A Brave Voice
“A Brave Voice”
January 24, 2013
Jacob Rudolph, a New Jersey high school senior took to the mic earlier this month and made his voice heard, by bravely “coming out” in front of hundreds of his peers. He chose the opportunity during an awards ceremony, where he was being awarded the “Class Actor” of his school. He proclaimed to the crowd, “Sure, I’ve been in a few plays and musicals, but more importantly, I have been acting every single day of my life. You see, I’ve been acting as someone I’m not. Most of you see me every day, you see me acting the part of ‘Straight Jacob’, when I’m in fact a LGBT teen.” Jacob’s friend filmed the announcement and Jacob’s father, Jonathan, posted the video on YouTube soon after. The video is quickly becoming a hit across the web, at one point being both Yahoo! News & Huffington Post’s top trending news story. Jacob is currently being tapped by major daytime TV personalities to be on their talk shows, but he was kind enough to share his courageous story first with 24/7, during a recent phone interview.
24/7: Jacob, what inspired you to “come out” during an awards ceremony and why then?
Jacob: Initially, it was because I wanted to come out of the closet. It was too taxing to keep my secret so personal. I actually found out I was going to win the “Class Actor” award before the awards ceremony itself, so I had time to prepare my little speech. Once I realized that my speech would be affecting the entire LGBT community as a whole, I knew that was something I had to do.
24/7: Did you think this video would create the following that it’s already doing?
Jacob: Somewhere in the back of my mind, I wanted to get noticed by LGBT celebrities like George Takei or Ellen DeGeneres, but I never would’ve thought of this kind of turnout and support of my message. It’s really overwhelming.
24/7: What was going through your head, while you were speaking on-stage?
Jacob: Well, looking back on it, I really only had one image in my mind of looking out into the audience and only seeing the spotlight. It just feels like trying to remember a crazy dream that you can only regress fragments of it. I would assume that I was feeling like, “There’s no going back, there’s no going back. Am I really doing this?” But as soon as I said, “Most of you see me everyday acting the part of ‘Straight Jacob’, when in fact I’m a LGBT teen.” After those words came out of my mouth, I knew there was no going back, and that’s kind of when I turned on the fire and addressed my speech as well as I could.
24/7: What do you hope viewers will take from watching your video?
Jacob: I hope that they will take away from my video that it’s really just okay to be who you are and standing up to be yourself. Regardless of any diversity you might face, acceptance of your own self is the first step to acceptance from other people in the LGBT community. I just want people to love each other forever and ever. And the only way that’s going to happen is if more leaders start popping up in the LGBT community and people start coming out more and more.
24/7: What are your future plans? I know you are finishing high school. Do you plan to go to college or if this video gets bigger, do you look to do speaking at schools? What’s your plan, would you say?
Jacob: My plans are to go to college for music and go into the business world of it. I look forward to continuing to be a supporter & advocate of LGBT rights.
24/7: What advice would you give to that young boy or girl out there, afraid of being as bold & brave as you have been?
Jacob: If I can do it, you can do it…because everybody has an inner strength that maybe can seem too small or see anything substantial come from it. But I think the first part is once you can accept it for yourself, your confidence grows and your self-image grows and from there, you’re limitless.
To watch Jacob’s full YouTube video, visit:
Interviewer: Jeff Conway, 24/7 Contributor
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