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Family

Mom shares her wholesome and hilarious response to son’s letter coming out as transgender

However, she couldn't help but point out one mistake.

Twitter

Cherie Garcia posted her son's coming out letter on Twitter.

Cherie Garcia managed to score some major mom points from her response to her child's creative—yet slightly flawed—coming out letter.

Using colorful cut-out letters, Garcia's son Crow made a short letter coming out as transgender, which looked something like a ransom note. The message was meant to be: Congratulations! You are now the proud owner of your very own son.

Garcia was nonchalant about the announcement, but she did notice something unsettling that every mom would notice. And she was quick to point it out.

Aware that something was getting ready to transpire (mother's intuition, after all) Garcia told Crow's dad—her ex-husband—on the phone that Crow was "either working on homework or holding someone ransom" after walking by his room. She was relieved to find out that neither was the case.

Garcia's tweet read: "My teenager handed me this envelope and asked that I wait to open it until after he went to his dad's house. After opening it, I called to let him know that the *only* thing that's wrong with this is the 'r' he accidentally left out of congratulations." She concluded the tweet with a supportive trans and rainbow flag emoji. Thanks, mom.

My teenager handed me this envelope and asked that I wait to open it until after he went to his dad’s house. After opening it, I called to let him know that the *only* thing that’s wrong with this is the “r” he accidentally left out of congratulations . 😊🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍🌈 pic.twitter.com/0DXmvcgGjk
— Cherie Garcia (@CherieAmours) November 14, 2021

Garcia and Crow make a game out of pointing out spelling errors on signs, so she felt especially compelled to call him out on that missing "r."

The follow-up tweet is really the kicker here. "There is nothing my kids could do to lose my support and unconditional love. My prayer for each of them is that they live life as their authentic selves, without compromise. My teen is figuring things out and I support him 100%, because God created both of my babies perfectly."

There is nothing my kids could do to lose my support and unconditional love. My prayer for each of them is that they live life as their authentic selves, without compromise. My teen is figuring things out and I support him 100%, because God created both of my babies perfectly. ❤️
— Cherie Garcia (@CherieAmours) November 14, 2021

Garcia's welcoming embrace for her son, along with the bonus spelling lesson, soon went viral on Twitter. Comments came flooding in from other parents wanting to commiserate with the coming-out letters they had received.

"I love the drama of it," wrote one mom. "My own non binary kiddo nailed a note to their door in the middle of the night and declared that if we must refer to them to refer to them as our spawn. I commented on the atrocious handwriting."

Garcia's reply? "I'll call you Voltron if you want, but please spell it correctly."

Another person shared their own creative process while coming out, saying "I couldn't decide when I came out so I gave my parents 3 different cards. This was one" followed by a (really well done) image of Pinocchio saying "I'm a real boy."

I couldn't decide when I came out so I gave my parents 3 different cards. This was one. pic.twitter.com/piv6dCig7z
— CapnV (@CapnVonV666) November 16, 2021

Every kid just wants to be seen as perfect in their mom's eyes. Spelling is important (as Garcia jokingly stated on Twitter) but to a teenager going through a major identity transition, compassion and acceptance are crucial. Growing up and figuring yourself out is no easy process. But knowing mom is always gonna love you, no matter what, at least makes it seem a little less impossible.

Thanks Cherie Garcia for the spelling lesson and gesture of love all-in-one. And to Crow, "congatulations."

This article originally appeared on 11.18.21

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Equality

Wil Wheaton's locker room story shows exactly why homophobic jokes are a problem

One of the great rules of comedy is punch up, not down.

www.flickr.com

Wil Wheaton | Wil Wheaton speaking at the 2018 Phoenix Comic… | Flickr

Comedy can be uplifting. And it can also be downright destructive. The rise of cancel culture has made us take a hard look at what we normalize for the sake of a good joke. And with Dave Chappelle’s controversial comedy special, that includes jokes which can be perceived as cruel or homophobic jabs by the LGBTQ community and allies.

