0:00:00.749,0:00:04.192
As a student of adversity,

0:00:04.192,0:00:05.700
I've been struck over the years

0:00:05.700,0:00:07.692
by how some people

0:00:07.692,0:00:09.096
with major challenges

0:00:09.096,0:00:12.148
seem to draw strength from them,

0:00:12.148,0:00:14.038
and I've heard the popular wisdom

0:00:14.038,0:00:16.367
that that has to do with finding meaning.

0:00:16.367,0:00:18.022
And for a long time,

0:00:18.022,0:00:20.531
I thought the meaning was out there,

0:00:20.531,0:00:23.544
some great truth waiting to be found.

0:00:23.544,0:00:26.103
But over time, I've come to feel

0:00:26.103,0:00:28.127
that the truth is irrelevant.

0:00:28.127,0:00:30.716
We call it finding meaning,

0:00:30.716,0:00:34.837
but we might better call it forging meaning.

0:00:34.837,0:00:36.913
My last book was about how families

0:00:36.913,0:00:39.837
manage to deal with various kinds of challenging

0:00:39.837,0:00:41.912
or unusual offspring,

0:00:41.912,0:00:44.096
and one of the mothers I interviewed,

0:00:44.096,0:00:47.275
who had two children with[br]multiple severe disabilities,

0:00:47.275,0:00:49.815
said to me, "People always give us

0:00:49.815,0:00:51.669
these little sayings like,

0:00:51.669,0:00:55.497
'God doesn't give you any[br]more than you can handle,'

0:00:55.497,0:00:57.008
but children like ours

0:00:57.008,0:01:01.110
are not preordained as a gift.

0:01:01.110,0:01:06.046
They're a gift because that's what we have chosen."

0:01:06.046,0:01:10.770
We make those choices all our lives.

0:01:10.770,0:01:13.037
When I was in second grade,

0:01:13.037,0:01:15.796
Bobby Finkel had a birthday party

0:01:15.796,0:01:20.321
and invited everyone in our class but me.

0:01:20.321,0:01:22.537
My mother assumed there[br]had been some sort of error,

0:01:22.537,0:01:24.434
and she called Mrs. Finkel,

0:01:24.434,0:01:26.773
who said that Bobby didn't like me

0:01:26.773,0:01:29.920
and didn't want me at his party.

0:01:29.920,0:01:32.847
And that day, my mom took me to the zoo

0:01:32.847,0:01:35.867
and out for a hot fudge sundae.

0:01:35.867,0:01:37.725
When I was in seventh grade,

0:01:37.725,0:01:40.050
one of the kids on my school bus

0:01:40.050,0:01:41.983
nicknamed me "Percy"

0:01:41.983,0:01:44.676
as a shorthand for my demeanor,

0:01:44.676,0:01:47.775
and sometimes, he and his cohort

0:01:47.775,0:01:49.849
would chant that provocation

0:01:49.849,0:01:51.718
the entire school bus ride,

0:01:51.718,0:01:55.535
45 minutes up, 45 minutes back,

0:01:55.535,0:02:00.068
"Percy! Percy! Percy! Percy!"

0:02:00.068,0:02:02.048
When I was in eighth grade,

0:02:02.048,0:02:04.695
our science teacher told us

0:02:04.695,0:02:06.344
that all male homosexuals

0:02:06.344,0:02:08.572
develop fecal incontinence

0:02:08.572,0:02:12.979
because of the trauma to their anal sphincter.

0:02:12.979,0:02:14.768
And I graduated high school

0:02:14.768,0:02:17.589
without ever going to the cafeteria,

0:02:17.589,0:02:19.308
where I would have sat with the girls

0:02:19.308,0:02:21.547
and been laughed at for doing so,

0:02:21.547,0:02:23.235
or sat with the boys

0:02:23.235,0:02:24.870
and been laughed at for being a boy

0:02:24.870,0:02:27.685
who should be sitting with the girls.

