Riki Wilchins 1 8:00 P.M. grand ballroom Reitz Union >>> Excuse me Good evening, everyone. Welcome to pride awareness 2005. Tonight, we have Riki Wilchins, give director of the GenderPAC. A couple of announcements, on Wednesday afternoon we are doing my big fat wedding on the north lawn. On Wednesday night, we are doing Stacy and Chin and a group of other local poets here in the grand ballroom. Thursday is lunch with pride in the Rion ballroom. There is limited free food for a the first few of you that show up. In the evening, we're co-sponsoring an event. 2 It is empowering beauty. Then on Friday is the queer ball. Which will also have an amateur drag show attached to it. I'd like to thank you all for coming out tonight and I'd like to introduce to you Riki Wilchins [ Applause ] >> can I make a couple of you who are feeling really and venture Rouse to move down front. I work almost entirely off eye contact or I will fizz fm There will be a test so people sitting down front will automatically get the grade curve higher Anybody having trouble hearing me? They turned the sound down a little bit. 3 Is that okay? Can people in the back hear me? If you can't hear, you can walk your little butt up here where the sound is real good. So, goodness. We have a little bit of a late start here. We actually started out from the hotel about from the Hilton about 7:00. We had to drive all over town with TomARo and Jason harassing the town with the car doors, saying something about the gators not loved or feared, of course I agreed with them. You guys are so well behaved. Not really? Thank you. It's always problematic 4 speaking at colleges because people assume they're going to be tested and sit there very Ernest. I've had people take notes during this discussion which I personally find terrifying. It's hard to believe when you're younger one day you will grow up and someone will assign you as homework. I'm trying to avoid that. I'm also a little bit jet bagged, I came from Miami, from south beach where the boys are prettier than you are, where they won't let you across the crossway unless you have six-pack ABC, some kind of zoning ordinance. The only place in the world you get panhandled so a guy 5 can use the gym. Those guys are gorgeous in south beach, let me tell you You go out with one, put a bag over your head. I will keep working here. I got some response, okay? We're going to have a good time. It's funny, they put you on these flights and you never stop to ask what you're actually on. They have great names, the PanAm wings of freedom, the American airlines eag le. Do not get on the JetBlue buzzard. Very, very bad idea. I should have known. It is a puddle-jumper, two ducks with a pontoon between them. Thank you. 6 You know you're travelling sheep when they come on the intercom and say, we have a water landing, Your pilot can be a flotation device. What happens when you don't have help. If there's smoke in the cabin, please drop your hand from the ceiling, put it over your mouth and make noises like this. We are going to Gainesville today, our flight time will be approximately 1 hour and 25 minutes, there are large tubes at the front and back. Where were we? Yes. So, I have to tell you something that's rather embarrassing about my college days. I cheated. 7 We have some gender studies teachers here so I can't go in too much detail. We were studying gender period and post-modernism. You guys are from Gainesville, right? Michelle Foucault, a French name. And the Gainesville people go, Whhh. I cheated, I stared at the gender identity of the girl signature next to me in a gender finals, trying to figure out what I was. I still haven't figured that out. It seems in the last ten or 15 years we have gone through a real transformation in terms of gender. I'm laughing because in tomorrow's car, I'm -- in 8 TomARo's car, I'm sitting in the passenger seat, a little dash thing says SRS on it real big. I since have learned that stands for safety restraint system. I'm generally in favor of restraint of any kind. I thought it stood sexual assignment surgery This is so cool. A little thing will pop out with all kinds of interesting things about our gender. I'm not sure if ToRo is up for it but I am. >> It seems like there's been a shift in the way people think and gender. I was hoping that my youth program coordinator could join me. She's in training and 9 hopefully she will walk in a few minutes because she, too is circling around harassing counties and yelling hey, Gators pn She came in wearing high heels and a long pump and call in the next day and bent over the copier, and I said, who's the guy fixing the copier. And I asked her about it, don't you get gender whiplash? She said, you just have to learn to use all your voices. I thought that was such a great idea When i was growing up, you have to be one thing or the other. Two boxes, you have to fit in your box, do not set a foot outside of your box, don't try to get in the 10 middle or between the 1X boxes, be in your box. I thought, this is such an enlightened approach to thinking about gender and what we are and what we could be. Use all your voices. It seems like gender stuff is everywhere. I'm thinking of movies People see "million dollar baby," the subject is awesome, Hilary Swank, she can punch me out any time and I thought that when I saw "boys don't cry" and Billy Elliot that won a Tony on broad way "southern comfort," and "normal" on HBO and "you don't know DiCk." You would think they're not exactly on speaking terms together. 