President Obama:
Hello, everybody! (applause) Thank you so much. (applause) Thank you, everybody. Have a seat. Have a seat. Well, hello, London. (applause) It is good to be
back in the UK. Thank you, Khadija, for that
wonderful introduction. I was saying backstage I'd
vote for her for something. (laughter) I want to thank our U.S. Ambassador, Matthew Barzun,
for all the great work that he's doing. (applause) And it is wonderful
to see all of you. I guess you all know
why I came this week. It's no secret. Nothing was going to stop me
from wishing happy birthday to Her Majesty. (laughter) And meeting George. (laughter) Who was adorable. Michelle and I had the
privilege to visit with Her Majesty and the Duke of
Edinburgh yesterday. I can't tell you
what we talked about. I can tell you that I hope
I am such an engaging lunch partner when I am 90. (laughter) And I'd like to thank Her
Majesty for letting us use one of her Horticultural
Halls for this town hall. I also just came from
touring Shakespeare's Globe -- which is a good way to
start your Saturday morning. Today is the 400th
anniversary of Shakespeare's death. And as he once wrote,
"brevity is the soul of wit," so I will try to be
brief on the front end so we have time for a
conversation. These are some of the
favorite things that I do when I travel
around the world, is just have a chance to
meet with young people and hear from them directly. It's inspiring to me. It gives me new ideas and I
think underscores the degree to which young people are
rising up in every continent to seize the possibilities
of tomorrow. Now, whenever I get together
with leaders of the United States and UK, you hear
a lot about the special relationship and the shared
values and interests that bind us together, and the
ways that our cooperation makes the world safer
and more secure, and a more just and
prosperous place. And all of that is true. We go back a pretty long
way, the UK and the U.S. We've had our quarrels. There was that whole
tea incident and -- (laughter) -- and the British
burned my house down. (laughter) But we made up. (laughter) Ultimately, we made up and
ended up spilling blood on the battlefield
together, side-by-side, against fascism and
against tyranny, for freedom and
for democracy. And from the ashes of war,
we led the charge to create the institutions and
initiatives that sustain a prosperous peace --
NATO; Bretton Woods, the Marshall Plan, the EU. The joint efforts and
sacrifices of previous generations of Americans and
Brits are a big part of why we've known decades
of relative peace and prosperity in Europe,
and that, in turn, has helped to spread peace
and prosperity around the world. And think about how
extraordinary that is. For more than 1,000 years,
this continent was darkened by war and violence. It was taken for granted. It was assumed that that
was the fate of man. Now, that's not to say that
your generation has had it easy. Both here and in
the United States, your generation has grown up
at a time of breathtaking change. You've come of age
through 9/11 and 7/7. You've had friends
go off to war. You've seen families
endure recession. The challenges of our time
-- economic inequality and climate change, terrorism
and migration -- all these things are real. And in an age of
instant information, where TV and Twitter can
feed us a steady stream of bad news, I know that it
can sometimes seem like the order that we've
created is fragile, maybe even crumbling, maybe
the center cannot hold. And we see new calls for
isolationism or xenophobia. We see those who would call
for rolling back the rights of people; people hunkering
down in their own point of view and unwilling to engage
in a democratic debate. And those impulses I
think we can understand. They are reactions to
changing times and uncertainty. But when I speak
to young people, I implore them and I implore
you to reject those calls to pull back. I'm here to ask you to
reject the notion that we're gripped by forces
that we can't control. And I want you to take a
longer and more optimistic view of history and the part
that you can play in it. I ask you to embrace
the view of one of my predecessors,
President John F. Kennedy, who once said:
"Our problems are man-made. Therefore, they can
be solved by man. And man can be as
big as he wants." That's how, since 1950,
the global average life expectancy has
grown by 25 years. Since 1990, we've cut
extreme poverty around the world in half. That's how, over
the past 100 years, we've come from a world
where only a small fraction of women could vote to one
where almost every woman can. That's how, since
just the year 2000, we've come from a world
without marriage equality to one where it's a reality in
nearly two dozen countries, including here and
in the United States. Every few months, I speak
with a new group of White House interns. They're roughly your age. They come in for six months;
they are assigned to various aspects of the White House. And I often talk to them
about the fact that if you could choose one moment in
history in which to be born, and you didn't know ahead of
time what you were to be -- you didn't know whether
you were a man or a woman, what nationality,
what ethnicity, what religion who
your parents were, what class status you might
have -- if you could choose one time in history where
the chances that you led a fulfilling life
were most promising, you'd choose right
now, this moment. Because the world, for
all of its travails, for all of its challenges,
has never been healthier, better educated, wealthier,
more tolerant, less violent, more attentive to the rights
of all people than it is today. That doesn't mean we
don't have big problems. That's not a cause
for complacency, but it is a cause
for optimism. You are standing in a moment
where your capacity to shape this world is unmatched. What an incredible
privilege that is. And you've never had better
tools to make a difference -- to forge a better UK and
a better Europe and a better world. So my primary message today
is going to be to reject pessimism and cynicism; know
that progress is possible, that our problems
can be solved. Progress requires the harder
path of breaking down barriers, and
building bridges, and standing up for the
values of tolerance and diversity that our nations
have worked and sacrificed to secure and defend. Progress is not inevitable,
and it requires struggle and perseverance and