0:02:27.685,0:02:30.558
I survived that childhood through a mix

0:02:30.558,0:02:33.097
of avoidance and endurance.

0:02:33.097,0:02:35.215
What I didn't know then,

0:02:35.215,0:02:36.836
and do know now,

0:02:36.836,0:02:39.223
is that avoidance and endurance

0:02:39.223,0:02:43.910
can be the entryway to forging meaning.

0:02:43.910,0:02:46.184
After you've forged meaning,

0:02:46.184,0:02:48.398
you need to incorporate that meaning

0:02:48.398,0:02:50.512
into a new identity.

0:02:50.512,0:02:53.880
You need to take the traumas and make them part

0:02:53.880,0:02:56.100
of who you've come to be,

0:02:56.100,0:02:58.845
and you need to fold the worst events of your life

0:02:58.845,0:03:01.038
into a narrative of triumph,

0:03:01.038,0:03:02.922
evincing a better self

0:03:02.922,0:03:06.471
in response to things that hurt.

0:03:06.471,0:03:08.216
One of the other mothers I interviewed

0:03:08.216,0:03:10.368
when I was working on my book

0:03:10.368,0:03:12.870
had been raped as an adolescent,

0:03:12.870,0:03:15.853
and had a child following that rape,

0:03:15.853,0:03:18.800
which had thrown away her career plans

0:03:18.800,0:03:22.850
and damaged all of her emotional relationships.

0:03:22.850,0:03:26.060
But when I met her, she was 50,

0:03:26.060,0:03:27.276
and I said to her,

0:03:27.276,0:03:29.932
"Do you often think about the man who raped you?"

0:03:29.932,0:03:34.391
And she said, "I used to think about him with anger,

0:03:34.391,0:03:36.623
but now only with pity."

0:03:36.623,0:03:38.884
And I thought she meant pity because he was

0:03:38.884,0:03:42.576
so unevolved as to have done this terrible thing.

0:03:42.576,0:03:44.135
And I said, "Pity?"

0:03:44.135,0:03:45.710
And she said, "Yes,

0:03:45.710,0:03:48.338
because he has a beautiful daughter

0:03:48.338,0:03:50.573
and two beautiful grandchildren

0:03:50.573,0:03:54.351
and he doesn't know that, and I do.

0:03:54.351,0:04:00.271
So as it turns out, I'm the lucky one."

0:04:00.271,0:04:03.583
Some of our struggles are things we're born to:

0:04:03.583,0:04:09.088
our gender, our sexuality, our race, our disability.

0:04:09.088,0:04:11.321
And some are things that happen to us:

0:04:11.321,0:04:15.177
being a political prisoner, being a rape victim,

0:04:15.177,0:04:17.370
being a Katrina survivor.

0:04:17.370,0:04:20.655
Identity involves entering a community

0:04:20.655,0:04:23.036
to draw strength from that community,

0:04:23.036,0:04:25.441
and to give strength there too.

0:04:25.441,0:04:29.926
It involves substituting "and" for "but" --

0:04:29.926,0:04:34.275
not "I am here but I have cancer,"

0:04:34.275,0:04:39.564
but rather, "I have cancer and I am here."

0:04:39.564,0:04:41.368
When we're ashamed,

0:04:41.368,0:04:43.345
we can't tell our stories,

0:04:43.345,0:04:48.174
and stories are the foundation of identity.

0:04:48.174,0:04:51.941
Forge meaning, build identity,

0:04:51.941,0:04:55.680
forge meaning and build identity.

0:04:55.680,0:04:57.981
That became my mantra.

0:04:57.981,0:05:01.701
Forging meaning is about changing yourself.

0:05:01.701,0:05:05.147
Building identity is about changing the world.

0:05:05.147,0:05:07.787
All of us with stigmatized identities

0:05:07.787,0:05:09.730
face this question daily:

0:05:09.730,0:05:12.082
how much to accommodate society

0:05:12.082,0:05:14.273
by constraining ourselves,

0:05:14.273,0:05:17.099
and how much to break the limits

0:05:17.099,0:05:19.866
of what constitutes a valid life?

