Rep. Jim Moran, D-Va., posted one of the most straightforward It Gets Better videos of any politician last week.
"I didn't happen to be born gay," he said, "but I've known an awful lot of bullies throughout my life. It's interesting that they all grew up to be insecure jerks."
Moran said the bullies "only seem to feel good about themselves when they were making other people feel bad about themselves."
He talks about growing up with a "horrible problem of shyness" that left him "red faced" and "sweating all over the place" when called upon in class. Still, Moran pushed himself into public speaking.
His first two speeches didn't go so well.
"I fainted," he said, "fainted right on the stage just drop down. They revived me and I started again. Fainted again, had to carry me out. Second speech. Same thing happened."
That was the bottom, so to speak. And now it's a story he tells often with pride for what he's overcome.
"Somehow I told myself things have got to get better because they can't get any worse," he said. "And they did, eventually."
Moran has served Virginia in Congress since 1991, and before that he was mayor of Alexandria. Watch his video below, followed by a few impassioned examples of the voice for gay rights that would have been lost had Moran not pressed on after those first few failed speeches. The videos are from the normally quiet world of C-SPAN but aren't to be missed.
February 24, 2010Moran took to the floor of the House to share an email from an active-duty soldier in Afghanistan who learned that a friend in his unit was gay "only after he was killed by an IED in Iraq."
"This issue is a matter of integrity," he said, echoing Admiral Mike Mullen of the Joint Chiefs. "This immutable human trait, sexual orientation, like the color of one's skin, does not affect one's integrity, their honor or their commitment to their country."
July 18, 2006"This is crazy," Moran said in protest of a proposal to amend the Constitution to ban same-sex marriage. "What this is really about, and what this amendment should really be entitled, is the gay discrimination act. That's all it is. And what's its motivation? It's a crass political attempt to divide America in an election year. We know it, and I suspect a lot of the American people know it, as well."
July 26, 2000Moran came to the defense of gay D.C. councilman Jim Graham, who had angrily criticized the Catholic Church for its condemnation of homosexuality. The issue came up during a debate over whether insurance companies should be required to cover contraception -- a plan the church wanted to be excluded from.
"Having been educated in Catholic schools all my life, if I were a gay man, I would feel the same sense of frustration and disappointment that councilman Jim Graham expressed," he said. "The intolerance, and yes, the hypocrisy, of the Catholic Church as an institution toward homosexuality ought to be addressed."
