i want to ask, how do you go forward? how do you empower young women, your friends, your little sister, to speak when this is not the life, this is not the world we grew up in? even ourselves that are young, how do you great a new environment where it's okay to raise your hand and say, i have an opinion and i want to be heard? >> right, right. i mean, i know, i feel your pain, i really do, because i was so punished in my own family for -- i don't know. i think there are women, there was a memo that handed out when we were born that said, please be quiet, don't use your loud voice. i think everybody else got the memo and somebody didn't give me the memo. and there are women i love that didn't get the memo either. so i had a little bit of an advantage in that i was kind of oblivious and didn't care whether or not people approved of me. and i feel very lucky because i

think i've not wasted a lot of energy on trying to please the people around me, who weren't going to be pleased no matter what i did anyway. so the first thing is to let go and be the person that you know that you are. you know, people were asking me to speak and ask me to do interviews and stuff like that, i definitely got a sense that if i lost about 30 pounds they'd ask me on cnn every night. i think that's true. and i thought, well, hell no, that's way more work than i'm willing -- you know. [ laughter ] and so my friends here will tell you, i am full staff. i'm the girl version of full staff. i love to party and whatever. so i decided long ago they wasn't going to change a thing about the fundamental aspects of who i was, and if i broke through or made a name for mi

myself-. trust yourself, you are good enough who you are. >> my name is wanda, going to graduate from journalism school. my question is more of a spiritual one. you were speaking earlier about cultivating peace, and we have to acknowledge the privilege in the room and i know that there are people in the room that have been triggered by the "me too" movement. it's difficult to be an effective communicator and remember that cultivating peace within is the first step obviously. and i'm very curious and obviously i'm a journalist and i just sent you a message on instagram, because some things you have to ask directly. how do you take care of yourself? this is heavy spiritual work. as women, we are expected, because of all kinds of gender

specific and cultural traditions, to nurture everyone else, and we forget that, you know what, sometimes mommy needs a break. how do you do that? and i openly ask women this every day now, because i'm not going to lie to you. it's been a really hard two years. >> yeah. don't ever stop asking that question, because i think it helps people remember that it's okay. because i think a lot of my friends think that it's not allowed because, you know, you're only given so many years and you have to do as much as you can in the time that you have. and i definitely fall prey to that, you know, i'll sleep when i'm dead routine. so i'm partly very blessed in my temperament which is, i just default to joy. i'm just really lucky. and when i'm in a room full of eight pieces of bad news and one piece of good news, i'm like, well, at least, we still have

almonds to eat, you know, or something like that. [ laughter ] so i do always path logically look at the bright side, and that's a temperament thing. but i remember there was my first time in liberia, there was a woman who told me the most horrific rape story and i was like, well, thank you very much for this and blah, blah, blah and i left the room, sat down at lunch. and they served me a plate of food and i almost threw up over the table. and i went to my room and i had to lie down. i didn't know what else to do but be horizontal. i wasn't listening to my body, and i was in a state of adrenaline, and i had never heard anything like this in my life. and i didn't know how to incorporate it into how i understand humans should behave. so, you know, once in a while, you have to lie down, or you have to meditate or you have to do whatever. i've been meditating lately, and honestly, it's just one of the

most major changes i've made in my life. i feel like that's huge. i also went back to church, which is really funny because when i hang out with the evangelicals, they were all in this big contest to see who can, like, reel me in. put notches on their bed post, i'm gonna get one! so the last thing i wanted to do was tell rob i was back in church, because he would be like, cha-ching! but i did find myself thinking that i missed, much as i did not miss my catholic upbringing and did not long for anything about being a catholic, i did miss the habit of gathering. and we need to gather. we need time alone. we need to meditate. but we need to gather, and we need to sit for an hour once in a while with people who want to talk about the meaning of life. that's what you do. that's the essence of it. and so i found the most hippie,

gayest, most atheist church you could possibly find, and it's the perfect place on earth. because literally every week, we talk about why we've been put on this earth. so it's wonderful. it's wonderful. so this lady's been so nice and patient. >> i'm ruth curtis. seepa, '71. and i'm sitting here getting this feeling that there are multiple universes of experience rather than one stream forward. because i grew up in alabama in the segregated south. and the tradition that i grew up in, i grew up on a college campus, was that you did speak out, it's just nobody was listening. but we talked to each other, and that fueled us to continue and to keep doing what we needed to do. i mean, it's not the same issues

necessarily that are the focus now with regard to rape and that kind of thing that -- women who are moving into high places and having to deal with men in higher places, and that's why i'm saying parallel universe. because it was racism and holding people back, and denying the humanity of certain -- of a group of people. so the whole idea of your voice and supporting people who speak out was there, it just wasn't being heard until the whole civil rights era took place. so i just wanted to mention that as a dimension of this whole discussion that needs to be acknowledged. >> thank you for that. i think a thing that gets missed