0:05:19.866,0:05:23.380
Forging meaning and building identity

0:05:23.380,0:05:26.147
does not make what was wrong right.

0:05:26.147,0:05:30.821
It only makes what was wrong precious.

0:05:30.821,0:05:33.024
In January of this year,

0:05:33.024,0:05:37.353
I went to Myanmar to interview political prisoners,

0:05:37.353,0:05:39.850
and I was surprised to find them less bitter

0:05:39.850,0:05:41.646
than I'd anticipated.

0:05:41.646,0:05:43.506
Most of them had knowingly committed

0:05:43.506,0:05:46.130
the offenses that landed them in prison,

0:05:46.130,0:05:49.414
and they had walked in with their heads held high,

0:05:49.414,0:05:51.764
and they walked out with their heads

0:05:51.764,0:05:55.556
still held high, many years later.

0:05:55.556,0:05:58.762
Dr. Ma Thida, a leading human rights activist

0:05:58.762,0:06:00.525
who had nearly died in prison

0:06:00.525,0:06:03.412
and had spent many years in solitary confinement,

0:06:03.412,0:06:06.860
told me she was grateful to her jailers

0:06:06.860,0:06:09.795
for the time she had had to think,

0:06:09.795,0:06:11.566
for the wisdom she had gained,

0:06:11.566,0:06:15.610
for the chance to hone her meditation skills.

0:06:15.610,0:06:17.177
She had sought meaning

0:06:17.177,0:06:21.060
and made her travail into a crucial identity.

0:06:21.060,0:06:22.887
But if the people I met

0:06:22.887,0:06:25.070
were less bitter than I'd anticipated

0:06:25.070,0:06:26.670
about being in prison,

0:06:26.670,0:06:29.534
they were also less thrilled than I'd expected

0:06:29.534,0:06:31.517
about the reform process going on

0:06:31.517,0:06:33.167
in their country.

0:06:33.167,0:06:34.837
Ma Thida said,

0:06:34.837,0:06:36.482
"We Burmese are noted

0:06:36.482,0:06:39.954
for our tremendous grace under pressure,

0:06:39.954,0:06:44.287
but we also have grievance under glamour,"

0:06:44.287,0:06:46.693
she said, "and the fact that there have been

0:06:46.693,0:06:48.028
these shifts and changes

0:06:48.028,0:06:50.342
doesn't erase the continuing problems

0:06:50.342,0:06:51.834
in our society

0:06:51.834,0:06:54.311
that we learned to see so well

0:06:54.311,0:06:56.245
while we were in prison."

0:06:56.245,0:06:58.404
And I understood her to be saying

0:06:58.404,0:07:01.860
that concessions confer only a little humanity,

0:07:01.860,0:07:04.118
where full humanity is due,

0:07:04.118,0:07:06.366
that crumbs are not the same

0:07:06.366,0:07:08.402
as a place at the table,

0:07:08.402,0:07:10.998
which is to say you can forge meaning

0:07:10.998,0:07:17.438
and build identity and still be mad as hell.

0:07:17.438,0:07:19.102
I've never been raped,

0:07:19.102,0:07:22.160
and I've never been in anything[br]remotely approaching

0:07:22.160,0:07:23.887
a Burmese prison,

0:07:23.887,0:07:25.771
but as a gay American,

0:07:25.771,0:07:29.805
I've experienced prejudice and even hatred,

0:07:29.805,0:07:34.347
and I've forged meaning and I've built identity,

0:07:34.347,0:07:36.696
which is a move I learned from people

0:07:36.696,0:07:39.218
who had experienced far worse privation

0:07:39.218,0:07:41.782
than I've ever known.

0:07:41.782,0:07:43.449
In my own adolescence,

0:07:43.449,0:07:46.941
I went to extreme lengths to try to be straight.

