Come with me.
I want to take you back to one of
the most difficult moments of my life.
It was March of 2012.
I was sitting at my computer screen.
I was staring at a letter
I spent a long time struggling to write.
And just as hard as it was to write it
It was even harder to find the courage to press send.
That's because this wasn't a normal letter.
This letter held a secret.
One that I worked so hard all my life to protect
to keep hidden.
And I knew that once it was out there
my whole life, my whole world
was likely to change.
So I agonized over this letter.
I read it over, and over.
And then one night I mustered up the courage
and I just hit send.
[Whew] Right?
I'm supposed to tell you
My secret's out there
I felt this overwhelming wave of relief.
But I didn't.
I was terrified.
And rightly so.
I knew that this secret would change the way people saw me
and I thought I was prepared for their judgement
but nothing can prepare you for an overwhelming tsunami of hate.
Senseless, blind, crude as it may be
But still, absolutely devastating.
Still, it's one of the best decisions I ever made
and I'm going to tell you why.
I'll give you some context.
I'm Egyptian.
I'm a proud Egyptian. I'll always be a proud Egyptian
even if the Egypt I grew up in became increasingly rigid as I aged.
Politically, socially, religiously
the powers that be created an environment that
choked the freedoms of millions of people
anyone who didn't fit into the normal narrative that they set for us
anyone who dared challenge those in power certainly.
But not me.
I was safe.
My grandparents were famous celebrities
literally revered in Egypt.
And as their grandson
I inherited this admiration.
In fact, I was often referred to as Egypt's favorite son.
You know, growing up a Sharif, in Egypt
that's kind of like being born
a Kennedy.
Or well, look at me
Kardashian
maybe, I don't know.
The point is I had every opportunity in the world.
I got to be an actor, as you heard
a spokesperson for top brands
even an underwear model.
I've since rediscovered carbohydrates.
My mom says I'm looking healthy.
That's nice.
Thanks mom.
But the point is if I wasn't overly exposed
I was certainly visible.
But I was also forced to be invisible.
You know, being in the public life
people thought they knew me.
But they didn't really know because I couldn't let them see.
Yes, I'm Egyptian.
Yes, I'm part of this famous family.
But like I said, I have a secret.
I'm gay.
This part of me was something that I kept hidden
because there was something that didn't fit into the Egypt I knew
the Egypt that scoffed at human rights
and persecuted people who were different.
You know being gay in Egypt means living in near constant fear.
While homosexuality is not technically illegal there
persecution, discrimination, they run rampant.
The LGBT community are often charged and arrested for crimes
such as obscenity, prostitution, inciting debauchery, and so forth.
You know, as a teenager I remember seeing coverage of the Cairo 52
when a disco called the Queen Boat was raided on the Nile
52 men arrested, charged, tortured
tried, ultimately convicted of such crimes.
Even those that were ultimately acquitted
had their names dragged through the media
their reputations destroyed
were forced to undergo invasive medical examinations.
They were rejected by their families and by society.
I always worried that that would be my story one day.
That I would get caught the same way.
I heard similar stories for years
and you continue to hear them to this day.
If you look here
this is a still image from a news report just last year.
A journalist
I won't give her credit and I will not name her
orchestrated a raid of a bathhouse with police.
They stormed in, arrested all these men
ushered them out naked, filmed them
and accused them of homosexuality and spreading AIDS in Egypt.
That was the headline story on the nightly news.
The story
completely fabricated, by the way
But the hate that drove it
and the fear that it instilled
that's very real.
You know, as a gay man
I felt isolated and lonely and I felt like
I didn't have a place in my own country.
And it's going to sound trivial to you
but maybe the only source of solace that I felt
came from Hollywood films and TV shows.
Shows like Will and Grace.
Seeing scenes like these of people living openly and authentically
and happily, being embraced by people around them
they provided me with great comfort.
They made me feel less alone.
They helped me realize that being different wasn't bad
and that there was a community out there
even if it was many miles away in Hollywood
that loved and supported the invisible me.
In 2012
I saw a glimmer of hope.
As many of you know this was a time of great change in Egypt.
The country was in the midst of a political revolution behind us
with the jubilant celebrations in Tahrir Square
but ahead of us lay uncertainty.
There were hope that things would change
there were promises of more open and tolerant society to come
but really it was anyone's guess what the new Egypt
would look like in the wake of revolution.
It was a formative and fragile time for our country
and I knew that this was the time I had to finally settle
my internal struggle and add my voice to those calling for
an open and inclusive Egypt.
I was a public figure.
I was given a voice.
But with that voice comes a responsibility to use it for good.
So I wrote the letter.
I revealed my secret.
I used myself as a litmus test.
I challenged those in power to react.
With the eyes of the world watching
I demanded that equal rights be given to all citizens regardless
of race, religion, sexual orientation, gender, what have you.
You know, I knew full well from getting my master's degree
in comparative politics that when entrenching constitutional principles
if a group is excluded from the outside it could take
centuries before the issue is revisited.
The piece immediately went viral.
It went global.
It was number two on Yahoo
number three on Twitter
and I was being inundated with hateful messages from all over.
They ran the gamut from snide comments to death threats
and it was impossible to know what threats were real
which were credible.
But they were so constant, and so extreme
that one thing became immediately clear
it would be a while if ever that I would get to go home.
And I still haven't been home.
Not even to bury my beloved grandparents.
I fell into a depression.
I had suicidal thoughts.
But almost worse
I nearly convinced myself that I should have never hit send.
But then something wonderful happened.
Maybe I'd missed them in the avalanche of hate
or maybe they came later
but soon I started to see messages like these.
They trickled in slowly.
And there weren't many at first
but their impact on me was huge.
They convinced me that I had made the right choice
and they put something into focus that has been
at the heart of everything I've done since.
Just as I took comfort in TV shows and characters
that I could relate to when I was growing up
I realized that my story could maybe help others feel less alone.
Emboldened, I became the national spokesperson
of the world's largest LGBT media advocacy organization
where I honed my skills and my message as I prepared to push for
equality back home in the Middle East
no small task.
And finally, three years after coming out I was ready.
I was ready to face my demons
and I conducted my first Arabic language TV interview.
Live, as an open and visible
and proud gay man.
It was a program with millions of viewers.
Four million watched live
some twenty million afterwards
the host is essentially the male Barbara Walters of the Middle East.
And what was important about it is that it was going to
be the first time that many people in the region
heard directly from an LGBT person.
Speaking openly, honestly
appealing to their hearts and minds as
someone they watched grow up from a young age.
Again, I was scared.
I was inviting a reaction.
And so I braced myself for another onslaught of hate and to be sure it came
but this time it was diluted.
With an unexpectedly strong wave of support
even more messages like before
messages like these.
A lot has happened in the world since then.
In some places
life has improved for LGBT people.
But in Egypt, the situation has regressed.
Every day I receive messages from LGBT youth
who find it difficult to go on
to find the courage to survive another day.
The pendulum has really swung back in Egypt towards
government mandated discrimination and intolerance
which means that once again, in Egypt
silence feels like the only option.
But it's not the only option.
I've come to believe that while my story may
not change the course of a country
it can be a small part in inspiring and challenging
others to live openly and authentically
and if my story can inspire others
their story can inspire others.
Stories hold incredible power.
And this power is no longer in the hands of the few.
It's no longer in the hands of a centralized source.
You know, we have a connected world
and with the power of new media this power has been
dispersed to all of us to share our stories
and to create change, and to accelerate acceptance.
My story is just one of many millions.
But that doesn't make it small.
That's what makes it huge.
We're not alone
and together with our stories
we can inspire millions more.
Thank you.
[applause]