Latest / The Breakfast Club / Laverne Cox Talks Acting Career, LGBTQ+ Community, +More With Jess Hilarious

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Laverne Cox Talks Acting Career, LGBTQ+ Community, +More With Jess Hilarious · The Breakfast Club

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Morning. Everybody is DJ n V Charlomagne the gout. We
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: all to Breakfast Club. We got our co host with
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  Speaker 1: us this morning, Miss Jess Hilarius. That's right, and we
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  Speaker 1: have our special guests first time here. Yes, thank you
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: for joining us, Laverne Cox Welcome, thank you, thank you,
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: thank you. I am so excited to be at the
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  Speaker 1: Breakfast Club. You have become such an important space for
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  Speaker 1: the culture on so many different levels, politically, in terms
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: of music, and it's just lovely to be here in
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  Speaker 1: all of my multitudes. Yeah, thank you. That's what Jason said.
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: That's what Jason said said we had reached out, So
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: we reached out last year when my barbie came out,
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  Speaker 1: I was like, it would be great to come onto
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  Speaker 1: the Breakfast Club and talk about the Laverne Cots barbie.
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  Speaker 1: I'm the first trans person to have a barbie created
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  Speaker 1: by and I thought it would be great, and I
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  Speaker 1: sold it would block because and I and I think
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: this audience is really valuable. And I think this audience, um,
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: I was, I was talking to Jason about this, and
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  Speaker 1: I think there's there's there's I don't like to say
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  Speaker 1: there's white media and black media, but like a lot
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  Speaker 1: of the work that I've done, the audiences have been diverse,
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  Speaker 1: but a lot it's been a majority white audience. And
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  Speaker 1: I'm working at e now and it's definitely a diverse
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  Speaker 1: audience there, but there's this is a black audience and
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  Speaker 1: I I'm black and I love being black, and this
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  Speaker 1: black excellence is I'm doing things out here, and I
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  Speaker 1: think that it's important for this audience to know that
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  Speaker 1: that was about this because it's given black superhero. Thank you, okay,
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: thank you for it's this is so this is Manfrey
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: Terry Muglair. It's vantage is from his Fall Fall Um
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  Speaker 1: nineteen eighty nine Buick Winter collection, obviously inspired by motorcycles,
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: inspired by cars. Terry mcglair actually has an exhibit at
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  Speaker 1: Brooklyn Museum right now. If people will like this, there's
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  Speaker 1: something in the exhibit that's similar to this. I collect
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: enters Terry muglare So yes, I'm glad you mentioned that.
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  Speaker 1: You have to kind of see the whole stand up
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: sounds too rich for my blood. Listen my favorite pieces.
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  Speaker 1: Thank you for asking I collect Muglair. I'm obsessed in
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  Speaker 1: a good way. I think maybe unhealthy. Um, they should
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  Speaker 1: be giving you free stuff a whole um because Megan
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  Speaker 1: the Stallion has a line and planed b Mugler's suits
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  Speaker 1: in my meetings, and she m in the video she's
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  Speaker 1: wearing all Muglaire Now. Kasey Kadwalder is the executive director
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  Speaker 1: of Muglair. Now, mister Muglair died who founded the company,
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  Speaker 1: but it's run beautifully now by Casey um Burnby took
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  Speaker 1: over here because he just knows Target and Walmart t
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  Speaker 1: shirts Lair. The girls are wearing Muglaire, the boys are
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  Speaker 1: wearing Muglaire. That non binary people are wearing Muglair. Feel
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  Speaker 1: the fan, Anessey, Honey, and get into it. Learn it.
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  Speaker 1: I get on the bike though, y'all just gonna wait
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  Speaker 1: a movie. I ain't going I am not getting on
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  Speaker 1: a bike. Years ago, when I was a waitress, so this,
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  Speaker 1: I met this guy. I used to work at Coffee
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  Speaker 1: Shopping Union Square. I remember Coffee Shopping Square. Oh yeah,
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  Speaker 1: I remember the coffee shop. I used to be a
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  Speaker 1: waitress there and I met this guy. And like you know,
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: when I was a waitress, I was young, in my twenties.
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  Speaker 1: I would meet guys at work. Yeah, and then the
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  Speaker 1: dude and he waited for me get off from work
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  Speaker 1: and he wanted to go hang out and he had
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  Speaker 1: to hit a motorcycle and I was like, sweetie, I'm
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  Speaker 1: not getting on this motorcycle. I was like, you can
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  Speaker 1: pay for me for a cab and then we can
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  Speaker 1: meet at the diner. Yeah. He got me a taxi
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  Speaker 1: and we met at the diner. I was not getting
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  Speaker 1: on that motorcycle. I had no interest now for a
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  Speaker 1: movie role. I'll do almost anything for a movie roll.
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  Speaker 1: So if someone wants to pay me, I'll get on
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  Speaker 1: a motorcycle. Okay, yeah, I think one wants to pay me. That.
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  Speaker 1: So many of us when you were acting on Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: I told you when I first met you with the
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  Speaker 1: iHeart Music Festival. He was backstage and I came up
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  Speaker 1: with you and I was like, yo, I'm a fan.
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  Speaker 1: I used to you know. I still love Oranges the
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  Speaker 1: New Block. Thank you. So acting is what you really
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  Speaker 1: really want to do, that's your passion. It absolutely is,
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  Speaker 1: and I'm still acting. Um. Last year a lot of
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  Speaker 1: people saw me Inventing Anna, which was a huge show
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  Speaker 1: on Netflix. UM. I played Casey Duke in that. UM.
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  Speaker 1: I have a guest spot in something that I can't
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  Speaker 1: talk about yet, but it's really cool, and we're prepping
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  Speaker 1: to do a show UM with Norman lear the legendary
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  Speaker 1: Norman Leer, and I'll talk over here as well, UM
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  Speaker 1: called Clean Slate. George Wallace, the legendary comedian, plays my Dad.
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  Speaker 1: It's said in my hometown of Mobile, Alabama. It's a
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  Speaker 1: comedy and it's about this woman who goes back home
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  Speaker 1: and tries to reconnect with her dad after many years
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  Speaker 1: of being away. So we start shooting that it's Havannah
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  Speaker 1: next month. Oh my god, I don't think it's Eara
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  Speaker 1: Ready for Norman Lea a comedy. Norman Liars the Jeffersons
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  Speaker 1: and uh good Time, Well Ready in Time. One Day
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  Speaker 1: to Time did really well, and he has he has
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  Speaker 1: new shows. Norman is one hundred years old and he's
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  Speaker 1: still producing shows and people are watching. So as long
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  Speaker 1: as they watch, and we're gonna be as long as
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  Speaker 1: they're watching. Yeah, Norman is amazing. He is. Getting to
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  Speaker 1: know him and just being in a room with him
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  Speaker 1: when we pitched the show to him ques just iconic.
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  Speaker 1: We sat in the room with him for like ninety
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  Speaker 1: minutes and after the meeting, he said he was ninety
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  Speaker 1: six of them. He said, I learned more about life
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  Speaker 1: in this last hour that I should have known that
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  Speaker 1: I didn't know. And I'm so grateful. And we started
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  Speaker 1: working together and pitching a show and it took years
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  Speaker 1: and now here we are. I want to go back.
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  Speaker 1: For people that don't know, this is Burncock's first time
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  Speaker 1: on a breakfast class. So how did you get into acting?
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  Speaker 1: What made you want to act? What got you into
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  Speaker 1: that mind frame as a kid? Break it down. I've
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  Speaker 1: I've always been a performer. So I started as a
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  Speaker 1: dancer and during PEE. So I'm fifty years old, so
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  Speaker 1: back in the day, right, but that's black. So back
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  Speaker 1: in the day there was PEE physical education and during PE,
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  Speaker 1: I would always dance and I would have I would
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  Speaker 1: have music in my head and I would have characters
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  Speaker 1: in my head and I would express these characters through movement.
