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George, when you were
working on Star Trek,

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and Star Trek is tremendously progressive,

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and one of the areas
Star Trek was not allowed

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to be progressive at the
time was in gay rights,

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and at the time that you
were working on Star Trek,

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you weren't allowed to
openly love who you love,

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and that was a risk to your career,

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<v ->was a risk to your safety.</v>
<v ->Absolutely.</v>

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And here we are now with
an openly gay couple

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on Star Trek: Discovery,

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and Star Trek has always said, "Hey,

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there's a place for you in the future,"

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and it finally says that
for an openly gay couple.

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Would you talk about
what that means to you?

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I've been closeted most
of my life, my adult life.

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I was living a double life.

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I was an activist.

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I was active in electoral politics.

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I was involved in the
civil rights movement.

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During the Vietnam War, I
was in the peace movement.

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I was a member of what was called EIPJ,

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Entertainment Industry
and Peace and Justice,

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and I worked alongside Jane
Fonda and Donald Sutherland,

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so I was an activist and

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closeted on the one issue

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that was very personal to
me, very much my issue,

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and here were all these
other people involved

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in gay liberation movements and so forth,

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giving up their lives,
giving up their careers,

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some, their families,
and here I was protecting

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my career

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and being closeted, which
adds another layer of torture.

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And some of my colleagues
knew, but, you know,

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they knew that if they talked about me,

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then it would hurt my career
and they respected my privacy,

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but I had a conversation.

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This was after we were canceled and...

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Gene had a party up in the Hollywood Hills

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with a place with a pool,

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and the activity was all
toward the house poolside,

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and Gene had swum out to
the other end of the pool,

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and kind of private,
so I swam out with him,

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and I introduced the idea
of, why won't Star Trek

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deal with the gay issue,
as a closeted man.

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And he said, "Yes, I'm
aware of that issue.

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It's an important part of diversity,

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but I can't deal with it

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because I have to exist on television."

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We had one episode where
we had a biracial kiss

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where Captain Kirk kissed Uhura,

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and that was the lowest-rated
show, that episode,

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that we ever had because in the South,

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they literally blacked out that show,

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<v ->and the ratings plunged.</v>
<v ->That's so shameful.</v>

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It's a high-risk business on television

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because it's a advertising medium.

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"I can't deal with that and
hope to stay on the air.

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I'm pushing at the edges already,

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and for me to continue doing it,

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I have to watch the guard rails."

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and I understood that, too,
because I was closeted,

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but I had that discussion with him,

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and now that we can have
a committed gay couple

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as a regular on a TV series,
I think it's a great advance.