1
00:00:00,763 --> 00:00:05,737
You're looking at a woman
who was publicly silent for a decade.

2
00:00:06,711 --> 00:00:08,537
Obviously, that's changed,

3
00:00:08,967 --> 00:00:10,381
but only recently.

4
00:00:11,051 --> 00:00:12,629
It was several months ago

5
00:00:12,629 --> 00:00:15,602
that I gave my very first
major public talk

6
00:00:15,602 --> 00:00:18,217
at the Forbes 30 Under 30 summit:

7
00:00:18,217 --> 00:00:22,431
1,500 brilliant people,
all under the age of 30.

8
00:00:23,101 --> 00:00:25,865
That meant that in 1998,

9
00:00:25,865 --> 00:00:29,452
the oldest among the group were only 14,

10
00:00:29,452 --> 00:00:32,299
and the youngest, just four.

11
00:00:33,039 --> 00:00:36,628
I joked with them that some
might only have heard of me

12
00:00:36,628 --> 00:00:38,580
from rap songs.

13
00:00:38,580 --> 00:00:41,727
Yes, I'm in rap songs.

14
00:00:41,727 --> 00:00:45,424
Almost 40 rap songs. (Laughter)

15
00:00:46,614 --> 00:00:50,109
But the night of my speech,
a surprising thing happened.

16
00:00:50,109 --> 00:00:56,355
At the age of 41, I was hit on
by a 27-year-old guy.

17
00:00:57,155 --> 00:00:59,331
I know, right?

18
00:01:00,301 --> 00:01:02,914
He was charming and I was flattered,

19
00:01:02,914 --> 00:01:04,687
and I declined.

20
00:01:05,387 --> 00:01:08,331
You know what his
unsuccessful pickup line was?

21
00:01:09,141 --> 00:01:12,461
He could make me feel 22 again.

22
00:01:12,461 --> 00:01:17,407
(Laughter) (Applause)

23
00:01:18,637 --> 00:01:23,908
I realized later that night,
I'm probably the only person over 40

24
00:01:23,908 --> 00:01:26,509
who does not want to be 22 again.

25
00:01:26,509 --> 00:01:29,109
(Laughter)

26
00:01:29,109 --> 00:01:32,969
(Applause)

27
00:01:35,269 --> 00:01:40,294
At the age of 22,
I fell in love with my boss,

28
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and at the age of 24,

29
00:01:43,115 --> 00:01:46,547
I learned the devastating consequences.

30
00:01:47,667 --> 00:01:50,848
Can I see a show of hands of anyone here

31
00:01:50,848 --> 00:01:55,361
who didn't make a mistake
or do something they regretted at 22?

32
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Yep. That's what I thought.

33
00:02:00,648 --> 00:02:06,428
So like me, at 22, a few of you
may have also taken wrong turns

34
00:02:06,428 --> 00:02:09,466
and fallen in love with the wrong person,

35
00:02:09,466 --> 00:02:11,428
maybe even your boss.

36
00:02:12,378 --> 00:02:14,973
Unlike me, though, your boss

37
00:02:14,973 --> 00:02:19,052
probably wasn't the president
of the United States of America.

38
00:02:19,802 --> 00:02:24,098
Of course, life is full of surprises.

39
00:02:24,098 --> 00:02:29,021
Not a day goes by that I'm not
reminded of my mistake,

40
00:02:29,021 --> 00:02:31,294
and I regret that mistake deeply.

41
00:02:33,404 --> 00:02:40,026
In 1998, after having been swept up
into an improbable romance,

42
00:02:40,026 --> 00:02:45,488
I was then swept up into the eye
of a political, legal and media maelstrom

43
00:02:45,488 --> 00:02:49,535
like we had never seen before.

44
00:02:49,535 --> 00:02:51,877
Remember, just a few years earlier,

45
00:02:51,877 --> 00:02:54,879
news was consumed from just three places:

46
00:02:54,879 --> 00:02:57,551
reading a newspaper or magazine,

47
00:02:57,551 --> 00:02:59,386
listening to the radio,

48
00:02:59,386 --> 00:03:01,004
or watching television.

49
00:03:01,004 --> 00:03:02,304
That was it.

50
00:03:02,304 --> 00:03:06,259
But that wasn't my fate.