discipline and faith. But that's the story of
how we won voting rights, and women's rights,
and workers' rights, and civil rights, and
immigration rights, and gay rights. Because those who came
before us often risked their lives to give us the chance
to know something better. That's what gives me so much
hope about your generation. So many of you are driven
by that same impulse. You're a generation that
has seen integration and globalization not as threats
but as opportunities -- for education, and exploration,
and employment, and exchange. You're a generation who sees
differences of pluralism and diversity not as a curse,
but as a great gift. That's one of the reasons
why the United States has invested in young leader
initiatives around the globe -- in Africa and Latin
America, Southeast Asia, and right here in the UK. So last summer, we
launched Young Leaders UK. And it's grown from four
students in Plymouth to more than 1,000 nationwide -- a
diverse group of Brits aged 18 to 30, from government
and NGOs and the private sector, including many
of you here today. I know Ambassador Barzun has
held town hall workshops at more than 100 high schools,
with more than 14, 000 "sixth formers." He's worked to create
more of the U.S. Embassy exchange programs
that have graduated alumni like Margaret Thatcher,
and Gordon Brown, and Tony Blair. Because we want you to have
the tools, connections, and resources that you need
to make yourselves change agents, the change that
you are looking for in the world. So you're young leaders
like Michael Sani, who's here today --
where is Michael? There he is. Michael was inspired by
America's "Rock the Vote" voter registration
initiative, so he started his own "Bite
the Bullet" -- "Bite the Ballot" -- excuse me -- (applause) -- initiative
here in the UK. He spent time in
Greensboro, North Carolina, where he learned about our
Civil Rights Movement. And he said: "I have a new
understanding of the meaning of perseverance, resilience,
and delayed gratification -- about fighting for change
you may not live to see, but your children
will live to see." Fighting for change that
you may not live to see, but that your children
will live to see. That's what this
is all about. That's what we
are all about. Whether in the Cold
War or world war, movements for economic
or social justice, efforts to combat climate
change -- our best impulses has always been to leave a
better world for the next generation. Maryam Ahmed is here today. Where is Maryam? Where are you? Are you also behind me? There's Maryam up top. It's that impulse that
compels a young leader like Maryam to say, I may have
grown up one of eight in a small West London house,
but I'm going to use the education I got at Oxford to
help any child have the same opportunities that I had. And Ali Hashem is here. Where is Ali? Right there. It's the same impulse
that's led Ali to say, I may have fled
Syria as a child, but now that I'm
in elective office, I'm going to use my power to
help other refugees like me. And Becca Bunce
is here today. Where is Becca? There's Becca. It's that impulse that
compels a young leader like Becca to say that, as a
woman with a disability, I may have fallen
down at times, but people who believed
in me picked me up. And I'm going to pay it
forward by fighting for people with disabilities and
against violence against women, because I believe the
world can be a better place. You can't help but be
inspired by the stories of young people like these,
both in the United States and the United Kingdom. And think of all the good
that we can do together. Think of all the good that
we have yet to accomplish. There is not a challenge on
this planet that our two countries don't
take on together. And as long as your
generation nurtures that special relationship, and
learns from one another, and stands together, I'm
confident the future is brighter than the past, and
that our best days are still ahead of us. So, with that, let's
have a conversation. All right -- you
guys were ready. (laughter) Here's what we're
going to do. I am going to go
boy, girl, boy, girl, to make sure that it's fair. I'll try to get in as
many questions as I can. Introduce yourself. We have mics. Right there. And tell me who you are
and where you're from, and then try to keep your
question -- or comment relatively brief so I can
get as many as possible. All right? And we will
start right here. The Press: Mr. President,
my name is Keona McCarney (ph) from Belfast,
Northern Ireland. And this special
relationship is felt nowhere stronger than in
Northern Ireland, where America has played a
really important role in our peace process. How will your predecessor
and those to come after you help to foster that? President Obama: Well,
Northern Ireland is a story of perseverance. And the fact that your
generation -- how old are you now? The Press: Twenty-one. President Obama: Twenty-one. Your experience has been
entirely different than your parents. There are still huge
problems there -- some of them political, some
of them economic. But every year we have,
on St. Patrick's Day, folks from Ireland come. And we had both your First
Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister come. And folks are working
these issue through. And what's interesting is
the degree to which the example of peacemaking in
Northern Ireland is now inspiring others. So in Colombia, Latin
America right now, they're trying to
undergo a peace process. And they've actually brought
people from Northern Ireland to come and describe how do
you overcome years of enmity and hatred and intolerance,
and try to shape a country that is unified. You know this
better than I do, but one of the things that
you see in Northern Ireland that's most important is
the very simple act of recognizing the humanity of
those on the other side of the argument, having empathy
and a sense of connection to people who are not like you. That's taken time, but
you're now seeing that. And I think among young
people who are interacting more, you're seeing that. It requires also forging a
new identity that is about being from Northern Ireland
as opposed to being Unionist or Sinn Fein or -- just
deciding the country as a whole is more important than
any particular faction or any particular flag. But this is a challenging
time to do that. Because there is so much
uncertainty in the world right now, because things
are changing so fast, there is a temptation
