[This talk contains mature content] My mother called this summer to stage an intervention. She'd come across a few snippets of my memoir, which wasn't even out yet, and she was concerned. It wasn't the sex.
[Ovaj govor predstavlja sadržaj za odrasle] Letos me je majka nazvala kako bi intervenisala. Naletela je na nekoliko odlomaka iz mojih memoara, koji još uvek nisu bili objavljeni, i bila je zabrinuta. Nije se radilo o seksu.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
It was the language that disturbed her.
Jezik ju je uznemirio.
For example: "I have been so many things along my curious journey: a poor boy, a nigger, a Yale man, a Harvard man, a faggot, a Christian, a crack baby, alleged, the spawn of Satan, the Second Coming, Casey." That's just page six.
Na primer: „Bio sam toliko toga tokom mog neobičnog putovanja: siromašni dečak, crnčuga, čovek sa Jejla, čovek sa Harvarda, peder, hrišćanin, dete ovisnice o kreku, navodno, potomak Satane, drugi Hristov dolazak, Kejsi.“ To je tek šesta strana.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
So you may understand my mother's worry. But she wanted only to make one small change. So she called, and she began, "Hey, you are a man. You're not a faggot, you're not a punk, and let me tell you the difference. You are prominent. You are intelligent. You dress well. You know how to speak. People like you. You don't walk around doing your hand like a punk. You're not a vagabond on the street. You are an upstanding person who just happens to be gay. Don't put yourself over there when you are over here."
Pa možete da razumete majčinu zabrinutost. Međutim, htela je samo da unese jednu malu ispravku. Pa je nazvala i otpočela je: „Hej, ti si čovek. Nisi peder, nisi propalica, i dozvoli da ti kažem razliku. Ti si ugledan. Ti si inteligentan. Oblačiš se lepo. Znaš da se izražavaš. Sviđaš se ljudima. Ne šetaš okolo sa ispruženom rukom kao propalica. Nisi ulična skitnica. Ti si cenjena osoba koja je igrom slučaja gej. Ne smeštaj sebe tamo kada ti je mesto ovde.“
She thought she'd done me a favor, and in a way, she had. Her call clarified what I am trying to do with my life and in my work as a writer, which is to send one simple message: the way we're taught to live has got to change. I learned this the hard way.
Mislila je da mi je učinila uslugu, a na neki način i jeste. Njen poziv je razjasnio ono što pokušavam da učinim u životu i u svom poslu kao pisac, a to je da pošaljem jednu prostu poruku: način na koji smo naučili da živimo mora da se promeni. Naučio sam ovo na teži način.
I was born not on the wrong side of the tracks, but on the wrong side of a whole river, the Trinity, down in Oak Cliff, Texas. I was raised there in part by my grandmother who worked as a domestic, and by my sister, who adopted me a few years after our mother, who struggled with mental illness, disappeared. And it was that disappearance, that began when I was 13 and lasted for five years, that shaped the person I became, the person I later had to unbecome. Before she left, my mother had been my human hiding place. She was the only other person who seemed as strange as me, beautifully strange, some mix of Blanche DuBois from "A Streetcar Named Desire" and a 1980s Whitney Houston.
Nisam rođen na pogrešnom koloseku, već skroz na pogrešnoj strani reke Triniti, dole u Oak Klifu u Teksasu. Tu su me podigli naizmenično moja baka, koja je radila kao kućna pomoćnica, i moja sestra, koja me je usvojila nekoliko godina nakon što je naša majka, koja je bolovala od mentalne bolesti, nestala. A taj nestanak, koji je počeo kad mi je bilo 13 godina i trajao je pet godina, oblikovao me je u osobu koja sam postao, osobu koja sam kasnije morao da prestanem da budem. Pre nego što je otišla, moja majka je bila moje ljudsko skrovište. Bila je jedina druga osoba koja se činila jednako neobičnom kao ja, prelepo neobičnom, nekakav spoj Blanš Duboa iz „Tramvaja zvanog čežnja“ i Vitni Hjuston iz 1980-ih.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
I'm not saying she was perfect, just that I sure benefited from her imperfections. And maybe that's what magic is, after all: a useful mistake. So when she began to disappear for days at a time, I turned to some magic of my own. It struck me, as from above, that I could conjure up my mother just by walking perfectly from my elementary school at the top of a steep hill all the way down to my grandmother's house, placing one foot, and one foot only, in each sidewalk square. I couldn't let any part of any foot touch the line between the square, I couldn't skip a square, all the way to the last square at the last blade of grass that separated our lawn from our driveway. And I bullshit you not, it worked -- just once though.