51
00:03:06,259 --> 00:03:09,881
Instead, this scandal was brought to you

52
00:03:09,881 --> 00:03:12,281
by the digital revolution.

53
00:03:12,281 --> 00:03:15,988
That meant we could access
all the information we wanted,

54
00:03:15,988 --> 00:03:20,283
when we wanted it, anytime, anywhere,

55
00:03:20,283 --> 00:03:24,973
and when the story broke in January 1998,

56
00:03:24,973 --> 00:03:27,759
it broke online.

57
00:03:27,759 --> 00:03:30,760
It was the first time the traditional news

58
00:03:30,760 --> 00:03:35,283
was usurped by the Internet
for a major news story,

59
00:03:35,283 --> 00:03:39,504
a click that reverberated
around the world.

60
00:03:40,484 --> 00:03:42,922
What that meant for me personally

61
00:03:42,922 --> 00:03:48,040
was that overnight I went
from being a completely private figure

62
00:03:48,040 --> 00:03:53,487
to a publicly humiliated one worldwide.

63
00:03:53,487 --> 00:03:57,782
I was patient zero
of losing a personal reputation

64
00:03:57,782 --> 00:04:02,338
on a global scale almost instantaneously.

65
00:04:03,588 --> 00:04:05,927
This rush to judgment,
enabled by technology,

66
00:04:05,927 --> 00:04:10,042
led to mobs of virtual stone-throwers.

67
00:04:10,042 --> 00:04:13,101
Granted, it was before social media,

68
00:04:13,101 --> 00:04:16,653
but people could still comment online,

69
00:04:16,653 --> 00:04:22,881
email stories, and, of course,
email cruel jokes.

70
00:04:22,881 --> 00:04:25,970
News sources plastered
photos of me all over

71
00:04:25,970 --> 00:04:29,754
to sell newspapers, banner ads online,

72
00:04:29,754 --> 00:04:32,293
and to keep people tuned to the TV.

73
00:04:33,913 --> 00:04:37,462
Do you recall a particular image of me,

74
00:04:37,462 --> 00:04:39,924
say, wearing a beret?

75
00:04:41,224 --> 00:04:44,219
Now, I admit I made mistakes,

76
00:04:44,219 --> 00:04:47,087
especially wearing that beret.

77
00:04:48,267 --> 00:04:52,556
But the attention and judgment
that I received, not the story,

78
00:04:52,556 --> 00:04:56,920
but that I personally received,
was unprecedented.

79
00:04:56,920 --> 00:05:00,079
I was branded as a tramp,

80
00:05:00,079 --> 00:05:06,627
tart, slut, whore, bimbo,

81
00:05:06,627 --> 00:05:09,405
and, of course, that woman.

82
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I was seen by many

83
00:05:13,220 --> 00:05:16,608
but actually known by few.

84
00:05:16,608 --> 00:05:20,186
And I get it: it was easy to forget

85
00:05:20,186 --> 00:05:22,787
that that woman was dimensional,

86
00:05:22,787 --> 00:05:26,755
had a soul, and was once unbroken.

87
00:05:29,505 --> 00:05:34,404
When this happened to me 17 years ago,
there was no name for it.

88
00:05:34,404 --> 00:05:38,801
Now we call it cyber-bullying
and online harassment.

89
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Today, I want to share
some of my experience with you,

90
00:05:43,917 --> 00:05:48,351
talk about how that experience has helped
shape my cultural observations,

91
00:05:48,351 --> 00:05:53,203
and how I hope my past experience
can lead to a change that results

92
00:05:53,203 --> 00:05:55,641
in less suffering for others.

93
00:05:58,221 --> 00:06:03,494
In 1998, I lost my reputation
and my dignity.

94
00:06:03,494 --> 00:06:06,994
I lost almost everything,

95
00:06:06,994 --> 00:06:10,105
and I almost lost my life.

96
00:06:12,905 --> 00:06:15,299
Let me paint a picture for you.

97
00:06:17,319 --> 00:06:20,866
It is September of 1998.

98
00:06:20,866 --> 00:06:23,552
I'm sitting in a windowless office room

99
00:06:23,552 --> 00:06:26,616
inside the Office
of the Independent Counsel

100
00:06:26,616 --> 00:06:31,051
underneath humming fluorescent lights.