11 It's like there's this huge kind of awareness in the culture right now around issues of gender. One of the things we do at GenderPAC is to track what happens in the media, not just in movies and television but also commercials and so forth. I've seen commercials with gender themes from Levis dockers, Campbell soup, Dr. Pepper, Citigroup, DintY Moore soups. Anyone seen the Citigroup ones? No one? You guys have arms? they show someone talking a young woman with a deep guy's voice coming out, yeah -- thank you. you didn't raise your hand. Where was the hand when I 12 needed it. Talk to the hand. Talk to the hand. >> I don't remember names. >> Well, it was really -- it grips you all of a sudden, you have this perfectly synchronized voice obviously from the other gender You have a big heavy guy saying, yes, I got the nails done and a perm and everything and all about identity theft. It's like all these kind of gender references are out there. I sometimes ask myself, where is this coming from? Why now? I've been doing this for like 20 years. Why at this moment are things starting to shift? 13 What is it about this historical moment that we're ready do have this particular discussion? I think it's -- I think it comes from a number of things. One of the things it comes from, of course, is the rise of two huge civil rights movements in the 1970s and 80s, women's rights and gay rights. One of the things that tell nims made us look at--tell nims made -- Feminism made us look at are these gender roles hardwired It's posed to be puppy tails and things like that. FEminiSm is not dictated. What happens us to in our lives as men and women, which is what it is about, most of it happens to us 14 personally, this stuff is political and needs to be looked at. I think gay rights took that a step further, what's the primary role of the gender system. boys should go with girls and girls should go with boys. I know that sounds strange. A lot of people believe that. Gay People, I think, by simply being openly gay, by loving members of the same sex or if you're bi-sexual, by loving anything that moves, it's the name of their national magazine. Couldn't don't you HiSS me. Don't be HiSSinG me, girlfriend. I think, show people you can break the primary rule 15 about gender and still be masculine or feminine break the rules about being gay. If you see a gay man or bush woman like Leslie Feinberg, you're forced to think about the difference between gender and sex in radical ways. People didn't used to have to do that because most gay people were closeted. In my mom's generation we used to watch television and wonder if LiBERACE really gay or now we wonder if Elton John is gay or does anybody care anymore. All of a sudden, you think about what it means to be a man or women in ways we don't have to encounter anymore. I think also transgender rates has changed the 16 roles. Someone change from one sex to another. Can someone change Sexes? what does it mean? It's a no brainer. Suppose you're a person that says I just want to have top surgery and live my life as a guy and take vitamin T, testosterone. And that's it. When does that person become man and when recognized. What pronoun do we use and when? Do we have guidance on that? Have walls around it? Courts and social groups all had to start thinking about sex in ways they didn't have to because of transgender people. 17 I think also seeing transgender people, what happened when "boys don't cry" came out, people had to look at Hilary Swank, this gorgeous FEm, and see her as BRAntino and I thought she was totally compelling in that role. Say, my God, I have to think about what this means, people can change in different ways. By the way, anyone see "lentil" with Barbara StREiSAnD. Is there ever a moment we were not completely aware that was Barbara FRiGGin StREiSAnD. I'm Victor Victoria. Give me a break, we knowE who you are. Talk about not knowing Dick . 18 By the way we have a sign-up sheet. You didn't sign in. Only one person signed up. Please put your e-mail so we can get to you Concluding my remarks tonight -- Michelle Foucault, a great French philosopher. I think the other place this came from, post modern theory, the rise of post modernism that came at the same time as looking at these three civil rights movement has made us think about the theoretical underpinnings that go with mention Foucault because you're here in Gainesville and know about that wonderful philosopher Judith Butler, I'm sorry, who has not really been 19 translated into English. Has anybody -- anybody here really understand or really care about the signifying practices of the academy and metaphors and et cetera. Like that stuff? Gets me hot, too. That's the . Does anybody really understand the con? Raise your hand. You do not? What is this fall las, you have to have the FAlACE but you can't be the FAlACE. >> I have heard various arguments. >> Really? >> I can't find anyone who has read the original anything. Everybody reads second and third source. 