<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?><oembed><version><![CDATA[1.0]]></version><provider_name><![CDATA[The Dish]]></provider_name><provider_url><![CDATA[http://dish.andrewsullivan.com]]></provider_url><author_name><![CDATA[Andrew Sullivan]]></author_name><author_url><![CDATA[https://dish.andrewsullivan.com/author/sullydish/]]></author_url><title><![CDATA[Quote For The&nbsp;Day]]></title><type><![CDATA[link]]></type><html><![CDATA[<p>&#8220;Now I feel strong and beautiful. I walk proudly down the streets of Manhattan. The people I love, love me. I make the funniest people in the country laugh, and they are my friends. I am a great friend and an even better sister. I have fought my way through harsh criticism and death threats for speaking my mind. I am alive, like the strong women in this room before me. I am a hot-blooded fighter and I am fearless.</p>
<p>But I did morning radio last week, and a DJ asked, &#8220;Have you gained weight? You seem chunkier to me. You should strike while the iron is hot, Amy.&#8221; And it&#8217;s all gone. In an instant, it&#8217;s all stripped away. I wrote an article for Men&#8217;s Health and was so proud, until I saw instead of using my photo, they used one of a 16-year-old model wearing a clown nose, to show that she&#8217;s hilarious. But those are my words. What about who I am, and what I have to say? I can be reduced to that lost college freshman so quickly sometimes, I want to quit. Not performing, but being a woman altogether.</p>
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<p>I want to throw my hands in the air, after reading a mean Twitter comment, and say, &#8220;All right! You got it. You figured me out. I&#8217;m not pretty. I&#8217;m not thin. I do not deserve to use my voice. I&#8217;ll start wearing a burqa and start waiting tables at a pancake house. All my self-worth is based on what you can see.&#8221;</p>
<p>But then I think, Fuck that. I am not laying in that freshman year bed anymore ever again. I am a woman with thoughts and questions and shit to say. I say if I&#8217;m beautiful. I say if I&#8217;m strong. You will not determine my story — I will. I will speak and share and fuck and love and I will never apologize to the frightened millions who resent that they never had it in them to do it. I stand here and I am amazing, for you. Not because of you. I am not who I sleep with. I am not my weight. I am not my mother. I am myself,&#8221; &#8211; the stupendously talented <a href="http://www.vulture.com/2014/05/read-amy-schumers-ms-gala-speech.html" target="_blank">Amy Schumer</a>. If you haven&#8217;t yet, read the whole glorious, hilarious thing.</p>
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