Five first week of April speeches
1. April 5th, 1968, The Mindless Menace of Violence
This famous speech was delivered one day after Dr Martin Luther King Jr was assassinated, and a day after RFK’s even more famous flatbed truck speech, which I’ve featured here before. Robert Kennedy would be assassinated himself two months later on 6th June, 1968.
The Mindless Menace of Violence was delivered at the Cleveland Club in Ohio, as part of RFK’s campaign for the presidency.
Some lovely alliteration in the third paragraph here - violence/violence; repression/retaliation, sickness/soul.
Yet we seemingly tolerate a rising level of violence that ignores our common humanity and our claims to civilization alike. We calmly accept newspaper reports of civilian slaughter in far off lands. We glorify killing on movie and television screens and call it entertainment. We make it easy for men of all shades of sanity to acquire weapons and ammunition they desire.
Too often we honor swagger and bluster and the wielders of force; too often we excuse those who are willing to build their own lives on the shattered dreams of others. Some Americans who preach nonviolence abroad fail to practice it here at home. Some who accuse others of inciting riots have by their own conduct invited them.
Some looks for scapegoats, others look for conspiracies, but this much is clear; violence breeds violence, repression brings retaliation, and only a cleaning of our whole society can remove this sickness from our soul.
2. April 6th, 1858, Mary Ann Shadd Cary, anti-slavery Sermon
Shadd Cary was the first ever black newspaper editor in North America, and she was a voice for the abolition of slavery and for women’s suffrage. As a fugitive slave, she fled from the USA to Canada, and this speech was delivered in Chatham, South West Ontario.
Slavery[,] American slavery[,] will not bear moral tests. It [exists] by striking down all the moral safeguards to society—[but] it is not then a moral institution. You are called upon as a man to deny and disobey the most noble impulses of manhood to aid a brother in distress—to refuse to strike from the limbs of those not bound for any crime the fetters by which his escape is obstructed. The milk of human kindness must be transformed into the bitter waters of hatred—you must return to his master he that hath escaped, no matter how every principle of manly independence revolts at the same. This feeling extends to every one allied by blood to the slave. And while we have in the North those who stand as guards to the institution the[y] must also volunteer as shippers away of the nominally free. You must drive from this home by a h[e]artless ostracism to the heathen shores when they fasted, bowed themselves, and spread sack cloth and ashes under them. Made long prayers &c[.] that they might be seen of men, but Isaiah told them God would not accept them. They must repent of their sins—put away iniquity from among them and then should their lights shine forth.1
April 1st, 2017, Troye Sivan’s GLAAD Media Award Acceptance
Troye Sivan was just embarking on his hugely successful career as a singer songwriter and actor when he won this award seven years ago. GLAAD is the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, and in this brief but powerful speech, Sivan acknowledged the heroes of gay and lesbian activism in decades past:
About a year or two ago, I watched a documentary called "How to survive a plague." I highly recommend it to anyone who hasn't seen it. The doc is about the early years of the AIDS epidemic and the efforts of organisations like ACT UP and the Treatment Action Group. Within the characters in the doc, I saw myself, and I saw my friends, and I saw my colleagues, and I saw my boyfriend. These kids were young, smart, active fighters. I saw that wit, and that humour, and that resilience that I’ve grown to love so much about my community.
They were just like my friends and I. I know I'm being super humble. Like this smart and everything, just like me. But I saw myself in these characters, and the difference was that these people were attending a friend’s funeral on a weekly basis. This was in New York City, not ever 40 years ago. They were fighting for medical treatment, they were fighting for visibility and they were fighting for their lives. It was a life or death situation.
It was this kind of sacrifice and activism that paved the way for all of us to be here tonight. While I'm so thankful and fortunate to have this award, I would like to share it with the warriors who made it possible but maybe didn't get one for themselves. This award is for Peter Staley. One of the featured activist in "How to survive a plague." Peter was one of the driving forces behind ACT UP, the founder of the Treatment Action Group, and a personal hero of mine. This is for Marsha P Johnson, and Sylvia Rivera. The Godmothers of the Stonewall Riots, who also founded a transgender rights group, in the 1970s.
This is for ... You can keep going on the teleprompter. This is for Bayard Rustin. Bayard was an openly gay civil rights leader, who worked alongside Martin Luther King Jr, and was largely written out of history as a result of homophobia. This is for Gilbert Baker, the creator of the Rainbow Flag. A symbol of pride. Who we sadly lost yesterday. This is for the Edie Windsors and the James Baldwins and the Frank Kamenys of the world. And the list goes on.
Though times and our needs may have changed, this ethos and spirit still persist in our community today.
4. April 6th, 2020, Queen Elizabeth II’s COVID Address to the nation
I’ve featured it before, but this was one of the great speeches of the pandemic. I’ve long been a republican when it comes to matters of monarchy in Australia., but the structure of this one, the sense of hope, and the callback to the blitz was just beautiful. And she delivered it perfectly.
It reminds me of the very first broadcast I made, in 1940, helped by my sister. We, as children, spoke from here at Windsor to children who had been evacuated from their homes and sent away for their own safety. Today, once again, many will feel a painful sense of separation from their loved ones. But now, as then, we know, deep down, that it is the right thing to do.
While we have faced challenges before, this one is different. This time we join with all nations across the globe in a common endeavour, using the great advances of science and our instinctive compassion to heal. We will succeed - and that success will belong to every one of us.
We should take comfort that while we may have more still to endure, better days will return: we will be with our friends again; we will be with our families again; we will meet again.
But for now, I send my thanks and warmest good wishes to you all.
April 4th, 1982, Steve Martin’s AFI Tribute to Frank Capra
I guess of all the people here tonight, I share the most memories with Mr Capra.
For he and I have known each other for over eighty years.
We’ve worked together, played together, and made many films together. So many I can’t even remember any of their titles.
There’s only one thing that could have made tonight more special to me, and that’s if this dinner had been in my honour.
I’d like to read a quote of Mr Capra’s: "An onion can make you cry. But there has yet to be invented a vegetable that can make you laugh".
Steve Martin was a regular doing these ‘from the floor’ tributes at AFI events in the mid eighties. This one is even better.
Thanks for glancing through my speeches bound together only by their Aprilness.
The latest episode of the podcast has a comedic feel to match the Comedy Festival in full swing in my home town of Melbourne. Declan Fay, who has just produced Geraldine Quinn’s remarkable ‘The Passion of St Nicholas’, is the guest, talking about speaking in schools, with brief diversions to When We Were Kings and the time he played on Matthew Pavlich. It’s a really fun episode.
Thanks for reading, and double thanks to the good people who have ‘upgraded to paid’ in recent times. It’s a nod of Speakola confidence, and necessary for this one-man project to keep rolling on.
Cheers
Tony
To know a bit about my non-speakola ‘day job’, here is the post about the documentary film I’m releasing this year. Sign up to the personal Substack for free.
Transcript from https://academic.oup.com/book/55181/chapter/424278579