And the Winner is...

Dustin Lance Black, in more ways than one.

I know Ogaypogo already blogged about this, but - here's the deal - I had already laid claim to posting Black's speech as a blog post. So, while I know the link has already been posted, I wanted to actually put his speech in its entirety right here.

As I sat beside Ogaypogo, we both found ourselves wiping the tears away. If only I could have seen this speech ten years ago, high school could have been a lot easier. It took a lot of courage to say what he said and it was inspiring and uplifting to see him take that step.

It is sad that it is courageous to say something encouraging to gay people everywhere, but it is the truth.

All of that said, I was quite moved by it and I will let Black's words speak for themselves:

"Oh my God. This was, um, this was not an easy film to make. First off, I have to thank Cleve Jones and Anne Kronenberg and all the real-life people who shared their stories with me. And, um, Gus Van Sant, Sean Penn, Emile Hirsch, Josh Brolin, James Franco and our entire cast, my producers Dan Jinks and Bruce Cohen, everyone at Groundswell and Focus for taking on the challenge of telling this life-saving story. When I was 13 years old, my beautiful mother and my father moved me from a conservative Mormon home in San Antonio, Texas to California, and I heard the story of Harvey Milk. And it gave me hope. It gave me the hope to live my life. It gave me the hope one day I could live my life openly as who I am and then maybe even I could even fall in love and one day get married.

I wanna...I wanna thank my mom, who has always loved me for who I am even when there was pressure not to. But most of all, if Harvey had not been taken from us 30 years ago, I think he'd want me to say to all of the gay and lesbian kids out there tonight who have been told that they are less than by their churches, by the government or by their families, that you are beautiful, wonderful creatures of value and that no matter what anyone tells you, God does love you and that very soon, I promise you, you will have equal rights federally, across this great nation of ours. Thank you. Thank you. And thank you, God, for giving us Harvey Milk."