[Music]
[Music]
[Applause]
the human body is a miracle
one of the most inexplicable phenomena
in this world we ought to realize it it
exists without your permission and dies
only if it is forced to how many times
have you had to tell your heart to beat
or your lungs read or your mind to think
how many times have you had to tell your
body to be this color to grow this hair
love this gender so you exist as you do
for a reason with life and you are we
really so different it’s your body can
form you of your purpose that’s you
permission to be here when if you
believe in a higher power does your body
exist anymore than those who do not call
that power God are we really so
different and if I am woman does this
mean that I should be too weak to da
style to create whole human beings
inside of myself and if I am man should
this mean that I should be too strong to
be part of such a fragile process and if
I am colored does my blood black and to
do my lips break from holding my tongue
too tight have you ever been forced to
be afraid it is not just a black thing
because what if I am for in my existence
somehow has been strong enough to
withstand being stood on for better view
of dreams that happen to be American but
does your body dream any less vividly if
you are not born in American and if you
are one do you ever feel no is that a
white thing
a gay thing do you ever feel angry
should that only be reserved for native
women black Latino Asian Arabic women
and if I am born and my any less of a
human being for being born like this if
I do not meet your standards of
able-bodied does that mean I am any less
capable of achieving greatness and if I
am who created such a standard did you
mold this earth with your own hands is
it okay if I just exist here for a while
does it ever cross your mind that we are
human beings breathing on this earth on
purpose
I never asked my heart to beat I never
asked for the skin that stretches over
my bones but don’t your bones look a lot
like mine if I were to share with you
secrets if the bodies around you were to
share with you secrets would you listen
I was asked to introduce conversations
about diversity at the University I
attend and so I’d written that poem and
I thought that if I could disconnect the
superiority and we could look at our
souls as human we would understand how
worthy of respect that existence really
is is because I think in this society
it’s very easy to categorize people and
say oh he’s only black
she’s only female they’re only foreign
and you allow that to determine the
value of that human body standing in
front of you when it should really be
the content of their character and I
used to think that if we could just
learn how to respect each other as human
beings the world would be a better place
that was short-lived because when I
realized this other side of things I
learned what economics was and I was I
realized sometimes a question is not
simply race specific it is class
specific sometimes you just have to have
enough money to matter in America and
now there’s plenty of examples around
the society that can prove that to be
true but the one that hits me the heart
is this is thing called gentrification
now for those of you who do not know
what this means it’s when high-income
investors will invest in a lower
economic class area and by capitalizing
on those land values they raise the cost
of lending tremendously so what you see
is new stores and nice homes we see is
rising rents in an unaffordable market
the place we call home may no longer be
our home in a matter of days did you see
what perplexes me most about
gentrification is the fact that as a
community if we were economically
unified we could address this problem
but we can hardly be so
shellie unified let all those categories
get in the way and so misunderstandings
turns into less then turns into you
don’t matter as much as me becomes about
the protests instead of how many of
people staying unified the days the
weeks the months after the protests now
I’m not saying we need to all hold hands
and sing Kumbaya but I come from a class
and an ethnic background of people who
have been brushed over generation after
generation after generation and I am
tired for all of my ancestors can we
just put away this illogical social war
so we can focus on this economic
enormity tearing our communities apart
from the inside say I I often wonder why
we can’t do this and then I realize it
becomes very hard to believe in your
ability to change your circumstance when
you’re always worried about the category
see every day I see people suffer truly
hungry mothers men left faceless over
mindless disagreements babies hateful
because the grass has not ever been
green on this side before an adequate
health care still unequal education
still inadequate housing still and when
an investor sees these trends and in a
community he says wow this is the
wonderful area blank canvas and
sometimes I wonder why we can’t look at
ourselves and think of ourselves as our
own investment is it because we don’t
believe in ourselves enough or do we
really not have
tools available so pull ourselves out of
the situation I used to ask myself this
question every day and then I started
asking other people and I realized it
was both because not only did we not
believe in ourselves but sometimes that
disbelief can be the only thing standing
in your way from creating the tools that
you need see if you were to deduce
gentrification down to a simple action
it is the funding of the development of
a new environment if we were able to
fund the development of our own
environment maybe we could turn
dilapidated housing into a new standard
of living so we are paying market price
for near slums maybe we could turn
unequal education and to collaboratively
design schools so our children really
don’t get left behind and maybe we could
stop building our communities with toxic
materials and turned that into an
intolerable ‘ti for poisoning human
beings based on their socioeconomic
status now most people will look at the
enormity of these problems and say oh
that’s that might cost millions I could
never and he would fail to realize that
as a collective we could now this
phenomena I’m talking about it already
exists in this society
it’s called crowdfunding and everybody
knows about it see but when you start
talking about real estate when you start
talking about renovation when you start
talking about true Urban Development
those platforms that everybody knows
about
they don’t exist for communities
like mine for people like me see not
only when you go on these platforms are
there no projects in the community of
where I live but it’s also completely