in the conversation we have about speaking up, is the role of humility and knowing when it's appropriate for you to be the person to speak as opposed to somebody else. "three billboards" was made by a man and i kept thinking to myself, did you really have to direct that film? couldn't some woman have directed it? like, really, did you have to? and white women have done a terrible job of accepting our role in systemic racism across the decades and centuries in this country. i come from a family that owned slaves in louisiana. and things were said in my childhood they wish i could bring in an exorcist because they're still in my heart, and i

don't want them to be part of me, but there are. i think if you gave everybody truth serum, there will be women that you talk to every day that have grandma's voice in the back, whispering. so if white women should be leading on anything, or white people should be leading on anything, it would be learning how to shut up and listen, how to hear what you just said about being from alabama and how your experience was different, how to stop telling people what their experience is, but let them tell you. so speaking up is great unless you're drowning someone out. and we need to be lifting each other's voices up. so i don't know what to do with my family's history. i imagine something, i just need to figure out what that is. but one of the things i've learned is when it's not right for it to be my voice.

[ applause ] >> hi, my name's brianna, i'm class of 2018, graduate school of arts and sciences. i just had a question and -- yeah. so as a young person, i'm in my 20s, a lot of people in this room are in their 20s and 30s. what advice would you give to women today how to break through the male-dominated spaces, in our careers, in our classes, in these -- in this world, in this patriarchy? >> so, i had to come to terms with something when i was researching for "women, war and peace", because all you read about war time is the terrible things men do. and i was coming home to dinner with my kids and my husband. after a while, you start looking

like, what is wrong with you guys? are you all evil? and no, they're not. of course they're not. of course they're not. and i finally got my head wrapped around this, in fact, most of them aren't. harvey weinstein has, what, 90 accusers at this point? you know, the people who are terrible are kind of the minority, it's just they do it over and over again, right? and they also, not by coincidence, happen to be like the big alpha guys who are deciding how films get made and who is going to be a star and who is not going to be a star. so it's not just that the world is being run by men. it's being run by a narrow swath of men who benefit by a system that privileges aggression and violence and a lack of regard for other people's humanity and

rights. which is why when they bring women into the room and start to act like women, who might peel off from the alpha? who might feel like other things are possible? because men, in fact, are harder on each other about gender roles than they ever are on us, let's face it. and if you ha've ever been a 13-year-old boy, which i'm sure you haven't been, there's a lot of suffering in it and a lot of horrible choices to be made. so my advice is, be a woman, bring what you know about life as a woman. you know, what you know about taking care of the life business. and find the allies in the men. because there are more of them around you. help them find their strength, help them speak out, support them when they do. don't tell them they're being sissies. find them attractive. that's a real problem.

because we outnumber of those harveys. we way outnumber those harveys. ooh, wait, can i tell you a harvey story? he used his button on me. the door that closes behind you. i went to talk to him about something business related involving my family. i went in, sat down, and he asked what i wanted to talk about. and i said michael eisner, and he just hit the button and the door closed behind me and locked, and i was like, aaah! but i've been so angry about harvey lately. i really am. it's hitting me hard, because i knew him. and i knew exactly who he was the minute i met him. and i don't know why anybody doubted what was very plainly up on the surface, so i've been walking around like a lit fuse. and on sixth avenue, i had to hail a cab. i once got into an argument with a friend of mine. this is how anxious i get in

conflict. and i literally had a nose bleed from it, so i don't do conflict. but i'm waiting for a cab, cab pulls up, driver goes to the back, reaches for a girl who couldn't be any older than you, and he grabs her roughly by the arm. so, line crossed. yanks her out of the cab, and starts yelling at her, you bitch, you bitch and she's crying and said, i forgot my wallet. i said, how much does she owe you? he was like $8. and i was like, really? i said, let her go. and he shoved me, and i shoved him back. and all of a sudden i'm in a shoving match. me! i was out of body, looking down. thinking, this is interesting. please hit me, because i would never hit you first. but i would really never have

hit a person and i really want to know what that feels like. so the girl, i finally convinced her to run off and she left and he turned to me and got right in my face, the way they do in baseball games, and he was yelling at me. my old me would have been shaking and crying and everything else. i'm standing there watching him like he's a bug in a microscope. you shoved me and i shoved you. you know i'm as strong as you are. this is all you have. this is it. this is the last trick in your bag of tricks and it's ridiculous. the emperor is not wearing any clothes. you guys, the emperor is not wearing any clothes. so don't let anybody out-shout you. i just started to laugh. i didn't do it on purpose. it looked so ridiculous to me. don't let anybody out-shout you. shouting is one of the dumbest and stupidest and the last of

