Fabulous Fridays, Chad King Interview (Part 2), The Mighty Woofables

It's Fabulous Fridays blogger friends, and I got a lot of fabulousness to give you today. Part 2 of my interview with Chad King, the fantastic young man, openly gay in high school, that was elected this years prom king, is up and ready to read today. I got A LOT of great emails about this great young man and how his story is so inspiring. Blogger software has been having kittens the last couple of days, so everything has been messed up. I appologize if you havent been able to leave comments or load the pages properly. It's taking me forever to post a blog entry, the system keeps going down. Hopefully it will be all cleared up by this weekend. Please comment on this interview and send your congrats to Chad and the awesome job as a person and a role model he is doing. If you didn't have a chance to read part one yet, you can scroll down to yesterdays post and read that first. Todays second half of the interview covers Chad being elected the Prom King, and all that has occurred afterwards, like a controversial article about him and a sweet and bright, special needs girl, Taylor, as the Prom King and Queen.

I want to start off quickly with a Fabulous Friday post though. Remember that Scion mobile dj car I shared with you a few Fab Fridays ago? Well, if during the summer you wanna ditch the car and go topless, and you love to ride bikes then this Kawasaki ZX10R is the option for you! The Kawasaki ZX10R features 12 loudspeakers with 1,500 watts of output, two iPod’s, a Sony PSP, a flat screen with DVD and remote control and a connection for an electric guitar too! So, all you cool dudes out there, ready for an ultimate ride!!!
And for those interested in speed, the legendary bike manufacturers, Ducati has released the first ever road going version of a MotoGP race machine with the prototype version of the Desmosedici RR which will go on market as an extremely limited edition next year. Ducati launched the RR production prototype the Italian Grand Prix at Mugello. The racing monster Desmosedici RR uses an L-four layout and features high technological features. Gizmag reports that, “The Ducati Desmosedici RR features advanced technology and aerodynamics that are derived from the GP6 currently being raced in the 2006 MotoGP World Championship.” The dream machines will be produced in a limited edition of 400 machines a year and will carry a hefty price tag of $70,000. And, if you are already a proud owner of Ducati 999R then you are going to feature on the company’s Top Priority list, so hurry to reserve your dream machine!!!

And now onto the second part of my interview with Chad King..........

Did you know Taylor well before the prom, or just passing friends?
Taylor is honestly one of my good friends. She sits with my group at lunch often, and I always say hi to her whenever I see her. We're buddies, we hang out at school.

Who did you take to the prom? Are you seeing anyone? Did you feel pressured on who you should take, a girl, or boy? Would you have been allowed to take a boy?
I took my best friend Taylor Hempy(female,different than Taylor prom queen,) to the Prom (we had made an agreement in 10th grade, that if we both didn't have boyfriends by the prom, we'd take each other.) I'm kinda seeing this guy, but it's not serious yet, and I wasn't seeing anyone at the time of the prom if that's what you're wondering. Taylor's bf actually broke up with her like a month before the dance, so I was going to ask this guy from another school whom I had kinda dated for a while, but taylor reminded me of our agreement... =P
It would have been fine if I had broughten a guy though; my lesbian friend (and founder of our GSA) brought her girlfriend, and everything was fine.

How did the story in the newspaper come about? What has been the reaction to it?
The newspaper story came about because a school-district official heard of the prom king and queen's particular dispositions respectively and felt touched by the students' maturity and compassion. Jennifer Kabbany (the author) contacted the school, and they called me and gave me her number.
Actually, the reaction has been pretty negative toward her article. Most of my friends and teachers and friend's parents feel that Jennifer spun the story to make it seem like the only reason I was elected king was because I am gay and the students elected me based on a pity vote--not necessarily because of my personality or popularity or whatever else would properly qualify somone to be king. The school prinicpal was so upset, she called me out of class that day and apologized for letting this happen and told me she would contact the district press secretary and try to straighten this whole thing out, and that I was elected because I'm one of the nicest, compassionate, caring.....individuals at school and not just "the gay kid."
Online, people have said everything from "God created Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve!" to "Chad and Taylor's story touched my heart, Thanks for such a wonderful article!" and everything in between. (If you want more in depth than that, go to californian.com, and scroll down to the bottom of the article and read the comments people have left--one is from me, some are from teachers and friends, some are bible-thumpers, and most are supportive community citizens.)

