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This Texas Sportscaster Stands Up for a Transgender Athlete (and It's Amazing)

Texas sports anchor Dale Hansen is causing quite the commotion by coming to the defense of a transgender teen athlete. The ABC local affiliate anchor used his two-minute address to talk about Mack Beggs, a 17-year-old who recently gained media attention after winning a state girl's wrestling title. While Beggs identifies as male and is going through the gender confirmation process, he was required by the state to compete according to his birth sex—something that simply didn't sit well with Hansen.

"Maybe I just hoped that in 2017, we would be done arguing about birth certificates, but obviously we're not," he said in the broadcast video below. "Somebody has to find a better answer than what we're being given now."

This isn't the first time Hansen has stepped up to defend LGBTQ athletes. In 2014, he shared similar emotions for Michael Sam, the first openly gay man drafted by the NFL. "I'm not always comfortable when a man tells me he's gay; I don't understand his world, but I do understand that he's a part of mine," he said in a moving broadcast at the time. (Seriously, it's worth a watch!)

He passed along the same powerful message for Beggs saying: "Transitioning is a struggle I cannot imagine. It is a journey I could not make." He continued by adding that if anything Beggs "needs our support, and he does not need a group of old men in Austin telling him who to wrestle because of a genetic mix-up at birth."

"He's a child, simply looking for his place in the world and a chance to compete in the world. Do we really not have the simple decency to allow him at least that?" he concludes. "Because it seems to me it's the very least we can do." This guy is seriously our new hero. We can only hope more of Hansen's peers will follow suit.


Faith Brar


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