The gift of being gay: Karen McCrocklin at TEDxTurtleCreekWomen

Karen McCrocklin is on a mission to celebrate the gift of being gay. As a storyteller, writer and radio host, she is committed to changing the narrative to include the idea that LGBT people are here to elevate the collective consciousness and teach us about how we are more alike than we are different. Karen also believes that being born a lesbian is the best thing that could have ever happened to her.

When I tell people that being a lesbian

is the best thing
that ever happened to me,

I'm never really that sure
how that's going to go.

Sometimes, not a big deal.

Others times, it feels
like a revolutionary gesture.

I have a friend whose name is Tina,

and we've known each other
since we were little girls.

And she is this big mouth,

big hair, big hearted,

big make-up Texas woman.

I absolutely adore her.

She's been married to her husband

for, probably, over twenty years, I guess.

And they have great kids,

and they've got a great life.

And it's a very different life than mine.

But the thing, and the best thing,

that we have in common

is that we're both really happy.

Now, I'm pretty sure she's still
holding a grudge

over the time in fifth grade,

when I cut her Barbie's hair

and dressed it in G.I. Joe clothes...
(Laughter)

And we're kind of unlikely friends,

but I adore her.

So, last summer, she invited me

to go to this seminar.

It was one of those
Ninja Internet Marketing

for World Domination kind of things.

And everybody there was going to be

like a super high achiever,

like the people that just sold
their start-up to Google

and now they're training
for the Olympics.

So... (Laughter). Right, that's right.

So, we're all in the car,
on the way there, and she said,

"What are you going to tell
people you do, if they ask you?"

And I said, "Well, I guess I'm going
to tell them the truth,

which is that I write and talk to people

about how being a lesbian is the best
thing that ever happened to me."

And she said, "You are not!"

And I said, "What?"

And she said, "I don't understand

why it is that you think

you have to keep telling people that.

Things are getting so much better
for you all.

In fact, I'm not even really that sure

why you think that you need
to tell people

you are a lesbian
in the first place."

I said, "What do you mean?"
And she said, "Well, for starters,

your hair". (Laughter)

"And sweater vest and jeans,
and sneakers.

And blazers, a lot of blazers."

(Laughter)

Now, I like to think...

(Laughter)

...that I am part of a grand tradition,

and that is my tribal guard.

(Laughter)

But if somebody decides to assume

that I'm a lesbian, from a mile away,

before they've ever even met me,

I am totally great with that,

because, for me, being lesbian,
gay, bisexual,

transgender, LGBT is a gift.

And I think that's an idea
worth spreading.

So, that's what I want
to talk about today.

First, why would anybody think

that something that is
so widely regarded

as a challenge to overcome,

or as a reason to feel disenfranchised

and angry is a gift?

And, second, why do we have
to keep talking about it?

So, if you were to look back

across the continuum of time,

through time immemorial,

and pick any point on that timeline,

you'll find a group, you'll find a race,

you'll find an ethnicity,
you'll find a religion,

you'll find some group

that has come to the forefront

as the catalyst for change.

In my life time,

it's been us.

Now, of course you can't
compare the journeys

of all these different groups.

Everyone has its own challenge,

which's got its own cultural repertoire,

very complex stuff.

But the thing that is true of all of them

is that every time we've had

a dialog as a society about these groups

and gone through this process,

it's elevated
the collective consciousness.

We learn about tolerance,

we learn about acceptance,

we learn about interconnectedness

and we learn about the ways

in which we are more alike
than we are different.

I am incredibly proud and grateful

to have been alive at a time

when my people were the chosen.

Incredibly proud, incredibly grateful,

because we are the current event

on what Dr. King called
the arc of the moral universe,

that bends towards justice.

So, not only do I think
that it's a gift,

I think it's a purpose,

it's a part of something much bigger.

And the other thing
we've learned from history

is that, once our society's changed
its level of acceptance,

it doesn't go backwards.

Nobody says, "We should have
never given women the vote."

Well, maybe. (Laughter)

Nobody says, "Bring back separate
drinking fountains."

