Joss Whedon was recently honoured for his activism at the HeForShe Media Summit held at YouTube Space LA. Whedon spoke to The Wrap backstage, telling them that a college girlfriend had spurred him to get involved many years ago.

“Orson Welles had died and I was all sad and drunk about it,” he recalled. “I said, ‘He had this amazing voice and they silenced him.’ And she said, ‘Yeah, that’s terrible. I feel that way about the entire history of my gender,'” he recalled of their conversation. “Good point: Orson Welles and half the people who were ever.”

“I feel like I’ve been a great interrupter,” he told The Wrap before he delivered his own speech urging men to stop and listen to women – admitted that’s something he can work on, too.

“This movement speak very gently to people on a very simple and personal level,” said Whedon on stage. “There are so many men who are absolutely behind this concept who either don’t know it or don’t act upon it.”

He went on to argue that listening is an extra, necessary step needed to enact change. “It’s not one I’ve personally mastered,” he said. “It’s listening. Count to five every single time before you interrupt – before you interrupt a co-worker, before you complement someone on something in your workplace, before you reprimand your daughter, before you compliment your daughter… before you explain.

“Take an extra step just to think for a moment, to think what the person you’re dealing with is going through,” he said. “What I would like is to never again win an award just for being a decent person.”

Original article at The Wrap.