Ne kažem da je bila savršena, već da sam zasigurno imao koristi od njenih nesavršenosti. A možda je, naposletku, baš u tome čarolija: u korisnoj grešci. Pa kad je počela da nestaje, ponekad danima, okrenuo sam se nekakvoj sopstvenoj čaroliji. Sinulo mi je, kao iz neba, da mogu da prizovem moju majku prosto hodajući savršeno od moje osnovne škole na vrhu strmog brda, pa skroz dole do bakine kuće, smeštajući jedno stopalo, i to samo jedno stopalo u svaki kvadrat na trotoaru. Nisam dozvoljavao deliću ijednog stopala da dotakne liniju između kvadrata, nisam smeo da preskočim kvadrat, sve do poslednjeg kvadrata kod poslednje vlati trave koja je razdvajala naš travnjak od ulaza u dvorište. I ne zezam vas, delovalo je - iako samo jednom.
But if my perfect walk could not bring my mother back, I found that this approach had other uses. I found that everyone else in charge around me loved nothing more than perfection, obedience, submission. Or at least if I submitted, they wouldn't bother me too much. So I took a bargain that I'd later see in a prison, a Stasi prison in Berlin, on a sign that read, "He who adapts can live tolerably." It was a bargain that helped ensure I had a place to stay and food to eat; a bargain that won me praise of teachers and kin, strangers; a bargain that paid off big time, it seemed, when one day at 17, a man from Yale showed up at my high school to recruit me for Yale's football team. It felt as out of the blue to me then as it may to you now. The Yale man said -- everybody said -- that this was the best thing that could ever happen to me, the best thing that could happen to the whole community. "Take this ticket, boy," they told me. I was not so sure. Yale seemed another world entire: a cold, foreign, hostile place. On the first day of my recruiting visit, I texted my sister an excuse for not going. "These people are so weird." She replied, "You'll fit right in."
Međutim, ako moj savršeni hod nije mogao da vrati moju majku, otkrio sam da ovaj pristup ima druge primene. Otkrio sam da svi ostali autoriteti oko mene vole jedino savršenstvo, poslušnost, pokornost. Ili će me bar, ako se potčinim, manje uznemiravati. Pa sam prihvatio pogodbu koju ću kasnije da vidim u zatvoru, Štazijinom zatvoru u Berlinu, na znaku na kom je pisalo: „Onaj ko se prilagodi može da živi podnošljivo.“ Bila je to pogodba koja je obezbeđivala da imam smeštaj i hranu; pogodba koja mi je donela pohvale nastavnika i rodbine, stranaca; pogodba koja se isplatila uveliko, kako se činilo, kada se jednog dana u mojoj 17. godini čovek sa Jejla pojavio u mojoj srednjoj školi da me vrbuje za fudbalsku ekipu sa Jejla. Činilo mi se tada neočekivanim kao što se možda sada čini vama. Čovek sa Jejla je rekao - svi su rekli - da je to nešto najbolje što je moglo da mi se desi, nešto najbolje što je moglo da se desi čitavoj zajednici. „Uzmi ovu ulaznicu, dečače“, rekli su mi. Nisam bio baš siguran. Jejl se činio kao potpuno drugi svet: hladno, strano, neprijateljsko mesto. Prvog dana moje regruterske posete, poslao sam poruku sestri kao izgovor što mi se nije išlo. „Ovi ljudi su tako čudni.“ Odgovorila je: „Savršeno ćeš se uklopiti.“
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
I took the ticket and worked damn hard to fit right in. When my freshman advisor warned me not to wear my fitted hats on campus ... "You're at Yale now. You don't have to do that anymore," she said. I figured, this was just one of the small prices that must be paid to make it. I paid them all, or tried, and sure enough they seemed to pay me back: made me a leader on the varsity football team; got me into a not-so-secret society and a job on Wall Street, and later in Washington. Things were going so well that I figured naturally I should be President of the United States.