0:07:46.941,0:07:48.890
I enrolled myself in something called

0:07:48.890,0:07:51.051
sexual surrogacy therapy,

0:07:51.051,0:07:54.868
in which people I was encouraged to call doctors

0:07:54.868,0:07:58.707
prescribed what I was encouraged to call exercises

0:07:58.707,0:08:02.459
with women I was encouraged to call surrogates,

0:08:02.459,0:08:04.950
who were not exactly prostitutes

0:08:04.950,0:08:07.875
but who were also not exactly anything else.

0:08:07.875,0:08:12.358
(Laughter)

0:08:12.358,0:08:14.075
My particular favorite

0:08:14.075,0:08:16.380
was a blonde woman from the Deep South

0:08:16.380,0:08:18.241
who eventually admitted to me

0:08:18.241,0:08:20.583
that she was really a necrophiliac

0:08:20.583,0:08:23.385
and had taken this job after she got in trouble

0:08:23.385,0:08:25.330
down at the morgue.

0:08:25.330,0:08:29.486
(Laughter)

0:08:31.476,0:08:34.334
These experiences eventually allowed me to have

0:08:34.334,0:08:37.123
some happy physical relationships with women,

0:08:37.123,0:08:38.641
for which I'm grateful,

0:08:38.641,0:08:41.365
but I was at war with myself,

0:08:41.365,0:08:46.199
and I dug terrible wounds into my own psyche.

0:08:46.199,0:08:49.424
We don't seek the painful experiences

0:08:49.424,0:08:52.100
that hew our identities,

0:08:52.100,0:08:53.910
but we seek our identities

0:08:53.910,0:08:57.343
in the wake of painful experiences.

0:08:57.343,0:09:00.229
We cannot bear a pointless torment,

0:09:00.229,0:09:02.729
but we can endure great pain

0:09:02.729,0:09:05.904
if we believe that it's purposeful.

0:09:05.904,0:09:08.160
Ease makes less of an impression on us

0:09:08.160,0:09:09.643
than struggle.

0:09:09.643,0:09:12.100
We could have been ourselves without our delights,

0:09:12.100,0:09:14.376
but not without the misfortunes

0:09:14.376,0:09:17.207
that drive our search for meaning.

0:09:17.207,0:09:20.990
"Therefore, I take pleasure in infirmities,"

0:09:20.990,0:09:23.274
St. Paul wrote in Second Corinthians,

0:09:23.274,0:09:27.790
"for when I am weak, then I am strong."

0:09:27.790,0:09:30.735
In 1988, I went to Moscow

0:09:30.735,0:09:33.850
to interview artists of the Soviet underground,

0:09:33.850,0:09:35.723
and I expected their work to be

0:09:35.723,0:09:38.177
dissident and political.

0:09:38.177,0:09:41.235
But the radicalism in their work actually lay

0:09:41.235,0:09:44.160
in reinserting humanity into a society

0:09:44.160,0:09:46.343
that was annihilating humanity itself,

0:09:46.343,0:09:49.131
as, in some senses, Russian society

0:09:49.131,0:09:50.998
is now doing again.

0:09:50.998,0:09:53.585
One of the artists I met said to me,

0:09:53.585,0:09:57.996
"We were in training to be not artists but angels."

0:09:57.996,0:10:01.151
In 1991, I went back to see the artists

0:10:01.151,0:10:02.629
I'd been writing about,

0:10:02.629,0:10:04.778
and I was with them during the putsch

0:10:04.778,0:10:06.540
that ended the Soviet Union,

0:10:06.540,0:10:08.829
and they were among the chief organizers

0:10:08.829,0:10:11.855
of the resistance to that putsch.

0:10:11.855,0:10:15.274
And on the third day of the putsch,

0:10:15.274,0:10:18.313
one of them suggested we walk up to Smolenskaya.