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  Speaker 1: And so I started studying dance in third grade. But
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  Speaker 1: I always knew I wanted to act, that I would
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  Speaker 1: transition to acting. And when I got to college, I
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  Speaker 1: was a dance major at mary Mount Monhant College and
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  Speaker 1: started acting there. I did my first play there. I
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  Speaker 1: did a lot of stuff in that theater department there,
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  Speaker 1: and just that was in the nineties. I was like,
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  Speaker 1: I moved to New York in ninteen ninety three, so
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  Speaker 1: I've been acting like since college and did my first
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  Speaker 1: moving my senior year at Marymount in nineteen ninety s.
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  Speaker 1: I knew that's what you wanted to do. I always knew,
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  Speaker 1: but then I had. I finally accepted being trans when
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  Speaker 1: I was in nineteen ninety eight and started transitioning, and
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  Speaker 1: I was like, well, they're aren't any transactors, so I
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  Speaker 1: don't know if I can't really be an actor and
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  Speaker 1: be trans. And so I went to fashion school for
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  Speaker 1: three semesters. I went to f I T and then
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  Speaker 1: I was like, I don't really want to do this.
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  Speaker 1: I love fashionbon I don't want to do it. And
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  Speaker 1: then like, I did a few more movies, just auditioned
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  Speaker 1: and got a few dependent films, and then I started
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  Speaker 1: training seriously with this woman named Susan Batts and who
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  Speaker 1: was an iconic acting coach. She's trained Oprah and Juliet
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  Speaker 1: Bnosh and Jamie Fox everybody, and she has a great
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  Speaker 1: studio here in New York. And I got really serious
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  Speaker 1: about acting and I just went for it, and it
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  Speaker 1: took years and years and years, but finally, basically twenty
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  Speaker 1: years after I moved to New York, I got my
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  Speaker 1: big break in Orange New Black. That was auditioning for that,
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  Speaker 1: because you know, at first, I'm sure people didn't necessarily
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  Speaker 1: SA so I don't know if Laverne fits this or
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  Speaker 1: how difficult was that being turned down. I mean, it
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  Speaker 1: was years of nots. I mean the reason why it
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  Speaker 1: took twenty years is that there were no roles for me.
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  Speaker 1: So at Susan's studio, she would have industry nights and
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  Speaker 1: I would audition for casting directors and agents and they'd
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  Speaker 1: be like, you're very talented, but there's no roles for
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  Speaker 1: you your trans It's like, maybe you should move to
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  Speaker 1: la And so it was. It was constantly that, and
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  Speaker 1: every once in a while trans something or drag thing
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  Speaker 1: would come up. And a lot of times in the
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  Speaker 1: beginning when I was auditioning, it would say drag queen,
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  Speaker 1: but I would just go in and they didn't know
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  Speaker 1: the difference between drag and trans and I would book
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  Speaker 1: or I wouldn't book. And so for years there just
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  Speaker 1: weren't roles for me. And so when the Orange's New
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  Speaker 1: Black Audition came along. I actually was going to stop acting.
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  Speaker 1: I turned forty that year, so this was eleven years ago.
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  Speaker 1: It was twenty twelve. I turned forty. The big break
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  Speaker 1: hadn't happened. I was like, well, girl, you're forty, you're black,
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  Speaker 1: you're trans. Who do you think you're kidding? Thinking you
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  Speaker 1: can do this? And I was studying from my gr
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  Speaker 1: e to go to grad school. Um, I was in
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  Speaker 1: student loan dead. It was a mess. Girl. I was
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: in renterrears like I was in a payment plan to
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: avoid eviction from my apartment. It's a girl, right when
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: I said, I love that girl. Girl is ginger neutral.
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: So girl is ginger neutral, like a lot of people say, dude,
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: and this ginger neutral girl is ginger neutral for me.
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  Speaker 1: So everybody's girl time. So it was so. But the
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  Speaker 1: great thing about when the Orange Audition it happened is
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  Speaker 1: that even though it was a struggle, I had been
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  Speaker 1: an acting class every week because I loved it. And
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  Speaker 1: this is what I say to people. If you want
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  Speaker 1: to be an actor and you don't love it, you
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  Speaker 1: should do something else because you're going to be too old,
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  Speaker 1: too young, too short, too thin to trans do black
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  Speaker 1: too white, and so all the rejection, I kept loving it,
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  Speaker 1: and so I kept even though I kind of gave
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  Speaker 1: up hope. I kept going to class because I love acting.
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  Speaker 1: And so when the audition came along, I did the
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  Speaker 1: one audition, I booked it. And then this juicy role
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  Speaker 1: came along, and this beautiful writing, and I was prepared.
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  Speaker 1: I was ready because I had trained, I had done
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: independent films for free, student films for free. I did
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  Speaker 1: everything I could to get experienced, and so when this
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: opportunity came, I was ready. And I and I love
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: the Oprah sets this as this thing is luck. Luck
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  Speaker 1: is only when preparation meets opportunity. And when my opportunity came,
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  Speaker 1: I was prepared. And I'm still here, and I still
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  Speaker 1: love what I do, and I get to do so
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  Speaker 1: many different things now. I love that I'm an actor,
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  Speaker 1: but I also get to host rick carpets and I
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  Speaker 1: have an interview show. It's amazing. That's what I want
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: to ask. Do you like one more than the other?
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: Do you like being in a live red carpet space
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  Speaker 1: more than you do like what? Because because then we
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: get to see your personality, we get to see like
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  Speaker 1: how you bond with other celebrities and like certain questions
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: and stuff that you ask, like do you like being
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  Speaker 1: in that? I love it. I didn't think I would
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  Speaker 1: when they and when he approached me, I was like, well,
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  Speaker 1: I hosted their countdown show in twenty twenty and had
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  Speaker 1: a lot of fun doing it, and then they asked
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  Speaker 1: me to, you know, be their new red carpets And
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  Speaker 1: it's like, do I want to do this? And will
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  Speaker 1: people forget that I act? And acting has always been that.
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  Speaker 1: Even though I've always said a lot of different things,
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  Speaker 1: I know that I'm an actor first and that's what
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  Speaker 1: I prioritize and that's why people even care about me.
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  Speaker 1: But I love it. I love it. I love it
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  Speaker 1: because we get to have fun on the red carpet.
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  Speaker 1: I love the fashion piece of it and we laugh,
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  Speaker 1: but we also can get to have space at the Grammars.
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: Recently I interviewed Machine Gun Kelly and he came to
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  Speaker 1: the carpet really vulnerable. It was intense. I was like,
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: what's going on here? It was a different energy than too,
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: and he was he was really emotional. He found out
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: in the car on the way way there that he
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: had lost the Grammy and he was planning to win,
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  Speaker 1: and he had built up Basically, he said that he
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: had built up like all of this. I'm going to
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: prove people wrong and I'm going to be valid now
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  Speaker 1: because I've won this Grammy and he didn't win it,
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  Speaker 1: and he actually had the courage to be vulnerable and
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  Speaker 1: admit that and on live television, and it was a
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  Speaker 1: beautiful raw moment. And I love being the whole space
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  Speaker 1: for that. I have a show with E called if
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  Speaker 1: We're Being Honest that's on Peacock and it's an interview show.
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  Speaker 1: When I get the whole space for a complexity, for
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  Speaker 1: people's humanity. We laugh, we cry at this great interview
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: with Joe Ky where we like talked about him kind
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: of repeating a pattern that his father sort of you know,
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: walked out on him. And then he talks in his
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: book about how he kind of like wasn't there for
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  Speaker 1: his kid and how he repeated that pattern, but then
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: how he interrupted it and he was in tears thinking
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: about this mother. There's this beautiful moment in his book
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  Speaker 1: where he talks about going to he was in conflict
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  Speaker 1: with his ex wife who was a father of his child.