Prihvatio sam ulaznicu i prokleto se silno trudio da se uklopim. Kada me je moja savetnica za brucoše upozorila da ne nosim kačkete na kampusu: „Sada si na Jejlu. Ne moraš više to da radiš“, rekla je. Mislio sam kako je ovo tek jedna od manjih cena koja mora da se plati zarad uspeha. Sve sam ih platio, ili sam pokušao, i veoma brzo su počele, kako se činilo, da mi uzvraćaju: postao sam vođa prve fudbalske ekipe; upao sam u ne tako tajno društvo i dobio posao na Vol stritu, a kasnije u Vašingtonu. Stvari su tako dobro išle da sam prirodno smatrao da bi trebalo da budem predsednik SAD-a.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
But since I was only 24 and since even presidents have to start somewhere, I settled instead on a run for Congress. Now, this was in the afterglow of that great 2008 election: the election during which a serious, moderate senator stressed, "The message you've got to send more than any other message is that Barack Obama is just like us." They sent that message so well that their campaign became the gold standard of modern politics, if not modern life, which also seems to demand that we each do whatever it takes to be able to say at the end of our days with peace and satisfaction, "I was just like everybody else." And this would be my message, too.
Međutim, kako su mi bile tek 24 godine, a kako čak i predsednici moraju da počnu negde, umesto toga sam se zadovoljio kandidaturom za kongres. Sad, ovo je bilo nakon velikih izbora iz 2008, izbora tokom kojih je ozbiljni, umereni senator naglasio: „Poruka koju morate da pošaljete više od bilo koje druge poruke je da je Barak Obama isti kao mi.“ Toliko dobro su poslali tu poruku da je njihova kampanja postala zlatni standard savremene politike, ako ne i savremenog života koji, kako se čini, takođe zahteva da svi mi uradimo šta god je potrebno da bismo mogli reći na kraju naših dana, pomireni i sa zadovoljstvom: „Bio sam isti kao i svi drugi.“ A to bi bila i moja poruka.
So one night, I made one final call to my prospective campaign manager. We'd do the things it'd take to win, but first he had one question: "Is there anything I need to know?" I held the phone and finally said, "Well, you should probably know I'm gay."
Pa sam jedne noći obavio poslednji poziv sa mojim uvaženim menadžerom kampanje. Uradićemo što je potrebno da pobedimo, ali prvo je imao jedno pitanje: „Ima li nešto što bi trebalo da znam?“ Držao sam telefon i naposletku rekao: „Pa, verovatno bi trebalo da znaš da sam gej.“
Silence.
Tišina.
"Hmm. I see," he nearly whispered, as if he'd found a shiny penny or a dead baby bird.
„Hmm. Razumem“, skoro da je prošaputao, kao da je pronašao blistavi novčić ili mrtvu ptičicu.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
"I'm glad you told me," he continued. "You definitely didn't make my job any easier. I mean, you are in Texas. But it's not impossible, not impossible. But Casey, let me ask you something: How are you going to feel when somebody, say, at a rally, calls you a faggot? And let's be real, OK? You do understand that somebody might want to physically harm you. I just want to know: Are you really ready for this?"
„Drago mi je što si mi rekao“, nastavio je. „Definitivno mi nisi olakšao posao. Mislim, u Teksasu si. Međutim, nije nemoguće, nije nemoguće. Kejsi, dozvoli da te nešto pitam: kako ćeš da se osećaš kada te neko, recimo na mitingu, nazove pederom? I budimo realni, u redu? Razumeš da će neko možda želeti da te fizički povredi. Samo želim da znam: da li si stvarno spreman za ovo?“
I wasn't. And I could not understand -- could hardly breathe or think, or say a word. But to be clear: the boy that I was at that time would have leapt at the chance to be harmed, to sacrifice everything, even life, for a cause. There was something shocking, though -- not that there should have been, but there was -- in the notion that he might be harmed for nothing more than being himself, which he had not even tried to do in the first place. All that he -- all that I -- had tried to do and be was what I thought was asked of me. I was prominent for a 24-year-old: intelligent, I spoke well, dressed decent; I was an upstanding citizen. But the bargain I had accepted could not save me after all, nor can it save you. You may have already learned this lesson, or you will, regardless of your sexuality. The queer receives a concentrated dose, no doubt, but repression is a bitter pill that's offered to us all. We're taught to hide so many parts of who we are and what we've been through: our love, our pain, for some, our faith. So while coming out to the world can be hard, coming in to all the raw, strange magic of ourselves can be much harder. As Miles Davis said, "It takes a long time to sound like yourself." That surely was the case for me.