0:10:18.313,0:10:19.595
And we went there,

0:10:19.595,0:10:22.854
and we arranged ourselves in[br]front of one of the barricades,

0:10:22.854,0:10:24.612
and a little while later,

0:10:24.612,0:10:26.873
a column of tanks rolled up,

0:10:26.873,0:10:28.910
and the soldier on the front tank said,

0:10:28.910,0:10:31.114
"We have unconditional orders

0:10:31.114,0:10:32.720
to destroy this barricade.

0:10:32.720,0:10:34.375
If you get out of the way,

0:10:34.375,0:10:35.940
we don't need to hurt you,

0:10:35.940,0:10:37.818
but if you won't move, we'll have no choice

0:10:37.818,0:10:39.531
but to run you down."

0:10:39.531,0:10:41.383
And the artists I was with said,

0:10:41.383,0:10:42.790
"Give us just a minute.

0:10:42.790,0:10:47.138
Give us just a minute to tell you why we're here."

0:10:47.138,0:10:49.194
And the soldier folded his arms,

0:10:49.194,0:10:53.794
and the artist launched into a[br]Jeffersonian panegyric to democracy

0:10:53.794,0:10:55.652
such as those of us who live

0:10:55.652,0:10:57.573
in a Jeffersonian democracy

0:10:57.573,0:11:00.868
would be hard-pressed to present.

0:11:00.868,0:11:02.624
And they went on and on,

0:11:02.624,0:11:04.627
and the soldier watched,

0:11:04.627,0:11:06.356
and then he sat there for a full minute

0:11:06.356,0:11:07.860
after they were finished

0:11:07.860,0:11:10.645
and looked at us so bedraggled in the rain,

0:11:10.645,0:11:14.322
and said, "What you have said is true,

0:11:14.322,0:11:17.938
and we must bow to the will of the people.

0:11:17.938,0:11:20.409
If you'll clear enough space for us to turn around,

0:11:20.409,0:11:22.863
we'll go back the way we came."

0:11:22.863,0:11:25.009
And that's what they did.

0:11:25.009,0:11:27.227
Sometimes, forging meaning

0:11:27.227,0:11:29.847
can give you the vocabulary you need

0:11:29.847,0:11:33.105
to fight for your ultimate freedom.

0:11:33.105,0:11:36.260
Russia awakened me to the lemonade notion

0:11:36.260,0:11:38.814
that oppression breeds the power to oppose it,

0:11:38.814,0:11:42.240
and I gradually understood that as the cornerstone

0:11:42.240,0:11:43.774
of identity.

0:11:43.774,0:11:48.459
It took identity to rescue me from sadness.

0:11:48.459,0:11:50.575
The gay rights movement posits a world

0:11:50.575,0:11:53.426
in which my aberrances are a victory.

0:11:53.426,0:11:57.054
Identity politics always works on two fronts:

0:11:57.054,0:12:00.109
to give pride to people who have a given condition

0:12:00.109,0:12:01.566
or characteristic,

0:12:01.566,0:12:03.242
and to cause the outside world

0:12:03.242,0:12:06.770
to treat such people more gently and more kindly.

0:12:06.770,0:12:10.288
Those are two totally separate enterprises,

0:12:10.288,0:12:12.113
but progress in each sphere

0:12:12.113,0:12:14.472
reverberates in the other.

0:12:14.472,0:12:18.221
Identity politics can be narcissistic.

0:12:18.221,0:12:21.549
People extol a difference only because it's theirs.

0:12:21.549,0:12:23.948
People narrow the world and function

0:12:23.948,0:12:26.999
in discrete groups without empathy for one another.

0:12:26.999,0:12:29.484
But properly understood

0:12:29.484,0:12:31.405
and wisely practiced,

0:12:31.405,0:12:33.396
identity politics should expand

0:12:33.396,0:12:35.923
our idea of what it is to be human.

0:12:35.923,0:12:37.641
Identity itself

0:12:37.641,0:12:40.190
should be not a smug label

0:12:40.190,0:12:42.274
or a gold medal

0:12:42.274,0:12:44.747
but a revolution.

