sometimes, we all go a little mad. mad defined; insane, angry, excited, intense, passionate
Monday, January 7, 2013
My Two Moms- The Issue is that There Are No Issues
I've been reading the book My Two Moms: Lessons of Love, Strength, and What Makes a Family by Zach Wahls for a few weeks now. Some of you might know Wahls- he delivered a speech regarding Resolution 6, a proposed amendment to Iowa's constitution that would define marriage as between a man and woman only, to the Iowa House of Representatives. If you haven't heard of him, check it out now. The video you see of his speech was uploaded to Youtube by Iowan House Democrats, unbeknownst to him. The video blew up all over the internet and on the news. Zach later appeared on the Ellen DeGeneres show and a year later published his first book; My Two Moms. My mom actually bought it for me, I think she saw it at Barnes and Noble and thought it would be a nice addition to my collection of LGBT-related books and films. It's pretty delightful so far. The stories of how his mom, Terry, (a.k.a "Tall Mom"), would test his memory of the boy scout's slogan, motto, and oath at the dinner table was very relatable and touching. I picked this book for my Issues in Modern American Society class because of this controversial question; can gay parent's actually raise children ("well")? I think it's a silly question, but to some people it's a legitimate concern. However, this book is filled with relatively little controversy that I sometimes feel it's not provocative enough for my Issues class. But isn't that the beauty of the book? This guy had a pretty happy and completely normal upbringing outside of the fact that he has two moms. The strength of this book is that it irrationalizes all the fears of those who doubt the strength of familal-love, reguardless of genders and sexual orientations. I imagine gay-parent-skeptics pick this book up thinking it will be packed with sob stories and chapters called "where's my daddy?" but what they find out is that having gay parents didn't make this child's life any harder than a child with hetero parents. There are no stories of molestation, abuse, overbearing or neglectful parents here. Just two, loving women who are raising two, nice kids. That's all. :)
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I like the idea that its not any different to have 2 parents of the same gender than it is to have 2 parents of different genders. I feel like its a bit of a overassumption to say all parents are loving though, hetero or not. I'm confused, does Zach Wahls actually have 2 moms? And if so, then why try to make a law restricting marriage to between a man and a woman only?
ReplyDeleteHey Carly! Sorry if my post was confusing, Zach Wahls is the son of two women, so yes, his parents are gay. He delivered his speech as a way to protest the proposed amendment. He was not in favor of resolution 6. He is absolutely pro-same sex marraige!
DeleteDonna,
ReplyDeleteFirst of all: I'm in love with Zach Wahls.
Second of all: I think your views on the book are extremely interesting. You would think the book would be about the struggles he's gone through growing up with two moms. And I like your point that it's actually more powerful that there really is no "issue" in his story. But do you find the book boring because of that? I mean, who wants to read a story about average life when we live it every day? Is it still worth reading even though there's not a lot of "drama"?
Hey Faith,
DeleteIsn't he such a cutie? And those are some good questions, I've them myself several times when I started the book. But I am actually almost done and it does get more controversial. The reason I continued to read it was because of how much I admire Zach. The book isn't all about the difficulties growing up in a "different" household; it's more inspirational than that. I'd recommend it to all LGBT people hoping to start a family some day. I think it will ease the anxieties of queer parents and change attitudes of those who doubt LGBT parents.