Ruby Rose on Pride, OITNB, Advice For Her Younger Self & Queer Identity | GLAMOUR UNFILTERED

[mellow music]

Hi, I'm Ruby Rose,

and this is Glamour Unfiltered for June Pride issue.

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What makes me feel proud?

I think just getting up every single day

and trying to see the positive in what we're gonna produce

as far as a collective consciousness in the world

and seeing that we've all lived through something

quite traumatic for the last year and a half.

And so I'm proud every day that people make a decision

to get up and try to do their best

'cause it's been very, very challenging.

And what does Pride mean to me?

Well, Pride Month, as far as the community,

what it means to me is that,

you know, Stonewall was a bit over 50 years ago,

and to me, it represents the community in a position

where their back was up against the wall

and they had to make a decision

to fight for the freedom that we have today,

and they had to make a decision

to live in their truth in a public way

In a time when really living in your truth privately

was kind of the only way people could do it and feel safe.

So for me, Pride is how far we've worked

to get to where we are, how hard we've fought,

and how far we have to go and how far we have to keep going

to keep that legacy alive of what people have done

to get us to where we are today.

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I came out when I was 12 years old,

which is quite young, in a way,

I only knew that to be my truth.

I didn't know any other way.

I didn't know how to live

without being sort of open and honest about it.

But I think I was also very young,

and maybe if I was a little bit older

and I realized how much people were more homophobic

or had different views about how people should live

and a lack of education in that area

I might not have come out so young.

But it was kind of good

because people thought it was a phase.

You know, it was sort of like, you're 12, it's a phase,

and it didn't get taken as seriously,

and then by the time everyone realized

what that really meant, what being gay meant

and what being with women meant,

they'd kind of gotten used to the fact that that was...

They're like, Oh, I guess she is gay.

And I got bullied for it.

I got tormented.

I kinda felt like I got sorta crucified at school.

And it was tough being basically the only gay person

in that school, but at the same time,

when I was getting ready to graduate,

it's like The L Word came out and Queer as Folk came out

and all these shows, and then everyone at school was gay.

Everyone had a girlfriend and a boyfriend, and boy...

I was like, Huh, I just miss the precipice,

which just goes to show how important it is

to have representation in the media.

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Orange is the New Black

was one of the most extraordinary experiences

that I've ever had in my life.

The cast, the crew, obviously it being my breakout role

in the United States as well, and coming off the back

of not really having any success in the States

and thinking I'm probably gonna have to go home,

you know, my visa would expire,

into this world of Jen Euston and Jenji

and these fantastic stories,

these fantastic women, and it blew up.

The show already blew up.

I mean, the show was as big as it could be.

But I mean, the season that I did, I didn't really,

I couldn't have possibly foreseen

that it would have been so well accepted by everyone

and appreciated and there'd be this sort of fanfare.

But I was very appreciative and I still am,

and I think it was one of the greatest shows

that has been made so I feel very honored

to have been on it.

[mellow music]

I mean, I feel like when it comes to giving advice

to one's younger self, it's like I know too much now.

I've learned way too much.

I think that my inner child,

my young self did a really good job with what she was given

and then the lack of what she had, and I always kind of,

people often talk to the inner child

to feel closer to themselves and they give them advice

and vice versa.

But for me, I usually go to my inner child to get advice.

You only have one life and it's a magnificent gift

that's been given to you, and if you're living it

for anybody else or trying to minimize yourself

or make yourself small for other people

so they're not uncomfortable, to make their life easier

so that you're not in the way, you're not living your life

to its potential, to what you can be.

And if you don't live your life to your truth

and if you don't give everything you have

into this small time that we have on this earth,

that will be your biggest regret.

You deserve the love.

You deserve people to love you for who you are.

You deserve to love other people and be loved.

So I just, you know, just keep fighting, keep doing it,

keep believing in yourself, and keep listening to that soul

and what it wants and give it to yourself

'cause you deserve it.

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I don't really like the stereotype thing

because I think that the point is everyone is unique

and everyone is different.

So I don't know if there's a certain group of people

that tend to dress a similar way

or like a similar style to music.

I don't know.

But I think that if that's what makes you happy,

that's what makes you happy.

I think stereotypes in any situation

are usually pretty harmful so I would avoid them.

Especially if you're not part of the community,

I would avoid making sort of assumptions

about different groups within the community,

but it's not something

that I've really spent a lot of time on.

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Growing up, when I got into modeling,

I felt like there was a lot of pressure

to look a certain way and to kind of fit in

into the industry and look like everybody else.

And because I didn't take that route and didn't go that way,

I just kept going more edgy

and kind of tried to carve out a place for myself,

even though that I was told there wasn't one there.

And so I had my short hair, my tattoos,

the way that I dressed, the music that I listened to,

and I found that I had my strength there.

But as I started to get a little bit of success,

then I started to feel more like, Do I owe it to them?

whoever them is, you know, Do I owe it to the people

that hired me for this, to wear this dress?

Do I owe it to this person to present myself in this way

'cause maybe that's what they want?

And so then that became grappling constantly,

and I still do it all the time.

You know, is this something that I want to do?

Is this a general exploration of myself in growth,

or is this just me trying to appease other people?

And I generally can notice it

'cause I start to feel a little empty.

I start to feel less inspired and charged and happy,

and I know I have to kind of take inventory and realize,

What is my authentic self saying and what have I outgrown

and what is coming from me?

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Social media is, well, it's here.

You know, social media is social media.

It's gonna exist whether we like it or not.

I think there's a tremendous amount of positives

as far as community and being able to find people

that you relate to and having, being able to make friends

and having connection,

which is obviously sort of the main point of it,

at least how it started.

And then as far as the negative points

of social media, I think...

We don't know the long-term effects of social media

so I don't know what it's gonna do to our brains

and what it's gonna do to our attention spans

and even our self-worth, our self-worth.

All right, now I've got a lisp.

But I think if we use it correctly

and we take control of when it doesn't make us feel good,

you know, if you're scrolling through social media

and you're not feeling good, you're feeling anxious,

or like someone else has got this great life

and you're not doing anything and you're depressed,

or it's making you just want to curl up and go back to bed,

which it can do, then you need to sort of take that

and twist it around and go, Okay,

that's not working for me.

What's gonna make me happy today?

Do I need to create something?

Do I need to draw?

Do I need to go for a walk, be in nature?

But do I need to take a rest from social media?

And I think when we take those risks,

it's actually a fantastic platform.

If we get used by it instead of using it,

then it becomes a disadvantage to us.

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When I was reading about the character

and Victoria and her daughter,

I was really impressed and moved

and I felt this immediate thought of my mum

because she was a single mum when she had me.

She had me at 20 and we,

you know, we were just vagabonds around Australia,

living in sort of this Bohemian lifestyle

on couches and in caravans and trailers in different places.

This woman, Victoria, would do anything it takes

to rescue and save and protect her daughter,

and I know that when my mum had me, it was exactly that.

She would have done anything to protect me

up until even now.

In fact, even now my mother would do anything to protect me.

So I really loved that aspect of the story

and I thought it gave Victoria a lot of purpose and meaning

and it meant that every situation was really high stakes

and high risk.

And it was an emotional film and I did feel very proud

kinda representing my mum in that.

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