Lgbt People

"I guess once I finish a dance and release it to the public and we're performing it, I'm kind of done... Well, I love watching it, and I love watching other people's work too if it's really good and interesting. But you know, the most exciting part is also very often the most frustrating part: trying to finish something or get it just right or get across something that I'm not sure what it is until it happens.”"

"The culture has changed, and times have changed, you know, the whole thing about being queer has changed entirely. So then I was the bad boy, a self-proclaimed homosexual choreographer. In the early ‘80s I said I was gay all the time because it was important politically."

"I like working with grown-up dancers much better, because there’s somebody to talk to at the airport when you’re delayed. In the middle of class, they hate me for it, but I always say, ‘What are you reading right now?’ or ‘Did you see this movie?’ or ‘Who wrote that piece of music?’ I do little quizzes to keep people involved and not just to become robotic dancing machines, because I hate to watch that."

"I believe firmly in that theory that the stuff you learn when you’re very, very young, it sort of stays. The very first dance I made up that was any good, I was about 15, and I’ve been wringing changes out of that ever since. That’s interesting to me. That’s not death. It’s style or something."

"I dreaded those public moments that highlighted the fact that I was a foreigner. Sometimes I sat at my desk, plotting my revenge. I would master the English language. I would infiltrate the gringo culture without letting on that I was a traitor. I would battle in their tongue and make them stumble. I would cut out their souls and leave them on the shore to be pecked on by vultures."

"I don’t, believe it or not. I don’t miss the roar of the crowd. I still get that when I take a bow, if I milk it right. I’m not regretful, but I’m envious sometimes."

"The early days of esto no tiene nombre were the happiest time in my life. I had a vision, I had hope, and I was not alone. There was a lot of love going around then — sexual love, spiritual love, friendship love, literature love, publishing love. Perfect love."

"The truth is, distributing intimate photos with the intent to publish them is a crime, and the perpetrator should be punished to the full extent of the law. I have notified Capitol Police, who are investigating it, and therefore will have no further comment on the matter."

"During the final tumultuous years of my abusive marriage, I became involved in a relationship with someone on my campaign. I know that even a consensual relationship with a subordinate is inappropriate, but I still allowed it to happen despite my better judgment. For that I apologize. I wish nothing but the best for her and hope everyone respects her privacy in this difficult time."

"Playing nice isn't really something that's in my vocabulary. I just do what I think is right."

"This is what needs to happen so that the good people who supported me will no longer be subjected to the pain inflicted by my abusive husband and the brutality of hateful political operatives who seem to happily provide a platform to a monster who is driving a smear campaign built upon cyber exploitation."

"John Rechy taught me everything. He taught me the importance of structure and the importance of clarity. I see that in my own students as well, you know, confusing mystery with vagueness. He taught me the difference."

"…Pershing Square was a gathering of denizens of every type, the gospel people would preach, hustlers would hustle, queens would camp. It was an incredible array of society. There was a cop there that ruled it, I mean as if he was the king. And he was a terror. And if he saw anybody there whom he had not seen, you went downstairs to a little place that was kind of secret. It was very, very weird downstairs, a little room where he would interview you without saying that he suspected you of anything. If it looked like you were hustling or the queens or whatever he would go there and hassle you."

"What makes people stay on your side is that believability, that authenticity. . . . . You don't need to talk about the policy details as much as you should give people a reason to trust you."

"I cannot tell you what it does to me to hear pre-Stonewall. And even in our literature, even in the art, pre-Stonewall, post-Stonewall. I wrote three books pre-Stonewall and a dozen more post-Stonewall. There’s no demarcation. Gay history is centuries and centuries from the Romans to the Greeks to Oscar Wilde to all kinds of outrages. And those seem to be put back and pre-Stonewall is passive. Post-Stonewall is brave and dignified. I actually have heard things like that…"

"I'm young, I'm a woman, I'm L.G.B.T.Q. I’m one of the California seats that’s going to be getting tons and tons of attention and I'm a new face for politics. We're providing an inside look into what politics looks like in this post-Trump moment."

"We confuse gay liberation with straight imitation. Straightness is our goal. This pushes us away from the uniqueness that is the gay experience."