At the same time, comedy is supposed to be disruptive, is it not? It’s meant to be audacious, bawdy, outrageous. And let’s not forget it’s often said sarcastically, meaning we don’t really believe what what's being said … right?

Wil Wheaton has previously given a brilliant take on how to separate the art from the artist. This time though, he’s confronting the art itself and what makes it problematic.

“For anyone who genuinely doesn't understand why I feel as strongly as I do about people like Chappelle making transphobic comments that are passed off as jokes, I want to share a story that I hope will help you understand, and contextualize my reaction to his behavior.”

Wheaton started off his story by sharing how he used to play ice hockey when he was 16, and one night enjoyed a warm welcome as a guest goalie. After a fun practice, Wheaton joined his teammates in the locker room.

“Before I tell you what happened next, I want to talk specifically about comedy and how much I loved it when I was growing up… One of the definitive comedy specials for me and my friends was Eddie Murphy's Delirious, from 1983. It had bits that still kill me… Really funny stuff.

There is also extensive homophobic material that is just…appalling and inexcusable. Long stretches are devoted to mocking gay people, using the slur that starts with F over and over and over. Young Wil, who watched this with his suburban white upper middle class friends, in his privileged bubble, thought it was the funniest, edgiest, dirtiest thing he'd ever heard… And all of it was dehumanizing to gay men… I didn't know any better. I accepted the framing, I developed a view of gay men as predatory, somehow less than straight men, absolutely worthy of mockery and contempt. Always good for a joke…

Wil Wheaton | Wil Wheaton at the Phoenix Comicon, on the Eur… | Flickrwww.flickr.com

…A comedian who I thought was one of the funniest people on the planet totally normalized making a mockery of gay people, and because I was a privileged white kid, raised by privileged white parents, there was nobody around me to challenge that perception. For much of my teen years, I was embarrassingly homophobic, and it all started with that comedy special.”

Here Wheaton pivots back to the locker room:

“So I'm talking with these guys…We're doing that sports thing where you talk about the great plays, and feel like you're part of something special.

And then, without even realizing what I was doing, that awful word came out of my mouth. ‘Blah blah blah F****t,’ I said.

The room fell silent and that's when I realized every single guy in this room was gay. They were from a team called The Blades (amazing) and I had just ... really fucked up.

"'Do you have any gay friends?" One of them asked me, gently.

"Yes," I said, defensively. Then, I lied, "they say that all the time." I was so embarrassed and horrified. I realized I had basically said the N word, in context, and I didn't know what to do. I wanted to disappear. I wanted to apologize, I wanted to beg forgiveness. But I was a stupid sixteen year-old with pride and ignorance and fear all over myself, so I lied to try and get out of it.

"They must not love themselves very much," he said, with quiet disappointment.

Nobody said another word to me. I felt terrible. I shoved my gear into my bag and left as quickly as I could.”

Genuinely lovely stuff from @wilw here.

(Also worth noting that Eddie Murphy has since apologized for a lot of the stuff in Raw and Delirious that he's referencing.) https://t.co/TFwyp4yzut
— Franklin Leonard (@franklinleonard) December 9, 2021

“That happened over 30 years ago, and I think about it all the time. I'm mortified and embarrassed and so regretful that I said such a hurtful thing. I said it out of ignorance, but I still said it, and I said it because I believed these men, who were so cool and kind and just like all the other men I played with (I was always the youngest player on the ice) were somehow less than ... I guess everyone. Because that had been normalized for me by culture and comedy.

A *huge* part of that normalization was through entertainment that dehumanized gay men in the service of "jokes". And as someone who thought jokes were great, I accepted it. I mean, nobody was making fun of *ME* that way…so…

This stuff that Chappelle did? …For a transgender person, those "jokes" normalize hateful, ignorant, bigoted behavior towards them. Those "jokes" contribute to a world where transgender people are constantly under threat of violence, because transgender people have been safely, acceptably, dehumanized. And it's all okay, because they were dehumanized by a Black man……Literally every queer person I know (and I know a LOT) is hurt by Chappelle's actions. When literally every queer person I know says "this is hurtful to me", I'm going to listen to them and support them, and not tell them why they are wrong…”

Wil Wheaton brings up some powerful points. While this is a complex issue, the insidious nature of dehumanizing jokes is pretty blatant. At some point we have to ask ourselves: Is it really worth harming someone else for the sake of a joke? When put that bluntly, the answer, I hope, is a resounding no.

