A Quote by Theodore Melfi

NASA didn't give a crap what gender you were or what race you were. If you could do the math, you were valuable. — © Theodore Melfi
NASA didn't give a crap what gender you were or what race you were. If you could do the math, you were valuable.
I noticed there were so many people, especially women, who would come up to me having recognized me from TV and say, 'I heard you were a math person, why math? Oh my gosh, I could never do math!' I could just see their self-esteem crumbling; I thought that was silly, so I wanted to make math more friendly and accessible.
I did not think my chances were very big when I saw some of the other men who were competing for the team. They were a good group, and I had a lot of respect for them. But I decided to give it the old school try and to take some of NASA's tests.
There were definitely songs in the past that were me dealing with living this gender dysphoria, and sometimes they were really direct and no one picked up on it - but oftentimes, they were more veiled in metaphor.
I think about all of my students who were math-phobic, who didn't believe they could learn math, who didn't understand, who didn't think they were smart enough, and by the end, they understood that they already had the gifts, and my job was to help them access them, and I believe that.
I was very much fascinated with the technology we had that we could edit in the computer our compositions, but all the sounds that were available on the market were crap.
The scene at a certain time was definitely boys; those huge warehouses were kind of violent parties, even. I think people in your immediate community made a nightlife scene that actually did break down gender roles and were along different lines of identity that had to do with race and experience in the '90s, rather than gender.
If you think about the way the hearings were structured, the hearings were really about Thomas' race and my gender.
What a terrible thing could be freedom. Trees were free when they were uprooted by the wind; ships were free when they were torn from their moorings; men were free when they were cast out of their homes—free to starve, free to perish of cold and hunger.
I met people on college campuses who were defining themselves as genderqueer to express revolutionary feelings, or to communicate their individuality; they were gender fluid without being gender dysphoric. This phenomenon may be culturally significant, but it has only a little bit in common with the people who feel they can have no authentic self in their birth gender.
At any Trump rally, the Trump supporters were peaceful. They were enthusiastic. They loved America. They were excited. They were pro Trump. They were not bullies. They were not angry. They were not doing anything unless they were provoked.
You were the one who made things different, you were the one who took me in. You were the one thing I could count on, above all, you were my friend.
And I think, on the other end, there were actors who were not as good as I was, perhaps who could have hung in too, but began to blame everything on race.
I conceived of myself in large part as a teacher. There wasn't a great understanding of gender discrimination. People knew that race discrimination was an odious thing, but there were many who thought that all the gender-based differentials in the law operated benignly in women's favor. So my objective was to take the Court step by step to the realization, in Justice Brennan's words, that the pedestal on which some thought women were standing all too often turned out to be a cage.
There were times when we didn't have enough food on the table. When it came to the end of the month, I could see my parents were sad because they were unable to give us the best. They had lots of debts. Sometimes they had arguments about it.
People give you a hard time about being a kid at twelve. They didn't want to give you Halloween candy anymore. They said things like, “If this were the Middle Ages, you'd be married and you'd own a farm with about a million chickens on it.” They were trying to kick you out of childhood. Once you were gone, there was no going back, so you had to hold on as long as you could.
We all have to acknowledge the life and the path we were born into. And the things that define us, they're often somewhat narrow: our class, our race, our gender, where we grew up, what geography we were exposed to. The curiosity and wonderment of, "What it's like on your path?" - that's when you go into high alert.
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