 30th of September 2011, in front of a sell-out theatre at the BFI in London, Charlie Kaufman delivered the final lecture in BAFTA's 2011 Screenwriters' Lecture Series.

Charlie Kaufman http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0442109
Full 70 minute Lecture: http://guru.bafta.org/charlie-kaufman-screenwriters-lecture-video

Images Captured / Edited: Eliot Rausch
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Video Language:
English

English subtitles

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