0:12:44.747,0:12:48.313
I would have had an easier life if I were straight,

0:12:48.313,0:12:50.110
but I would not be me,

0:12:50.110,0:12:52.775
and I now like being myself better

0:12:52.775,0:12:54.828
than the idea of being someone else,

0:12:54.828,0:12:56.476
someone who, to be honest,

0:12:56.476,0:12:58.560
I have neither the option of being

0:12:58.560,0:13:01.037
nor the ability fully to imagine.

0:13:01.037,0:13:03.189
But if you banish the dragons,

0:13:03.189,0:13:05.754
you banish the heroes,

0:13:05.754,0:13:07.295
and we become attached

0:13:07.295,0:13:10.423
to the heroic strain in our own lives.

0:13:10.423,0:13:11.704
I've sometimes wondered

0:13:11.704,0:13:14.486
whether I could have ceased[br]to hate that part of myself

0:13:14.486,0:13:17.067
without gay pride's technicolor fiesta,

0:13:17.067,0:13:21.568
of which this speech is one manifestation.

0:13:21.568,0:13:24.465
I used to think I would know myself to be mature

0:13:24.465,0:13:27.319
when I could simply be gay without emphasis,

0:13:27.319,0:13:31.228
but the self-loathing of that period left a void,

0:13:31.228,0:13:34.963
and celebration needs to fill and overflow it,

0:13:34.963,0:13:38.657
and even if I repay my private debt of melancholy,

0:13:38.657,0:13:41.413
there's still an outer world of homophobia

0:13:41.413,0:13:44.302
that it will take decades to address.

0:13:44.302,0:13:47.617
Someday, being gay will be a simple fact,

0:13:47.617,0:13:50.466
free of party hats and blame,

0:13:50.466,0:13:51.984
but not yet.

0:13:51.984,0:13:54.733
A friend of mine who thought gay pride

0:13:54.733,0:13:56.647
was getting very carried away with itself,

0:13:56.647,0:13:58.211
once suggested that we organize

0:13:58.211,0:14:00.233
Gay Humility Week.

0:14:00.233,0:14:04.700
(Laughter) (Applause)

0:14:06.643,0:14:08.838
It's a great idea,

0:14:08.838,0:14:11.267
but its time has not yet come.

0:14:11.267,0:14:13.252
(Laughter)

0:14:13.252,0:14:15.451
And neutrality, which seems to lie

0:14:15.451,0:14:18.205
halfway between despair and celebration,

0:14:18.205,0:14:21.391
is actually the endgame.

0:14:21.391,0:14:23.911
In 29 states in the U.S.,

0:14:23.911,0:14:27.173
I could legally be fired or denied housing

0:14:27.173,0:14:29.339
for being gay.

0:14:29.339,0:14:31.960
In Russia, the anti-propaganda law

0:14:31.960,0:14:34.937
has led to people being beaten in the streets.

0:14:34.937,0:14:36.993
Twenty-seven African countries

0:14:36.993,0:14:39.891
have passed laws against sodomy,

0:14:39.891,0:14:42.130
and in Nigeria, gay people can legally

0:14:42.130,0:14:43.588
be stoned to death,

0:14:43.588,0:14:46.278
and lynchings have become common.

0:14:46.278,0:14:49.368
In Saudi Arabia recently, two men

0:14:49.368,0:14:51.273
who had been caught in carnal acts,

0:14:51.273,0:14:55.940
were sentenced to 7,000 lashes each,

0:14:55.940,0:14:59.339
and are now permanently disabled as a result.

0:14:59.339,0:15:01.210
So who can forge meaning

0:15:01.210,0:15:03.990
and build identity?

0:15:03.990,0:15:07.317
Gay rights are not primarily marriage rights,

0:15:07.317,0:15:10.253
and for the millions who live in unaccepting places

0:15:10.253,0:15:12.430
with no resources,

0:15:12.430,0:15:14.910
dignity remains elusive.