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  Speaker 1: And he goes and she's like, she's broken open a
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: piggy bank and she's like, you know, looking, you know,
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: looking for change to buy food. And he's like, what
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: are you doing. She's like, I don't have enough money
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: to buy food for your child. And he saw it
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  Speaker 1: in that moment. They had been fighting. He saw in
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: this moment and then he broke down and he's like,
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: I'm never gonna let you go through this again. And
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: it's such a powerful moment in the book. And I
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: asked him about that moment, and it was a moment
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: where he had been repeating the pattern of his absentee father,
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: but he broke that pattern in that moment. And this
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: is the shit I love. This is the stuff I
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: love where we can like have real moments to interrupt
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: patterns of historical trauma. You talk about that all the time.
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: I love moments when we can have revelations and understand
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  Speaker 1: something new about ourselves with the guests them speaking with
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  Speaker 1: and then hopefully the audience. And so I love being
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: an actor, but I feel like that's it's the same
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: thing as an actor. As an actor, what we do
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: is we mind the depths of who we are as
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  Speaker 1: human beings and hopefully create empathy for these characters so
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  Speaker 1: that people can learn about themselves. Ultimately, people don't watch
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: television to you know, watch you. They watch to see
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: themselves to learn about themselves. And so in all the
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: work that I get to do, it's all really about that.
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  Speaker 1: It's a space of healing. You're always sending healing energy
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: to everyone, and we need a lot of healing in
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: this world and not what my job, I feel is
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: as an artist and as a public person is to
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: create these spaces of healing. That's why I encourage therapy
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: so much, because I feel like it interrupts those patterns
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  Speaker 1: that you're talking about good therapy. I've been in therapy
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  Speaker 1: since two thousand, for twenty three years. Sometimes people like
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: does it dot work? Why are you still in there
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: for twenty three years? And I may just still needed
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: things that happen. It's a process. It's not like healing
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: isn't like I got it and it's done. You know,
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  Speaker 1: when the pandemic happened in twenty twenty, I was just
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: stuff hit me that I didn't even and I've been
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: in therapy obviously, but at that point for twenty years.
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  Speaker 1: But like the voices when you're by yourself all the time,
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  Speaker 1: those voices that like tell me you that you're not enough,
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  Speaker 1: that they come back and you and you had to
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: do a different level of work. But what's so exciting
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: about the work that I've done in therapy over the
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: years is that I can hold space in an interview
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  Speaker 1: for complexity and for someone being raw. I can hold
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: space in the romantic relationships and my friendships that I
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: can that love. It's in my life right now and
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  Speaker 1: I can show up for it. You know. I was
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: talking to a dear friend of mine and she was
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: and she was I was asking you about her love life,
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  Speaker 1: and she was like, I need to be in therapy
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: before I try to be in another relationship. She was like,
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: I think the last guy was a good guy, but
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: I didn't know how to handle it. And I think
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: so often this good thing might come to us romantically,
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: professionally and we might not be able to receive it.
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  Speaker 1: Do you remember that moment, This is such an iconic
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: moment for me, when um Oprah was ending her talk
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: show and she interviewed Eyan La van Zande. Do we
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: remember this moment? We should go and watched when they
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  Speaker 1: had their healing moment and and Oprah was like, because
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: Oprah was like, I did you understand I was sat
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: in the audience that I had you on stage and um,
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: I won't go in through the whole history of but
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: they had a falling out and Oprah was like, did
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  Speaker 1: you not understand that? How I you know? I trusted
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: you on my show to beyond you know, be on
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: stage in my show. She and Janna said I couldn't
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: receive it. She was like, I was broken, I'm ghetto,
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: I was this, and then she literal She said it
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: like four times and she was almost in tears. I
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: couldn't receive it. And the last time she said I
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: couldn't receive the Oprah's like, I get it. I get it.
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: So we have to get ourselves ready to receive the
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: blessings that the universe has for us. Waiting for us
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: in therapy is a great way to do that. I
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: think therapy um for people people are struggling with addiction.
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: I think if you can't afford therapy, there are twelve
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: step programs out there for people to go that are free,
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: and there's it's nice to not just drugs or alcohol.
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: There's codependency, UM twelve steps, there's um debtors anonymous girl,
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: go get your go, get your hell, girl, you can heal.
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: I wanted to ask you about the red carbon thing
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: because I wanted to ask what did you learn in
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: the moment with Will and Jada, Like, after you received
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: a backlash and everything, what did you learn? Oh? Hey,
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: they um to be really brutally honest. I learned. I
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: learned a few things. I learned that the world was
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: not ready for the evolved relationship that they were presenting us.
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: Because when I, you know, I just jokingly said, you know,
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: we're looking for, you know, more entanglements. I love read
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: table talk. I love this mess. And people thought I
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: was being shady and like and I talked to Jada afterwards.
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: She was fine, she thought it was funny. But the
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: world interpreted it as mess. The world saw so much
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: of what they had put out about their relationship in
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: an open, honest way. They I feel like their intention
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: was for us to heal, for us to see a
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: different way to do relationships that wasn't like this traditional thing,
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: and the world made it into mess, and that the
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: world wasn't ready that it was constantly they were they
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: were the world was like wanting to make it into
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: something that they weren't giving us. And it also reminded
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: me that when you make your relationship, um public, it
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: becomes entertainment for people, and it's not They're not real people,
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: and so I'm going to keep my stuff private. Um.
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: So it was that piece of the entertainment pizza. But
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: it's also like, oh, the world isn't ready for this
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: evolved relationship that they presented us with, and that made
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: me sad. And I think it means that we just
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: have more work to do around letting go of um,
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: traditional heteronormative, monogamous ideas about what a relationship should look like.
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: I think everyone can do relationships on their own terms
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: and should do relationships on their own terms, and I
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: think they're doing that and the people just don't get it.
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: How did you deal with it with all the social
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: media and the backlash, and you know, because social media
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: would be a nasty place, they gave you a lot
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: of small There was oh my god, it was I
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: watched one video I won't say who I watched, and
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: the first thing went in and I was like, I'm
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: not watching anything else, so and I just didn't just
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: let were not even don't girl, No, I didn't, okay,
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: but I just stopped. I just stopped that you don't.
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: This has happened, luckily, I'm this has happened before when
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: I did when I did rock Here a picture show,
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: and when I was cast in that, and there was
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: just an outrage and an uproar. I just stopped watching
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: and stopped reading. I just didn't engage with it at all.
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: And I think that's what I have to do. I
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: have to just not engage with it and understand that
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: it's not about me. And I think it's hard to
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: feel misunderstood though when to feel that piece is very difficult.
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: But I have to remind myself who I am. I
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: have to remind myself what my intentions are and not engage.
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: But I also think there's it's tricky for me because
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: I also think one needs to be open for feedback.
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: One needs to be open to receive criticism when it's
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: in good faith. So that's what I have to balance
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: because I'm not above reproach and I've made mistakes. My
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: prayer today, my prayer every day is God, give me
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: permission to do this imperfectly and allow me to be
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: of service. So it's not it's not gonna be perfect,
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: and I'm a perfectionist in a bad way. So I
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: have to let go of that and hopefully I'll be
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: of service. And so I can't. I have to be
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: able to balance like getting getting critique from trustedsources that
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: elevates me and makes me better and holding myself accountable
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: and being held accountable. Right, we all have to do that,
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: but then not allowing trolls and people who don't have
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: the best of intentions and are operating in good faith
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: not letting that in. Yeah, I'm gonna be able to distinguish.
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: So I go through that still to this day. And
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: that's what I wanted to also ask you to so
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: I you know, being a comedian, we we often speak
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: on that nothing is off limits, you know what I'm saying,
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: Like we speak on things that you know, people in
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: this in these days these days and times may take
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: a total different way than we're trying to, you know,
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: put it out there. Has do you think that because
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: a comedian has a joke about LGBT that they're homophobic?
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: Like do you like, what are your thoughts on that?
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: Because I got a lot of jokes about the LGBT,
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: but I have a lot of jokes about straight people too. Yeah, everybody.