20 People that have actually read the original French are mostly confined to RikERS island in the lower Bunk, I might add. Post modern theory has become -- when I was going through this transition and going through the real life test, which means you can transition and not get killed, you have passed the real life test. If you get killed, you have failed the real life test and they will give you surgery. So, as I was going through this, I was reading Butler, I thought, oh, my God, this is so empowering. Because here are -- that's Christine. Yeah. I was just defaming you a 21 few minutes ago and saying you were late because you were harassing the townspeople so they know about you. But Butler taught me that there is a gender system out there. There is a system that pushes and prods and even punishes us if we don't immediate our gender role. That was really good to know. I thought everybody was naturally, all the girls were naturally feminine and boys naturally masculine. I grew up when there were no openly gay people. Not a single homosexual. What a coincidence. It seemed like a natural fact of life, the way God intended it. 22 Butler said you could look underneath and see how people were creating gender, and it was a doing, not a being. That gave me as a younger person a chance to look at myself in a different way saying I didn't have to transition from male to female, bush to masculine. And I could look at myself and instead of the pressures facing me. Everything in this society seems to be one or the other. Butler help med reclaim that middle ground, it's not important I announce myself as this or that, it's important I be comfortable with me and recognize pressure to be not me when I see it. 23 So, as I started to work with that concept, and I started to work in some of the groups that I was in, I found it didn't mesh very well. I was kicked out of some groups for not being transgender enough, believe it or not. I was kicked out of other groups for not being a real woman. I was kicked out of a gay group because I wasn't announcing myself as necessarily being gay or straight. God only knows I get harassed on the public street almost every time I walk route It's just the way it is. People see someone that looks gender queer, they're 24 going to say something. I started thinking about what I had learned about post modernism and about the queer theory and about identities and thinking is there a space to do something about this system that doesn't require me to announce who and what I am? Is there a way to deconstruct these identities and find a way through politics that brings people together instead of separating them into wedges of a pie. As I started to back away from groups that started giving me trouble, I started to say, well, maybe there is a new foundation on which we could build this structure, because we're starting to see the 25 outlines of the problem. We're starting to understand that gender stereotypes and gender punishment and gender privilege and regulation does cause real harm. It hurts everything from school kids bullied to transgender people who get killed, to female managers who are called ball buster and BitCh behind their back and gay men who get told they're faggots. It hurts all those people. It even hurts straight people. I'm interested, I have a professor I work with that says the number one expert in masculinity in the U.S. is Eminem. We can talk strictly about gender and harass them from 26 gender he split faggot off from homo and right in the middle of "8 mile" he says, you're the homosexual, you're the faggot. What does faggot mean in that context? It means you are unmanly and unmasculine and I spit on you for that That's what's going on right now as gay is becoming more accepted, less acceptable is to transgress gender enormous. That means you're changing sexes, changing genders or you just want to use all your voices. So as I started looking around, I said maybe there is a different way to do this. I'm not sure I have any answer there but I do want 27 to sketch a couple of answers. I think they're important. As we go forward as separate movements, in identities we will have problems because identities always leave someone behind. The experiences I had, as painful as they were, taught me something, which is that other people have had them, too. I remember going to a women's conference in Indianapolis. It was the most inclusive place you've ever been to There was room for, you know, single women and room for women with children and room for women of color and a room for lesbian women and I don't know, everyone. 