We will not win our rights by staying quietly in our closets.

Burst down those closet doors once and for all, and stand up and start to fight.

All over the country, they're reading about me, and the story doesn't center on me being gay. It's just about a gay person who is doing his job.

A reading of the Declaration of Independence on the steps of a building is widely covered. The events that started the American Revolution were the meetings in homes, pubs, on street corners.

All men are created equal. Now matter how hard they try, they can never erase those words. That is what America is about.

I would like to see every gay doctor come out, every gay lawyer, every gay architect come out, stand up and let that world know. That would do more to end prejudice overnight than anybody would imagine. I urge them to do that, urge them to come out. Only that way will we start to achieve our rights.

If I turned around every time somebody called me a faggot, I'd be walking backward - and I don't want to walk backward.