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: I think it's really complicated. I interviewed um Cameron Espizto
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: on my show if We're being honest, and Cameron's a
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: non binary stand up comic, and Cameron thinks you should
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: be able to joke about anything. But Cameron also said
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: that a lot of comedians who have problems who's saying
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: they're always being canceled and they can't aren't allowed to
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: joke anymore, aren't used to getting feedback. Cameron said, like,
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: since I've stepped since I stepped on a stage, Cameron's
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: assigned female at birth, it's non binary. Cameron is like,
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: ever since I stepped on the stage as a stand up,
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: I've been getting feedback. And Cameron said, you've probably been
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: getting feedback since you stepped on the public stage. And
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: these people, I think they're not used to getting feedback
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: and so feedback so so so there's that piece. And
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: I think too that one can say something or do
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: something that may be homophobic or racist and not be racist, right,
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: But there's a difference between I am like a statement
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: of um Brene Brown distinguishers between shame and guilt is
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: shame is I am a mistake, and guilt is I
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: made a mistake right. So I think that's an important
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: distinction to make that someone can unknowingly right say something
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: or do something that's um that's transphobic and not be transphobic.
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: I was on set for a show that I was
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: doing many years ago and M, one of my coworkers
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: who I adore and we're still friends to this day,
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: said the T word, the T word that ends with
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: a why. And I wasn't I wasn't upset by it,
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: but I was like, I understood in that moment that
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: this my coworker didn't understand that a lot of trans
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: people would take that as a slur. Yah. See, you
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: didn't know, and a lot of people don't know. And
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: so I was like, girl, just so you know, I'm cool,
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: but a lot of transpolkes if you said that word
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: would have a problem. And she was like, oh my god,
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry. She sent me flowers.
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: It's like, girls, it's not that serious. No, she just
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: didn't know. And I think we need to be able
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: to give people grace when they don't know and give
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: them space to evolve. And I'm not language police either.
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: I'm not a language police either, but I think that
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: things can be I think transphobia exists, and then there
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: are many comics who say really transphobic things. I don't
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: necessarily believe they are transphobic, but what they're doing is
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: transphobic phobic. So it's just like something just like with racism, right,
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: Like I could think somebody can do something racist or
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: say something racist, not necessarily intending it in a certain way.
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: They're worth that we might not even know are problematic
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: and we just don't know, but it is racist, it
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: is transphobic. So a thing can be a thing, and
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: we can call a thing a thing. And for me,
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: it's about people evolving, giving people space to evolve. I'm
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: not into like canceling people in cancel culture doesn't really
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: about comedians though, because there is a difference between feedback
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: and backlash, and I think a lot of comedians think
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: they're getting backlash and comedians thrive off of that, but
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: actual feedback, like who's thriving off of it? Um that
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: can think of he loves he loves someone. I don't
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: the transphobic and I wonder how much of it is
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: actual feedback as opposed to backlash. Like there are people
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: who will take the time to teach, you know, like
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: a sloop like my man David Johns, he'll take the
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: time to teach, but a lot of times they don't
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: feel like they're teaching. They're just upset. Yeah, And it's
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: I think it's a piece of like not being comfortable
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: getting feedback or wanting to. I mean, for you, it's
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: a comic. I mean, I mean, have you been criticized
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: your critique for some of your LGBTQ definitely, most definitely.
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: But it made me. I was mad. I was very
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: upset because I'm like, how can you say I'm homophobic?
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: Homophobic because of this and because of that? And then
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: and then it comes to thing of like if you say,
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: oh yo, you know my brother gay or I got
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: a gay best friend, then they still put you in
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: a box like well that's like that's like yeah, and
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: which I hate what oh yeah, yeah, yeah. It's people
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: always you know, say I was born a man and
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: all that, and I hate that. And how does that
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: make you feel? How did it make you feel when
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: people when people as as as as a non trans woman.
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: To be honest with you, I really do not get upset.
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: I know I have that I don't. I don't get upset.
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: I honestly have never got upset. I actually started putting
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: it in my jokes. But it's other people that were
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: a lot of black women for a lot of black
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: women get upset about that. Yeah, I'm gonna be totally
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: honest with you. No, I didn't get upset for that.
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: I got upset that I called this this guy he
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: was LGBT. He called me the T word that ended
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: with a why, And I called him the F word,
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: and I felt like and and but it was blue,
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: I said. I felt like, all right, slur for slur
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: and and he's like, oh, you know, everybody's like, you're
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: not a part of the community. You can't say that.
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: It gives him the right to tell me that I'm
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: a T word, Like you didn't know. He was being smart.
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: He knew exactly that I was a woman, that you
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: know that I'm born a woman and a woman. But like,
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: I got mad that. I didn't get mad that he
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: even called me that. I got upset because it's like, yo,
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: you called me that, and I can't call you this,
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: like I don't like that. I just I can't. I can't.
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: I just couldn't get with that, Like, Yo, you hit
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: me below the belt and and you weren't saying it
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: because you were you really thought that you said it
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: because you knew that something like oh yeah, there's a
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: there's I think it's it was it Umm one of
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: the city girls who just has a lyric about like
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: pretty like transgender, like we it's It shouldn't be an
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: insult to say that someone I mean, look at me, right,
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: but it shouldn't be an insult to say that someone
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: looks trans it's trans is beautiful, but right transit hashtag
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: trans is beautiful. But let's not. Let's not like really
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: like not look at how it was bought too, Like
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: it was brought to me like he was being smart.
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: It wasn't brought to oh you are pretty, and I
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: think it wasn't like, well, it's deep to me about that.
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: Just historically, I love looking at history. There is a
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: history in America. I think this is why it's tricky
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: for a lot of black women when just the exist
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: since of trans women, particularly black trans women. But then
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: when non trans women are called trans or say they
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: look trans. There's a whole history of discounting the womanhood
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: of black women in the United States of America. Wins
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: the journal Truth declared a I woman in eighteen fifty
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: one in Ohio. She did that in the context of
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: a system that said if you are black, then you're
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: a man, and if you're a woman, you're a white woman.
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: And so she was invisibilized in that system. And there
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: is a history of that in the United States. And
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: black women have different bills and different bodies shapes, and
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: it's beautiful, but there's that history that we have to
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: reckon with. And I think that, like so much of
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: transphobia in well in America and all over the world,
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: a lot of it in the black community, I think
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: it is also about just colonialism in general and the
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: impact of like racism on our community, the historic emasculation
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: of black men, Like there's there's been literally during when
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: black men were lynched, they would you know, their genitals
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: were cut off, And there's that whole history that we're
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: trying to sort of reckon with as Americans. That's deeply painful,
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: and trans people like represent that. I think for some
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: black folks, that history that trauma, and then I think it.
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: I always believe if you have a problem with somebody
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: else being themselves, it's something inside of you that's not
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: quite right. And and that's why our healing journey is
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: so important. I think, like, um, I say on my
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: podcast that like I think fifty percent, it's like, Okay,
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: there are systems in place. Racism is a system. Transphole
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: b as a system. We're all like raised in these
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: systems and are affected and internalize these things that we
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: have to unlearn if we want to decolonize our minds
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: and liberate ourselves. But what's my fifty percent? I am
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: responsible ultimately for my life. I'm responsible for how I feel.
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: I've never been a victim and your own healing, and
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: I'm responsible to my own healing if you didn't, even
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: if you didn't cause your own trauma, I'm a sponsible
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: for my hand as an adult. As an adult, and
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: I think too, when in that moment being using that
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: f sler, you were mad, I was like that reaction
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: took and for me, I was I I've decided. Many
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: years ago, I had an incident in a gay club
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: and I was I was co hosting an event and
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: I used the F word. I said, used some loud
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: F words. This was years ago. After the show, these
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: two black gay men came up to me and read
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: me for They read me for filth and I'm there
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: with my friend Ari, May he rest in peace and
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: I'm like, no, we're reclaiming that word and I'm trans
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: and they were like not having it. And I talked
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: to my friend Ari and iself right because I was like,
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: we're reclaiming that word. We're taking the power away from
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: that word, and Ari was like absolutely. And I talked
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: to my brother. My brother is identified as a practicing homosexual.