28 Actually a room for-leather women It must be tough do it with leather and drag around in the heat. You're regretting bringing me, I know that. No one told us she was going to say things like this. And I was talking about something here, wasn't I? Who knows what it was? >> The leather. >> No, before the leather. Before the SRS. Thank you I sat in the waiting room and there was someone sitting there. I said, you know, why aren't you in one of the rooms, bi-sexual room, Jewish room. She said I don't know what I am and so I don't know 29 what room I would be welcome in. I kind of feel like that myself. I'm never quite sure what I am or if I want to be something specific and concrete so I'm never quite sure where I'm going to be welcome. And so if we're going to fight this issue of gender, how are we going to do it? Are we going to have a gay movement that goes against stereotypes and transgender that fights stereotypes and women's movement that does it or special movement against parenting children. When I was going to the airport today I saw this little kid that couldn't have been more than two or three months out of the 30 room. She already had little posts in her ears, already had on little white shiny panties and white booties. This was the ShAnA O'Connor of kids. We're talking Q ball with a pink hat and big bow on the side I thought if this kid is the next Martina Navatilova She will have a tough, tough life. Three months old and it's all already written. If we're going to include people like her in parenting practices and going to include gays and lesbians and straight women and boys harassed at school, I'm just going to do one more digression there, Michael KimmEl, 31 who's a researcher at Stony Brook in New York did a research project on the 28 now unfortunately 29 school shootings that have happened since 19 82. There have been millions and millions of words written post Columbine. They have all talked about random violence. KimmEl's . and finding is that it is distinctly non-random. In fact, it's the same student over and over again. Almost every single one of those shootings with only three exceptions happened in rural red state communities, where there was easy access to guns, these were almost entirely white, straight kids who 32 had been ruthlessly tormented and bullied for years over and over and had their manhood brought up, they finally reached for a gun and did something about it The wrong thing. What's interesting about the Minnesota killings, except for the race, it still fits a lot of the profile. Until we start addressing gender -- violent codes of masculinity among adolescent males we'll not stop high school shootings. Even right after Minnesota, the subject of gender came up They talked a little bit about bullying, bullying is not sexy and neither is gender. 33 We're seeing whole parade about neonaziism. Why do kids get into stuff like that, hyper masculinity? because they've been taunted and tormented for not being masculine enough. The question in my own mind, how do we fight the struggle? Are we going to do it piecemeal or all at once? If we do it all at once, decide to hit all these issues around gender, decide we want to put all that theory to work taught us to deconstruct identity and deconstruct the gender system, how do we do it in way that doesn't rob people eve their identities but brings them together. In the U.S., it's a tough 34 question to answer because we've done civil rights movements in '50s and '60's. They set the movement for using the courts and taught us how to do human civil rights. At the same time, there's a feeling I think right now that identity politics, dividing us up into one identity or another has kind of played itself out. I say this tongue in cheek because I actually spoke to a student group that used this Akron mo we really want to have a lesbian transsexual queer sexual youth movement. No, they used it. The perfect example, the analogy just going to keep getting longer or a . we 35 say no. We need to start emphasizing principles and not identities. We cannot keep asking people what Is your body so we can decide if you're welcome. Gay or straight, male or female, gender or transgender? We have to start making principles people have because they're human if we're going to do a movement around this issue of gender. Here's what I want to get to, my human rights argument. I think the human rights paradine is starting to offer us that. In the Supreme Court decision against adolescent 36 what's the word-sorry? Thank you. Execution. It's the time lag. Against execution of adolescence, they quoted international law and said, you know what, the U.S. is behind. They were talking about human rights law. There is a growing body of thinkers that are saying, you know what, there are certain inalienable rights just because we are human. You don't have to pass a special law about this or argue for this because you're one identity or another. You have these rights because you are a human being because you deserve them that is the human 37 rights model. It doesn't ask you what your identity is, it doesn't ask what your body is, if you're a human, you should have these rights. The whole gender thing, gender identity and, suppression are not part of human rights law yet. But I think this is where it needs to go, I think this is where the gender struggle needs go. The human rights model, saying everyone ought to have the right to their gender identity and expression regardless who they already or Or regardless how they identify today or tomorrow or the sexuality of their body, this is something you should have because you're 38 a human. Are you a 3-year-old kid, you should have this? A gay person, you should have this, a straight mother, you should have Indianapolis I hope that's where the human rights struggle evolves in the coming years. I want to talk about the gender advocacy coalition, we are not a PAC. We're in Washington D.C. GenderPAC is devoted to bring this struggle to America. We