:00:14. > :00:20.HARDtalk is in New York City, and my guest today is a woman who has
:00:21. > :00:23.spent her life challenging the assumptions that go with the label
:00:23. > :00:29."physically disabled." Amy Mullins had both of her legs amputated
:00:30. > :00:35.below the knee when she was just a year old. She went on to become a
:00:35. > :00:40.champion athlete, an actor, and a highly paid model. She has been
:00:40. > :00:50.feteed as an inspiration across America. But what is is the real
:00:50. > :01:01.
:01:01. > :01:07.lesson of the remarkable story of Amy Mullins, welcome to HARDtalk.
:01:07. > :01:10.Thank you. It's fair to say you made your name as an athlete First,
:01:10. > :01:15.yeah. Who starred in the Paralympics, who broke world
:01:15. > :01:19.records. I just wonder, you know, in a way, do you feel athletics was
:01:19. > :01:25.where you could be the very best? No. Not at all. It was one of the
:01:25. > :01:29.areas in which I felt I could be the very best. I think my
:01:29. > :01:34.resistance to being put in a box that's nice and neat and to be tied
:01:34. > :01:39.up with a bow has really been the one defining thing of my life and
:01:39. > :01:45.my career. I thought it would be unlikely that sports would be the
:01:45. > :01:50.first place I would make my name. I mean, acting was really what I knew
:01:50. > :01:55.I wanted to do from my earliest memories. I was even recalling this
:01:55. > :02:02.morning - because it's the bicentennial of Dickens' birthday -
:02:02. > :02:05.that my first play on stage was Oliver. And the joy, the adrenaline
:02:05. > :02:09.- all of those things that it brought me - it's the same thing
:02:09. > :02:14.whether you're performing in an Olympic stadium or you're walking
:02:15. > :02:20.out onto a stage to do a monologue, or you're telling a story in front
:02:20. > :02:26.of 300 or 3,000 people at a design conference. Here's what strikes me
:02:26. > :02:29.about everything you've just described - where you get your
:02:29. > :02:34.satisfactions, from the athletics arena, from the stage, or from the
:02:34. > :02:38.big hall where you are speaking or performing. All of them are
:02:38. > :02:43.intensely exposed places, physically exposing places. And yet,
:02:43. > :02:48.you know, we have to, in a way, begin by discussing the fact that,
:02:48. > :02:54.from the age of one, you were a double amputee. And yet you never
:02:54. > :03:01.shied away from those physically exposing places. No I've never
:03:01. > :03:05.shied away from anything like that. just realised in the last few years
:03:05. > :03:11.that that is the common thread that does link together all of the
:03:11. > :03:17.things I've done. In every way, whether it's prom sports to really
:03:17. > :03:23.using my body as a coathanger in the fashion world, to provoking
:03:23. > :03:28.conversations about ideas around beauty or the human body and
:03:28. > :03:35.looking at advanced prosthetic design, to the kind of ancient art
:03:35. > :03:38.form of doing theatre. Storytelling has always been at the heart of
:03:38. > :03:42.that. It's something I'm comfortable doing. It's something I
:03:42. > :03:46.like doing. And it's being very private in a very public way.
:03:46. > :03:51.that the case from being very young? When you're growing up and
:03:51. > :03:54.getting used to the idea that you have particular challenges to face
:03:54. > :04:04.because of what happened to you and what happened to your body, to your
:04:04. > :04:04.
:04:04. > :04:09.legs, did you never, as a youngster, want to sort of avoid being watched
:04:09. > :04:14.by hundreds of people, being under the gaze of a wide audience?
