Speech from Red, White, and Royal Blue

 

 

Here is a great speech text and video link from Red, White, and Royal Blue. Like most speeches, it’s part informative and part persuasive. I think this would be an excellent speech for use in a public speaking, persuasion, or ethics course.

“Good morning.

Henry and I have been together since the beginning of this year. As many of you have already read, we’ve struggled everyday with what this means for our families, our countries and our futures. And while neither of us is naive about what it means to be public figures, we never imagined our most private and intimate thoughts, fears and truths would become fodder for public examination.

What was taken from us this week was our right to determine for ourselves how and when we should share our relationship and queer identities with the world.

The truth is every queer person has the right to come out on their own terms, and on their own timeline. They also have the right to choose not to come out at all. The forced conformity of the closet cannot be answered with the forced conformity in coming out of it.

This isn’t about shame. This is about privacy and the fundamental right of self-determination which are exactly the principles on which the struggle for queer liberation has always been fought.

But there is another truth that is much simpler: I fell in love with a person who happens to be a man and that man happens to be a prince. He has captured my heart and made my life immeasurably better.

I love his Royal Highness, Prince Henry George Edward James Hanover-Stuart Fox. I hope one day we’ll have the opportunity to be public about our relationship on our own terms.”

Here is the link to the video of this speech: https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/relatedvideo?&q=video+link+for+Alex%27s+speech+in+Red+white+and+royal+blue&&mid=442BFFC9D9B30E200214442BFFC9D9B30E200214&&FORM=VRDGAR

 

 

Gay History

 

Yesterday, TCM ran Night and Day, the biopic of Cole Porter. In it Cary Grant plays the famed songwriter/composer Cole Porter and Alexis Smith plays his loving wife. Apart from whatever merits or lack of them that this movie possessed, it’s a great example of how gay people are robbed of their history. Cole Porter was gay but this is never shown; instead you see a heterosexual male deeply in love with his wife. It’s a good example of how the media—at least in the 40’s but into the 21^st century as well, contributed (along with political, religious, and social institutions) to deny gay people a legitimacy, a presence, a history. 

Also yesterday, the New York Times ran an article on “Helping a Child to Come Out” (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/07/fashion/helping-a-gay-child-to-come-out.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0), perhaps an indication of how much society has progressed, perhaps an indication of how little society has changed.

            Among the interesting things pointed out in the article are these:

1.      Gay teens have higher rates of alcohol and drug abuse, depression, and suicide than their heterosexual counterparts. Helen Kahn, the director of the Family Project of the Human Rights Campaign, attributes this to the stress of being different, of being stigmatized and the problems that come with reactions from “friends” and family.

2.      Despite the attendant difficulties of coming out, one survey found that closeted gay children had an even harder time than those who did come out. Those who came out were significantly happier than those who remained in the closet.

3.      Parents need to listen to their children—often between the lines—so that they can help the child come out in his or her own time. Parents also need to show that their love is unconditional, that the home is a safe place where the child can discuss anything.