Actress Annette Bening says her transgender child, Stephen Ira Beatty, is “such an inspiration” to her, and she wishes everyone would have a trans person in their family in order to truly “get it.”
“I have a trans son, and he is such an inspiration to me,” Bening told the Hollywood Reporter in a recent interview. “Certainly, what’s happening in the political world with trans people is so concerning and so dire. It’s only going to get worse as we go into the election cycle.”
The American Beauty star went on to bizarrely claim that the political right, which is currently trying to implement anti-grooming laws, has been conducting “the real transition.”
“For me, the real transition has happened as the right wing in the country has become more and more mobilized on misinforming people about the LGBTQ community,” she said. “They have been vilifying our community and creating problems that do not exist and creating and sowing hate and fear as a way of rallying their base.”
Bening also claimed that Republicans once campaigned against gay people, “but now it’s transphobia, and it’s just rampant.”
“They’re doing it at a time when there are more and more trans people who are living openly and who are our teachers, our writers and our doctors. One of my most favorite doctors is a trans woman,” the actress declared, adding that she wishes everyone would have a transgender person in their family.
“What I would wish is for every person to have someone who is trans in their family because once somebody you love is trans, then you get it,” she said.
“I was very ignorant about what that meant to be a trans kid,” Bening, who shares a trans child with Hollywood star Warren Beatty, added. “I, like every other parent, want to protect my kids and make sure they’re OK, and I had a lot of learning to do.”
Bening reacted to the GOP’s anti-grooming legislation and efforts by claiming the conservative lawmakers are “trying to stir up all this fear in people about trans kids and parents, and they are trying to legislate that. This should not be scary to anybody else.”
The Grifters star also noted that her conservative parents acknowledge her child’s false sex identity, and even play along with it.
“My parents are Republicans, and I was raised in a Republican household,” she said. “My mother, who is now 94, was one of the first people to say, ‘I used to have a beautiful granddaughter. Now I have a handsome grandson.’ It’s that simple.”
Bening’s comments come at a time when Republican lawmakers in states like Texas and Tennessee are making moves to ban surgeries for transing children and social conditioning toward transgenderism in public schools.
The Kids Are All Right star joins the growing list of celebrity parents publicly playing along with their children’s delusions, and lecturing other people who desire normal lives for their own children.
Bening’s daughter — the eldest of four children with her husband, actor-director Warrner Beatty — was born Kathlyn Beatty and now goes by the name Stephen Ira. Ira claims she “survived conversion therapy and transphobic abuse” after deciding to transition at age 14.
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