:04:14. > :04:17.think there was a distinction in my mind from being stared at, with the
:04:17. > :04:21.focus being my legs - that certainly gave me some
:04:21. > :04:26.uncomfortable moments as a child. I mean, that's - you know the
:04:26. > :04:32.difference and feeling between an audience, whether it's in a
:04:32. > :04:35.supermarket or on the beach, staring at you with a sense of
:04:35. > :04:41.hesitation or even fear, versus - Did you remember that? Absolutely,
:04:41. > :04:47.yeah. Absolutely. I think people are afraid of what they don't
:04:47. > :04:50.understand. But that's where the opportunity to perform in a public
:04:50. > :04:53.way can engage conversation. And I guess your parents must have been
:04:54. > :04:57.aware of that too - maybe when they were on the beach with you as a
:04:57. > :05:02.young girl, or shopping in the supermarket - they might have seen
:05:02. > :05:10.people staring at you sometimes. But did they, in talking to you
:05:10. > :05:15.about all of this, ever say to you, "You know what, Aimee? You may want
:05:15. > :05:18.to make choices in life which leave you less exposed"? Or did they
:05:18. > :05:22.encourage you to be out there, up- front, in a sense, in people's
:05:22. > :05:28.faces with who you were? We didn't talk about it, Stephen. We didn't
:05:28. > :05:36.talk about it. My parents had bigger issues on their plate, like,
:05:36. > :05:40.you know, paying the mortgage and working, you know, two jobs. And my
:05:40. > :05:43.two younger brothers to raise. Than to worry about how secure my psyche
:05:43. > :05:47.was as a child. It was really kind of like "Get on with it. Stick up
:05:47. > :05:51.for yourself if you need to stick up for yourself. This is the
:05:51. > :05:56.reality of the world. People are gonna stare at you. What are you
:05:56. > :06:00.gonna do about it?" It was very much a culture of self-reliance.
:06:00. > :06:04.I've looked back at your record. You were a successful athlete, but
:06:04. > :06:10.you were doing, it seems to me, two different things. On one level, you
:06:10. > :06:15.were trying to compete against able-bodied athletes in running and
:06:15. > :06:20.jumping and all that sort of stuff. That same time, you were becoming a
:06:21. > :06:27.leading member of the American Paralympic team. I just wonder
:06:27. > :06:31.which meant more to you - trying to compete - and you were competing -
:06:31. > :06:36.against the able-bodied, or developing that career in the
:06:36. > :06:42.Paralympic team. I never saw them as separate. I had never met
:06:42. > :06:46.another amputee until my late teen years. The internet didn't kick in,
:06:46. > :06:51.really, until 1995, so the idea that you could sit down, as you do
:06:51. > :06:55.today, and type in "amputee" or "prosthetic" and have thousands of
:06:56. > :07:01.images with which to educate yourself and decide whether or not,
:07:01. > :07:08.you know, "Oh, there's a sporting event for me if I want to race
:07:08. > :07:12.against other amputees ." It just wasn't around for me. I remember
:07:12. > :07:18.being in second grade and my godmother called - "Quickly, turn
:07:18. > :07:23.on the telly to this morning news programme." There was a gymnast on
:07:23. > :07:29.who had her arm amputated from the elbow down, and she was doing flips
:07:29. > :07:35.and cartwheels. Of course, you had to write in to the show, cos she
:07:35. > :07:40.had some great prosthetic and it was the beginnings of an electric
:07:40. > :07:45.wrist. You had to write to the show, hope they would pass the letter on
:07:45. > :07:48.to your person - you're talking six months, perhaps. That was how you
:07:48. > :07:53.found out about new technology. The insurance situation in the United
:07:53. > :07:56.States is such that a lot of the new intelligent technology being
:07:56. > :08:01.created in the realm of prosthetics wasn't going to be covered any time
:08:01. > :08:06.soon. So the producethetist didn't have any way to let you know about
:08:07. > :08:13.new things. You developed, along with designers, the - I suppose
:08:13. > :08:16.what is the prototype of the "blade" that we now know with Oscar
:08:16. > :08:22.Pistorious and his feats on the track in the Paralympics and
:08:22. > :08:28.regular competition as well. Did you see the blade, and the fitting
:08:28. > :08:33.the blades to your legs, as the way that you could actually compete on
:08:33. > :08:35.a playing field with the able- bodied? Stephen, I competed on the
:08:35. > :08:39.playing field with athletes who didn't use prosthetics my whole
:08:39. > :08:44.life. I was on a state championship softball team for five years. I was
:08:44. > :08:48.a swimmer. I played - you name the sport, I played it. I was racing
:08:48. > :08:53.downhill skiing in high school, and winning. And I remember thinking,
:08:53. > :08:56."I really shouldn't tell anybody that my legs are wooden, because I
:08:56. > :09:03.don't have freezing-cold feet to worry about going down the slopes."