the resorts of scoundrels. so never let anybody shout you down. [ applause ] >> hi. i'm caroline. i'm an mph candidate coming up in may 2018. you've had an incredibly diverse, if you will, career, from hot girls wanted to pray the devil back to hell. can you talk very pragmatically if you will, about how you arrived at where your heart's greatest joy met the world's deepest need? >> i've never spoken really pragmatically in my life, so i'll try to start now. it's a good question. because i've been really lucky, you know, honestly. i think of it as, the road was

unrolling in front of me and i just kept walking it. as i got past a certain age, i started thinking, it's never been a mistake to trust it, where it was taking me, so i'm just going to keep trusting it, and that's the way i've been operating ever since. i've learned that every decision i've made out of fear has been a bad decision. i've learned that any time i ever felt tempted not to tell the truth, it was a terrible mistake. i have learned that it is amazing how much of a difference just to be generous in every interaction you have, because you really never know who is going to come back 20 years later and turn out to be running a foundation. i mean, if you choose joy and you choose generosity, i honestly, this is the only thing that's mystical and religious about me, it will find you. it will. not pragmatic a bit.

sorry. [ applause ] i think one more. is one more okay? >> thank you. hi, my name is etansha, graduate of engineering school from class 2001. i work in a company that has over 200,000 employees. we have a women's diversity network. and the co-chair of the network -- there are two chairs, one is a man, and one is a woman. initially i find it's quite intriguing but actually working through that, i actually find the experiences somewhat open -- i would say he opens the perspective in many ways. so i wonder your perspective of how we shall sort of interact, engage, and potentially partner with men? because we're living in a world that's almost half-half. >> well, it is half-half. in fact, we're the majority. so the fact that we're considered diversity is odd, isn't it?

it makes no sense at all. so there's a mistake we often make about when we talk about ending patriarchy, because people who don't things, think we want to replace it with matriarchy. and i had a mother, we all had a mother, nobody wants to live in a mark yatriarchy, nobody wants. [ laughter ] what we're saying is, we're living way out of balance. and we're not getting the full picture because everybody's not working on creating the picture. so we're looking to walk side by side with men as our peers, without an expectation of being punished or violated in exchange for that. it's pretty simple. so if he is a man who understands that and sometimes you have to wait a long time before he shows himself, then

great. he's going to be one of your best and biggest allies. just make sure he's the kind of man who understands what i said before about understanding when it is right for him to speak and when it isn't. michael moore spoke at the women's march in january. and he was the only one that they had to cut the mike off because he wouldn't stop talking. [ laughter ] so, if he understands how to bring humility to it, so it's up to us to help men along with this. to get them to be a little less afraid of what it is we're trying to accomplish. because they are afraid. right? the ground is shifting under their feet and we have to help them with that. but we need to insist it shifts. we need to insist, yeah. thank you so much, everybody.

[ applause ] >> thank you. thank you so much. tuesday morning on c-span, the senate energy and natural resources committee holds a hearing on puerto rico's electric grid. and the recovery from hurricane maria. we'll have live coverage at 10:00 a.m. eastern on c-span3. wednesday morning, the confirmation hearing for gina haspel, the nominee to be cia director. that hearing of the senate intelligence committee live on c-span at 9:30 a.m. eastern wednesday morning. ♪ ♪ >> c-span's washington journal, live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. coming up tuesday morning, virginia republican congressman

scott taylor joins us to discuss military and veterans issues. then national urban league president and ceo mark morial will discuss the findings of the 2018 state of black america report. be sure to watch c-span's washington journal live at 7:00 a.m. eastern tuesday morning. join the discussion. >> sunday morning on 1968, america in turmoil, we look at the cold war as the backdrop for the events of 1968, including the vietnam war, the presidential campaign and the space race. joining us to talk about that turbulent type of elizabeth cops, historian and documentary filmmaker, and mark cramer, program director for the project on cold war studies at harvard university. watch "1968 america in turmoil" live sunday at 8:30 a.m. eastern on c-span's washington journal,

and on american history tv on c-span3. >> the head of the justice department's executive office for immigration review recently sat down for a conversation about the agency's mission and what it's doing to address the backlog of cases in the immigration court system. from the center for immigration studies, this is an hour. >> good evening. my name is andrew arthur, and i'm the resident fellow on law and policy at the immigration center. i want to welcome you to the national press club for the first in a series of what we're calling immigration news makers events. these events will give the heads of federal agencies, members of congress, and other government immigration policy makers an opportunity to discuss their priorities as well as the challenges they face in implementing and enforcing the immigration laws of the united states. we are honored to have as our first immigration news m