People watching the Republican National Convention on FOX News may be surprised to see ads from gay rights organizations. JusticeUSA made a minute-long video ad promoting the freedom to operate the toilet for transgender people.
Watch the video:
This groundbreaking up-to-date ad highlights the challenges transgender people face in accessing public restrooms — and highlights the lack of state and federal anti-discrimination protections for transgender people. The ad will make its national television debut on FOX News Channel next Thursday, July 21, during the final night of the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Ohio. It will re-air nationally on MSNBC during the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia a week later.
“I am a transgender woman,” Alaina Kupec says in the narration. “I was born in a male body, but deep down I always knew I was a woman.”
The video shows Kupec in a restaurant when a transgender woman suddenly needs to operate the restroom. A restaurant employee follows Kupec into the bathroom to make sure Kupec uses the men’s room. The men look out of the bathroom in disgust, while the narrator explains that transgender people fear harassment and violence. Friendly women appear and immediately seem willing to let Kupec operate the women’s room. Kupec enters the bathroom with the women, and the commercial ends.
The TV ad was paid for by Traffic Development Project, Freedom for All Americans Education Fund, National Center for Transgender EqualityAND Ohio Equality Education Fund.
Kupec is a resident of North Carolina, where the bathroom issue became a battleground in May because people must operate the restroom that corresponds to the gender listed on their birth certificate.