Nisam bio. I nisam mogao da razumem - jedva sam mogao da dišem, razmišljam ili progovorim. Da pojasnim: dečak koji sam tad bio bi se zaleteo na priliku da bude povređen, da žrtvuje sve, čak i život, zarad cilja. Bilo je tu nešto šokantno, ipak - ne znači da je trebalo da bude, ali bilo je - u pomisli da bi mogao da bude povređen samo zbog toga što je to što jeste, a što prvenstveno nije ni pokušavao da bude. Sve što je on - sve što sam ja - pokušavao da budem i što sam bio je bilo ono što sam smatrao da se traži od mene. Bio sam ugledan za 24-godišnjaka: inteligentan, lepo sam se izražavao, pristojno odevao; bio sam uzoran građanin. Međutim, pogodba koju sam prihvatio ipak nije mogla da me spasi, a ne može da spasi ni vas. Možda ste već naučili ovu lekciju ili ćete naučiti, bez obzira na vašu seksualnost. Kvir pojedinci dobijaju koncentrisanu dozu, nesumnjivo, ali represija je gorka tableta koju nude svima nama. Naučeni smo da skrivamo toliko delova nas samih i onog kroz šta smo prošli: našu ljubav, naš bol, neki i našu veru. Iako razotkrivanje pred svetom može da bude teško, zadiranje u sirovu, čudnovatu čaroliju nas samih može da bude još teže. Kao što je Majls Dejvis govorio: "Potrebno je dugo vremena da zazvučite kao vi." To je zasigurno bio moj slučaj.
I had my private revelation that night at 24, but mostly went on with my life. I went on to Harvard Business School, started a successful nonprofit, wound up on the cover of a magazine, on the stage at TED.
Imao sam lično prosvetljenje te noći sa 24 godine, ali sam uglavnom nastavio dalje sa životom. Krenuo sam na Poslovnu školu na Harvardu, osnovao uspešnu neprofitnu organizaciju, završio na naslovnici časopisa, na sceni TED-a.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
I had achieved, by my late 20s, about everything a kid is supposed to achieve. But I was real cracked up: not exactly having a nervous breakdown, but not too far off, and awful sad either way. I had never thought of being a writer, didn't even read, in earnest, until I was nearly 23. But the book business is about the only industry that will pay you to investigate your own problems, so --
Postigao sam do kasnih dvadesetih otprilike sve što bi klinac trebalo da ostvari. Međutim, zaista sam se slamao. Nisam baš imao nervni slom, ali nisam ni bio predaleko od toga, i svakako sam bio veoma tužan. Nikad nisam pomišljao da postanem pisac, nisam čak ni previše čitao, sve do svoje skoro 23. godine. Međutim, knjižarstvo je otprilike jedina industrija koja vam plaća da istražujete sopstvene probleme, pa -
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
So I decided to give it a try, to trace those cracks with words.
Pa sam odlučio da se okušam, da pokušam rečima da opišem te pukotine.
Now, what came out on the page was about as strange as I felt at that time, which alarmed some people at first. A respected writer called to stage his own intervention after reading a few early chapters, and he began, much like my mother, "Hey, listen. You've been hired to write an autobiography. It's a straightforward exercise. It's got a beginning, middle and end, and is grounded in the facts of your life. And by the way, there's a great tradition of autobiography in this country, led by people on the margins of society who write to assert their existence. Go buy some of those books and learn from them. You're going in the wrong direction."
Sad, ono što je izašlo na papir je bilo čudno kao i moja osećanja tada, a to je u početku uznemirilo neke ljude. Jedan uvaženi pisac me je nazvao kako bi i sam intervenisao nakon što je pročitao nekoliko prvih poglavlja i otpočeo je, baš poput moje majke: „Hej, slušaj. Angažovan si da napišeš autobiografiju. To je jednostavna vežba. Ima početak, sredinu i kraj, i zasnovana je na činjenicama iz tvog života. I usput, imamo značajnu tradiciju autobiografskog pisanja u našoj državi, predvođenu ljudima sa margina društva koji pišu da bi istakli svoje postojanje. Kupi neke od tih knjiga i uči od njih. Ideš u pogrešnom smeru.“
But I no longer believed what we are taught -- that the right direction is the safe direction. I no longer believed what we are taught -- that queer lives or black lives or poor lives are marginal lives. I believed what Kendrick Lamar says on "Section.80.": "I'm not on the outside looking in. I'm not on the inside looking out. I'm in the dead fucking center looking around."