to forge identities, tribal identities that give
you a sense of certainty, a buffer against change. And that's something that
our young people -- we have to fight against. Whether you're talking about
Africa, or the Middle East, or Northern
Ireland, or Burma, the forces that lead to the
most violence and the most injustice typically spring
out of people saying, I want to feel important by
dividing the world into "us" and "them." And "them" threatens me, and
so I've got to make sure that my tribe
strikes out first. And fighting that mentality
and that impulse requires us to begin very young,
with our kids. One of the most encouraging
things I've seen in Northern Ireland is children starting
to go to school together and having a sense that we're
all in this together, as opposed to it's
"us" against "them." But it's going to
take some time. It will depend on leaders
like you to make it happen, all right? No pressure. You're going to be fine. You're going to do it. All right, good question. All right, so it's
a gentleman's turn. That gentleman right there. Yes, you. There's nobody behind
you, right there. No, no, no. (laughter) You. Hold on a second. I was pointing down
here, but go ahead, and I'll call on him next. Go ahead. The Press: Hi, I'm
Peter from London. President Obama: Hi, Peter. (laughter) The Press: I always
imagine in the future, so if your successor comes
to you and she says -- (laughter and applause) -- I suppose it
could be Bernie. (laughter) And she says, oh, he's
prioritized education, health care, and defense. These are three
issues we've got, we've got in the budget. And what's your priority
and how do you think about ranking those? And what do you think --
what would you like to see as your core
priorities there? President Obama: For
the next President? The Press: And for
yourself, as well. But, yes. President Obama: Well, one
of the things that I've learned as President is I
don't always have the luxury of just choosing
one or two things. Turns out that how well we
do in the United States and how well the globe does
depends on a lot of things. My first priority is to keep
the American people safe. Just like I'm sure
Prime Minister Cameron, if you asked him, what
is your first priority, it's keeping the
United Kingdom safe. So security is always going
to be a top-of-the-list item. And the threats from ISIL
and transnational terrorism are absolutely
critical to address. But how we address
them is important. And recognizing that
security is not just a matter of military actions,
but is a matter of the messages we send and the
institutions that we build, and the diplomacy
that we engage in, and the opportunities that
we present to people. That is going to be
important for the next President of the United
States and any global leader to recognize. I am in awe of our
respective militaries, the men and women in uniform
who serve their country and make such extraordinary
sacrifices. But we do them a disservice
if we think that the entire burden of keeping the world
safe is just placed on those who are in uniform. That's where
diplomacy comes in. You look at something like
Iran where obviously the United States and Iran has
had a terrible relationship since 1979; the theocracy
there has engaged in all kinds of very dangerous
and provocative behaviors, and they were on the path
to obtain a nuclear weapon. The hard, diplomatic
work that we did, along with the UK and the EU
and members of the Security Council, to forge an
agreement where they are no longer on the path to get a
nuclear weapon -- we never engaged in a military
strike to do it, but it resulted in
a much safer world. And the same is true when
you think about development in sub-Saharan Africa. An organization like Boko
Haram is ideologically driven and we have to help
countries like Nigeria fight against the brutality and
the rape and the pillage that they engage in. But if there are communities
where children can't read or feed themselves, they are
much more vulnerable to fostering these kind of
demented ideologies. So I think it's not an
either-or question, and it's important for young
people who -- very many thoughtful young people I
think instinctually are suspicious of military
action because too often it's been used as a
knee-jerk response to problems as opposed to
part of a broader set of solutions. But we have to do both,
and we can do both. In terms of the United
States right now, I would love to see a focus
on early childhood education as the next step in filling
out our social safety net. We don't yet have
institutions that are fully adapted to the fact
that, guess what, women work and
support families, and they need things like
paid family leave and high-quality child care. And we know that when we
invest in children between the ages of zero and three
that the outcomes in terms of them getting effective
educations and having thriving lives are enormous. We end up saving huge
amounts of money from reduced crime and poverty
if we just make that early investment. That's something that some
countries do better than others, and we can learn
from other countries along those lines. Across the board, across the
developing world right now, I think we have to attend
to issues of inequality. And one of the places to
start addressing these issues of inequality is
making sure that every child is getting a
decent education. And a lot of our countries
are not doing as well as they should on that front. All right, who is next? The young lady right there. You, yes, you. (laughter) The Press: Hi, my name is
Fatima, and my question is, do you think signing the
T-TIP agreement will have a negative impact on the EU,
due to the standards of regulation enforced? President Obama: For those
of you who are not aware, T-TIP, as we call it, is the
trade deal that is being negotiated between the
United States and the European Union. We haven't gotten
it done yet. The truth is, is that the
United States and Europe already have enormous
amounts of trade, but there are still barriers
that exist that prevent businesses and individuals
that are providing services to each other to be able
to do so seamlessly. And if we are able to
get this deal done, it's estimated that it will
create millions of jobs and billions of dollars of
benefits on both sides of the Atlantic. But getting trade
deals done is tough, because each country has its
own parochial interests and factions. And in order to get