out of my price range you see in most
cases to even start investing it is one
thousand to five thousand dollars at a
time now I don’t have spare thousands I
have spare change but I did the math and
I realized that it’s 20 percent of my
community rounded their purchases up to
the nearest dollar
that’d be 3.2 million dollars at the end
of the year now I want you to really
realize what I’m saying here not my
country not 20 percent of my state not
mica not my city my community do you see
the potential there and I kept asking
myself why does this not exist yet this
would help so many people and then I
realized well heck if nobody else is
gonna try I guess I will so I got some
folks together and we started competing
in business plan competitions at my
college and then I realized how hard it
really was going to be to secure funding
when you are talking to someone who has
not experienced economic oppression so
then I started talking to architects
engineers social scientists and they
played with that idea because they knew
very well that it was possible but they
were also not really willing to
challenge the status quo and then
something hit me harder than ever one
day you see I was talking to a faculty
member someone who I looked up to for
years telling him about the difficulty
we were having securing funding and he
looked me dead in my face and said to me
you’re trying so hard to challenge the
way things are being done
just worry about yourself
be normal world’s to dock for
revolutionaries hmm I said to talk be
normal and I try to imagine what my life
would be like if the leaders before me
had decided to be normal
do you know it used to be normal to see
human beings stroll up by their necks in
residential neighborhoods used to be
normal to beat and bomb babies because
of the way that they were existing when
they came out of their mother’s womb nor
should it be normal to continue watching
people drink poisoned water in Flint
Michigan
should it be normal to completely ignore
an entire demographic of investors when
you’re talking about their own and
living environment should it be normal I
hope that a lot of you are saying no
because very often it takes somebody to
stand up and say the world is just too
dark not to have revolutionaries you see
why should that word be too big for you
and I it doesn’t mean impossible it
doesn’t even mean war of violence
it simply means change just change they
oversimplify and / normalize that word
in the tech industry all of the time I
mean it oh we’re evolutionized the way
people experience technology
revolutionize the way they experience
virtual reality can we revolutionize how
I experience real reality so I can walk
[Applause]
so that I can walk into my community and
say wow look at all these amazing things
we created for ourselves
you see I wrote that poem hoping that
somebody would read between the lines
and realize the enormity of their own
human existence how profound that is
when people try to step up they will
tell you oh that’s too big for you you
are only but you are never only a
category never only black or only female
or only not from this country no you are
human you exist here for a reason there
was not much else on this earth bigger
than life itself
be that change be revolutionary we have
always been enough
you
[Music]
[Applause]
the human body is a miracle
one of the most inexplicable phenomena
in this world we ought to realize it it
exists without your permission and dies
only if it is forced to how many times
have you had to tell your heart to beat
or your lungs read or your mind to think
how many times have you had to tell your
body to be this color to grow this hair
love this gender so you exist as you do
for a reason with life and you are we
really so different it’s your body can
form you of your purpose that’s you
permission to be here when if you
believe in a higher power does your body
exist anymore than those who do not call
that power God are we really so
different and if I am woman does this
mean that I should be too weak to da
style to create whole human beings
inside of myself and if I am man should
this mean that I should be too strong to
be part of such a fragile process and if
I am colored does my blood black and to
do my lips break from holding my tongue
too tight have you ever been forced to
be afraid it is not just a black thing
because what if I am for in my existence
somehow has been strong enough to
withstand being stood on for better view
of dreams that happen to be American but
does your body dream any less vividly if
you are not born in American and if you
are one do you ever feel no is that a
white thing
a gay thing do you ever feel angry
should that only be reserved for native
women black Latino Asian Arabic women
and if I am born and my any less of a
human being for being born like this if
I do not meet your standards of
able-bodied does that mean I am any less
capable of achieving greatness and if I
am who created such a standard did you
mold this earth with your own hands is
it okay if I just exist here for a while
does it ever cross your mind that we are
human beings breathing on this earth on
purpose
I never asked my heart to beat I never
asked for the skin that stretches over
my bones but don’t your bones look a lot
like mine if I were to share with you
secrets if the bodies around you were to
share with you secrets would you listen
I was asked to introduce conversations
about diversity at the University I
attend and so I’d written that poem and
I thought that if I could disconnect the
superiority and we could look at our
souls as human we would understand how
worthy of respect that existence really
is is because I think in this society
it’s very easy to categorize people and
say oh he’s only black
she’s only female they’re only foreign
and you allow that to determine the
value of that human body standing in
front of you when it should really be
the content of their character and I
used to think that if we could just
learn how to respect each other as human
beings the world would be a better place
that was short-lived because when I
realized this other side of things I
learned what economics was and I was I
realized sometimes a question is not
simply race specific it is class
specific sometimes you just have to have
enough money to matter in America and
now there’s plenty of examples around
the society that can prove that to be
true but the one that hits me the heart
is this is thing called gentrification
now for those of you who do not know
what this means it’s when high-income
investors will invest in a lower
economic class area and by capitalizing
on those land values they raise the cost
