VP Harris on Breaking Barriers: Sometimes People Will Open the Door for You Sometimes ‘You Need to Kick that F**king Door Down’

EXCERPT:

HARRIS: “To especially the young people here, I say to you, when you walk in those rooms, being the only one that looks like you, the only one with your background, you walk in those rooms, chin up, shoulders back, be at a meeting room, a boardroom, a courtroom, a hearing room, you walk in those rooms, knowing that we are all in that room with you, applauding you on and expecting certain things from you, including that you will not be silent in those rooms. And that we expect that from you because we also expect that you will internalize and know we're there with you. And so your voice can be strong. It is as Alicia said my mother would say to me, 'Don't you ever let anybody tell you who you are. You tell them who you are.' Don't ever carry as a personal burden your capacity to do whatever you dream and aspire to do based on other people's limited ability to see who can do what. This is part of what's involved, is that we have to know that sometimes people will open the door for you and leave it open sometimes they won't. And then you need to kick that f***ing door down.”