a trade deal done, each country has to
give something up. So it's a
time-consuming process. And people, right now, are
especially suspicious of trade deals because trade
deals feel as if they are accelerating some of these
globalizing trends that have weakened labor unions and
allow for jobs to be shipped to low-wage countries. And some of the criticism in
the past of trade deals are legitimate. Sometimes they have served
the interests of large corporations and not
necessarily of workers in the countries that
participate in them. But we've just gone through
this exercise between the United States and Asia,
where we organized a large regional trade deal
with 11 countries, and part of the argument
that I'm making in the United States is that the
answer to globalization and income inequality and lack
of wage growth is not to try to pull up the drawbridge
and shut off trade. The idea is to make sure
that in these trade deals we are embedding standards
and values that help lift workers' rights and help
lift environmental standards and help fight against
things like human trafficking and child labor. And our values should be
embedded in how countries trade with each other. So, for example, Vietnam was
one of the countries that is part of this Trans-Pacific
Partnership, and we said to Vietnam,
if you want access to our markets, we understand you
have a different political system than us, but if
workers have no rights and there's no possibility of
organizing labor unions, we're not going to let you
sell a bunch of sneakers and t-shirts into our country
because by definition you're going to be undercutting the
standards of living of folks in our country. And so for the first time,
the government of Vietnam has started to change its
laws to recognize labor unions. Now, they're
still suppressed. Those standards are not
where they are in the United States or the UK. But it gives us a lever by
which to begin to raise standards all
around the world. Now, that's less of an issue
between the United States and Europe. The main thing between the
United States and Europe is trying to just break down
some of the regulatory differences that make it
difficult to do business back and forth. Plus, making sure those
light sockets are all matched up. (laughter) I mean, those light sockets
are really irritating. (laughter) Let's see. I promised I was going to
call on this gentleman back here. Yes, sir. No, no, right here. You keep passing
by this poor guy. (laughter) The Press: My name is
Elijah, I'm from London. After eight years, what
would you say you want your legacy to be? President Obama:
Well, I mean, I still have a
few more months. (laughter and applause) Actually, eight months and
52 days -- not that I'm counting. (laughter) I just made that up, I
actually don't know. (laughter) It's roughly
something like that. It's interesting, when
you're in the job, you're not thinking on a
day-to-day basis about your legacy -- you're thinking
about how do I get done what I'm trying to get
done right now. And I don't think that I'll
have a good sense of my legacy until 10
years from now, and I can look back with
some perspective and get a sense of what worked
and what didn't. There are things
I'm proud of. The basic principle that in
a country as wealthy as the United States, every person
should have access to high-quality health care
that they can afford -- that's something I'm
proud of, I believe in. (applause) Saving the world economy
from a Great Depression -- that was pretty good. (laughter and applause) The first time I came to
London was April of 2009, and the world economy
was in a free fall, in part because of the
reckless behavior of folks on Wall Street, but in part
because of reckless behavior of a lot of financial
institutions around the globe. For us to be able to
mobilize the world community to take rapid action to
stabilize the financial markets, and then in the
United States to pass Wall Street reforms that make
it much less likely that a crisis like that can happen
again, I'm proud of that. I think on the
international stage, the work that we did to get
the possible nuclear weapons that Iran was
developing out of Iran, and doing so without going
to war is something I'm very proud of. There are things that people
don't pay a lot of attention to now, but the response
to the Ebola crisis -- for about three weeks, everybody
was sure that everybody was going to die -- we're
all going to get Ebola, we're all going to die. (laughter) And there was sort of
hysteria about it. And then everybody
forgot about it. And the reason everybody
forgot about it was because we mounted what was probably
one of the most effective, if not the most effective,
international public health responses in the
history of the world, and saved hundreds of
thousands of lives. So, I'll look at a
scorecard at the end. And I'm proud about the fact
that I think that I have been true to myself
during this process. I don't -- sometimes I look
back at what I said when I was running for office and
what I'm saying today, and they match up. So there's, I think, a
certain core integrity to what I've been trying to do. We've had failures, and
occasionally we've been blocked, but this goes back
to one of the themes of my opening statement, and it's
important for all the young people here to remember. Change takes time. And oftentimes, what you
start has to then be picked up by your successors
or the next generation. If you think about the
gap between -- well, something I'm most familiar
with -- the American Civil Rights Movement. You had abolitionists in
the 1700s who were fighting against slavery, and for
a hundred years built a movement that eventually
led to a civil war, and the amendments to our
Constitution that ended slavery and called for equal
protection under the law. It then took another hundred
years for those rights that had been enshrined in the
Constitution to actually be affirmed through the Civil
Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. And then it's taken another
50 years to try to make sure that those rights
are realized. And they're still
not fully realized. There's still discrimination
in aspects of American life, even with a black President. And, in fact, one of the
dangers has been that by electing a black President,
people have then said, well, there must be no
problems at all. And obviously you see
Ferguson and some of the issues that we've seen in