Or even, "Hey! Whatever happened

to that throwing Christians
to the lions thing?"

It doesn't happen.

Now, if you are an inveterate
TED talk watcher, like I am,

you've probably seen
a few about compassion,

or authenticity, or vulnerability.

In fact, we've heard about some
of those things today.

It's part of our contemporary dialog,

we are living in this upward-driven search

for the "aha" moment.

It's everywhere.

We trade wise and insightful quotes
on social media

like baseball cards.

I went to the Big Box hardware store

to buy a lawn mower,

and there were curtains
of inspirational sayings,

next to the laundry detergent.

(Laughter)

It's everywhere.

And the important thing for me,

and the thing that I've begun to know,

is that, as lesbian, gay, bisexual,

transgender, LGBT people,

we deal with these themes
early and often.

You remember sitting
in a Literature class,

learning about man's inhumanity to man,

or the individual versus society?

We deal with this stuff
every single day.

And so, in a way, it propels us
towards a higher consciousness,

towards a different way
of looking at the world.

There's woman sitting here
in the audience today,

and some of you met her upstairs.

Her name is Shery.

Shery's parents have not spoken to her

in thirty two years,

since, as a seventeen-year-old,

she came and told them
she was a lesbian,

and they kicked her out of the house.

Imagine that!

Here's the striking thing, though.

Here's what Shery says.

Shery says, "Yeah, it's an incredibly
painful experience."

But she wouldn't have any other way,

because what it's taught her

is that she didn't have
to modify who she is.

She doesn't have
to make compromises

to make other people happy.

The only person whose happiness

she's responsible for is her own.

She's a walking example
of how to take adversity

and turn it into a better,
higher version of yourself.

Now, we are all familiar

with the fear of rejection.
Everybody knows it.

Tina's fourteen-year-old

locked herself in her room,

sobbing for a couple of days,

because some people
were mean to her on Facebook,

and they unfriended her.

We've all felt what that feels like,
when somebody says,

"Er! There's something
about you that is not OK."

We know what that's like,

But those are the times

when we get to decide
what is OK, in here.

Now, when I first came out,

there were plenty of times
I would have told you

being a lesbian was the worst thing

that ever happened to me.

Higher consciousness was not really
on my radar.

I was mostly interested in,
"Where I'm going to find

some other gay people and girls
that will date me?"

(Laughter)

But, as I began to meet people,

as I began to get out into this world,

I saw people who made the decision
and the choice

to lie, to edit and to hide

behind this wall of shame
that they've created,

because that was going
to keep them safe,

because it's scary.

And I was scared too, but I did

what a lot of people do
when they're scared:

I got angry,

because that brings you
a little jolt of power!

I marched, I protested...

It never stopped for me.

I was incredibly, incredibly angry,

because all of those things were true,

and some of them still are.

But I remember a day
when there was a man,

and I screamed at him,

until it felt like my lungs
were bleeding,

because he was holding
a sign that said,

"God hates fags."

And then, I went home

and I realized that
I probably hadn't done

a lot to change
that man's opinion that day.

(Laughter)

And that really,
what being angry was doing

was keeping me from showing up
as who I am,

which is a person who believes
that love should win.

Now, all of those thIngs that
I was angry about are true

and, certainly, protest, dissent
are critical

in the face of injustice.

But so is love. So, the trick
is to find the balance.

One of my favorite quotes
is from Dr. Wayne Dyre.

He says, "When you change the way
you look at things,

the things you look at change."

And it's true.

Whatever it is that I'm out there

looking for it in the world

it's the first thing
that I am going to see.

Except my car keys.

(Laughter)

But what I choose,
the person I want to be,

what I choose today is to see

that my experiences as a lesbian

have taught me
to go deeper and bigger

than I ever would have, otherwise.

Being a part of a marginalized group

has given me a sensitivity

towards oppression

and just towards people in general.

It's changed the way I look
at all of those things.

And what it's taught me
is to look for the similarities,

before I look for the differences.

It's an amazing thing to understand.

And the other thing
that I've learned from my community

is that we're already equal.

