Dwyane Wade Supports Transgender Child At TIME Conference

Dwayne Wade is afraid for his son’s life, or as he would want you to say, his daughter.

The three-time NBA Champion spoke out at the TIME100 Summit Tuesday to say that he is afraid that Zaya (15-years-old transgendered) will grow up in an environment where he will hate.

“As blessed as it is for my daughter to have parents who can support her, I’m still afraid every moment she leaves the house,” he told CNN’s Poppy Harlow at the event. “And not just because of gun violence, but because of the way people perceive her in this world.”

Wade stated in an emotionally driven rant that Zaya is in danger because of the fact that many states have banned transgender women from sports and prevented doctors giving youth gender-affirming medical care (which, in turn, are positive things).

“To me, it’s a joke. This is how we live our lives. We do this. When you’re out there making rules, if you’re not experiencing this … Come and live a day with my daughter. Come and see how it is to walk through this world as her,” Wade said.

Wade has described Zaya as being the “leader” of the family in his journey form boy to girl, which began when he was three. Wade says that this was the moment Zaya realized he was transgender.

Zaya understood two things. One, she knew straight. Two, she also knew that gay people were out there. But Zaya started doing more research. She was the one who sat down with us as a family and said, ‘Hey, I don’t think I’m gay,’” Wade said in 2020. She went through the entire list, and she said: “This is how you identify yourself.” This is how I identify myself as a woman. He said, “I identify myself as young woman.”

Wade was wrong in so many ways during his journey to parenthood.

First, three-year-olds are not yet in the right place to care for their basic needs. Wade and his wife, Gabrielle Union, should have immediately thought to themselves, “We should try to correct his thinking.”

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The second was that Wade let his son go along this lonely and difficult road of building his future on a lie, and not doing his job of persuading and correcting his son.

Third, he makes the decision to go on stage at an event put on by the most iconic Magazine in the world and not only support his son’s decision, but ridicule those who stand for truth. His boldness also led him to suggest that he may run for office in the future.

It is a complicated mess, which just shows how urgently our country requires strong fathers.