have taken a lot of heat. I have had the most incredible fight with my board. We lost half of our board ten years ago because we decide wed would not be a 39 specifically transgender organization and lost half the board when we said we weren't going to be an LEt organization. This is a human rights issue and don't want to ask who you are, if you're being harassed because of hour gender or expression of identity, you're ours, we don't care who you are, a lesbian, lure ours, a transgender person, you're ours, that's all we need to nope It's been a struggle and also been very powerful. And we now have straight people who come and work on this issue. Increase lig we're reaching out to communities of color where gender stereotypes are an issue because gender 40 stoppers are always raised and racial stereotypes are always gender. We want to reach out to concerned parents so someone doesn't tell their daughter she's not good at math or computers or their son told he needs to do more football and less art. What we're seeing in the last few years not just from gender patchwork but countless allies doing this work, there is a paradine shift happening. Gender is becoming the next edge of human rights in communities across this country. Ten years ago there were no members of Congress in cities or states or major corporations who were based on gender identity 41 separation. Now, we have corporate sponsors W J.P. Morgan, chase, Citigroup, Kodak, there are almost a third of Congress have now signed diversity pledges banning gender identity discrimination in their offices. Over 75 or 80 local jurisdictions you guys know maybe became the sixth state, California, yes, gray Davis was signing anything before he left office, insert your Arnold joke right here. Illinois, I thought was very powerful, right around New Year did that. My first big mainstream populous state. All of a sudden, gender is that next area of human 42 rights. Where will it go in the coming years? it will only get bigger The question is how big will it get? A lot of that will be up to you She shock troops in this movement, in almost every movement in this country are youth. It's college youth driving it. College youth have the interest and theoretical understanding to take this fight to the next level. So the next time you read one of those arms, the next time you read about a transgender person who was killed, the next time you read about a lesbian or gay man getting harassed, the 43 next time you read about a school shooting from some poor dumb kid in a red state community that grabbed a shotgun, the next time you see a two month old infant already wearing posts in her ears or big boys don't cry or a lady doesn't do that or a young kid getting shamed, I want you to think about getting involved in the struggle. You're probably involved in lots of other things, we're all busy people. I want you to think about getting involved in this struggle now, because this is the human rights issue of our time. Thank you. [ Applause ] 44 >> I do want to say questions? No. Questions, comments, criticisms. You can actually make statements. College questions have been asking everything I is a question, like, I read your book and like didn't you think it kind of like SuCkED? My response is a statement you'd like to make with that question? So -- I have lulled you into submission. >> At the Hippodrome, there's movie called "beautiful boxer," I don't know if any of you have heard about it, a true story about a ThAi boxer, who is a trans. 45 The slogan is he has a something like man to become a woman. It's really good and will be there until Thursday. >> other comments, questions? There will be a test. I I haven't read the article but how did you know the school shooters were all straight? >> as far as we know. They could have all been closeted way almost all were called faggot at one point but none have been called gay as far as anyone knew, as far as anyone knew. I think, his . was that faggot was being used has become a universal term of derision in these situation 46 and it's been separated from sexuality. . >> what's your opinion- >> I thought you were going to say what's my sign? >> It's uterus with the stomach rising in the moon URAnuS. >> what's your opinion on gays gender identity position >> what's my opinion on gender identity disorder? >> What should be listed in the DSM IV. >> What's my opinion in gender identity disorder in psychopathology. I have said it should be replaced with a new disorder called gender PAtholiA, a need or desire 47 to patholIgise any need or desire a patient has. Recent studies by Michael KimmEl have shown nine out of ten psychiatrists evince that. I believe we could get more information out of this dreaded disease we could cure it. We will never cure lesbian something. but we will cure gender PAtholiA. I just don't get it >> if you say you want a nose job, that's okay. You can have a BoB job, tummy job, lube job, don't even ask. If you walk in and say you have a grown in job, slid you have a mental disorder. I don't know what that's 48 about. I really don't. I don't know who why we have to make life tougher. Get rid of it Surgery on the man. people watch south park? See Tom's Rhinoplasty and should have-can't hear. [ Inaudible ]. >> I'm just saying -- I'm