0:15:14.910,0:15:17.922
I am lucky to have forged meaning

0:15:17.922,0:15:19.988
and built identity,

0:15:19.988,0:15:22.285
but that's still a rare privilege,

0:15:22.285,0:15:25.114
and gay people deserve more collectively

0:15:25.114,0:15:28.550
than the crumbs of justice.

0:15:28.550,0:15:31.601
And yet, every step forward

0:15:31.601,0:15:33.667
is so sweet.

0:15:33.667,0:15:37.321
In 2007, six years after we met,

0:15:37.321,0:15:39.378
my partner and I decided

0:15:39.378,0:15:41.112
to get married.

0:15:41.112,0:15:43.294
Meeting John had been the discovery

0:15:43.294,0:15:45.150
of great happiness

0:15:45.150,0:15:48.250
and also the elimination of great unhappiness,

0:15:48.250,0:15:50.864
and sometimes, I was so occupied

0:15:50.864,0:15:53.365
with the disappearance of all that pain

0:15:53.365,0:15:55.717
that I forgot about the joy,

0:15:55.717,0:15:59.464
which was at first the less[br]remarkable part of it to me.

0:15:59.464,0:16:02.165
Marrying was a way to declare our love

0:16:02.165,0:16:06.151
as more a presence than an absence.

0:16:06.151,0:16:08.603
Marriage soon led us to children,

0:16:08.603,0:16:10.210
and that meant new meanings

0:16:10.210,0:16:14.462
and new identities, ours and theirs.

0:16:14.462,0:16:17.389
I want my children to be happy,

0:16:17.389,0:16:21.170
and I love them most achingly when they are sad.

0:16:21.170,0:16:23.850
As a gay father, I can teach them

0:16:23.850,0:16:26.527
to own what is wrong in their lives,

0:16:26.527,0:16:28.320
but I believe that if I succeed

0:16:28.320,0:16:30.640
in sheltering them from adversity,

0:16:30.640,0:16:33.530
I will have failed as a parent.

0:16:33.530,0:16:36.598
A Buddhist scholar I know once explained to me

0:16:36.598,0:16:38.567
that Westerners mistakenly think

0:16:38.567,0:16:40.922
that nirvana is what arrives

0:16:40.922,0:16:43.665
when all your woe is behind you

0:16:43.665,0:16:46.904
and you have only bliss to look forward to.

0:16:46.904,0:16:49.069
But he said that would not be nirvana,

0:16:49.069,0:16:50.579
because your bliss in the present

0:16:50.579,0:16:54.578
would always be shadowed by the joy from the past.

0:16:54.578,0:16:57.408
Nirvana, he said, is what you arrive at

0:16:57.408,0:16:59.790
when you have only bliss to look forward to

0:16:59.790,0:17:02.273
and find in what looked like sorrows

0:17:02.273,0:17:05.126
the seedlings of your joy.

0:17:05.126,0:17:06.837
And I sometimes wonder

0:17:06.837,0:17:09.230
whether I could have found such fulfillment

0:17:09.230,0:17:10.692
in marriage and children

0:17:10.692,0:17:12.745
if they'd come more readily,

0:17:12.745,0:17:16.770
if I'd been straight in my youth or were young now,

0:17:16.770,0:17:20.192
in either of which cases this might be easier.

0:17:20.192,0:17:21.771
Perhaps I could.

0:17:21.771,0:17:24.108
Perhaps all the complex imagining I've done

0:17:24.108,0:17:26.241
could have been applied to other topics.

0:17:26.241,0:17:27.881
But if seeking meaning

0:17:27.881,0:17:29.738
matters more than finding meaning,

0:17:29.738,0:17:33.101
the question is not whether I'd be happier

0:17:33.101,0:17:34.647
for having been bullied,

0:17:34.647,0:17:36.319
but whether assigning meaning

0:17:36.319,0:17:38.054
to those experiences

0:17:38.054,0:17:40.470
has made me a better father.