the criminal justice system indicating the degree to
which that was always false. So, does that mean all the
work that was done along the way was worthless? No, of course not. But it does mean that if any
of you begin to work on an issue that you
care deeply about, don't be disappointed
if a year out, things haven't been
completely solved. Don't give up and
succumb to cynicism if, after five years, poverty
has not been eradicated, and prejudice is still
out there somewhere, and we haven't resolved all
of the steps we need to take to reverse climate change. It's okay. Dr. King said, "The arc of
the moral universe is long, but it bends
towards justice." And it doesn't
bend on its own. It bends because we pull
it in that direction. But it requires a series
of generations working and building off of what the
previous one has done. And so, as President, I
think about it in those ways. I consider myself a runner,
and I run my leg of the race. But then I've got a baton
and I'm passing it on to the next person. And hopefully they're
running in the right direction, as opposed
to the wrong direction. And hopefully they
don't drop the baton. And then they go and then
they pass it on to somebody else. And that's how I think
you've got to think about change, generally. All right. It is a young woman's turn. Yes, right here, in the red. Yes, you. No, no, that's you. You're wearing red. Yes. (laughter) The Press: Hi, I'm Louisa. I'm a climate
change campaigner, and I want to thank you for
your smart and creative way to try and sort of get
a grip on the problem. President Obama: Yes. The Press: And given you've
been talking about the value of social movements, I was
wondering which campaigns have made you change your
mind while you've been in office and inspired
you to do things, and where you think we need
more external pressure from campaigns to create
meaningful change. President Obama: Well,
that's an interesting question. And are you talking
about climate change, in particular? Or are you talking
about just generally, on a whole
spectrum of issues? That's interesting. It's interesting because
I started as a community organizer trying to pressure
politicians into getting things done. And then -- now I'm
on the other side, and so what has worked
and what hasn't. Well, in the United States
what's been remarkable is the rapidity with which the
marriage equality movement changed the political
landscape and hearts and minds, and resulted in
actual changes in law. (applause) It's probably been the
fastest set of changes in terms of a social
movement that I've seen. On issues of LGBT
rights generally, I didn't need a
lot of pressure. I came in working on ending
a policy called "don't ask, don't tell," that was
preventing LGBT citizens from serving in our
military openly. We did that very
systematically. Policies in terms of those
who had HIV-AIDS being able to emigrate to our country,
hospital visitations -- there were a whole host of
things that we were already doing. But on marriage equality,
I was in favor of what's called civil unions. My notion was initially that
labeling those partnerships as marriage wasn't necessary
as long as people were getting the same rights, and
it would disentangle them from some of the religious
connotations that marriage had in the minds of
a lot of Americans. And that's where I think
-- I have to confess my children generally
had an impact on me. People I loved who were
in monogamous same-sex relationships explained
to me what I should have understood earlier, which
is it was not simply about legal rights but about
a sense of stigma, that if you're calling it
something different it means that somehow it means less
in the eyes of society. I believe that the manner
in which the LGBT community described marriage equality
as not some radical thing, but actually reached out to
people who said they care about family
values, and said, if you care about everything
that families provide -- stability and commitment and
partnership -- then this is actually a pretty
conservative position to take, that you should
be in favor of it. I thought there was a lot of
smarts in reaching out and building and framing the
issue in a way that could bring in people who
initially didn't agree with them. As a general rule, I think
that what, for example, Black Lives Matter is doing
now to bring attention to the problem of a criminal
justice system that sometimes is not treating
people fairly based on race, or reacting to shootings
of individuals by police officers, has been really
effective in bringing attention to problems. One of the things I caution
young people about, though, that I don't think is
effective is once you've highlighted an issue and
brought it to people's attention and
shined a spotlight, and elected officials or
people who are in a position to start bringing about
change are ready to sit down with you, then you can't
just keep on yelling at them. And you can't refuse to
meet because that might compromise the purity
of your position. The value of social
movements and activism is to get you at the table,
get you in the room, and then to start trying
to figure out how is this problem going to be solved. You, then, have a
responsibility to prepare an agenda that is achievable,
that can institutionalize the changes you seek, and
to engage the other side, and occasionally to take
half a loaf that will advance the gains
that you seek, understanding that there's
going to be more work to do, but this is what is
achievable at this moment. And too often what I see
is wonderful activism that highlights a problem,
but then people feel so passionately and are so
invested in the purity of their position that they
never take that next step and say, okay, well, now I
got to sit down and try to actually get something done. So the Paris agreement that
we just negotiated and that a number of countries just
signed yesterday on Earth Day -- the agreement we
shaped is not going to, by itself, solve
climate change. The science argues that the
world is going to need to do a lot more in order for us
to prevent catastrophic climate change. But my strategy from the
start has been, all right, if I can get the Chinese
to agree with us, as the two largest emitters,
that we have to do something, and lock in China
with us for the first time to take some serious steps
around reducing carbon emissions, and if by getting