We are working to change
the laws to reflect that.

And the other thing

is that the only thing
I really have to loose is myself.

So, that brings us
to the second question,

which is: why do we have
to keep talking about this?

Well, all those groups
that I was talking about before,

the difference between us and them,

from LGBT people and them,

is that, for the most part,

they all have had the support

or, at least,
a shared common experience

with their families.

I heard the comedian Wanda Sykes
in the perfect statement.

She said that, for her,

the difference between being
black and gay

was that she didn't have
to tell her parents

that she was black.

(Laughter)

And it's true.

Nobody knows, unless we talk about it.

And we do it over, and over,
and over again.

And the good thing about that is --

and the thing that we have seen

all of the research show --

it's that the thing that most changes

people's negative opinions about us

it's knowing us! It's exposure to us!

So, we have to talk about it,

because that's what's
creating the change.

There's a whole cycle that exists for us.

When we do things like, say,

"Hi! My name is Karen,
and I'm a lesbian",

it changes society.

Now, I heard a guy the other day,

and he was a gay man.

And he was doing this thing,

this very wistful kind of thing of,

"Oh... Wouldn't it be great?

I can't wait for the day

when we don't have
to go through this stuff anymore,

when people stop making assumptions
about each other."

And I thought, "I can't wait
fot that day either!"

But, rather than sitting
and wishing for it,

what I want to do
is keep taking about it,

until we make it happen.

So, I have other friends
on the other end of the spectrum

that study queer theory
and sexual identity,

and they write doctoral dissertations

on things like rejecting
the hetero normative paradigm,

and the dissolution
of the gender binary

and things like that.
And it's fascinating.

It's an incredibly fascinating topic.

Really cutting edge stuff.

But, when we're talking,
I always have to remind them

that I'm over here with cousins

that write me letters that say,
"You're going to hell!"

And they refer to my girlfriend
of twelve years

as "that woman".

The academics are here,

my cousins are here,

(Laughter)

and it's a big conversation.

So, OK. When I found out
I was going to do this talk,

I had to call Tina.

"Hi! I'm going to do a TEDx talk!

I'm so excited, I can't wait."

She was like,
"Girl, that's wonderful!

What are you going to talk about?"

(Laughter)

And I said,
"Hum, about how being a lesbian

is the best thing
that ever happened to me."

And she said,
"Good. Do you know why?

Because last week, I was
talking to a woman at my church

and she was very upset,

because she thinks her son is gay,

and she doesn't know
how to talk to him about it.

She doesn't know what to say."

And she said, "And, because
I have been hanging around,

listening to you, I felt like I knew

what to say to support her."

And I said, "What would you say?"

And she said, "Well, I told her

that she should not worry
about what to say,

or saying the wrong thing.

She should just start talking.

And that she should make sure

that he knows that she loves him.

And then, I told her
that being gay was a gift."

And I'm on the other
end of the phone, going... [Yeah!].

(Laughter)

But then, I pushed it too far,

and I said, "Well, did you tell her

that being gay
could be the best thing

that ever happened to you?"

And she hung up the phone on me!

(Laughter)

But I think about that woman and son

and this is what I know:

no matter what happens

with parental support, legal advances,

societal acceptance,

the thing that is never
going to change

is that moment
-- and it is a lonely moment --

when you look in that mirror

and you say, "There's something

about me that is different

and nobody else knows it.

And now, I have to summon the courage

to go and tell them."

And that's not a gay thing,

that's not a straight thing.
That's a human thing.

So, this is what I want you
to take away from this:

when you get a call or in a conversation,

next week, next month, next year

-- and it's going to happen --

about this topic,
with somebody that's struggling,

or trying to find the right words,

you have a choice
about who you want to be.

You can choose to stand there,
with every ounce

of empathy, compassion
and humanity that you have,

in an effort to make and find

a point of connection,

because that's where
everything good really starts.

In fact, I would say

that the ability to find
that point of connection

in every interaction in your life

is a gift.

My name is Karen

and being a lesbian is the best thing

that ever happened to me.

Thank you.

(Applause)