101
00:06:31,051 --> 00:06:34,882
I'm listening to the sound of my voice,

102
00:06:34,882 --> 00:06:38,620
my voice on surreptitiously
taped phone calls

103
00:06:38,620 --> 00:06:41,756
that a supposed friend
had made the year before.

104
00:06:41,756 --> 00:06:45,331
I'm here because
I've been legally required

105
00:06:45,331 --> 00:06:51,194
to personally authenticate
all 20 hours of taped conversation.

106
00:06:53,194 --> 00:06:57,181
For the past eight months,
the mysterious content of these tapes

107
00:06:57,181 --> 00:07:01,129
has hung like the sword
of Damocles over my head.

108
00:07:01,129 --> 00:07:05,215
I mean, who can remember
what they said a year ago?

109
00:07:05,215 --> 00:07:09,303
Scared and mortified, I listened,

110
00:07:11,013 --> 00:07:15,555
listened as I prattle on
about the flotsam and jetsam of the day;

111
00:07:15,555 --> 00:07:19,426
listen as I confess my love
for the President,

112
00:07:19,426 --> 00:07:22,805
and, of course, my heartbreak;

113
00:07:22,805 --> 00:07:27,623
listen to my sometimes catty,
sometimes churlish, sometimes silly self

114
00:07:27,623 --> 00:07:32,342
being cruel, unforgiving, uncouth;

115
00:07:33,262 --> 00:07:36,121
listen, deeply, deeply ashamed,

116
00:07:36,121 --> 00:07:38,805
to the worst version of myself,

117
00:07:38,805 --> 00:07:42,317
a self I don't even recognize.

118
00:07:44,537 --> 00:07:48,659
A few days later, the Starr Report
is released to Congress,

119
00:07:48,659 --> 00:07:53,770
and all of those tapes and transcripts,
those stolen words, form a part of it.

120
00:07:54,790 --> 00:07:58,961
That people can read the transcripts
is horrific enough,

121
00:07:58,961 --> 00:08:01,708
but a few weeks later,

122
00:08:01,708 --> 00:08:05,005
the audio tapes are aired on TV,

123
00:08:05,005 --> 00:08:08,591
and significant portions
made available online.

124
00:08:10,661 --> 00:08:15,245
The public humiliation was excruciating.

125
00:08:15,245 --> 00:08:18,708
Life was almost unbearable.

126
00:08:20,938 --> 00:08:26,054
This was not something that happened
with regularity back then in 1998,

127
00:08:26,054 --> 00:08:31,836
and by this, I mean the stealing
of people's private words, actions,

128
00:08:31,836 --> 00:08:34,459
conversations, or photos,

129
00:08:34,459 --> 00:08:37,038
and then making them public;

130
00:08:37,038 --> 00:08:39,475
public without consent;

131
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public without context;

132
00:08:41,937 --> 00:08:44,531
and public without compassion.

133
00:08:46,091 --> 00:08:49,181
Fast forward 12 years to 2010,

134
00:08:49,181 --> 00:08:52,338
and now social media has been born.

135
00:08:53,158 --> 00:08:58,190
The landscape has sadly become much
more populated with instances like mine,

136
00:08:58,190 --> 00:09:01,208
whether or not someone
actually make a mistake,

137
00:09:01,208 --> 00:09:06,920
and now it's for both public
and private people.

138
00:09:06,920 --> 00:09:11,849
The consequences for some
have become dire, very dire.

139
00:09:13,799 --> 00:09:16,347
I was on the phone with my mom

140
00:09:16,347 --> 00:09:19,064
in September of 2010,

141
00:09:19,064 --> 00:09:20,921
and we were talking about the news

142
00:09:20,921 --> 00:09:23,713
of a young college freshman
from Rutgers University

143
00:09:23,713 --> 00:09:25,866
named Tyler Clemente.

144
00:09:26,656 --> 00:09:29,804
Sweet, sensitive, creative Tyler

145
00:09:29,804 --> 00:09:32,183
was secretly webcammed by his roommate

146
00:09:32,183 --> 00:09:34,956
while being intimate with another man.

147
00:09:36,826 --> 00:09:39,264
When the online world
learned of this incident,

148
00:09:39,264 --> 00:09:42,399
the ridicule and cyber-bullying ignited.