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Family

They started dating as heterosexuals in 2004. Now, they've blossomed into a loving lesbian marriage.

No matter what changes, some people are truly meant to be together.

via Instagram

Some couples are just meant to be together. Sarah, 38, and Jenni Barret, 37, have gone through some major changes as a couple and after 15 years of marriage, have managed to find themselves happier than ever.

Jenni and Sarah both met through a friend at Arizona State University in 2004. But back then Sarah was called Sean. Jenni identified as a straight woman and Sean, a straight man.

"I knew he was The One as soon as he gave me a killer head massage that same night," Jenni told The Daily Mail. The couple tied the knot in December of 2005.

At the time, Jenni didn't know about her fiance's gender issues, but she thought it was a little unique that she took such an interest in their wedding plans.

"I didn't clock it at the time, but looking back at the wedding, Sarah was a bit of a bridezilla," Jenni says. "I was happy to elope and get married just us two, but she organized every part of the big day, from tableware to the venue - all I did was try on the dress and turn up."

via JenniBerr / Instagram

The couple would go on to have two boys, Morgan in 2007 and Toby in 2009.

After the birth of their second child, Jenni began to notice that Sarah would buy clothing traditionally meant for women.

"She started buying a lot of clothes like that, which were on the edge of what is seen as male or female," Jenni says. "She would wear a nightie to bed and on date nights she'd be wearing countless layers of clothes with a bra underneath, so no one could see. I noticed something going on, but it wasn't hurting anybody so I left it."

However, the couple's suspicions that their eldest son, Morgan, may be gay brought the issue to the forefront in their relationship.

"We'd suspected Morgan was gay since he was about two," Jenni says. "He just can't hide it — not that we would ever want him to. He was born singing theme tunes and being over the top."

See on Instagram

The discussions about Morgan's sexuality pushed Sarah to put a mirror up to herself and have a tough conversation with Jenni.

"Sarah rolled over one evening in bed in 2016 and told me, 'I really need to talk to you - I think I'm trans.' I'd come to realize why I'd always been so drawn to her, it was because of who she was on the inside — a woman — and not her shell," Jenni said.

"I turned around and said, 'That's ok, I think I'm gay.'"

What began as a heterosexual relationship had transformed into a loving lesbian marriage. The next job was explaining the situation to their children.

"We explained that Daddy had a girl's brain and that it was in the wrong body — but doctors would fix it," Jenni says. "Now, we're both Jewish, the boys call Sarah 'Eema' — Hebrew for Mother."

Sean changed her name to Sarah and began to take a combination of of testosterone blockers and estrogen every day. The couple set up an Instagram account to celebrate their unique family.

"We're so proud of our LGBT family, although we do always say that, after Morgan came out in 2018, Toby must feel left out," Jenni says.

"He jokes that he's going to have to come out as bisexual to fit in!"

See on Instagram

This article originally appeared on 9.4.20

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I told a kid a riddle my dad told me when I was 7. His answer proves how far we've come.

This classic riddle takes on new meaning as our world changes for the better.

When I was 7, my dad told me a riddle.

"A man and his son are driving in their car when they are hit by a tractor-trailer.

Photo via iStock.

(We were driving at the time, so of course this was the riddle he decided to tell.)

The father dies instantly.

The son is badly injured. Paramedics rush him to the hospital.

Photo via iStock.

As he is being wheeled into the operating room, the surgeon takes one look the boy and says:

'I can't operate on him. He's my son.'

How is that possible?!"

Without missing a beat, I answered:

"The doctor is his mom!"

Photo via iStock.

