Activist, musician, drag queen, and 2024 Out100 honoree Pattie Gonia made history by delivering an in-drag TED Talk on the event's main stage. During her talk — titled "Why joy is a serious way to take action" — Pattie advocated for climate change, made the audience laugh, and discussed how turning pain into joy can be a powerful force to "fight for what we love."
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Pattie's main-stage TED Talk — filmed in Brussels, Belgium in October 2024 — was officially released this week. Under the premise that "joy is a strategy to fight back," the environmentalist queen discussed the biggest lesson that the art form of drag has taught her: "You can take fighting for something seriously without taking yourself too seriously."
Pattie recalled, "When queer people were beaten in their homes, and put in jail just for existing. When we had the statistics and the facts on the millions of queer people dying of AIDS — yet no one was joining our fight — drag performers turned pain into joy. And, in doing so, welcomed millions more people to fight with us."
After explaining that joy is a great and necessary tool to make the climate movement feel irresistible and to inspire others to join, Pattie argued that "we deserve more than doom and gloom, because this is the only planet with a Beyoncé on it."
As the audience laughed, the queen added: "Facts are facts, TED."
Pattie was invited to speak at TED Countdown, the organization's main climate event every year, during the fall of 2024.
"It was a whole production!" Pattie tells Out. "From designing an upcycled dress with designer Anna Molinari out of pool floaties, shower curtains, and Barbie doll pieces; to memorizing the script in the middle of tour last fall in the back of our tour van; to learning a lot about queer history and the AIDS crisis."
While many drag artists have spoken at independently organized TEDx events, and RuPaul himself has delivered a main-stage TED Talk out of drag, Pattie has broken new ground delivering a talk on the TED main stage and being in full drag.
When asked about the significance of a drag artist being taken seriously to deliver a legitimate TED Talk about climate change while presenting in full drag, Pattie replied that we need even "more drag queens on main stages."
"The world is finally waking up to the power of queerness and drag," she added. "To be honest, that's why so many people in power — like billionaires and politicians destroying this planet for profit — are feeling so threatened."
Pattie Gonia's full TED Talk, "Why joy is a serious way to take action," is now streaming on TED.com.