"When I was 14, I learned what transgender meant and cried of happiness. After 10 years of confusion I finally understood who I was. I immediately told my mom, and she reacted extremely negatively, telling me that it was a phase, that I would never truly be a girl, that God doesn't make mistakes, that I am wrong. If you are reading this, parents, please don't tell this to your kids. Even if you are Christian or are against transgender people don't ever say that to someone, especially your kid. That won't do anything but make them hate them self. That's exactly what it did to me."

"I was bewildered. I did nothing at all to promote the book, even to the extent of denying that I wrote it. I felt that if I left the streets as soon as I had some success, I'd be betraying the world that I wrote about. And the truth is that I couldn't give it up. I'd been hustling for so long that it was a habit."

"Every character in City of Night has a strong antecedent…Miss Destiny was very real. That was the name she used, and all those stories were based on my recollections of her. We kept in touch for a few years after the book came out; she'd ring me in the middle of the night, saying she was with one of her 'husbands' who didn't believe she could be a character in a famous novel. Then some boozy voice would come on, and I'd have to say 'Yes, that really is the fabulous Miss Destiny'. After a few years the calls stopped, so I guess Miss Destiny is now rattling her beads in God's face, like she always said she would."

"You have to understand what the world was like back then. Being queer was very dangerous, and there was a lot of stigma about it. Even when I was hustling, it took me a long time to realise myself as a gay man. It's hard to accept that some of us, at one time or another, had heterosexual feelings. I certainly did. I emerged very slowly into homosexuality, despite the way I was living."

"I celebrate that figure as an “outlaw.” That’s someone who lives in defiance of oppressive laws, and, in doing so, thrives against those strictures."

"It’s been more difficult for me to come out as a Mexican-American than come out as gay."

"I wasn’t like every other comedian at the time because I was coming from a different perspective. I was an outsider looking in. And I was even different from all the other black comics on the scene because a lot of them were of Caribbean origin and a lot of their jokes were poking fun at Africans. So I got my first taste of success quite quickly just from being different. It was taking it to the next level that was difficult."

"My sense of humour has always been quite in-your-face. I haven’t got that quintessential dry British humour, so my style fits in quite well...A lot of Americans have never been outside America. So if I’m doing something about Malaysia, say, I have to explain where Malaysia is and what the culture is before I go into the joke."

"I was more qualified than most of the guys I was working with, which they hated. I’d come into work and there’d be a banana skin stuck to my overalls or a picture of a monkey on my coat."

"I’ve never had any of my specials aired anywhere on British TV. If I’d sat in England waiting for someone to give me a TV show, I’d still be there, being the token black face on Mock the Week. That, to me, is a slap in the face."

"I just want to be the best friend who comes in, steals the scene, and bounces ...and then use that small amount of fame to sell out theaters and play to bigger audiences…So as we were starting to write the show, I kept saying to [her co-writers] 'You know what? [Abishola] needs a funny friend ... a confidant.'"

"I would definitely like to tear down this wall I've built around myself, because I don't need it anymore. And I know that intellectually, and on good days, I know that emotionally. I don't want to be thin, I want to be smaller, because I just do. I think it makes so many things easier just on a day-to-day basis, and also I have no small amount of vanity, so I just want to be able to find cuter clothes. Sometimes it's really basic things that I would like for myself."

"It’s used like a weapon. What it means is, ‘I don’t want to think about your concerns. I don’t want to have to extend my empathy.’…We have to think with nuance, and unfortunately public discourse rarely allows for nuance. And see where that has gotten us."

"Because oftentimes I’m the first or the only – so I cannot be the last."

"They start by understanding that feminism is just an idea. It’s a philosophy. It’s about the equality of women in all realms. It’s not about man-hating. It’s not about being humorless. We have to let go of these misconceptions that have plagued feminism for 40, 50 years. It’s ridiculous that we’re still having this conversation. “But I love men!” Who cares! It’s not about men at all."

"For me today, the most important filmmaker alive, for me personally is Pedro Almodóvar. Because he takes people on the fringes of society and they are bizarre. And If you read about them in the newspapers, you would think they were criminals. But in an Almodóvar film, you forgive them and you even learn to love them, which I think is closer to godliness, than making a film about good people running around."