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: He doesn't like the word gay. He thinks it's a
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: white bourgeois construct and he prefers the idea of practiced orition. Anyway,
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: we're twins, and I talked to my brother about it,
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: and I expected my brother would be like, yeah, they
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: were crazy and they were wrong. And my brother was like,
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: that's not your word to reclaim. It's like but no,
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: but no, it's like, that's not your word to reclaim.
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: And then he said it a third time and then
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: I started crying. Yeah, because I had to admit that
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: I said something that was hurtful. I saw the hurt
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: in their eyes and I didn't. I immediately became defensive,
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: and that defensiveness I get, but like that that uncomfortability,
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: that that moment of sitting with like I hurt somebody
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: and I didn't intend to, but I hurt somebody and
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: that felt awful. So that's how it was for me
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: when the whole community felt like what felt like the
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: whole community was because like that's like half of my
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: fan base LGBC, like what my community has come hard
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: for me too, and it's and then sometimes it's like, yo,
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: I know, I didn't mean that. I didn't mean to
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: hurt all of y'all. You know what they're trying to
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: hurt that I try to hurt that one person because
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: he was trying and only because he was trying to
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: hurt me, not even oh I think this way about
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: like nah, And it was like it was kind of
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: hard to come back from. That was the I was
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: the first social media influencer to be canceled and then
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: by such a big community of people who supported me.
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: And what's the healing for you? What's what's the healing
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: for you? Because I think for me, I think like
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: is there I would I want to be in a
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: moment where someone I let someone have me go out
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: of character to insult them. That that's something That's what
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: I think. But for you, has there been healing around that?
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: Has there been? Because I think the what we don't
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: see a lot of for me when somebody is quote
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: unquote canceled is we don't see the evolution of what
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: they've learned and how they've learned it, right, Like what
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: did I learn from this situation? Like how did I
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: hold myself accountable? What have I learned about it? That's
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: what I think. This is what people need when when
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: someone's been through the meal, like what have I learned
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: from it? Whatever? You so what my like my apology
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: was bad then because it was you know, that was
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: the thing where you did somebody get canceled? You must
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: apologize And then they called my apology backhanded like I
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: said before, and vernam always think like this. I'm like, look,
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: if you want me to respect you, you must respect me.
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: You get what I'm saying, like you must you you
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: are in this community, you can be whatever you want.
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: It don't bother me. If you are the LGBT, it
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: don't matter. You will respect me. As who I am
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: and imna respect you as who you are. You could
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: have said anything, Oh you ugly you d you called
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: me that because that was gonna get a reaction, like
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: you called me a slur that that if somebody said
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: that to you, you would you hate it? Like you can't.
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: That's an unspoken word. You can't. You set it yourself
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: like other transgender can't even spew that word like you
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: know what I'm saying. You you said the F word
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: them too, menday thing like that, like what you're a
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: part of the community, you still can't say. You have
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: to respect me if you want me to respect you.
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: Like so, I want to apologize to the community. I said.
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: I meant what I said to him. I said, man,
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: y'all want me to respect. It starts with respect, no
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: matter if you know the person or not. Everybody a
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: human being. You're a human being first, That's what you
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: are first. I hear you everything else, That's how I'm
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: always be, But I hear you, man. Offer. I can't
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: make anybody to anything. Absolutely. I can't make anybody respect me.
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: I actually, like so much of my healing work around
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: relationships is I can't make somebody love me. I can't
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: make somebody treat me right. I can't make somebody see me.
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: I can take myself out of the situation I can't
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: take my I can put my myself in a situation
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: where someone can see me, can respect me, and it's
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: able to Some people aren't able to respect us because
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: they don't respect themselves right. So like so I can't
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: make somebody do something, and so like the whole um,
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: you will respect me thing I'm like people, they might not,
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: you know. I feel like I come with nothing but love,
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: and I work my ass off, and there's so many
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: people who are only going to see my transnis and
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: never see the excellence, see the hard work, see the talent,
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: and I can't make them do that. I can't make
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: them do that. If you ever get tired of being
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: I don't want to say the face, but the person
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: that everybody comes to when it's a joke that people
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: don't like, or when somebody says something in a lyric
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: or spoke for me, you get tired of that. I'm
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: not anymore. There's so many more of us. And what
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: I what I love about my career and what I'm
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: really proud of is that I'm the first openly trans
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: person to be nominated for an acting in Me, and
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: I'm not the last. I'm the first transperson to be
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: on the cover of Time magazine, but I'm not the last.
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: Um There's so many more trans people with the platform now.
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: What I am frustrated by with these legislative attacks against
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: trans people now is that people aren't talking to enough
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: trans people. They're like lots of pundits and people who
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: like talk about trans issues without a transperson insight. There
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: used to be a time I'm old enough, where you know,
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: people would talk about trans issues and actually bring on
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: trans people to talk. I can't. What I've learned is
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: I can't speak on every issue because it's exhausting. This
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: stuff is also traumatizing. Transphobia is traumatizing, Racism is traumatizing,
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: is traumatizing, and I can't live in that space. I
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: can't live in that space all the time. And that
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty taught me that too, Oh girl, trauma on
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: top of trauma, So I have to sometimes I have
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: to go away and not speak on those things. And
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: I'm so blessed that I get to have a public
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: platform where I don't talk about being trans at all
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: where I get to go on the red carpet and
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: I talk about artists in their work, and I go
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: on my show and I talk about artists in their work,
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: and so it's not it can't always be about that.
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: I love being trans. Trans is beautiful. I always say,
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: I'm not beautiful despite my big hands, my big feet,
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: my white shoulder, was my deep voice. I'm beautiful because
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: of those things, those things that make me noticeably trans.
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: But I get to occupy spaces that where my transance
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: is not the only thing. So I'm honored that I've
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: been chosen, I think, by power greater than myself, to
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: be a vessel for all of the visibility that trans
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: people have now. And it used to feel like a
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: lot of pressure. And I used to feel this obligation
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: to speak up about everything. And now I pray to
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: God that like i'd say thank you, but I'm like,
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: can I wear this light more lightly and with more joy?
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: And I'm getting there. I'm in, and I'm getting there
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: by staying in the love. I started ending my emails
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: like God twenty years ago, stay in the Love, to
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: remind myself and my fellow artists that we got into
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: this because we love it, not because the business part
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: of being an artist is treacherous. But I love it,
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: and I think love is always the solution. When I
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: talked to coronerl West on my podcast, he said a
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: lovely thing to me that I'm in the tradition of
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: love warriors that we've had in the black community from
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: you know, time memorium, Like he said, you know that,
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: you know they hated us, but we have taught people
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: how to love. It's black folks. We consistently do that,
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: and like that. For me, it's what it's all about.
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: It's about existing and inhabiting love and putting that out
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: there and hopefully getting that back. And I think that
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: is the only thing with all of the vitriol and
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: policies that are being passed. They are attacking trans people,
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: They're attacking like you know, ap African American studies and
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: just all these things that we have to Education is important.
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: I'd like to remind people that in everyone osis, but
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: it's just good to be reminded that they didn't want
• 39:02
  Speaker 1: slaves to read. They did not want if you learn
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: to read as a slave, you would be be you
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: would be killed. They did not want us to be educated.
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: And right now you have a governor of Florida, governor
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: of Texas who wants their banning books. They don't want
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: you to learn about things. And so in this moment,
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: like as black people, as marginalized people, we need to
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: educate ourselves. We need to learn critical thinking to on
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: the internet to figure out what's misinformation and what's not.
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: That education and learning it's like, it's it's it's it's
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: a practice of freedom. Education has always been freedom for
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: black folks, and it is now as well, and it's
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: it's extended to trans people. Trans people, we've always been here.