the two largest emitters I can now leverage all the
other smaller countries to also put in their own
targets for emissions, and if we can set up an
architecture that recognizes the need for carbon
reduction and can allow people to -- allow countries
to hold each other accountable, then
that's a start. And we can now start turning
up the dial as our science and our understanding
improves, and as technology improves,
so that poor countries don't feel that they have to
choose between development and carbon reductions. And there are all kinds
of compromises in that. But it's a start. Now, there are some
climate activists who, after the Paris agreement
was signed, said, ah, this is not enough! But they're not in a
conversation, apparently, with Prime Minister Modi
of India, for example, who's thinking, I've still
got several hundred million people without electricity,
and I have some obligation to try to relieve them of
their poverty and suffering, so I've got to balance
those equities against the imperatives of the
planet as a whole. Now, the good news is, is
that most of the groups that have been involved in this
process have been pretty sophisticated. But that's a general
principle that I think all of you should consider. Make noise and occasionally
you can act a little crazy to get attention, to shine
a spotlight on the issue, to highlight it. But once people who are in
power and in a position to actually do something about
it are prepared to meet and listen with you, do your
homework; be prepared; present a plausible
set of actions; and negotiate and be
prepared to move the ball down the field even if it
doesn't get all the way there. The Press: (inaudible) President Obama: No. You do, but it wouldn't
be fair if you just start yelling out a question --
because it's a guy's turn also. (laughter) All right, go ahead. The Press: Thank you,
President, firstly, for all you did for the
world and for mankind. I think you made a great
contribution and you inspire a lot of young people
across the world. But my question is slightly
-- on East Africa -- since you said you can
ask any question. Just last week, 400
young boys died in the Mediterranean Sea in trying
to seek a better life. Most left in Somalia. And those young boys have
lost their livelihoods. Since, there is
international ships coming to the Somali
territorial water, and those ships have been
trying to protect the international ships
from the piracy. But at the same time
they have been doing it, there has been a lot of
proven cases that they have been dumped as waste
in the Somali Sea. And also there is proven
cases within the coast cities that children are
dying with very strange diseases that
they've never seen, that these things are coming
to the coast came out from the sea. So today I have the
opportunity to ask you, while you're here for the
next eight or nine months that you have, can you
kindly use your leverage within the international
arena to galvanize the international community
to look at this issue? And can you share some
practical steps that you can take to ensure -- (applause) President Obama: Well,
I'l be honest with you. I'm not fully familiar with
some of the issues you referred to. I'm certainly familiar with
the challenges that Somalia has been going through. And we've been working
aggressively to try to help Mogadishu develop a
functioning state that can protect its people and that
can get an economy moving that gives young
people opportunity. I'm certainly familiar with
the issues of piracy and the international concerns that
led to many of these ships patrolling these areas. I'm less familiar with some
of the issues that you discussed. So what I'll do is,
after this meeting, as we're shaking hands, I'll
try to get some additional information from you. One of the things I've
learned as President is, although you can always fake
your way through an answer, sometimes it's really good
just to say, you know what, I don't know all the
answers on this one. (applause) So I'll find out more about
the specifics that you're talking about. All right. See, now since you've raised
your hand and you didn't continue to act crazy, I'm
going to go ahead and call on you. Go ahead. (laughter) The Press: First of all,
sincerest apologies. I guess I got overwhelmed. President Obama:
That's okay. You got excited. The Press: My name is Maria. And you've been speaking a
lot about how we have to become the change
that we want to see. And you've spoken
about progress, about human rights, and
about how we in the United States and the UK need to
lead in terms of civil rights movements
and LGBTQ issues. Now I'm about to do
something terrifying, which is I'm coming out to
you as a non-binary person, which means that I don't
fit within -- I'm getting emotional, I'm so sorry. President Obama:
That's okay. (applause) The Press: I come
from a -- I'm from (inaudible) background, which inevitably
has cultural implications. And I know that in North
Carolina, recently, with the bathroom bill, and
people are being forced obviously to produce birth
certificates to prove their gender in order
to go to a toilet. In UK, we don't recognize
non-binary people under the Equality Act, so we
literally have no rights. So if there was any
discrimination, there's nothing we can do. I've been working for the
last nine months with the UK Civil Service (inaudible) with Julianne Smith in
order to do what I can, even though I'm still at
university and running for local election
at the same time. I managed to get them
to respect pronouns. I've managed to get them to commit to gender-neutral toilets. And these are thing
I've done as a student. And I really, really wish
that yourself and David Cameron would take us
seriously as transgender people. And perhaps you could
elucidate as to what you can do to go beyond what has
been accepted as the LGBTQ rights movement, in
including people who fit outside the social norms. (applause) President Obama: First of
all, that wasn't that crazy. I thought you were going
to ask to come up here and dance with me or something. (laughter) But, look, I'm incredibly
proud of the steps it sounds like you've already taken
to speak out about your own experience and then to try
to create a social movement and change laws. It sounds to me like
you're on the right track. I can't speak for
David Cameron, although I will say
that on LGBT issues, I think David has been ahead
of the curve relative to a lot of other leaders around