"It started as a process of writing what I know to be true and it became a process of revelation. I was able to make some realisations about myself that previously I hadn’t made and it really forced me to confront my relationship not only with my body, but with food. I mostly saw how unkind I had been to myself when my body has actually gotten me through quite a lot in life. And recognising that, in many ways, I was holding on to the weight for the wrong reasons and the only one that was really hurting was myself."

"In fact, it’s the opposite…As a black woman, as a black queer woman, specificity is incredibly important, because diverse experiences are rarely seen in literature."

"I rely on it, it’s an addiction, the need to tell stories. If anything, my relationship with film has become more tense, more of a problem, because there is always that question: when will my time be up? Will this be the last film I make?...Perhaps this is the reason I haven’t developed any other facets of my life. Quite the opposite, I think I’ve cut back. So I’ve now reached the point where film is the only thing that makes me feel whole. Cinema is the only thing I have. It’s finished up being both the end and the means for me."

"Whenever I've shot my previous films, I've felt phantoms of my own cinema past and personal past hovering over me. They accompanied me through those films. But this time I felt completely on my own. For the first time this film did not go hand-in-hand with my memories. The tone is different as well. It's very austere."

"In fact I was never the son my parents wanted. I mean, I think that they really loved me. But it’s something I realised from a very young age."

"I make fiction films because I like representation. That’s why I don’t make documentaries, and I don’t think I’ll ever make documentaries. The colors of my movies are not completely real, because I like that distance, that this is a movie, and reality is over there. I don’t want to make something that looks completely real. I want a representation of that. And this is what was appealing to me and why I started making movies."

"The moment I step outside the safety of my home, I hate how visible I am, how people treat me, how they stare and comment both loudly and under their breath … I do not know how to carry myself with confidence when I go out into the world. Any sense of self I have is often shattered within minutes, and then I am all insecurities and fears, wishing myself into a more socially acceptable form."

"I'm an artist…and I'm part of every decision in a movie. This is not how they work in Hollywood. There, the director is part of the crew, not the main creator. I'm too old to change now. I wouldn't know how to do it."

"There is a before and an after…In the after I was broken, shattered, and silent."

"I've had a very good relationship with my mother, but there's a whole generation of Spanish women who have struggled: very strong fighting figures who carry their families. These women are now in their 80s and feel that life has been unfair to them; they don't know how to grow old and how to be happy old ladies."

"But it’s one of my worries, I can’t get over it in my mind. I mean, I can’t even reconcile myself to the fact that death is real. Plus I’m an atheist, so I have no belief in the afterlife and no creed to help me out. I see the whole thing as unnatural, I know that sounds odd.” He snorts. “So yes, I’m definitely afraid of dying."

"I grew up in this world where fat phobia is pervasive…And I just thought, 'Well, boys don't like fat girls, so if I'm fat, they won't want me and they won't hurt me again.' But more than that, I really wanted to just be bigger so that I could fight harder."

"In order to survive, I could never put myself in the position of whining about being a woman. I just got on with it. As much as it was possible, I found a way to do what I wanted to do."

"I did in the beginning. It helped me to cultivate some kind of female persona. I took a lot of different aspects of my character from my childhood or young-womanhood and elaborated on them. The guys were also writing songs, and I felt like I had to portray what they were writing and appreciate the male point of view as well as the female point of view."

"And I always felt that since all my life, I was always called ‘Debbie’ or ‘Harry’ – so I embodied this myself and it’s just the way it was. It probably still is!...Yeah, so I don’t know – I never really had any problems with that and I’m always surprised when people have a fear or frustration about their combination of sexualities – I think we do better recognising both within ourselves."

"With lyrics, I have a basic idea, and then I write little phrases that fit with the music and encapsulate a feeling. I start with a theme and then try to adjust it to the music. I like the music to come first. For the book, I would sit down and tell the story, and then go back and edit myself. It’s probably a similar process to what you do with your photography. You shoot it, and then go back to it."

"I’ve never been a diarist… I wish I had done that. Selfishly, I wanted to have all these moments in my life shape me, but I didn’t necessarily want to share them. And I guess that makes me a nasty bitch."