Međutim, više nisam verovao u ono čemu su nas podučavali - da je pravi smer bezbedan smer. Više nisam verovao čemu su nas podučavali - da su životi kvir ljudi ili crnaca ili siromašnih marginalni životi. Verovao sam u ono što Kendrik Lamar kaže u pesmi „Section.80“: „Ne gledam spolja ka unutra. Ne gledam iznutra ka spolja. Tačno sam u jebenom središtu i osvrćem se okolo.“
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
That was the place from which I hoped to work, headed in the only direction worth going, the direction of myself, trying to help us all refuse the awful bargains we've been taught to take. We're taught to turn ourselves and our work into little nuggets that are easily digestible; taught to mutilate ourselves so that we make sense to others, to be a stranger to ourselves so the right people might befriend us and the right schools might accept us, and the right jobs might hire us, and the right parties might invite us, and, someday, the right God might invite us to the right heaven and close his pearly gates behind us, so we can bow down to Him forever and ever. These are the rewards, they say, for our obedience: to be a well-liked holy nugget, to be dead.
To je bilo mesto sa kog sam se nadao da ću da delam, zapućen u jedinom pravcu u kom se vredi kretati, u pravcu sebe, pokušavajući da pomognem svima nama da odbacimo užasnu pogodbu koju smo naučili da prihvatamo. Naučeni smo da pretvorimo sebe i svoja dela u sićušne zalogaje koje je lako svariti; naučeni smo da se sakatimo kako bismo imali smisla drugima, da budemo stranci sebi samima kako bi smo se sprijateljili s pravim ljudima i kako bi nas prave škole primile i da bismo se zaposlili na pravim poslovima, i kako bi nas pozvali na prave žurke, i kako bi nas, jednog dana, pravi bog pozvao u pravi raj i zatvorio svoja biserna vrata za nama, kako bismo mogli da mu se klanjamo na vek vekova. Ovo su nagrade, kažu, za našu poslušnost: da postanete uvaženi sveti zalogaj, da budete mrtvi.
And I say in return, "No, thank you." To the world and to my mother. Well, to tell you the truth, all I said was, "OK, Mom, I'll talk to you later."
A ja kažem na to: „Ne, hvala.“ Svetu i mojoj majci. Pa, da budem iskren, samo sam rekao: „U redu, mama, pričaćemo kasnije.“
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
But in my mind, I said, "No, thank you." I cannot accept her bargain either. Nor should you. It would be easy for many of us in rooms like this to see ourselves as safe, to keep ourselves over here. We speak well, we dress decent, we're intelligent, people like us, or act like they do.
Međutim, u sebi sam rekao: „Ne, hvala.“ Ne mogu ni njenu pogodbu da prihvatim. A ne treba ni vi. Bilo bi lako za mnoge od nas u prostorijama poput ove da na sebe gledamo kao da smo na bezbednom, da se držimo tu. Lepo se izražavamo, pristojno odevamo, inteligentni smo, sviđamo se ljudima, ili se oni ponašaju kao da im se sviđamo.
But instead, I say that we should remember Lot's wife. Jesus of Nazareth said it first to his disciples: "Remember Lot's wife." Lot, in case you haven't read the Bible recently, was a man who set his family down in Sodom, in the midst of a wicked society that God decided he had to destroy. But God, being cruel, yet still a sap in part, rushed two angels out to Sodom to warn Lot to gather up his folks and get out of Dodge. Lot heard the angel's warning, but delayed. They didn't have all day to wait, so they grabbed Lot's hands and his two daughters' hands, and his wife's hands, and hurried them out of Sodom. And the angels shout, "Escape to the mountain. Whatever you do, don't look back," just as God starts raining down fire on Sodom and Gomorrah. I can't figure out how Gomorrah got dragged into this. But Lot and his folks are running, fleeing all that destruction, kicking up dust while the Lord rains down death, and then, for some reason, Lot's wife looks back. God turns her into a pillar of salt. "Remember Lot's wife," Jesus says.