149
00:09:44,079 --> 00:09:45,998
A few days later,

150
00:09:45,998 --> 00:09:49,714
Tyler jumped from 
the George Washington Bridge

151
00:09:49,714 --> 00:09:51,247
to his death.

152
00:09:51,247 --> 00:09:53,194
He was 18.

153
00:09:55,644 --> 00:10:00,347
My mom was beside herself about
what happened to Tyler and his family,

154
00:10:00,347 --> 00:10:02,902
and she was gutted with pain

155
00:10:02,902 --> 00:10:06,570
in a way that I just couldn't
quite understand,

156
00:10:06,570 --> 00:10:08,940
and then eventually I realized

157
00:10:08,940 --> 00:10:11,921
she was reliving 1998,

158
00:10:11,921 --> 00:10:15,954
reliving a time when she sat
by my bed every night,

159
00:10:18,824 --> 00:10:24,797
reliving a time when she made me shower
with the bathroom door open,

160
00:10:24,797 --> 00:10:28,907
and reliving a time
when both of my parents feared

161
00:10:28,907 --> 00:10:31,857
that I would be humiliated to death,

162
00:10:31,857 --> 00:10:34,169
literally.

163
00:10:36,339 --> 00:10:39,286
Today, too many parents

164
00:10:39,286 --> 00:10:42,628
haven't had the chance to step in
and rescue their loved ones.

165
00:10:42,628 --> 00:10:46,809
Too many have learned
of their child's suffering and humiliation

166
00:10:46,809 --> 00:10:49,374
after it was too late.

167
00:10:49,944 --> 00:10:54,541
Tyler's tragic, senseless death
was a turning point for me.

168
00:10:54,541 --> 00:10:58,582
It served to recontextualize
my experiences,

169
00:10:58,582 --> 00:11:02,877
and I then began to look at the world
of humiliation and bullying around me

170
00:11:02,877 --> 00:11:06,360
and see something different.

171
00:11:06,360 --> 00:11:11,584
In 1998, we had no way of knowing
where this brave new technology

172
00:11:11,584 --> 00:11:14,254
called the Internet would take us.

173
00:11:14,254 --> 00:11:18,462
Since then, it has connected people
in unimaginable ways,

174
00:11:18,462 --> 00:11:20,379
joining lost siblings,

175
00:11:20,379 --> 00:11:24,450
saving lives, launching revolutions,

176
00:11:24,450 --> 00:11:29,300
but the darkness, cyber-bullying,
and slut-shaming that I experienced

177
00:11:29,300 --> 00:11:31,805
had mushroomed.

178
00:11:33,145 --> 00:11:37,845
Every day online, people,
especially young people

179
00:11:37,845 --> 00:11:40,772
who are not developmentally
equipped to handle this,

180
00:11:40,772 --> 00:11:43,304
are so abused and humiliated

181
00:11:43,304 --> 00:11:45,996
that they can't imagine living
to the next day,

182
00:11:45,996 --> 00:11:49,145
and some, tragically, don't,

183
00:11:49,145 --> 00:11:51,901
and there's nothing virtual about that.

184
00:11:53,551 --> 00:11:56,598
ChildLine, a U.K. nonprofit that's focused

185
00:11:56,598 --> 00:11:59,616
on helping young people on various issues,

186
00:11:59,616 --> 00:12:03,309
released a staggering statistic
late last year:

187
00:12:03,309 --> 00:12:06,930
from 2012 to 2013,

188
00:12:06,930 --> 00:12:10,204
there was an 87 percent increase

189
00:12:10,204 --> 00:12:15,080
in calls and emails related
to cyber-bullying.

190
00:12:15,080 --> 00:12:17,262
A meta-analysis done
out of the Netherlands

191
00:12:17,262 --> 00:12:21,977
showed that for the first time,
cyberbullying was leading

192
00:12:21,977 --> 00:12:24,299
to suicidal ideations

193
00:12:24,299 --> 00:12:28,199
more significantly than offline bullying.

194
00:12:28,199 --> 00:12:31,960
And you know what shocked me,
although it shouldn't have,

195
00:12:31,960 --> 00:12:35,897
was other research last year
that determined humiliation

196
00:12:35,897 --> 00:12:38,895
was a more intensely felt emotion

197
00:12:38,895 --> 00:12:42,955
than either happiness or even anger.