My dad first heard the riddle when he was a child in the '60s.

Back then, most women didn't work outside of the home.

Few of those who did had college degrees, much less professional degrees.

Female doctors were few and far between.

Back then, it was a hard riddle. A very hard riddle.

By 1993, when I first heard it, the notion that women could be highly skilled, highly trained professionals wasn't so absurd.

To me, it was normal.

I knew women who were lawyers. Bankers. Politicians. My own doctor was a woman.

To be sure, women still faced challenges and discrimination in the workplace. And even 20 years later, they still do.

But at its core, the riddle is about how a family can work. And that had changed. Long-overdue progress had rendered the big, sexist assumption that underpinned the whole thing moot.

A very hard riddle was suddenly not a riddle at all.

I never forgot it.

Now, I'm 30 — almost as old as my dad was he first told me that riddle.

My dad at 30 (left) and me at 30. Photos by Eric March/Upworthy and Mary March, used with permission.

I don't have kids, but I mentor a child through a volunteer program.

Once a week, we get together and hang out for an hour. We play ping pong, do science experiments, and write songs. Neither of us like to go outside.

It's a good match.

One day, we decided to try to stump each other with riddles.

He rattled off about five or six.

I could only remember one: The one about the man, his son, and the surgeon.

Photo via iStock.

I thought it would be silly to tell it.

I was sure that, if it was easy in 1993, it would be even easier in 2014. Kind of ridiculous, even.

But a part of me was curious.

It had been 21 years — almost as long as it had been between when my dad first heard the riddle and when he shared it with me.

Maybe it wouldn't be so easy.

Maybe I was missing something obvious, making my own flawed assumptions about how a family could work.

Maybe the world had changed in ways that would be second nature to a 13-year-old but not to me.

So I began:

"A man and his son are driving in their car, when they are hit by a tractor-trailer. The father dies instantly. The son is badly injured and is rushed to the hospital by paramedics. As he is being wheeled into the operating room, the surgeon takes one look at the boy and says:

'I can't operate on him. He's my son.'

How is that possible?!"

Without missing a beat, he answered: "it's his other dad"

Photo via iStock.

Times change. Progress isn't perfect. But no matter what shape a family takes, at the end of the day, #LoveWins.

This article was written by Eric March and originally appeared on 06.21.16

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Identity

My wife surprised her coworkers when she came out as trans. Then they surprised her.

She was ready for one reaction but was greeted with a beautiful response.

All photos by Amanda Jette, used with permission.

Zoe comes out to her coworkers.

Society, pay attention. This is important.

My wife, Zoe, is transgender. She came out to us — the kids and me — last summer and then slowly spread her beautiful feminine wings with extended family, friends, and neighbors.

A little coming out here, a little coming out there — you know how it is.

It's been a slow, often challenging process of telling people something so personal and scary, but pretty much everyone has been amazing.

However, she dreaded coming out at the office.

She works at a large technology company, managing a team of software developers in a predominantly male office environment. She's known many of her co-workers and employees for 15 or so years. They have called her "he" and "him" and "Mr." for a very long time. How would they handle the change?

While we have laws in place in Ontario, Canada, to protect the rights of transgender employees, it does not shield them from awkwardness, quiet judgment, or loss of workplace friendships. Your workplace may not become outright hostile, but it can sometimes become a difficult place to go to every day because people only tolerate you rather than fully accept you.

But this transition needed to happen, and so Zoe carefully crafted a coming out email and sent it to everyone she works with.

The support was immediately apparent; she received about 75 incredibly kind responses from coworkers, both local and international.

She then took one week off, followed by a week where she worked solely from home. It was only last Monday when she finally went back to the office.

First day back at work! I asked if I could take a "first day of school" type picture with her lunchbox. She said no. Spoilsport.

Despite knowing how nice her colleagues are and having read so many positive responses to her email, she was understandably still nervous.

Hell, I was nervous. I made her promise to text me 80 billion times with updates and was more than prepared to go down there with my advocacy pants on if I needed to (I might be a tad overprotective).

