-
Not Synced
In the summer of 2017,
-
Not Synced
a woman was murdered
by her partner in Sofia.
-
Not Synced
The woman, let's call her Vee,
-
Not Synced
was beaten for over 50 minutes
-
Not Synced
before she died.
-
Not Synced
The morning after,
-
Not Synced
her neighbors told the press
that they heard her screams,
-
Not Synced
but they didn't intervene.
-
Not Synced
You see, in Bulgaria
-
Not Synced
and many other societies,
-
Not Synced
domestic violence is typically seen
as a private matter.
-
Not Synced
Neighbors, however, are quick to react
to any other kind of noise.
-
Not Synced
We wanted to expose and affect
the absurdity of this,
-
Not Synced
so we designed an experiment.
-
Not Synced
We rented the apartment
just below Vee's for one night,
-
Not Synced
and at 10pm,
-
Not Synced
Maxim, the artist in our group,
-
Not Synced
sat on the drum set
we had assembled in the living room
-
Not Synced
and started beating it.
-
Not Synced
Ten seconds.
-
Not Synced
Thirty seconds.
-
Not Synced
Fifty seconds.
-
Not Synced
A minute.
-
Not Synced
A light came on in the hallway.
-
Not Synced
One minute and 20 seconds.
-
Not Synced
A man was standing at the door,
hesitant to press the bell.
-
Not Synced
One minute and fifty-two seconds.
-
Not Synced
The doorbell rang,
-
Not Synced
a ring that could have saved a life.
-
Not Synced
Beat is our project exploring
the ominous silence
-
Not Synced
surrounding domestic violence.
-
Not Synced
We filmed the experiment
and it became instantly viral.
-
Not Synced
Our campaign amplified
the voices of survivors
-
Not Synced
who shared similar stories online.
-
Not Synced
It equipped neighbors
with specific advice,
-
Not Synced
and many committed to taking action.
-
Not Synced
In a country where every other week,
-
Not Synced
the ground quietly embraces
the body of a woman
-
Not Synced
murdered by a partner or a relative,
-
Not Synced
we were loud and we were heard.
-
Not Synced
I am an activist,
-
Not Synced
passionate about human rights innovation.
-
Not Synced
I lead a global organization
for socially engaged creative solutions.
-
Not Synced
In my work, I think about
how to make people care and act.
-
Not Synced
I am here to tell you
-
Not Synced
that creative actions can save the world,
-
Not Synced
creative actions and play,
-
Not Synced
and I know it is weird to talk about play
and human rights in the same sentence,
-
Not Synced
but here is why it is important.
-
Not Synced
More and more, we fear
that we can't win this.
-
Not Synced
Campaigns feel dull,
-
Not Synced
messages drown,
-
Not Synced
people break.
-
Not Synced
Numerous studies, including a recent one
published by Columbia University,
-
Not Synced
show that burnout and depression
are widespread amongst activists.
-
Not Synced
Years ago, I myself was burned out.
-
Not Synced
In a world of endless ways forward,
I felt at my final stop.
-
Not Synced
So what melts fear or dullness or gloom?
-
Not Synced
Play.
-
Not Synced
From this very stage, psychiatrist
and play researcher Dr. Stuart Brown
-
Not Synced
said that nothing
lights up the brain like play,
-
Not Synced
and that the opposite of play is not work,
-
Not Synced
it's depression.
-
Not Synced
So to pull out of my own burnout,
-
Not Synced
I decided to turn my activism
into what I call today playtivism.
-
Not Synced
(Laughter)
-
Not Synced
When we play, others want to join.
-
Not Synced
Today, my playground
is filled with artists,
-
Not Synced
techies, and scientists.
-
Not Synced
We fuse disciplines
in radical collaboration.
-
Not Synced
Together, we seek new ways
to empower activism.
-
Not Synced
Our outcomes are not
meant to be playful,
-
Not Synced
but our process is.
-
Not Synced
To us, play is an act of resistance.
-
Not Synced
For example, Beat,
-
Not Synced
the project I talked about earlier,
-
Not Synced
is a concept developed by a drummer
and a software engineer
-
Not Synced
who didn't know each other
two days before they pitched the idea.
-
Not Synced
Beat is the first winner in our lab series
-
Not Synced
where we pair artists and technologists
to work on human rights issues.
-
Not Synced
Other winning concepts
include a pop-up bakery
-
Not Synced
that teaches about fake news through
beautiful but horrible-tasting cupcakes
-
Not Synced
(Laughter)
-
Not Synced
or a board game that puts you
in the shoes of a dictator
-
Not Synced
so you get to really grasp the range
of tools and tactics of oppression.
-
Not Synced
We did our first lab
just to test the idea,
-
Not Synced
to see where it cracks
and if we can make it better.
-
Not Synced
Today, we are so in love with the format
that we put it all online
-
Not Synced
for anyone to implement.
-
Not Synced
I cannot overstate the value
of experimentation in activism.
-
Not Synced
We can only win
if we are not afraid to lose.
-
Not Synced
When we play, we learn.
-
Not Synced
A recent study published
by Stanford University
-
Not Synced
about the science
of what makes people care
-
Not Synced
reconfirms what we have
been hearing for years:
-
Not Synced
opinions are changed
not from more information
-
Not Synced
but through empathy and using experiences.
-
Not Synced
So learning from science and art,
-
Not Synced
we saw that we can talk about
global armed conflict through light bulbs,
-
Not Synced
or address racial inequality in the US
-
Not Synced
through postcards,
-
Not Synced
or tackle the lack of even
one single monument of a woman in Sofia
-
Not Synced
by flooding the city with them,
-
Not Synced
and with all these works
-
Not Synced
to trigger dialogue,
understanding, and direct action.
-
Not Synced
Sometimes, when I talk about
taking risks and trying and failing
-
Not Synced
in the context of human rights,
-
Not Synced
I meet raised eyebrows,
-
Not Synced
eyebrows that say, "How irresponsible,"
-
Not Synced
or, "How insensitive."
-
Not Synced
People often mistake play for negligence.
-
Not Synced
It is not.
-
Not Synced
Play doesn't just grow our armies stronger
or spark better ideas.
-
Not Synced
In times of painful injustice,
-
Not Synced
play brings the levity we need
to be able to breathe.
-
Not Synced
When we play, we live.
-
Not Synced
I grew up in a time
-
Not Synced
when all play was forbidden.
-
Not Synced
My family's lives were crushed
by a communist dictatorship.
-
Not Synced
For my aunt, my grandfather, my father,
-
Not Synced
we always held two funerals,
-
Not Synced
one for their bodies, but,
years before that, one for their dreams.
-
Not Synced
Some of my biggest dreams are nightmares.
-
Not Synced
I have a nightmare that one day
all the past will be forgotten
-
Not Synced
and new clothes will be dripping
the blood of past mistakes.
-
Not Synced
I have a nightmare
-
Not Synced
that one day the lighthouses
of our humanity will crumble,
-
Not Synced
corroded by acid waves of hate.
-
Not Synced
But way more than that, I have hope.
-
Not Synced
In our fights for justice and freedom,
-
Not Synced
I hope that we play,
-
Not Synced
and that we see the joy
and beauty of us playing together.
-
Not Synced
That's how we win.
-
Not Synced
Thank you.
-
Not Synced
(Applause)