198
00:12:44,305 --> 00:12:47,490
Cruelty to others is nothing new,

199
00:12:47,490 --> 00:12:53,870
but online, technologically
enhanced shaming is amplified,

200
00:12:53,870 --> 00:12:59,187
uncontained, and permanently accessible.

201
00:12:59,187 --> 00:13:04,877
The echo of embarrassment used to extend
only as far as your family, village,

202
00:13:04,877 --> 00:13:07,221
school, or community,

203
00:13:07,221 --> 00:13:11,099
but now it's the online community too.

204
00:13:11,099 --> 00:13:13,941
Millions of people, often anonymously,

205
00:13:13,941 --> 00:13:17,934
can stab you with their words,
and that's a lot of pain,

206
00:13:17,934 --> 00:13:21,070
and there are no perimeters
around how many people

207
00:13:21,070 --> 00:13:23,158
can publicly observe you

208
00:13:23,158 --> 00:13:26,577
and put you in a public stockade.

209
00:13:27,717 --> 00:13:30,186
There is a very personal price

210
00:13:30,186 --> 00:13:32,300
to public humiliation,

211
00:13:33,130 --> 00:13:38,901
and the growth of the Internet
has jacked up that price.

212
00:13:39,841 --> 00:13:42,268
For nearly two decades, now,

213
00:13:42,268 --> 00:13:46,386
we have slowly been sowing the seeds
of shame and public humiliation

214
00:13:46,386 --> 00:13:52,207
in our cultural soil, both on and offline.

215
00:13:52,207 --> 00:13:57,105
Gossip websites, paparazzi,
reality programming, politics,

216
00:13:57,105 --> 00:14:00,031
news outlets, and sometimes hackers,

217
00:14:00,031 --> 00:14:03,050
all traffic in shame.

218
00:14:03,050 --> 00:14:07,159
It's led to desensitization
and a permissive environment online

219
00:14:07,159 --> 00:14:13,521
which lends itself to trolling,
invasion of privacy, and cyber-bullying.

220
00:14:13,521 --> 00:14:17,306
This shift has created
what Professor Nicolaus Mills calls

221
00:14:17,306 --> 00:14:21,090
a culture of humiliation.

222
00:14:21,090 --> 00:14:26,269
Consider a few prominent examples
just from the past six months alone.

223
00:14:26,269 --> 00:14:31,353
Snapchat, the service which is used
mainly by younger generations

224
00:14:31,353 --> 00:14:34,048
and claims that its messages
only have the lifespan

225
00:14:34,048 --> 00:14:35,751
of a few seconds.

226
00:14:35,751 --> 00:14:39,161
You can imagine the range
of content that that gets.

227
00:14:39,161 --> 00:14:43,294
A third party app which Snapchatters
use to preserve the lifespan

228
00:14:43,294 --> 00:14:45,988
of the messages was hacked,

229
00:14:45,988 --> 00:14:52,838
and 100,000 personal conversations,
photos, and videos were leaked online

230
00:14:52,838 --> 00:14:57,095
to now have a lifespan of forever.

231
00:14:57,095 --> 00:15:01,251
Jennifer Lawrence and several other actors
had their iCloud accounts hacked,

232
00:15:01,251 --> 00:15:05,198
and private, intimate, nude photos
were plastered across the Internet

233
00:15:05,198 --> 00:15:07,080
without their permission.

234
00:15:07,080 --> 00:15:11,212
One gossip website
had over five million hits

235
00:15:11,212 --> 00:15:13,787
for this one story.

236
00:15:15,027 --> 00:15:18,526
And what about the Sony Pictures
cyber-hacking?

237
00:15:18,526 --> 00:15:21,523
The documents which received
the most attention

238
00:15:21,523 --> 00:15:27,559
were private emails that had
maximum public embarrassment value.

239
00:15:27,559 --> 00:15:30,809
But in this culture of humiliation,

240
00:15:30,809 --> 00:15:34,899
there is another kind of price tag
attached to public shaming.

241
00:15:35,639 --> 00:15:38,797
The price does not measure
the cost to the victim,

242
00:15:38,797 --> 00:15:41,050
which Tyler and too many others,

243
00:15:41,050 --> 00:15:43,024
notably women, minorities,

244
00:15:43,024 --> 00:15:47,202
and members of the LGBTQ
community have paid,

245
00:15:47,202 --> 00:15:51,758
but the price measures the profit
of those who prey on them.