not saying there are no barriers, I am saying we don't need to PAtholiGiZE people and put them through a real life test. I think doctors are in the business of judging and people want a procedure, they should have a procedure. I'm not sure I feel that way about a 7 or 8-year-old. I'm sure there's some age 49 we have to have. I'm thinking of a 35-year-old that walks in and says, I want surgery or I want anything, we shouldn't prevent that. Like said, when I come from south beach, the plastic surgery capital of the world, about the only surgery you can't get on else can be lifted, tucked, stapled, folded. [ Inaudible ] >> there are only feminist issues involved -you want to have that discussion? my argument would be you're politicizing, when you tell women they shouldn't have breast implants, you're PolitiCizinG the behavior. Someone asked me if we ha had the perfect society around gender enormous 50 people would never have to have sex surgery anymore they wouldn't need to If they wanted to be a boy or girdle they could be that regardless of their body. If we had an open field more people would choose to change sexes because there wouldn't be any barriers and more people would be interested in doing it. If we had to go through live tests fewer people would have appendectomies or appendixes removed. There are always issues around -- AppEnDECtomiES or appendixes. >> I think people should be able to make choices and that's what I think the Schiavo thing was about. People should be able to make choices about their 51 own bodies. >> what would you say to folks who charge that focussing on human rights aspects of gender discrimination is the way you separate it from your average Joe associating that struggle? >> I would say [ Inaudible ] >> is it a legal strategy or a way you believe it should be to end gender? >> It's good question. I'm sorry I didn't think of it. The question is the human rights aspect going to separate this out or to people who may not have understood that or be comfortable with it or know what human rights is or is 52 this a political strategy. We're starting to watch a parenting program called children as they are working with diverse kinds of parents to encourage their kids to grow up without forcing them to measure up to standards of masculinity or femininity. I don't know we're teaching them human rights language but the overall approach of the program is going to human rights and its inception. The rights every kid should have. You can help your child have. We're not asking to memorize human rights principles or international covenants, we are talking about it as a more generic 53 way instead of saying is your kid pre-gay? This is the program for you. I don't want to do that. It weeds out parents who are either uncomfortable with that or don't think they're kids are that far gone, if you will, they don't want to be forced to push their kids into 3 boy box or girl box. So, I think it's also a political strategy. It's a way to do this that doesn't force us to resolve questions of identity. It's interesting to me JuDith Butler is my life in some ways. The theoretical foundation for most people working on this is post modern. One of the things post 54 modern has taught us is to be profoundly cynical about identities as being real facts opposed to things that we do. Even critical race theory is starting to deconstruct in blackness or Asianness and not look at skin color is not constructive, it's a real fact. What we make of it is very much socially constructive. You have two kinds of things, this identity based approach to gender along with people whose theoretical understanding is identities are unstable foundations to do politics on. They always have hi ark kiss and exclusions and things that don't fit. These two things are in 55 collision. Human rights away that we can get through it. We have identities. And we can't say we can't have identities, and say identities are gone. At the same time, you don't have to resolve those questions and say are identities real or social? We want to talk about everyone and how they identify. That's the political aspect of it. I think it also gives us a chance to draw a wider spectrum of people into this. Some people criticize and say, you're deluding. You guys use air quotes in Gainesville? Guys not air guitar or air 56 drums or air butt. These are air quotes, mom, I don't want go back to school. I think the irony about identities will kill us in the end. We might find this issue very important. It's like it's not a criticism, a strength, I want to you reach out to people. Does that delude us? Yeah ask, if deluding us is about getting more people involved, I'm about a solution and certain amount of -- I'm about a certain amount of dilution and certain amount of strength. A great question. Human rights is still evolving and very much not yet accepted in the U.S. 57 Why, because the U.S. exception says we don't need human rights standards we have the bill of rights being forced by man who said abortion is okay. Anybody notice we now have an om buds man who is supposed to guard to make sure civil liberties are not being undermined by the action offers the government? There used to be name for that position, called the attorney general. Now, we need a special position to do that. Sorry. I get carried away. It's a tough time. I know there's a question out there. You're all looking at each other. 