:09:03. > :09:08.I always was looking at the perspective of how I could possibly
:09:08. > :09:11.use everything I had for the advantages it might hold. When you
:09:11. > :09:15.into second base and you've got wooden legs, and that girl knows
:09:15. > :09:19.what's coming at her, she usually gets out of the way! She so I
:09:19. > :09:23.actually had the stolen-bases record one year in my softball
:09:23. > :09:26.league. This is where it gets interesting. This is exactly where
:09:26. > :09:33.the argument over Oscar Pistorious and his blades is right now - the
:09:33. > :09:38.discussion is whether, in some respects, the technology gives the
:09:38. > :09:42.Paralympian an unfair advantage - this idea of the level playing
:09:42. > :09:45.field - perhaps the advantage these days lies with those who are able
:09:45. > :09:49.to employ technology with prosthetics? Well, it doesn't
:09:49. > :09:52.currently, but it will in the future. First of all, I have to
:09:52. > :09:58.address the idea of a level playing field. That's ridiculous in sport.
:09:58. > :10:03.We don't have such a thing. We don't care when Tyson Gay, at 5ft
:10:03. > :10:07.11in, lines up against Usain Bolt at 6ft 5in and how different that
:10:07. > :10:11.stride length is. We don't care so much when we look at a country that
:10:11. > :10:18.doesn't have the economic resources to have access to training and
:10:18. > :10:23.facilities and the best coaches and hyperbaric chambers to train.
:10:23. > :10:29.Understood, but those differences are, in the end, differences about
:10:29. > :10:39.the way in which what God gave, if you put it that way, us in terms of
:10:39. > :10:42.the human body - So it's technology versus carbon fiber and titanium?
:10:42. > :10:45.That seems to be the way the discuss is running right now. Is
:10:45. > :10:48.that meaningless? Yeah! Materials are materials. We have to ask
:10:48. > :10:52.ourselves as a society why we're fine with sport evolving in every
:10:52. > :10:57.other way - cycling, tennis, golf - they don't use the same materials
:10:57. > :11:03.they used 50 years ago. We allow pitchers in baseball to have
:11:03. > :11:08.muscles removed from their thighs and implanted in their elbows once
:11:08. > :11:14.nature has told them their limit is up on throwing. We don't care that
:11:14. > :11:17.Tiger Woods gets not one, but two lazeic surgeries with which to
:11:17. > :11:21.better his vision past what nature would have allowed. This is
:11:21. > :11:26.happening all across sport. With the specific case with regards to
:11:26. > :11:32.Oscar, it was ruled upon four years ago by the governing body - there
:11:32. > :11:37.is no definitive science, no peer- reviewed science, that points to
:11:37. > :11:42.any net advantage. I mean, there's a lot you can go into with respect
:11:42. > :11:46.of, "OK, hip swing versus force generated on the ground." At the
:11:46. > :11:52.end of the day, Stephen, name me one Olympian who has voluntarily
:11:52. > :11:57.amputated their legs for this so- called advantage. None. I'll name
:11:57. > :12:02.you one Paralympian - Thanhy Grey Thompson, in the UK who is
:12:02. > :12:09.concerned that, if athletes like Pistorious end up competing in the
:12:09. > :12:13.Olympics as well as the Paralympics, that it will end up devaluing the
:12:13. > :12:17.Paralympics - the Paralympics will end up looking like a sort of
:12:17. > :12:24.second-class event or a second- class prize to be sought. Can you
:12:24. > :12:27.see where she's coming from with that concern? I respect Tanny Grey
:12:27. > :12:34.Thompson as an athly, but I really disagree with her on this point.
:12:34. > :12:41.First of all, it's happened already. Mala Runyan ran in the Olympics and
:12:41. > :12:45.Paralympics, Brian McKeehan, a skier. Sarah Story from Great
:12:45. > :12:50.Britain may well compete in the Olympics and Paralympics next
:12:50. > :12:53.summer. There's a swimmer from South Africa with one leg amputated
:12:53. > :12:56.who swam in Beijing. There's a table-tennis player from Poland.
