Those of you who follow us on facebook
may wonder why we have
things like this on facebook
And I do hope everyone is following us
but if you follow us on facebook
you know that we have a laugh
in the afternoon everyday
Can you all see that?
So, you know, we have things
like this, or, things like this one
This one was just up earlier this week
It's a scientist tip on how you tell an
alligator from a crocodile
by whether the animal will see you later
or in a while. That's how you can tell
There's another way you can tell
the difference between them
and that is if the animal is singing
and dancing and playing a musical
instrument, it's certainly an alligator
Crocodiles would never do anything
like that, so why do we do this?
Why are we 'yucking' it up all the time
Well, the fact is that the topics we
deal with on a regular basis are very grim
We deal with a lot of dark stuff
As you just saw, our previous speaker,
practically in tears,
And he's not the only one that's going
through this type of stuff.
And one of the least fun things that
we deal with now, is child abuse.
These are not fun things to deal with.
So we laugh, we try to yuck it up and have
a good time, because if we don't,
we give up. We gotta be in it for the
long haul, which means you gotta be
able to, you know have some fun once
in a while. So that's why we have
stupid alligators and chick magnets
and things like that on our website
every afternoon.
So, I mentioned this pamphlet,
"Do you know a survivor
of the Sexual Revolution?"
If you open that up and study it,
you will not see survivors
of sexual abuse on there.
And the reason they're not on there
is because when I was working this out on
2013, I said to myself, "Well you know
there's always been sexual abuse,
it isn't really fair to attribute that to
the sexual revolution. And besides look at
all these other stuff we have to work on.
Isn't this enough for one organization?
And besides secretly, I didn't want to
deal with it because it's not...
It's awful. No one really wants to deal
with it, but then last year
these issues started coming up, with the
sexual harassment issues with
Harvey Weinstein, and all of these things
And you could kind of see that the girls
were trying to solve the #metoo movement
but they weren't really going to get it
done because they were kind of hanging
on to the sexual revolution.
They were hanging onto things they
shouldn't be hanging on to.
And, so I thought "You know, maybe we need
to be talking about this" And then
the whole thing, clergy sexual abuse
within the catholic church, and then I
just became really convinced
"yeah, we gotta deal with it"
First off, nobody else will deal with
the broad spectrum of the sexual
revolution like we will, so therefore
we're the only guys in the field.
And also the sexual revolution is deeply
implicated in this whole thing.
For this reason. The sexual revolution is
a set of ideas, and those ideas
empower predators. They encourage
predators. The core idea of the
sexual revolution is that everybody is
entitled to sex! Everybody is entitled to
guilt-free, child-free, problem-free, sex.
And anybody who says otherwise is
violating your human rights, for crying
out loud. Who really thinks
you're entitled to sex. I mean come on,
that's the view of a rapist. That's not
real to think you're entitled to sex.
So that one idea, has many tentacles
and is a very poisonous idea. And at the
same time, these ideas also undermine the
victims. They disarm the victims.
And so the sexual revolution is profoundly
implicated in the whole thing. And so,
that's what motivated me to reach out
to our next speaker, Moira Greyland Peat,
whom we're going to honor as
the public witness of the year.
I met Moira at an event sponsored by
in texas, and I heard her story of growing
up with openly, actively, gay, and
lesbian parents. She's the author of the
best selling book, "The Last Closet", and
she's the daughter of famous gay
authors, Marion Zimmer Bradley, and
Walter Breen. And this is a photo of Moira
there in the center with her mother
and her brother. Her mother was the
author of this series of books,
"The Mists of Avalon". She was married to
Walter Breen, who was also a famous author
Moira's mother had a long time lesbian
lover, and Walter Breen lived an active
homosexual life and was himself, an
unrepentant child molester. Both of her
parents sexual abused Moira and her
brother, for years. And since they were
famous authors, and icons really, in the
science fiction community, people didn't
really do much about it.
Her father enjoyed being in hot tubs
with children. Sometimes without any
clothes on, he would encourage
kids to get into the hot tub with him
without any clothes on. And numerous
adults saw or could have seen that the
kids were being groomed.
and really, for all practical purposes
nobody did anything about it.
As a teenager, Moira called the police
on her father, when she caught him
in the act of molesting an 11 year old boy
Her father was arrested, put in prison,
where he died, and her family considered
this an act of betrayal. Rather than
denying what her father did, her mother
said, "well children have the right to
make up their own lines about having sex
with adults. Her father had made his views
clear in this book called, "Greek Love",
and a journal called, "The Journal of
Greek Love", which she edited.
In 2014, Moira revealed all these things
about her parents. People were shocked,
and she was shocked, to find how many
people who were also children of gays,
reached out to her with similar stories.
So the last closet..... book
it not simply a taill of victimization
its also a tail that explain how her parent
became who they became
but more regad your self as lucky of one way
her life will pay resorted
as a result she is a successful professional
musician you wrote this girl
im taking this right of your bio
she is the founder and former artistic
director of the royal english opera
she is a ward winning dramatic color true
sabrentel. with the new life out of range
she is an acomplished concert harpest
singer composer recruting artist and
movie actress. topnight oops
tonight we're gonna hear her
tell her story and perhaps recite
a poem or tow from her work
but first of all help me welcome our
ruth institute public witness of the year
a ......
thank you so much .....
thank you
good eavning, how are you doing ?
usually when I'm in front of
crowd of people im sitting in the corner
with a harp and i dont have to talk
im just going to sit their hmmm
im the radio and that is i think very much
how i felt about my parents
for a long time. im just going to watch
and not say anything i want just
to play the harp over here
anyway