the world and even here in the UK. I can say from my
perspective that we're taking a lot of serious
steps to address these issues within the
federal government. The challenge we've
had is North Carolina, the law that comes up, for
example, that's a state law. And because of our
system of government, I can't overturn on my own
state laws unless a federal law is passed that prohibits
states from doing these things. And with the Congress
I currently have, that's not likely to happen. But we're doing a lot of
work administratively. And as I said, you should
feel encouraged just by virtue of the fact that I
think social attitudes on this issue have changed
faster than I've seen on any other issue. It doesn't feel fast enough
for you or for those who are impacted. And that's good -- you
shouldn't feel satisfied. You should keep pushing. But I think the trend
lines are good on this. We're moving in the right
direction -- and in part, because of a courageous
act of young people like yourself. So stick with it. (applause) All right. Let's see. Gentleman in the green here. The Press: Thank you much. I agree with everything
you said so far about compromise. But in an age of
polarized politics, how do you inspire people
to commit to compromise and fighting for the
middle ground? President Obama: I think
it's a great question. It's something that
I wrestle with. I would distinguish between
compromising on principles and compromising in getting
things done in the here and now. And what I mean by that is
I am uncompromising on the notion that every person,
regardless of race, religion, sexual
orientation, ethnicity, has a dignity and worth and
have to be treated equally. So I'm uncompromising in
that basic principle. And I'm also of the belief
that in order to realize the principle, every child has
to have true opportunity; that every child is
deserving of a decent education, and
decent health care, and the ability to go to
college so that they can make of themselves
what they will. So that's a powerful
principle in me. That drives my politics. But if I'm sitting
with Congress, and I have the opportunity
to get half a million more kids into an early childhood
education program, even though I know that that
will 2 million who need it out of the program, but
the alternative is none, I'll take half a
million, right? And I can look at myself in
the mirror and feel good about the 500,000
that I'm helping, knowing that the next round
of budget negotiations that we have, I'm going to go
for another half a million, and I'm going to go for
another half a million after that. So I think it's important
for everyone to understand that you'd have
to be principled, you have to have a North
Star, a moral compass. There should be a reason
for you getting involved in social issues
other than vanity, or just trying to mix and
mingle and meet cute people that you're interested in --
although that's not a bad reason. (laughter) But you have to
recognize that, particularly in pluralistic
societies and democratic governments like we have in
the United States and the UK, there are people
who disagree with us. They have different
perspectives. They come from different
points of view. And they're not bad people
just because they disagree with us. They may, in fact, assert
that they've got similar principles to ours, but they
just disagree with us on the means to vindicate
those principles. And you are absolutely right
that we are in this age now -- partly because of what's
happened with our media, in which people from
different political parties, different political
orientations can spend the bulk of their day
only talking to, and listening to, and
hearing the perspectives of people who already
agree with them. I know less about
the UK media, but in the United States,
it used to be we had three television stations. And people might complain
about the dominance of these three television stations,
but there was one virtue to them, which was everybody
was kind of watching the same thing and had the same
understanding of what the facts were on
any given issue. And today, you have 500
television stations, and the Internet will give
you a thousand different sources of information. And so what's increasingly
happening in the United States is, is that if
you're a conservative, then you're watching Fox
News or you're reading a conservative blogpost. If you're a liberal,
then you're reading the Huffington Post or reading
The New York Times. And there's this massive
divergence that's taking place in terms of just what
the agreed-upon facts and assumptions are that
we're talking about. And that does make it
harder to compromise. And there have been some
interesting studies that have been done showing that
if you spend time with people who just agree with
you on any particular issue, that you become even more
extreme in your convictions because you're never
contradicted and everybody just mutually reinforces
their perspective. That's why I think it is so
important for all the young people here to seek out
people who don't agree with you. That will teach
you to compromise. It will also help
you, by the way, if you decide
to get married. (laughter and applause) But the most important
thing is understanding that compromise does not mean
surrendering what you believe, it just means that
you are recognizing the truth, the fact that these
other people who disagree with you or this other
political party, or this other nation --
that they have dignity too, that they have
worth as well, and you have to hear
them and see them. And sometimes we don't. All right, how much time do
I have, by the way, people? One more question? I'll make it two. I'll make it two. Let's see. The young lady right there. Go ahead. The Press: Good
morning, Mr. President. I'm losing my
voice, I apologize. President Obama:
That's okay. The Press: My name is Helen,
and my question for you is, what leadership skills have
you found yourself relying on most during your
time in office, and why? President Obama:
A thick skin -- (laughter) -- is very helpful. I was just talking
about this, actually, with the Ambassador
last night. Where is Matthew? I think I was just
talking about this. Yes, I think we were
just talking about this. Two things I'm pretty good
at -- well, let me say this. One of the things that
happens as you get older is you are, hopefully, more
aware of and honest with yourself about what your