58 Just move on the written quiz? >> I have two questions. >> you know More feminist trouble making. Someone who's read my book, damn it I have dozens of books out there. [ Inaudible ] >> It's shorthand because you can do the Butler argument about sex being gender but it's whole other discussion, the same reason I don't mention air sex. The first time I do I have to have a 20 minute discussion. In every group where there is an intersection person, I will say, hi, sorry I didn't talk about it I it's LuBti. Sorry. 59 [ Inaudible ] >> you know, it's way of cutting up the pipe I don't think the words are real. I don't really think words are transparent. think we create the words and then they create our reality. So, can you call it all gender? Yeah, can you split it up, sex versus gender? Yeah. I really think we see boy/girl because we've been taught to see that. There are probably thousands of genders out there, we don't see them. We're black and white people and live in a technicolor world. It's hard to see the different genders. 60 I have the struggle with death going on with the transportation. they look at my BooBS and call Messier and wait to see if I react. I do not react. Well, thank you so much. I'm going down to Gainesville. I hear it's sunny there. You look so good in that suit, you big stud. When they started doing a cavity search, I stop doing that Shit. One of the people on my board suggest we nude new pronounce, ma'am/sir, get that a lot, the bathrooms over there, whichever one you want. We don't have words for these things so it's very hard to see them. 61 The things that we do see are the ones that are named Language is the first social contract. [ Inaudible ] >> I like queer. I think queer is a really cool project. The problem with queer is it will never be used in the "New York Times." It will never be an acceptable word for non-queer people to use. I think the word [ Inaudible ] I Neil same way about trans, which I think is more of a transgenderism than it's supposed to be. It's supposed to be an umbrella. It's a now becoming and identity. I hear people regularly 62 saying you're not transgender. The umbrella has now shifted to trans, especially among college students, such as trans meaning gender queer. I don't think trans is ever going to work either, so I've been looking for other ways to approach this for other people to access it. I am afraid we will have gay rights and gay rights will look like gay versus straight again. We'll not ever get to issues of underlying gender. More and more I see it's okay to be gay as long as you vote straight. As long as you're a macho straight boy or macho gay boy, you're okay. 63 God help you if you're EffimienAtE, nobody wants you We don't get the same status. Excuse me, I want to good like FuCk everything about gender and status and privilege, let's start from the right and all of us from day one are born with the right to our opinion and expression. The most intimate things we have is how we express ourselves when we wake up and comb our hair, why is it not written any place. That's what I want to see happen, if that makes sense. [ Inaudible ] >> how do I rec style saying it's okay to be gain group of people entirely 64 closeted? [ Inaudible ] >> it's funny. When I go to south beach which is entirely gay, entirely closeted, none of those boys are out with to their parents because it's so not cool. I don't have a good answer to that You have to catch people at the moment that they're at. Some people will hear you and some people, I'm not ready to come out to my parents yet and ready to be an open activist on this. I've had people come up to me in groups and be very upset I was talking about ways to organize that didn't involve identities because they had just come to the realization they 65 were a less band it was so important to them and didn't want to take that away from them. People are in different paths of different points on the path and you have to hope you're catching them where they are, or at least later, they'll hear you when they're ready to. I don't have a great answer. It's a problem. I mean, gay rights is still a very young concept is in some ways. I'm shocked at the . of the fallback position for even Republicans in a lot of cases to become civil unions. If you asked for civil unions ten years ago, it was shocking now it's a 66 fallback position. It's amaze progress with an amazing backlash. [ Inaudible ] >> it's good . That's a good . Are we done? We have some place else to be? Actually, if anybody does need to leave, please feel free to SkEEDADDlE. There'll be a reception afterwards? Talk into my mike. >> We will be sitting outside or inside wherever we can find a room. >> thank you all for coming. [ Applause ] >> we have a conference in 67 Denver I'd like to invite you all to. Last year, We had over 1200 people, about 900 youth from all across the country. We have sterling as our keynoter and it's going to be awesome, always is, in Washington D.C. and we have scholarships and we just extended the deadline. $150 for three nights and a hotel and registration. You can get a scholarship on top of that. We'd love to have you!