And that's when her office pals decided to show the rest of us how to do it right.

She got in and found that a couple of them had decorated her cubicle to surprise her:

Her cubicle decorated with butterflies.

All photos by Amanda Jette, used with permission.

Butterflies! Streamers! Rainbows! OMG!

And made sure her new name was prominently displayed in a few locations:

Zoe written on the board.

All photos by Amanda Jette, used with permission.

They got her a beautiful lily with a "Welcome, Zoe!" card:

Welcome lily and card

All photos by Amanda Jette, used with permission.

And this tearjerker quote was waiting for her on her desk:

A quote from Oscar Wilde.

All photos by Amanda Jette, used with permission.

To top it all off, a 10 a.m. "meeting" she was scheduled to attend was actually a coming out party to welcome her back to work as her true self — complete with coffee and cupcakes and handshakes and hugs.

Coming out party with cupcakes.

All photos by Amanda Jette, used with permission.

(I stole one, and it was delicious.)

NO, I'M NOT CRYING. YOU'RE CRYING.

I did go to my wife's office that day. But instead of having my advocacy pants on, I had my hugging arms ready and some mascara in my purse in case I cried it off while thanking everyone.

I wish we lived in a world where it was no big deal to come out.

Sadly, that is not the case for many LGBTQ people. We live in a world of bathroom bills and "religious freedom" laws that directly target the members of our community. We live in a world where my family gets threats for daring to speak out for trans rights. We live in a world where we can't travel to certain locations for fear of discrimination — or worse.

So when I see good stuff happening — especially when it takes place right on our doorstep — I'm going to share it far and wide. Let's normalize this stuff. Let's make celebrating diversity our everyday thing rather than hating or fearing it.

Chill out, haters. Take a load off with us.

It's a lot of energy to judge people, you know. It's way more fun to celebrate and support them for who they are.

Besides, we have cupcakes.

This article originally appeared on 04.08.16.

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Identity

Gay man has the perfect comeback to a woman who won't stop hitting on him at a bar

Unwanted attention is unwanted attention.

via Petr Sidorov/Unsplash and Max Harlynking/Unsplash

A woman is flirting with a gay man at a bar.

A gay man is getting some love for the way he handled a straight woman at a bar who behaved rather entitled towards him. A Reddit user named KineticVibes was out with his friends when he noticed a woman trying to get his attention.

“I (25M) was out with friends last night and we went to a bar. This girl made eye contact with me when I walked in and I smiled at her. Me being a gay man I thought nothing of it,” KineticVibes wrote.

The woman approached him after realizing he wasn’t reacting to her flirtations from across the bar. “About 20 minutes later, the same girl walks up to my friends and me, and it's clear she is very drunk and says to me, ‘Do you want to buy me a drink?’ To which I replied, ‘No, sorry, I'm here just to hang with my friends,’” he continued.

She was clearly taking an aggressive approach by walking up and asking him to buy her a drink. Why didn’t she just ask what he was drinking and buy him a drink instead? She also unintentionally put him in a very uncomfortable spot because he didn’t want to tell her he was gay.

Even though it’s 2024 and people are a lot more accepting of people’s sexuality, you never know when a drunk person in the bar will have a problem with someone being gay and try to start a fight. “I am still not totally comfortable telling any old stranger on first meeting that I'm gay—so this seemed like the best course of action for me,” KineticVibes wrote.

Even though he was polite, the girl kept prodding him.

“She looks rejected and a bit frustrated now behind her glossy eyes and says, ‘A pretty girl wants to drink with you and you say no?’ Now I'm getting frustrated, and I kind of snap and say, ‘Well, I'm gay, so pretty girls don't work on me.’”

“She snarkily laughs and says, ‘Well, if you ever decide to date women, let me know,’ to which I very snappily reply, ‘If you ever decide to become a man, let me know,’” KineticVibes said. The quick-witted response made his friends a bit uncomfortable.

“You could tell it embarrassed her and my friends all kind of got mad at me, saying that I should have patience and be nicer,” he concluded the story.

