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 in the present day to protest Walt Disney Co.’s response to controversial laws handed in Florida generally known 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 firms, will air new a brand new public service announcement from GLAAD that includes a transgender teen which requires nationwide help 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 isn’t any totally 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 contains laws similar to Florida’s HB 1557 regulation, which has been dubbed the “Don’t Say Gay” invoice, in addition to a Texas directive, which was just lately barred, that referred to as for investigations of fogeys of transgender kids for youngster abuse.
The new PSA will likely be aired by shops 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, particularly, got here beneath scrutiny prior to now month for not publicly opposing Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” laws till after it handed by the Florida Senate.
The firm has vowed to assist repeal the brand new regulation which forbids instruction on sexual orientation and gender identification in public faculties for kindergarten by third grade.
Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, has been crucial of Disney since its executives got here out in opposition to 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.
Amid this discord, Disney employed Kristina Schake as its new government vice chairman of worldwide communications. Schake was a cofounder of the group behind a federal lawsuit difficult Proposition 8, a California state constitutional modification that was supposed to ban same-sex marriage.
The firm additionally introduced Wednesday earmarked practically 80 acres of land in Florida for reasonably priced housing to be constructed upon. The new improvement is anticipated to incorporate greater than 1,300 items and supply residents quite a lot of dwelling decisions situated in shut proximity to colleges.
“We are invested in working along with our neighborhood to resolve complicated points,” stated Jeff Vahle, president of Walt Disney World Resort, in a press release.
Disclosure: Comcast is the mum or dad firm of NBCUniversal and CNBC.