of lending tremendously so what you see
is new stores and nice homes we see is
rising rents in an unaffordable market
the place we call home may no longer be
our home in a matter of days did you see
what perplexes me most about
gentrification is the fact that as a
community if we were economically
unified we could address this problem
but we can hardly be so
shellie unified let all those categories
get in the way and so misunderstandings
turns into less then turns into you
don’t matter as much as me becomes about
the protests instead of how many of
people staying unified the days the
weeks the months after the protests now
I’m not saying we need to all hold hands
and sing Kumbaya but I come from a class
and an ethnic background of people who
have been brushed over generation after
generation after generation and I am
tired for all of my ancestors can we
just put away this illogical social war
so we can focus on this economic
enormity tearing our communities apart
from the inside say I I often wonder why
we can’t do this and then I realize it
becomes very hard to believe in your
ability to change your circumstance when
you’re always worried about the category
see every day I see people suffer truly
hungry mothers men left faceless over
mindless disagreements babies hateful
because the grass has not ever been
green on this side before an adequate
health care still unequal education
still inadequate housing still and when
an investor sees these trends and in a
community he says wow this is the
wonderful area blank canvas and
sometimes I wonder why we can’t look at
ourselves and think of ourselves as our
own investment is it because we don’t
believe in ourselves enough or do we
really not have
tools available so pull ourselves out of
the situation I used to ask myself this
question every day and then I started
asking other people and I realized it
was both because not only did we not
believe in ourselves but sometimes that
disbelief can be the only thing standing
in your way from creating the tools that
you need see if you were to deduce
gentrification down to a simple action
it is the funding of the development of
a new environment if we were able to
fund the development of our own
environment maybe we could turn
dilapidated housing into a new standard
of living so we are paying market price
for near slums maybe we could turn
unequal education and to collaboratively
design schools so our children really
don’t get left behind and maybe we could
stop building our communities with toxic
materials and turned that into an
intolerable ‘ti for poisoning human
beings based on their socioeconomic
status now most people will look at the
enormity of these problems and say oh
that’s that might cost millions I could
never and he would fail to realize that
as a collective we could now this
phenomena I’m talking about it already
exists in this society
it’s called crowdfunding and everybody
knows about it see but when you start
talking about real estate when you start
talking about renovation when you start
talking about true Urban Development
those platforms that everybody knows
about
they don’t exist for communities
like mine for people like me see not
only when you go on these platforms are
there no projects in the community of
where I live but it’s also completely
out of my price range you see in most
cases to even start investing it is one
thousand to five thousand dollars at a
time now I don’t have spare thousands I
have spare change but I did the math and
I realized that it’s 20 percent of my
community rounded their purchases up to
the nearest dollar
that’d be 3.2 million dollars at the end
of the year now I want you to really
realize what I’m saying here not my
country not 20 percent of my state not
mica not my city my community do you see
the potential there and I kept asking
myself why does this not exist yet this
would help so many people and then I
realized well heck if nobody else is
gonna try I guess I will so I got some
folks together and we started competing
in business plan competitions at my
college and then I realized how hard it
really was going to be to secure funding
when you are talking to someone who has
not experienced economic oppression so
then I started talking to architects
engineers social scientists and they
played with that idea because they knew
very well that it was possible but they
were also not really willing to
challenge the status quo and then
something hit me harder than ever one
day you see I was talking to a faculty
member someone who I looked up to for
years telling him about the difficulty
we were having securing funding and he
looked me dead in my face and said to me
you’re trying so hard to challenge the
way things are being done
just worry about yourself
be normal world’s to dock for
revolutionaries hmm I said to talk be
normal and I try to imagine what my life
would be like if the leaders before me
had decided to be normal
do you know it used to be normal to see
human beings stroll up by their necks in
residential neighborhoods used to be
normal to beat and bomb babies because
of the way that they were existing when
they came out of their mother’s womb nor
should it be normal to continue watching
people drink poisoned water in Flint
Michigan
should it be normal to completely ignore
an entire demographic of investors when
you’re talking about their own and
living environment should it be normal I
hope that a lot of you are saying no
because very often it takes somebody to
stand up and say the world is just too
dark not to have revolutionaries you see
why should that word be too big for you
and I it doesn’t mean impossible it
doesn’t even mean war of violence
it simply means change just change they
oversimplify and / normalize that word
in the tech industry all of the time I
mean it oh we’re evolutionized the way
people experience technology
revolutionize the way they experience
virtual reality can we revolutionize how
I experience real reality so I can walk
[Applause]
so that I can walk into my community and
say wow look at all these amazing things
we created for ourselves
you see I wrote that poem hoping that
somebody would read between the lines
and realize the enormity of their own
human existence how profound that is
when people try to step up they will
tell you oh that’s too big for you you
are only but you are never only a
category never only black or only female
or only not from this country no you are
human you exist here for a reason there
was not much else on this earth bigger
than life itself
be that change be revolutionary we have
always been enough
you
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