Disney worker Nicholas Maldonado holds an indication whereas protesting outdoors of Walt Disney World on March 22, 2022 in Orlando, Florida. Employees are staging a company-wide walkout at this time to protest Walt Disney Co.’s response to controversial laws handed in Florida referred to as the “Don’t Say Gay” invoice.
Octavio Jones | Getty Images News | Getty Images
With tensions excessive between The Walt Disney Company and Florida lawmakers, the leisure large, alongside three different main media corporations, will air new a new public service announcement from GLAAD featuring a transgender teen which requires nationwide assist of LGBTQ youth.
The PSA facilities on Texas mother Amber Briggle and her son Max.
“If you’ve got by no means met a transgender youngster earlier than what I would like you to know is that that youngster is not any completely different than yours,” Briggle says within the announcement. “They have the identical hopes and goals and deserve the identical equality as yours does.”
The video launches as a number of states proposing and passing payments that many see as dangerous to LGBTQ youth. This consists of laws reminiscent of Florida’s HB 1557 legislation, which has been dubbed the “Don’t Say Gay” invoice, in addition to a Texas directive, which was lately barred, that referred to as for investigations of fogeys of transgender youngsters for youngster abuse.
The new PSA will be aired by outlets owned by Disney, Comcast, WarnerMedia and Paramount.
Disney’s participation comes at a time when firm executives are working to be extra aggressive in advocating for LGBTQ rights. CEO Bob Chapek, specifically, got here underneath scrutiny up to now month for not publicly opposing Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” laws till after it handed by way of the Florida Senate.
The firm has vowed to assist repeal the new legislation which forbids instruction on sexual orientation and gender id in public colleges for kindergarten by way of third grade.
Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, has been crucial of Disney since its executives got here out towards the laws calling the corporate “woke” and threatening to repeal the 1967 Reedy Creek Improvement Act, which permits Disney to behave as its personal authorities inside the outer limits of Orange and Osceola counties in Florida.
Disclosure: Comcast is the mother or father firm of NBCUniversal and CNBC.