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: I like to remind folks that transposed have existed and
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: indigenous cultures all over the world. In Hawaii they had Mahoo,
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: in India, Hydra and Africa there there um you know,
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: non but they wouldn't be called trans people now but
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: with colonialism, with spirits, so I think two spirits and
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: Native American cultures. Um in Angola, there was um um
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: um in Zinga Queen and Zinga had her um I
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: forget the name, the name of her sort of non
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: binary kind of um folks um in her court. So
• 40:15
  Speaker 1: we've existed throughout time. Trans folks and people who didn't
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: exist within the binary and this gender binary thing it's
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: a white, colonial Western thing, right, So like, let's educate
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: ourselves about that and understand that when we're being transphobic
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: and we're enforcing this like binary idea of man and woman,
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: we're like doing some colonial shit. We're doing some like
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: wide imperialist stuff. Right. Let's like if we look at
• 40:39
  Speaker 1: indigenous cultures and look at the way other people of
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: practiced things, you know, um, transient or gender knock conformed people, health,
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: sacred spaces, and in um in India, you would wouldn't
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: have a wedding or christening without the presence of a
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: hydred of bless that child or bless that wedding. And
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: trans folks have been spiritual leaders throughout history. A new
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: want to ask mcause we're talking about it when it
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: comes to gender identity, should we let kids wait until
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: they are older to make that decision? Because I know
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: that's a big it is a big conversation right now.
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: And what I say to that is that if you
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: are not a trans child, or have a parent or
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: a parent of a child who thinks they might be trans,
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: it's none of your business. I think what has been
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: happening with the GOP specifically now and all of the like.
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: We have to protect kids, kids in sports, kids, this
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: kids that it's never been about kids. It's always been
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: about stigmatizing trans people. There's a law in Oklahoma that
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: was just introduced that would ban gender firm incare up
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: until the age of twenty six. This tells me what
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: I've already always known. There's never been about kids. It's
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: about making trans people not exist. Donald Trump just made
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: a speech saying we need to ban gender firm in
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: care for everybody. He may have misspoken, He misspeaks a lot,
• 41:53
  Speaker 1: but he said we need to ban it for everybody.
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: That is the plan. So I think when we are
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: talking about some one else's access to healthcare or bodily autonomy,
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: it's nobody else's business, whether they're a child or an adult.
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: The American Academy for Pediatrics, the American Medical Association, the
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: Endocrine Society have a set of protocols and they're all
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: well respected for treating trans kids. And that should be
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: handled by doctors, not legislators, not people who are not involved.
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: There's nobody's business. And I think when we have these
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: conversations about trans people, and we focus on transition body surgery.
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: When you're a Supreme Court confirmation hearing and they're talking about,
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: you know, mutilating children or you know, castraating children, that
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: language objectifies trans people and dehumanizes us. This whole conversation
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: has been deeply dehumanizing. And when you can dehumanize people,
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: you can take away their rights, and that is exactly
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: what they're doing right now. They've done a really good
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: job of dehumanizing trans people, LGBTQ plus people in general,
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: and they're they're taking away our rights within no one's
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: really doing anything about it. So our work is to
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: rehumanize everybody, to rehumanize each other. When we dehumanize somebody else,
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: we dehumanize ourselves. When I interviewed doctor Joy Degree, who
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: I'm coined the term post traumatic slave syndrome on my podcast,
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: she said that, like the healing is not just for
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: um formally enslaved people, it's also for the people who
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: enslaved folks. When they enslaved us, they were dehumanizing themselves.
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: When you discriminate against other people, you dehumanize yourself when
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: you allowed yourself to you know, come out of character
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: and respond to that that dude who said that to you,
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: that that was you were not humanize, you were not
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: giving yourself the dignity, the reality, the royalty, the humanity
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: that you deserve to be above that in that moment
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: and for many years, a trans elder said to me,
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: it's not what they call you, it's what you answer to. No,
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: I get it. Do you feel like he was wrong? Absolutely?
• 43:57
  Speaker 1: All right? Absolutely, because for a while it was so
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: one sided, like it's like, no, you can say that
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: because he's a part of I'm like, no, you can't,
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: and he can say whatever you want to say. I'm
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: not like that I was saying that. I'm just saying like,
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: But at the end of the day, one of my favorite,
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: one of my favorite things though absolutely very human, very human,
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: and I'm not I'm very human, but like, and we're
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: human beings. But when if we when we want to
• 44:23
  Speaker 1: evolve and we want to grow spiritually, how do we
• 44:26
  Speaker 1: then proceed? And one of my favorite things that I
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: heard and from a therapist is what other people say
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: about me, it is none of my business because if
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: I'm in this constant space of like, you must respect me,
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: you want we see it on reality shows all the time.
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: You got to respect me. And then I'm fighting with
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: somebody and I'm just I'm fighting and I'm like coming
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: out of character. It's like, this is not why God
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: put me here. God did not put me here to
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: be reactive to somebody who in some low vibrational, low
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: vibrational place, um some low vibrational energy. God put me
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: here to to be annoyed, to live in the annoyance
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: space that i'm I'm so, I'm not coming out of
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: character because someone's calling me something. People call me stuff
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: all the time. My whole life. People have been calling
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: me stuff. You know, I'm glad you here because we
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: can't even help just unpack another little bit of trauma
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: that she went through. Remember just I saw you say
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: this on it Don't Call Me White Girl podcast. Yeah,
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: it was a guy holing at you floor out and
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: you was trying to try to fly you outright. I
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: wasn't into excuse me what happened? Okay, I need I
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: need kind know. Okay, there was this guy, he's known
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: everybody knowing me's a singer. Try to holler me too,
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: saying the ones that will act like they didn't. But yeah,
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: he um d MD me and he was like, he
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: wanted me to you know, of him, um, have sex
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: with him, Yeah, have sex with him. But he wanted
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: me to bend him over because whyn't you strip on? No,
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: he thought I had that already came like that. He
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: thought that you were a trans woman who had had
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: and he really wanted this experience. And he didn't know
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: he hit me after. I might know who it is.
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: She might not even be shocked, but the thing is,
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: and I was like, wow, like and this was traumatizing
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: for you? No, I just was like, no, it wasn't.
• 46:37
  Speaker 1: It was not you man trying to exult me. He
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: just literally thought that I was you know, he was.
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: He was really wanting. I wasn't upset at all. When
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: I seen the money, I was like, dang, I wish
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: I did have one of those. Because he was thought
• 46:59
  Speaker 1: you were a sex worker. Yes, he thought he were
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: sex worker. He thought you were trans. People always often
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: assume they're transfer people, the sex workers. We're not all
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: sex workers. There's other things we can do. And this
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: is not to you know, demean sex work. We we
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: you know, we're sex workers should be decriminalized and all that. Um, wow.
• 47:18
  Speaker 1: But when I told have been looking. When I was like, okay,
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: so no I am you know woman, he was like,
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: oh damn, all right, well see like it was like
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: you still slop me out for the money if you
• 47:30
  Speaker 1: But no, he wanted something very specific, Yeah, very specific,
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: and he wasn't disrespectful after he wasn't and I wasn't
• 47:37
  Speaker 1: about to put that up, you know, none of that.
• 47:39
  Speaker 1: But he was really like, I wouldn't say disappointed, but
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: it was like that's all right, Like we have to
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: you know. It's it's tricky to talk about sax. We're
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: transford because we're often sexualized, right, and so to have
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: an adult conversation about sex and sexual reality and not
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: again to elevate the humanity of trans people. This is
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: this is my work to elevate the humanity of trans people.
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: But there are straight identified men who enjoy being pegged
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: having a woman strap on, who enjoy a trans woman
• 48:15
  Speaker 1: who might you know, give them that that that pleasure,
• 48:18
  Speaker 1: and they still identify a straight because she's still a woman. Right.