Has anyone besides the local newspaper and the Gay Guru, taken any interest in your story?
I read a reposting of the article on Towerload.com as well as you, and a bunch of people at school told me that they heard my story on a radio station (no one could remember which) and that some girl called in and was like "yea, I love Chad and Taylor! They're so awesome." umm, a few friends mentioned hearing something on TV, but I think they all heard it from the same person who was mistaken (they said they saw it on CNN! I'm thinking that's pretty unlikely...)
My friends have written to Ellen Degeneres
and there was a rumor around school that Oprah had called me.
(LOL, I had like 20 people begging me to take them with me on the show!)

Do you mind the attention?
HAHA, it's funny you ask that, because my friends always give me crap for being an attention whore. I actually think I'm moderately Histrionic...but yea, I'm really enjoying the "local celebrity" feeling this has given me.

What do you think about being a gay role model?
Role Model? wow, I haven't really considered myself to be a gay role-model. I guess it's awesome. I mean, if people look up to me because I am such a nice guy and how I treat other people, I think that's great--I genuinely try to befriend everyone and treat other's how I want to be treated. If people are just looking up to me because I was able to win Prom King while being openly gay, I think they're missing the point. However, I do hope my story has helped some gay teens with problems being accepted realize that there is a possibilty of acceptance. Maybe not today or tomorrow, but society is obviously taking the right steps forward to ensure that one day, everybody will be accepted and celebrated. In that way, I hope my story has really touched a lot of people to realize that hate and prejudice are not a solution.

What are your plans for after Graduation?
Well, I just got a summer job working at Starbucks to save up money for school. I'm going to go to school at Cal. State Univ. Stanislaus. But right now, I'm really looking forward to spending a few care-free months just hanging out with my friends!

Anything else you want to tell me about yourself, or that is important to you?
A few people online have questioned my popularity, and just assume it was a prank vote or pity vote that got me elected...well, I just want to be able to prove my popularity by mentioning that I was also on the Homecoming court this year, and I won Best Personality for my senior class, not that I should HAVE to prove it.
Also, I base my popularity on stuff I learned from my mom (who was a Homecoming Queen her senior year, as was her mom, and her aunt--it runs in the family, my sister was nominated for queen, but lost by 8 votes.) some things she told me were to always be nice to everyone--treat them how you want to be treated. She also told me to say hello to everybody-- so I do--to everyone I know, even if I don't know them that well, I try to reach out and make friends with everyone. I really took this stuff to heart and I think it has paid off nicely.
Also, it may be important to know that my principal's brother is a gay minister from Germany (she's also from Germany, but he still lives there) so that might be a reason for my school's outstanding acceptance policy.
Also, I just really wanted to get the message across that this shouldn't be a big issue. In the minds of my friends and myself, I was the Prom king way before I was ever the Gay Prom King. Me being gay just happens to be an added feature. Further, this shouldn't be an issue because it shouldn't be a big deal that ANYONE won king--black, white, gay, mentally challenged, whatever--people should learn to accept and celebrate people individually.
(Also, I met a kid online who i'm pretty sure is openly gay at school, and he won Prom King as well --he goes to a school in Torrance, CA--Los Angeles area)

And that concludes my interview with Chad. I will post the interview in its entirety on the next website update, June 16th, as well. I hope you can see what a great young man he is, and take from it Chad's attitude, that the fact that he is gay, should not be the big deal, it just is. Thanx Chad, for a great interview and a continued friendship. One last thing I will add to this long post, I have forgotten all week to link the current episode of The Mighty Woofables comic that is one of my favorites on the web, by Roque Yanez. Have a great weekend blogger buds, will be back to regular posting tomorrow...GG