Voice for Equality: Shanna Moakler

Shanna Moakler is a former Miss USA, actress and reality television star. After being crowned Miss USA in 1995, Ms. Moakler went on to star in USA Network’s Pacific Blue for two seasons and her own MTV reality television show following her marriage to Blink-182 drummer Travis Barker on Meet the Barkers. She appeared on Dancing with the Stars in 2006 and recently, she hosted the CW’s Crowned: The Mother of All Pageants. Learn more here.

Following the 2009 Miss USA/Miss California pageant competition, during which contestant Carrie Prejean expressed her opposition to marriage equality and then joined the anti-gay National Organization for Marriage as a highly-visible spokesperson, Shanna Moakler, who was the Co-Executive Director of the pageant, voiced her support for marriage equality. During a panel discussion on the Larry King Live show, Ms. Moakler asked:

What is wrong with a mother and a mother? And what is wrong with a father and a father? I don’t think that anyone can define marriage except two people who are in a union together who love each other. I don’t think there’s an organization that can do that. [Link]

In another interview with US Weekly magazine, Ms. Moakler stated:

What I hope for is helping others understand ‘civil union’ and then one day helping people learn ‘marriage’ is something not God, not the state or country can solidify, but between two people who love each other.” [Link]

Ms. Moakler later resigned from the Miss California USA organization as a result of the controversy surrounding Carrie Prejean and her anti-marriage equality activities, stating:

I cannot with a clear conscious move forward supporting and promoting the Miss Universe Organization when I no longer believe in it… [Link]

Freedom to Marry salutes Shanna Moakler as a Voice for Equality! See other Voices for Equality here.

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