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: So I think that like a more evolved conversation that
• 48:25
  Speaker 1: a lot of people aren't ready for, is that a
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: sex act does not define your sexuality. A sex act
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: does not define your sexuality. So you can have a
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: sex act that involves you know, you know him wanting
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: to do right now. It's nobody can tell you who
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: you are. Nobody can tell you who you are, so
• 48:49
  Speaker 1: you people. Sexuality exists on a spectrum, and I think
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: it's like really problematic when we find out that someone
• 48:57
  Speaker 1: enjoys something sexually and we start telling them that they
• 49:02
  Speaker 1: are gay or start telling them of their sexuality. It
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: is not our business to tell somebody their sexuality if
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: they're in the closet, if they're in denial, that's actually
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: not our business either, right, So there's too much of
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: that I think we can allow. And people are doing
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: all sorts of things, um sexually, and I think it's
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: all wonderful. I think it's great, liveal it's all it's
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: just consensual and everybody is an adult and it's great.
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: And I don't I think that, like it's an advanced concept,
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: but sex separating a sex act from someone's sexuality, I
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: think it's something that's very evolved that I would love
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: for people to be able to potentially does that doesn't
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: necessarily mean he's gay, that's what she's sayings, but not people.
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: I just love the fact that a transplement potentially took
• 49:56
  Speaker 1: one of justice prospects. That's what That's what I think
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: found here. He found the girl. Yeah, one of me,
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: one of me? You want me? Do you want me?
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: To this day? You could have been like I could
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: strap on? Did you offer that? Yes? Because the money
• 50:14
  Speaker 1: you did? Much? How much was fifty thousand dollars? Girls
• 50:18
  Speaker 1: like what? Okay? You can tell the girls who this girl?
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: The sex worker girls out there there is a man,
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: a singer offering fifty thousand dollars and they better give
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: me a piece of Oh he's like he's over fifty.
• 50:36
  Speaker 1: He's like this was like somebody we listened to like
• 50:40
  Speaker 1: that in this ain't still listening. We're still listening to
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: them right now. Fifty thousand dollars, girl, A lot of
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: girls can use that, and so I did you know,
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: just talking it over with my it's so beautiful to
• 50:56
  Speaker 1: be a black dutiful to be a black trans woman
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: and not me that money. It's good, beautiful to make
• 51:03
  Speaker 1: my own money. Can we talk about this please? Yes? Barbie?
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: Can we get the ball? We can we talking about Barbie?
• 51:10
  Speaker 1: We were talking about this. You will Mittel be okay
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: with us having that conversation and they're talking about I
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: want to know, how did this doll come about? Was
• 51:19
  Speaker 1: this dream of yours? When I found out Aba Duvernet
• 51:23
  Speaker 1: had a dollar, I was like, I want a doll too.
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: When I said to my manager Paul, it's like, I
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: want a Barbie, and like, I don't know if he
• 51:29
  Speaker 1: reached out, but like if several years later Mattel reached
• 51:32
  Speaker 1: out and said, we'd love to do a Barbie. We're
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: doing a tribute collection. And I said absolutely. It's like
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: it was a dream and it was. I have a lot.
• 51:40
  Speaker 1: I've talked a lot about this when the barbe came out.
• 51:42
  Speaker 1: But when I was a kid, I wanted Barbie and
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: my mom did not allow me to play with Barbie.
• 51:46
  Speaker 1: She it was forbidden. And when I was around thirty
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: and I was in therapy, like starting therapy was like
• 51:53
  Speaker 1: two mid two thousands, I was in therapy and I
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: told that story to my therapist, and my therapist said,
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: you can It's never too late to have a happy childhood.
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: You can reparent that inner child. I think you should
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: go and buy yourself a Barbie. Did you and play
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: with her? I absolutely did. I bought a Barbie, I
• 52:08
  Speaker 1: played with her, addressed her, and it was healing. And
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: then I told my mom about it. And then my
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: mom are sending me barbies always. Oh really, my mom
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: started sending me barbies this. I'm not going to crown
• 52:21
  Speaker 1: the Breakfast Club really, um and black Barbie. Absolutely, so
• 52:26
  Speaker 1: it'send to me black Barbies. And it was just this
• 52:28
  Speaker 1: wonderful like that we all have a little kid inside
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: of us that that needs attention, that needs healing, and um,
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: yeah she's been I've been taking really good care of
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: my inner child and Barbie has been a huge part
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: of that. And so what was so exciting for me
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: about having my own Barbie is that other people can
• 52:47
  Speaker 1: have this space, whatever age you are, or like reparent
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: your inner child or and and have and know that
• 52:54
  Speaker 1: you can be trans or non binary and that like
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: you exist. Yeah, they're absolutely brought it for you. Yeah,
• 53:03
  Speaker 1: and you forgive your mom? Why did you forgive your mom?
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: Because you had to be some resentment the fact that
• 53:09
  Speaker 1: you wanted to play the ball but she wouldn't let you.
• 53:10
  Speaker 1: But you also have to understand that at that time,
• 53:13
  Speaker 1: I you know, this is a while. Look this is
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: probably like God ground that same time two thousand and five,
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: two thousand and six. So I don't know how old
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: I was. I was like thirty, mid early to mid thirties,
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: and I just realized I needed to. When we hold
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: on to resentment, it's like giving taking poison and expecting
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: it to hurt, you know, hurt someone else, that old proverb.
• 53:34
  Speaker 1: And so I just realized. She did the best she
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: could what she had. And my mom is an incredible
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: human being. She put herself through college, she got a
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: master's degree, she was a teacher, she's retired now. My
• 53:45
  Speaker 1: mother took care of to kid. My mother's an incredible
• 53:48
  Speaker 1: human being, and she did the best she could and
• 53:52
  Speaker 1: with what she had. And I turned out pretty well.
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: And I love myself now and that's my mom is
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: responsible for that. So yeah, I forgave my mom a
• 53:59
  Speaker 1: long time. I yeah, call me stupid because when I
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: first heard about the doll, you know, representation matters, we
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: know that, but how are you supposed to know this
• 54:08
  Speaker 1: is a trans Well, my face is on the back
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: because there's Laverne Cox and then my pictures on the back,
• 54:14
  Speaker 1: So um, I'm trans. So I mean, yeah, so it's
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: technical and it's not trans barbie, but it's the first
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: Barbie to be made in the image of a trans person. Yeah,
• 54:24
  Speaker 1: it's a Barbie doll. Oh and then if you read
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: this on the bag, you literally can yeah, okay you yeah, yeah,
• 54:34
  Speaker 1: literally needs to be styled. Though we appreciate you for
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: joining us. We are and we have a question. I'm
• 54:41
  Speaker 1: sure Charlot man and just feel the same if there's
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: ever something that we have to call upon and ask
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: a question. We want you to be a friend of
• 54:49
  Speaker 1: the room where we can call you if you're in
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: la and say, hey, Laverne this, there's this situation. What's
• 54:53
  Speaker 1: your opinion. So sometimes we might not get your representation
• 54:56
  Speaker 1: because it's exhausted, and don't call up. You can call me,
• 55:01
  Speaker 1: you can call me. I there's certain things that don't
• 55:04
  Speaker 1: comment on, Like there's certain nions who do their thing
• 55:07
  Speaker 1: and I don't. I don't like because I also don't
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: want to be for me, it's important to be critical
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: of concepts and ideologies and mindsets, but love people and
• 55:18
  Speaker 1: the media will be is very quick to put you
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: in Laverne Cox by this person, or Laverne Cox calls
• 55:25
  Speaker 1: out this person. Then all of a sudden, I'm feuding
• 55:27
  Speaker 1: with someone, I am not here to feed with anybody.
• 55:30
  Speaker 1: I'm not here to like be in conflict with another
• 55:33
  Speaker 1: famous person. Don't pick me against anybody. So like that,
• 55:37
  Speaker 1: I can talk about I can talk about concepts and ideas,
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: but I'm just I'm very careful not to be People
• 55:45
  Speaker 1: still try to pick me against folks, but I don't
• 55:47
  Speaker 1: do it, and so I'm very careful about that. So
• 55:50
  Speaker 1: I'll speak about, you know, an idea or a concept
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: or like or something specific. If you want to talk
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: about why something's fansophobic, like, we can break some stuff down.
