Meet Zack Wahls
Emily Niebrugge: What was the hardest part about growing up with two moms?
Zach Wahls: Part of the challenge was growing up in the early ’90s. There just weren’t a lot of kids who had openly gay parents. There were plenty of kids who had gay parents, but their parents weren’t out. That was the
difference.
EN: What compelled you to give testimony in front of the Iowa Legislature?
ZW: I was asked to give it. My senior year of high school, I wrote a poem that ended up running in the state’s largest newspaper. So, a couple of the folks knew I was a kid in Iowa City who had gay parents. When this hearing was announced, they told me I should come speak.
The reason I was willing to get up off my butt and do it, is because it was my family. We really felt like we were being pushed into a corner, and they were trying to make my moms’ relationship illegal. That’s not OK.
EN: Were you surprised by the outcome?
ZW: I was absolutely surprised by the outcome. I was unaware that I was being recorded. Nobody told me they were uploading it to YouTube, nobody had me sign a video release form, nobody gave me a phone call until it was going viral. I found out it was going viral when I got a call from the Ellen DeGeneres show.
I didn’t handle it very well. I started shaking, and I didn’t stop for like 12 hours. It was pretty bad. It was a little crazy, but it turned out all right.
EN: Have you noticed a difference of opinions in different regions of the country?
ZW: Yes and no. Obviously, Texas is different from Massachusetts, but at the end of the day I think kids our age are hands down more supportive of LGBT rights. It isn’t really a geographic or regional thing — it’s really more of a generational thing. There’s a poll out by ABC that found that 81 percent of people aged 18-29 support same-sex marriage. Eighty-one percent. That’s crazy. That’s unbelievable. That number has never been that high. It is a huge testament to the power of positive storytelling that we now have an entire generation growing up seeing these positive stories of people like Ellen, people like Neil Patrick Harris, who put forward this incredible role model and who say, ‘I am a person first, and then I am a gay talk show host or a gay actor.’ You are an individual and a human being before you are a gay person, and that’s really what this was about.
EN: What makes you want to visit colleges and give this presentation?
ZW: We’ve come a long way, but it’s not over yet. Frankly, one of the things I thought when I went to give that speech, was this is going to be a sprint through the finish. But after doing it for about a year, I thought, ‘this is not a sprint at all — this is a marathon.’ What I’ve started to realize now, two years out, is that this isn’t a marathon — it’s a relay race. When I give a talk like this, I really hope that I am able to inspire some people in the audience to go out and share their own story and to talk with other people and to share the good news: that gay people are people. It’s a radical idea for some people, but it’s good to know. In my mind, that is really what it’s all about.
EN: What’s your vision for the future?
ZW: I believe in the inherent worth and dignity of every person — who you are, where you come from, what you believe. We all have that basic humanity, which if allowed to flourish, can thrive and grow and become something very beautiful. But if it is forced into a closet, if it is covered up, we shouldn’t be surprised when that spirit withers. To me, what this movement is about is allowing that individual humanity, that freedom to flourish and thrive and experience the potential. Every life is fleeting. It’s hard to remember that when we’re in college — we all think we’re invincible, but we don’t have a lot of time to the extent that we are able to have a good time while we are here, that’s important.