strengths are and what your weaknesses are. I could list my weaknesses,
but you asked me about the things I've found useful,
so I'll skip over that. (laughter) Two things I'm pretty good
at -- one is attracting talent. And anybody who
wants to be a leader, I would advise you to spend
a lot of time thinking about how am I helping other
people do great things. Because, as President
of the United States, I am dealing with so many
issues and I can't be expert on everything, and I
can't be everywhere. And the one thing I can do
is assemble a team of people who are really good and
really smart and really committed, and care
about their mission, and have integrity, and
then give them the tools, or get rid of the barriers,
or help coach them so that they can do a great job. And I think leaders who
think that their primary job is to make everybody do
exactly what they want, as opposed to helping to
organize really talented people to collectively
go to where we need to go typically stumble. You should be predisposed to
other people's power -- how can I make the people
around me do great things. If they do, then, by
definition, I'll succeed, because that's my job, is to
get this team moving in the right direction. So that's one. The second thing, I'm pretty
good at setting a course, a general direction, and
being able to hopefully unify that team around
that general direction. Oftentimes I have to rely on
other people to implement and execute to get there,
but setting a direction requires also listening to
what is it that's important to people. And the third thing is
synthesizing -- I think it's very useful as a
leader to be able to -- particularly on complex
issues -- to sit around a table and hear a lot of
different points of view, and be able to get to what's
the nub of the issue, what's the heart
of the problem, what's the essential
conflict that we're trying to resolve, and get
everybody to see the problem the same -- see
what the problem is. Because I see a lot
of organizations, they spend a lot of time
doing a lot of work, but they're working on the
wrong thing or they're distracted from the
essential issue. Somebody once said, it's
more important to do the right thing than
to do things right. And what they meant was you
can hack away and build this amazing path
through the jungle, but if you're headed in the
wrong direction then it's a waste of time. So you've got to make sure
that people understand what it is that we're
trying to solve. Yes, that's enough. (applause) I've got time for one more. All right. The Sikh gentleman. Yes. The Press: Hello. So my question is related to
an issue which minorities face in the USA. We see many times Sikhs
being discriminated against, as Muslims, and even
if we were Muslims, that still doesn't give
the right for anyone to be Islamophobic to us. So my question is, why isn't
a firm stand being taken on issues such as
ample security, where there's a lot
of issues with TSA? Since your neighbors in
Canada -- Justin Trudeau, he recently said that he's
going to apologize for an issue which happened
102 years ago, and he has recently
become Prime Minister, so why is it that he is
taking a firm stand on an issue which happened
so long ago, whereas countries such as
the USA aren't taking a stand against discrimination
when it is 2016? (applause) President Obama: Hold on. Before everybody starts
applauding that question -- (laughter) -- let's make sure that
we're on the same wavelength in terms of facts. I have taken an adamant
stand against making sure that we're not racially
profiling in airports. And it is explicit TSA
policy not to racially profile. Now, does that mean that out
of the hundreds of airports and thousands of TSA
officials that there has not been times where a Sikh is
going through the airport and somebody targets them
for a secondary screening because of what
they look like? Of course that's happened. But that's not my
administration's policy. And I'm happy to provide you
with chapter and verse as to why we have taken an
explicit stand against this. It does raise a broader
issue that you're mentioning, which is that in
pluralistic societies like the United States, like the
UK, in diverse societies, one of our biggest
challenges is going to be how do we approach keeping
people safe and preventing terrorist acts. There was a time when
terrorism here in the UK was largely emanating
from the IRA. So this is not a
uniquely Muslim problem. What is also true is, today
there are a tiny subset of groups that have perverted
Islam in justifying killing innocent people. And how we do that in a way
that is consistent with our values and consistent with
pluralism and respect for religion is
vitally important. And I, about
four months ago, visited a mosque in the
United States precisely to send a message that our
greatest allies in this process are the incredible
Muslim Americans who are, historically, fully
integrated into our society, that economically, are
actually doing better than the average American
in many measures, that are fighting
in armed forces, that are defending our
people in all sorts of ways, and that if we engage
in Islamophobia, we are not only betraying
what is essential to us, but just as a
practical matter, engaging in self-defeating
behavior if we're serious about terrorism. And so the language
that we use, the tactics and
approaches that we take, the respect that we show all
people -- those are security matters. It's not just feel-good,
liberal political correctness. It's a matter of what is it
that we're fighting for, and how are we going to win
this fight against people who are so blocked off from
the reality of others who they don't agree with that
they'd be willing to blow themselves up and kill
hundreds of people. It's the extreme of what I
was just talking to this gentleman about, about the
inability to compromise and recognize difference, and
feel comfortable with that. So, look, this is going to
be a challenging issue for some time to come. But I'm confident that it is
an issue that we can succeed at, as long as young people
like you are committed to not just believing the right
thing and feeling the right ways, but fighting for
it; and so long as you're engaged and active, and
speaking out, and listening. And if you do that, I feel
pretty good about our futures. I feel good about
our chances. You guys inspire me. Thank you very much. Appreciate it. (applause)