246
00:15:52,868 --> 00:15:56,931
This invasion of others is a raw material,

247
00:15:56,931 --> 00:16:02,921
efficiently and ruthlessly mined,
packaged, and sold at a profit.

248
00:16:02,921 --> 00:16:08,703
A marketplace has emerged
where public humiliation is a commodity

249
00:16:08,703 --> 00:16:12,047
and shame is an industry.

250
00:16:12,047 --> 00:16:15,739
How is the money made?

251
00:16:15,739 --> 00:16:17,573
Clicks.

252
00:16:17,573 --> 00:16:20,104
The more shame, the more clicks.

253
00:16:20,104 --> 00:16:23,958
The more clicks,
the more advertising dollars.

254
00:16:25,428 --> 00:16:27,633
We're in a dangerous cycle.

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The more we click on this kind of gossip,

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the more numb we get
to the human lives behind it,

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and the more numb we get,
the more we click.

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All the while, someone is making money

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off of the back of someone else's suffering.

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With every click, we make a choice.

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The more we saturate our culture
with public shaming,

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the more accepted it is,

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the more we will see behavior
like cyber-bullying,

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trolling, some forms of hacking,

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and online harassment.

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Why? Because they all have
humiliation at the cores.

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This behavior is a symptom
of the culture we've created.

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Just think about it.

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Changing behavior begins
with evolving beliefs.

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We've seen that to be true
with racism, homophobia,

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and plenty of other biases,
today and in the past.

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As we've changed beliefs
about same sex marriage,

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more people have been
offered equal freedoms.

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When we began valuing sustainability,

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more people began to recycle.

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So as far as our culture
of humiliation goes,

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what we need is a cultural revolution.

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Public shaming
as a blood sport has to stop,

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and it's time for an intervention
on the Internet and in our culture.

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The shift begins with something simple,
but it's not easy.

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We need to return to a long-held value
of compassion, compassion and empathy.

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Online, we've got a compassion deficit,

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an empathy crisis.

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Researcher Brené Brown said, and I quote,

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"Shame can't survive empathy."

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Shame cannot survive empathy.

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I've seen some very dark days in my life,

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and it was the compassion and empathy
from my family, friends, professionals,

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and sometimes even strangers
that saved me.

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Even empathy from one person
can make a difference.

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The theory of minority influence,

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proposed by social psychologist
Serge Moscovici,

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says that even in small numbers,

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when there's consistency over time,

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change can happen.

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In the online world,
we can foster minority influence

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by becoming upstanders.

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To become an upstander means
instead of bystander apathy,

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we can post a positive comment for someone
or report a bullying situation.

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Trust me: compassionate comments
help abate the negativity.

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We can also counteract the culture
by supporting organizations

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that deal with these kinds of issues,

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like the Tyler Clemente
Foundation in the U.S.,

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In the U.K., there's Anti-Bullying Pro,

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and in Australia, there's Project Rockit.

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We talk a lot about our right
to freedom of expression,

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but we need to talk more about

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our responsibility
to freedom of expression.

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We all want to be heard,

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but let's acknowledge the difference
between speaking up with intention

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and speaking up for attention.

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The Internet is 
the superhighway for the id,

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but online, showing empathy to others

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benefits us all and helps create
a safer and better world.

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We need to communicate
online with compassion,

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consume news with compassion,

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and click with compassion.

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Just imagine walking a mile
in someone else's headline.

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I'd like to end on a personal note.

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In the past nine months,

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the question I've been 
asked the most is why.

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Why now? Why was I 
sticking my head above the parapet?

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You can read between the lines
in those questions,

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and the answer has nothing
to do with politics.

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The top node answer was and is

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because it's time:

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time to stop tip-toeing around my past;

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time to stop living a life of opprobrium;

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and time to take back my narrative.

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It's also not just about saving myself.

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Anyone who is suffering from shame
and public humiliation

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needs to know one thing:

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you can survive it.

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I know it's hard.

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It may not be painless, quick, or easy,

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but you can insist
on a different ending to your story.

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Have compassion for yourself.

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We all deserve compassion,

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and to live both online and off
in a more compassionate world.

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Thank you for listening.

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(Applause)