:12:56. > :13:01.It's happened already. It certainly hasn't diminished the value and the
:13:01. > :13:06.excitement of the Paralympic games thus far. It will only continue, I
:13:06. > :13:11.think, to raise the awareness of the Paralympic Games and to
:13:11. > :13:15.encourage more and more people to think of how they can test
:13:15. > :13:18.themselves against the best athletes in the world, period -
:13:18. > :13:21.that's gender, that's race, and that's whether or not you run with
:13:21. > :13:26.some kind of assisted medical device that you need to use in
:13:26. > :13:30.order to run. A final thought on the Paralympics - it's a simple one.
:13:30. > :13:35.You are the chief of the US team going to the Paralympics, and
:13:35. > :13:39.indeed the Olympics - a joint chief of the teams. I just wonder, when
:13:40. > :13:46.you look back at Beijing, the last Olympics, and look at the way the
:13:46. > :13:51.US media covered the Paralympics in particular, we saw NBC - who'd had
:13:51. > :13:55.more than 2,000 staff covering the Beijing Olympics - reduce their
:13:55. > :14:00.staffing for the Paralympics to just a handful of people, I think
:14:00. > :14:04.five or six people were left behind. Is it going to be different this
:14:04. > :14:14.time around? Do you think the American public and the American
:14:14. > :14:15.
:14:15. > :14:20.media rare really care about When I competed in the Paralympics
:14:20. > :14:26.as a teenager, I have not even heard of it. There was such little
:14:26. > :14:35.media awareness. The internet has done so much to advance that. It
:14:35. > :14:41.has actually been the last 5-6 years that the US Committee is
:14:41. > :14:47.house along the US Olympic Committee. Many people around the
:14:47. > :14:55.world see the Paralympics, I'm putting this in quotes, the
:14:56. > :15:02.disabled games, you have always spoken out about your dislike of
:15:02. > :15:06.this word, disabled. Explain to me why it matters so much to you that
:15:06. > :15:12.people, with all sorts of different physical impairments are not put in
:15:12. > :15:16.this collective gripping of disabled. It is not so much that I
:15:16. > :15:23.have an issue with that word, I have an issue with the laziness
:15:23. > :15:30.with which people use said. 60 years ago when someone required
:15:30. > :15:38.classes in order to see, they would have been considered disabled. --
:15:38. > :15:45.glasses. We do not think of it like that today. They are so on the
:15:45. > :15:50.present that we do not think of it as a disability any more. The
:15:50. > :16:00.average age of Americans, the larger segment of the population is
:16:00. > :16:01.
:16:01. > :16:06.over 65, in Europe as well. He replacements are becoming
:16:06. > :16:12.commonplace. If you look at that word, it is one word -- one thing
:16:12. > :16:16.to apply the word to a car that has broken down. It is another thing to
:16:16. > :16:21.apply it to a child who has their entire life ahead of them. This is
:16:21. > :16:25.the baggage that we want to saddle them with. We presume they are
:16:25. > :16:35.limited because their bodies or mines were differently to a typical
:16:35. > :16:35.
:16:35. > :16:41.one. By the way, what does that mean? -- minds work. Isn't it
:16:41. > :16:51.important to give as powerful as boys as possible to those who have
:16:51. > :16:55.there is a physical impairments? -- voice. By talking about the
:16:55. > :16:59.disabled and disabilities, in politics for example, it gives that
:16:59. > :17:07.particular group of people, a collective voice, a collective
:17:07. > :17:13.power they wouldn't have. I have never been a representative of a
:17:13. > :17:19.group that is so diverse. I have no idea -- no idea what it is like to
:17:19. > :17:23.have a visual impairment or a hearing impairment. What I know is
:17:23. > :17:29.my experience. What I would ask is that we refer to people as the
:17:29. > :17:35.individuals that they are. Let's go to your decision to go into
:17:35. > :17:39.modelling. That is a very particular field. That is where a
:17:39. > :17:46.very narrow aesthetic is imposed on people in that business. Why did
:17:46. > :17:50.you want to take that on? I thought that modelling and fashion
:17:50. > :17:56.advertising in general was just a great arena in which to have a
:17:56. > :18:01.conversation about a social issue which usually has such heavy
:18:01. > :18:07.overtones that it tends to not engage as many people in the
:18:07. > :18:13.conversation as should be engaged. Quite simply, it demands,
:18:13. > :18:18.particularly of the women inside that business, a look. If you look
:18:18. > :18:25.at the models we see around the world, they tend to be very tall,
:18:25. > :18:29.slim, flawless in their features. That is why people look at that
:18:29. > :18:34.industry and think it creates a false impression of the way people
:18:34. > :18:40.are. It probably does create a false impression. It is not meant
:18:40. > :18:47.to reflect the way people are, it is meant to be fantastic. One
:18:47. > :18:54.designer's crazy dream about what they see in the fantasy for spring
:18:55. > :18:59.2012. It is not meant to be representative. I really think
:18:59. > :19:06.about from Gandhi, you must be the change you wish to see in the world.