• 55:58
  Speaker 1: That's example that the different conversation in Dubai and people
• 56:02
  Speaker 1: were upset and we would say, there's so many states
• 56:06
  Speaker 1: here that necessarily don't respect that anti so it was like,
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: so what's the difference. So we didn't understand it, So
• 56:12
  Speaker 1: that would be like, well, what what what were your
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: thoughts on that? You know, I'm in the be high
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: like hardcore no matter which multiple times, multiple times like please.
• 56:27
  Speaker 1: And Beyonce actually gave me my first fashion campaign Ivy
• 56:30
  Speaker 1: Park Fall Winner twenty seventeen. My first fashion campaign was
• 56:34
  Speaker 1: from Beyonce. Let Beyonce make her money let Beyonce make
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: her money and then on. But and honestly, there's what
• 56:42
  Speaker 1: is it. It's February whatever, it's mid February. And this
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: year alone, over three hundred pieces of anti trans and
• 56:49
  Speaker 1: LGBTQ legislation have been introduced in stay legislatures all over
• 56:52
  Speaker 1: the country, over three hundred pieces. So everybody who's saying
• 56:56
  Speaker 1: that there's you know, there's a lot of states here
• 56:59
  Speaker 1: in the United State. Are you just not gonna go
• 57:02
  Speaker 1: to the concert there? Because like in Florida and Oklahoma,
• 57:06
  Speaker 1: in Texas and Tennessee girl, Arizona girl, and I feel
• 57:12
  Speaker 1: like communities, certain communities need to experience joy, right, so
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: you gotta find those pockets of joy when you can
• 57:17
  Speaker 1: what perfect place. And it's just because the government is
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: discriminatory does not necessarily mean that the people there are right.
• 57:27
  Speaker 1: We live under people live under passive regimes, and doesn't
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: mean that people are bad, right, It just means the
• 57:33
  Speaker 1: government is so right. Because when I went to London
• 57:36
  Speaker 1: and I was like, oh, I was like, I ain't
• 57:38
  Speaker 1: want to talk about the queen, And one of the
• 57:40
  Speaker 1: produces was like, man, and I can't say what he
• 57:43
  Speaker 1: says say And I was like whoa, so y'all don't care,
• 57:45
  Speaker 1: and he was like, nah, nah, we don't care. Yea.
• 57:49
  Speaker 1: It depends right, But like you said, like the government,
• 57:52
  Speaker 1: the politics and the government, sometimes their people don't even
• 57:56
  Speaker 1: be worried about what they got, you know, what they
• 57:59
  Speaker 1: got going on date. They agree with what their people
• 58:01
  Speaker 1: instead of who runs them. It's my last question. I
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: guess it's more like even though a statement, I guess
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: the challenge I have is a personality is I often
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: wonder what's more impactful? Right, because you're Laverne Cocks to me,
• 58:13
  Speaker 1: like you're not transgender actors, n co Laverne Cocks, You've
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: got a lot of things going on, So I wonder
• 58:18
  Speaker 1: what's more powerful? Just having you on a platform like
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: this and just having a conversation about everything that you're doing.
• 58:24
  Speaker 1: Are allowing you to speak to your your transmiss because
• 58:28
  Speaker 1: to me, I could take you, I could take it
• 58:29
  Speaker 1: to leaving the way I can do vow bind a
• 58:33
  Speaker 1: girl who can do vot that? For me, it's like
• 58:39
  Speaker 1: I the most just living my life as I'm fifty
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: years old, living my life. I worked in restaurants in
• 58:45
  Speaker 1: New York for twenty years. I did not go to
• 58:48
  Speaker 1: the restaurant talking about my transit. When I was working
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: in a coffee shop, I just went to the restaurant
• 58:52
  Speaker 1: and I was myself, and some people knew I was trans,
• 58:54
  Speaker 1: some people didn't. They they got to know me. It's
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: a human being and that is the most powerful thing. Ever.
• 59:02
  Speaker 1: When I'm on sets, I'm not like educating people are
• 59:04
  Speaker 1: doing diversity inclusion of training. I'm doing my job and
• 59:08
  Speaker 1: showing up and doing me has been the best way.
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: So I think it's like it's about our humanity. Yes
• 59:14
  Speaker 1: I'm trans, but like I'm so much more than that,
• 59:16
  Speaker 1: and every trans person is so much more than that,
• 59:19
  Speaker 1: and and this just our humanity, like our like don't
• 59:26
  Speaker 1: reduce us to transitions or surgery. You know. I think
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: it's it can be reverally valuable for other trans people
• 59:32
  Speaker 1: to see, you know, trans folks transition online. But like
• 59:36
  Speaker 1: so often people think it's all about that, and it's not.
• 59:40
  Speaker 1: It's about a life lived. It's like, yes, I'm I'm
• 59:43
  Speaker 1: I love my body, I'm happy with where I'm at,
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: with being done with transition whatever that means, But there's
• 59:49
  Speaker 1: so much more life than like that. Like that. It's
• 59:54
  Speaker 1: the issue is when people don't want to let trans
• 59:59
  Speaker 1: people exist, when they're murdering us, when they're misgendering us,
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 1: when they don't want to let us be in school
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 1: and and use our right pronouns, and discrimination like trying
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: to ban us from homeless shelters. An employment you know,
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: I'm an employment rate is three times a national average
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 1: UM seventy eight percent of trans kids or bulleting in schools.
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 1: That's the problem as existing is not the problem people
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 1: people's insecurity. You know, lean tin price my idol black operating,
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: or would saying you know, um, racism is never the
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 1: problem of the black artist. It's everybody else's problem. So
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 1: that so the work really for is everybody else getting
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: getting on board, you know, And I thin people have
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: and people have a lot of feelings about that. I
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 1: get it. I understand people. People are frustrated I have
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 1: to use this pronoun now, and like the non binary thing,
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 1: people a lot of confused it by even other trans
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: people have difficulty with it. And I had difficulty with
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: it and pronounced for a while. But like what I think,
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 1: it's a bad out. As understanding, particularly as black folks,
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 1: is that we were black people were second class citizens
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 1: for really long time in the United States. In a
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 1: lot of ways, we still are. And this whole inclusivity
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 1: thing is about acknowledging that we're here, that we have
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: somebody contribute, and that we should have equal access and equity.
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 1: Same thing with transfer. We've always been here, we've been
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: second class citizens, and so it just if we're going
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 1: to acknowledge that these folks are here, let's just like
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: respect them and let them be. And it shouldn't affect you.
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 1: It really shouldn't. And I think that like some men
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: who get upset, like I feel like a lot of
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 1: men who get upset about trans women, it's like they
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 1: want to be misogynist and they want to like holler
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 1: at a girl and like know that she was assigned
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 1: female at birth, and they get upset, and it's like,
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: that's not my problem, because my problem if you're dragged
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: to me, it's not like my problem that you clicked
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 1: swipe right on me on a date app like it
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 1: just unmatched and move on. It's like people get so
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 1: and then I think, right, you know what I'm saying. Hell,
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 1: And and for some women, people who are signing female
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 1: at birth and who are a woman identified who had
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 1: probably issues who transplant. We're not here to take your spot.
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 1: We're not here to like we're we can all. There's
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 1: room enough for all of us, you know. It's a
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 1: lot of this is about scarcity, and there's enough for
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 1: there's enough for everyone, right, And it's like we're not
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 1: a threat. We just want to exist. We want to
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 1: just live our lives, you know, Laverne Cox. We're being
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 1: honest with Laverne Cox on Peacock Yes, yes, and Oscars,
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 1: red carpet. That's right, March, that's right, March twelve. Well,
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: thank you so much for joining us. We appreciate you,
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 1: and don't be a stranger. Thank you. It's the Breakfast Club,
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 1: as Laverne Cox