But did he need to be nicer to the woman? She tried to make eye contact, but he didn’t respond. Then she asked him to buy her a drink, to which he said no, politely. She then doubled down and asked why he wouldn’t buy one for her because she was pretty. Just about everyone in the comments on the story thinks he did the right thing by responding to her snark with a bit of sass. "I would’ve bought you a drink after that. Handling with humor 10/10," A_Bull_Nuts responded.

Others thought the woman acted entitled by demanding a drink and got what she deserved. "If she was a dude, people would call her an incel for behaving like she's entitled to anyone's attention. It's not cute when dudes do it. It's not cute when dudettes do it," NotSoBunny wrote.

"This is what I came here to say... She reeks of entitlement! She put herself out there and got shot down and then doubled down. She may not be a man, but she's got a huge set of balls demanding a stranger pay her way," formiddabble-opponent added.

This article originally appeared on 4.2.24

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Identity

A woman hit on a gay man in a parking lot and the misunderstanding is so heartwarming

The enouncter was special for both of them but for different reasons.

via WowRealNeat/TikTok and TifanieMayberry/TikTok

Tifanie Mayberry and David Frazier discuss their chance encounter.

Usually, when you read a story about people being confronted in a grocery store parking lot, it's bad news. But not this time. Back in November of 2023, Portland, Oregon-based photographer David Frazier had an uplifting experience in the parking lot of a New Seasons market after being approached by a female admirer.

He later told the story on TikTok in a video that received over 3.4 million views.

While making a quick run to the store, Frazier parked next to a woman driving a Tesla. He noticed she was eating, hanging around and “vibing,” so he flashed her a smile and went into the store, where he picked up a bite to eat.

Upon returning to his car, the woman was still there. She rolled down her window and asked Frazier, “Hey, are you single?” Frazier was taken aback by the question and replied: “Sadly, yes, I am. Um, also very gay, though.”

@wowrealneat
Dear New Seasons Parking Lot Girl, you’re so cool and ily ❤️ #fyp #portland #parkinglot #xoxo

He told the woman he was flattered and that asking never hurts. "You're just so handsome," she replied. Frazier returned the compliment, calling her "pretty," and the two shared a laugh and went their separate ways.

But the interaction stuck with Frazier. He thought it took real "guts" to tell a stranger you think they're attractive. He also felt that it was "kind" and "flattering" for her to compliment him. "She seemed like such a genuine and kind and earnest" and "cool" person, he said in the video.

He hoped the TikTok video he made would eventually reach her somehow. “You have uplifted me in a way that I didn’t know I needed, and it made me feel amazing, and I just wanted to say thank you and I hope you have such an incredible weekend,” Frazier told the woman through his post.

He also invited her to get a “friend coffee.”

Five weeks after Frazier posted the video, it successfully reached its intended audience of one. It was seen by Tifanie Mayberry, the woman driving the Tesla. She shared a reaction video where she watched Frazier’s original post. The video received over 11 million views.

@tifaniemayberry
#duet with @David #fyp WOW!! Never expected for this to come back around like this. OMG. The internet is internetting and I LOVE it!!

Mayberry followed the reaction video up with another, explaining that her behavior in the parking lot that day was a perfect example of where she is in life. She’s 35, single and ready to settle down and have kids. If that means she has to be a little forward in approaching men, so be it.

"So what you're witnessing is me just being like no BS and being 'like okay if I see me a good one, I just like to lasso them, and reel 'em in’ and be like 'Hey, I'm interested,' and that's just kind of where I am in life. And apparently, this one got back to me in a very unexpected way,” she said.

Mayberry added that she has yet to speak with Frazier but is looking forward to meeting him. She hopes that one day he’ll even make it to her wedding.

@tifaniemayberry
Well its been a very funny ending to 2023, and I have to say it ended things on such a great note for me 🥹❤️✨ Thanks TikTok!! @David - Coffee in the New Year?!

This article originally appeared on 1.5.24

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