Međutim, umesto toga, tvrdim da bi trebalo da se setimo Lotove žene. Isus iz Nazareta je to prvo rekao svojim učenicima: „Setite se Lotove žene.“ Lot, u slučaju da niste skoro čitali Bibliju, je bio čovek koji se smestio sa porodicom dole u Sodomi, u središtu rđavog društva koje je Bog odlučio da mora da uništi. Međutim, Bog, budući okrutan, no ipak malčice i luckast, požurio je dva anđela da pođu u Sodomu i upozore Lota da okupi svoje i da uhvati maglu. Lot je čuo anđeosko upozorenje, međutim, odlagao je. Nisu imali čitav dan da čekaju, pa su zgrabili Lotovu ruku ruke njegove dve kćerke, i ruke njegove supruge i požurili su s njima van Sodome. I anđeli su povikali: „Bežite u planinu. Šta god radili, ne osvrćite se nazad“, baš u trenutku kada je Bog počeo da suklja vatru na Sodomu i Gomoru. Ne shvatam kako je Gomora uvučena u sve ovo. Međutim, Lot i njegovi trče, beže od sveg tog uništenja, podižu prašinu dok Gospod seje smrt, a onda, iz nekog razloga, Lotova žena se osvrće nazad. Bog je pretvara u stub soli. „Setite se Lotove žene“, kaže Isus.
But I've got a question: Why does she look back? Does she look back because she didn't want to miss the mayhem, wanted one last glimpse of a city on fire? Does she look back because she wanted to be sure that her people were far enough from danger to breathe a little easy? I'm so nosy and selfish sometimes, those likely would have been my reasons if I'd been in her shoes. But what if something else was going on with this woman, Lot's wife? What if she could not bear the thought of leaving those people all alone to burn alive, even for righteousness's sake? Isn't that possible? If it is, then this backward glance of a disobedient woman may not be a cautionary tale after all. It may be the bravest act in all the Bible, even braver than the act that holds the whole Book together, the crucifixion. We are told that up on Calvary, on an old rugged cross, Jesus gave his life to save everybody: billions and billions of strangers for all time to come. It's a nice thing to do. It made him famous, that's for sure.
Međutim, pitam se: zašto se osvrnula nazad? Da li se osvrnula nazad jer nije želela da propusti pustošenje, želela je da baci poslednji pogled na grad u plamenu? Da li se osvrnula nazad jer je želela da se uveri da su njeni ljudi daleko od opasnosti kako bi malo odahnula? Ponekad sam takvo sebično njuškalo da bi to verovatno bili moji razlozi, da sam bio na njenom mestu. Međutim, šta ako se nešto drugo dešavalo s ovom ženom, Lotovom suprugom? Šta ako nije mogla da podnese misao da ostavlja sve te ljude da sami živi izgore, čak ni u ime pravednosti? Zar to nije moguće? Ako je tako, onda ovaj osvrt nazad neposlušne žene možda naposletku i nije opomena. Možda se radi o najhrabrijem činu u čitavoj Bibliji, čak i hrabrijem od čina koji ovu knjigu drži na okupu, raspeća. Rečeno je da je gore na Golgoti, na starom ofucanom krstu, Isus dao svoj život da spasi sve ljude: milijarde i milijarde stranaca za sva buduća vremena. To je lep postupak. Proslavio ga je, zasigurno.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
But Lot's wife was killed, turned into a pillar of salt, all because she could not turn her back on her friends, the wicked men of Sodom, and nobody even wrote the woman's name down.
Međutim, Lotova žena je ubijena, pretvorena u stub soli, samo zato što nije mogla da okrene leđa svojim prijateljima, rđavim ljudima iz Sodome, a niko čak nije ni zapisao ime te žene.
Oh, to have the courage of Lot's wife. That's the kind of courage we need today. The courage to put ourselves over there. The courage that says that either all of us have to be faggots, or none of us can be faggots, for any of us to be free. The courage to stand with other vagabonds in the street, with all the wretched of the earth, to form an army of the least of these, with the faith that from the naked crust of all we are, we can build a better world.
Ah, imati hrabrost Lotove žene. Taj vid hrabrosti nam je danas potreban. Hrabrost da se stavimo tamo. Hrabrost koja kaže da svi moramo da budemo pederi ili niko od nas ne može da bude peder, kako bi bilo ko od nas bio slobodan. Hrabrost da stojimo sa drugim skitnicama na ulici, sa svim ubogim na zemlji, da osnujemo vojsku od potrebitih, s verom da smo svi goli došli na svet, možemo da sagradimo bolji svet.
Thank you.
Hvala vam.
(Applause)
(Aplauz)