Ideas worth spreading

Fifty shades of gay

3,187,222 views |

iO Tillett Wright |

TEDxWomen 2012

• December 2012

iO Tillett Wright has photographed 2,000 people who consider themselves somewhere on the LGBTQ spectrum -- and asked many of them: Can you assign a percentage to how gay or straight you are? Most people, it turns out, consider themselves to exist in the gray areas of sexuality, not 100% gay or straight. Which presents a real problem when it comes to discrimination: Where do you draw the line?

iO Tillett Wright has photographed 2,000 people who consider themselves somewhere on the LGBTQ spectrum -- and asked many of them: Can you assign a percentage to how gay or straight you are? Most people, it turns out, consider themselves to exist in the gray areas of sexuality, not 100% gay or straight. Which presents a real problem when it comes to discrimination: Where do you draw the line?

This talk was presented at an official TED conference. TED's editors chose to feature it for you.

About the speaker

iO Tillett Wright

iO Tillett Wright

See speaker profile

As a child actor, iO Tillett Wright turned his shoes around in the bathroom stall so that people would think he was a boy. As a teenager, he fell in love with both women and men. His life in the gray areas of gender and sexuality deeply inform his work as an artist.

Learn more

This talk was presented at an official TED conference. TED's editors chose to feature it for you.