:19:06. > :19:10.If I did not like what I thought fashion was putting out as a
:19:10. > :19:15.representative of beauty, why not change the conversation? Why not
:19:15. > :19:20.get myself involved in the conversation? Which I have been
:19:20. > :19:25.lucky enough to do. You talk about the conversation as if you have the
:19:25. > :19:32.power to influence the people you work with, do you really? You say
:19:32. > :19:41.it is very important to cost of eight the healthy body image. --
:19:41. > :19:48.cultivate. The image of that young women seek, is not actually
:19:48. > :19:52.cultivating a healthy body image at all. This is where I was at a huge
:19:52. > :19:59.advantage. I never saw myself represented at in fashion
:19:59. > :20:04.advertising almost advertising. I was never influenced by those
:20:04. > :20:13.images of what I should be. I was empowered because of the lack of
:20:13. > :20:22.those images to create my an idea about what a beautiful model could
:20:22. > :20:27.be. Once I started having a public profile in the mid-1990s, people
:20:27. > :20:34.came up to me and said, you are a very beautiful girl, you do not
:20:34. > :20:40.look disabled. Either that is so interesting, I do not feel disabled.
:20:40. > :20:45.-- I thought. People were admitting something to me, the last against
:20:45. > :20:51.them paradigm. You do not feel like one of them, you feel like one of
:20:51. > :20:57.us. Of course, we are all one of us. Do you think the industry has
:20:57. > :21:01.become more open to different body images, body shapes? I think the
:21:01. > :21:08.industry has a long way to go. But I do think they have become more
:21:08. > :21:13.open in celebrating a broader range and diversity of the kinds of
:21:13. > :21:18.people that are indeed beautiful. That do indeed radiate something
:21:18. > :21:22.attractive. A lot of times people do not remember they have a lot
:21:22. > :21:26.more power in this argument than they think they do. You vote with
:21:26. > :21:31.your wallet. If you do not like the advertising that a company is
:21:31. > :21:36.giving you, do not buy the product. You have talked about the
:21:36. > :21:42.stereotypes that have greeted you when you have gone to do jobs, you
:21:42. > :21:50.do not look disabled. Is that also true of you're acting career? Is it
:21:50. > :21:56.difficult to get the parts that the not involve Aimee Mullins, the
:21:56. > :22:02.celebrated double amputee, rather than Aimee Mullins playing a
:22:03. > :22:09.character part in a movie or a play which has nothing to do with your
:22:09. > :22:17.particular back story? It has been an interesting journey. In the
:22:17. > :22:21.beginning, yes. Absolutely. This is another business that is usually
:22:21. > :22:31.marked by categories. The stereotypes of these seven carat --
:22:31. > :22:33.
:22:33. > :22:41.categories. Really he -- you have to be in the game for long enough
:22:41. > :22:46.worry your talent will speak for itself. Yesterday, I read for a
:22:47. > :22:54.lawyer, journalist and a CIA operative. None of them had any
:22:54. > :23:04.prosthetics. That has taken a few years. I had plenty of offers to
:23:04. > :23:14.play it landmine victims. None of which I could do. I had these
:23:14. > :23:14.
:23:14. > :23:22.lovely moments when producers or directors have seen, you do not
:23:22. > :23:28.have mobility issues for this role... Could I'd play a ballerina?
:23:28. > :23:32.Probably not. In the end I want to come back to the beginning, which
:23:32. > :23:39.is about your basic motivation. When you have casting directors
:23:39. > :23:49.offering you endless rolls as a land mine victim, part of the must
:23:49. > :23:49.
:23:49. > :23:55.think I do not want to be in this business? Part -- part of you.
:23:55. > :24:04.have to change this industry. That is what I think. There are actors
:24:04. > :24:08.out there who are contributing to this push. I have the opportunity