0:17:40.470,0:17:44.478
I tend to find the ecstasy hidden in ordinary joys,

0:17:44.478,0:17:46.437
because I did not expect those joys

0:17:46.437,0:17:48.965
to be ordinary to me.

0:17:48.965,0:17:50.782
I know many heterosexuals who have

0:17:50.782,0:17:53.048
equally happy marriages and families,

0:17:53.048,0:17:55.909
but gay marriage is so breathtakingly fresh,

0:17:55.909,0:17:59.213
and gay families so exhilaratingly new,

0:17:59.213,0:18:03.472
and I found meaning in that surprise.

0:18:03.472,0:18:06.910
In October, it was my 50th birthday,

0:18:06.910,0:18:10.128
and my family organized a party for me,

0:18:10.128,0:18:11.617
and in the middle of it,

0:18:11.617,0:18:13.034
my son said to my husband

0:18:13.034,0:18:14.700
that he wanted to make a speech,

0:18:14.700,0:18:15.694
and John said,

0:18:15.694,0:18:20.316
"George, you can't make a speech. You're four."

0:18:20.316,0:18:21.830
(Laughter)

0:18:21.830,0:18:24.166
"Only Grandpa and Uncle David and I

0:18:24.166,0:18:26.215
are going to make speeches tonight."

0:18:26.215,0:18:29.120
But George insisted and insisted,

0:18:29.120,0:18:32.123
and finally, John took him up to the microphone,

0:18:32.123,0:18:35.179
and George said very loudly,

0:18:35.179,0:18:37.623
"Ladies and gentlemen,

0:18:37.623,0:18:40.205
may I have your attention please."

0:18:40.205,0:18:42.920
And everyone turned around, startled.

0:18:42.920,0:18:45.027
And George said,

0:18:45.027,0:18:47.358
"I'm glad it's Daddy's birthday.

0:18:47.358,0:18:50.799
I'm glad we all get cake.

0:18:50.799,0:18:53.957
And daddy, if you were little,

0:18:53.957,0:18:57.224
I'd be your friend."

0:18:57.770,0:19:00.601
And I thought — Thank you.

0:19:00.601,0:19:02.900
I thought that I was indebted

0:19:02.900,0:19:04.695
even to Bobby Finkel,

0:19:04.695,0:19:07.432
because all those earlier experiences

0:19:07.432,0:19:09.800
were what had propelled me to this moment,

0:19:09.800,0:19:12.332
and I was finally unconditionally grateful

0:19:12.332,0:19:16.107
for a life I'd once have done anything to change.

0:19:16.107,0:19:18.152
The gay activist Harvey Milk

0:19:18.152,0:19:20.680
was once asked by a younger gay man

0:19:20.680,0:19:22.896
what he could do to help the movement,

0:19:22.896,0:19:24.307
and Harvey Milk said,

0:19:24.307,0:19:26.721
"Go out and tell someone."

0:19:26.721,0:19:29.345
There's always somebody who wants to confiscate

0:19:29.345,0:19:30.950
our humanity,

0:19:30.950,0:19:33.738
and there are always stories that restore it.

0:19:33.738,0:19:35.316
If we live out loud,

0:19:35.316,0:19:36.982
we can trounce the hatred

0:19:36.982,0:19:40.396
and expand everyone's lives.

0:19:40.396,0:19:44.020
Forge meaning. Build identity.

0:19:44.020,0:19:46.093
Forge meaning.

0:19:46.093,0:19:48.840
Build identity.

0:19:48.840,0:19:50.638
And then invite the world

0:19:50.638,0:19:52.334
to share your joy.

0:19:52.334,0:19:55.580
Thank you.

0:19:55.580,0:19:57.006
(Applause)

0:19:57.006,0:20:00.083
Thank you. (Applause)

0:20:00.083,0:20:04.182
Thank you. (Applause)

0:20:04.182,0:20:08.182
Thank you. (Applause)