“Juno” star Ellen Page announced a transgender identity, new pronouns, and a name change to “Elliot” on Tuesday, for which many congratulated the Academy Award nominee, including some companies.
“Hi friends, I want to share with you that I am trans, my pronouns are he/they and my name is Elliot,” Page said in a statement posted to Twitter. “I feel lucky to be writing this. To be here. To have arrived at this place in my life. I feel overwhelming gratitude for the incredible people who have supported me along this journey. I can’t begin to express how remarkable it feels to finally love who I am enough to pursue my authentic self.”
Page went on to express that the joy of coming out as trans was “fragile” because it was fraught with fear. “The statistics are staggering. The discrimination towards trans people is rife, insidious and cruel, resulting in horrific consequences. In 2020 alone it has been reported that at least 40 transgender people have been murdered, the majority of which were Black and Latinx trans women.”
Page added that “the political leaders want to criminalize trans health care and deny our right to exist,” as well as those “who continue to spew hostility towards the trans community.”
“[Y]ou have blood on your hands. You unleash a fury of vile and demeaning rage that lands on the shoulders of the trans community, a community in which 40% of trans adults report attempting suicide. Enough is enough. You aren’t being ‘cancelled,’ you are hiring people. I am one of those people and we won’t be silent in the face of your attacks,” Page wrote.
— Elliot Page (@TheElliotPage) December 1, 2020
Page was met with overwhelming support on Twitter, and even received adulation from companies such as Netflix, Hulu, Rotten Tomatoes, Dark Horse Comics, Bud Light, Ritz Crackers, and Oreo Cookie. The official Twitter account of Sony even took the time to correct the pronoun usage of an anonymous Twitter user with fewer than 100 followers.
*him
— Sony (@Sony) December 1, 2020
or them
— Sony (@Sony) December 1, 2020
Page has long been an LGBT activist who has repeatedly taken issue with religious conservatives who oppose homosexuality and transgender behavior. In 2019, before the alleged attack on actor Jussie Smollett was revealed to be a hoax, the “Umbrella Academy” star went on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” to tearfully claim Vice President Mike Pence had fostered a culture in which hate crimes were increasingly committed against gay people like Smollett.
“[Pence] has hurt LGBTQ people so badly as the governor of Indiana,” Page said, “and I think the thing we need to know and I hope my show ‘Gaycation’ did this in terms of connecting the dots in terms of what happened the other day to Jussie. I don’t know him personally, I send all of my love.”
After accusing Pence of supporting gay conversion therapy while governor of Indiana, which he has denied, Page added, “Connect the dots. This is what happens. If you are in a position of power and you hate people and you want to cause suffering to them, you go through the trouble, you spend your career trying to cause suffering, what do you think is going to happen?”
When evidence emerged that Smollett had faked the attack, Page did not apologize to Pence, but instead doubled down, writing in part in The Hollywood Reporter: “While the media and public debate the case and await more information, we must not lose sight of the very real, endemic violence that LGBTQ+ people, people of color and other underrepresented communities face every day.”
The same month, Page also attacked actor Chris Pratt for attending Hillsong Church, an evangelical congregation that does not endorse homosexuality. “Oh. K. Um. But his church is infamously anti lgbtq so maybe address that too?” Page snarked in response to an article about Pratt’s faith.
Oh. K. Um. But his church is infamously anti lgbtq so maybe address that too? https://t.co/meg8m69FeF
— Elliot Page (@TheElliotPage) February 8, 2019
During the Republican primary campaign in 2015, Page got into a heated back-and-forth with Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) about churches and religious people who do not support homosexuality.
“We don’t have a right to force a Jewish rabbi to conduct a Christian wedding ceremony,” Cruz reasoned. “We don’t have the right to force a Muslim imam to conduct a Jewish wedding ceremony. We are a country that respects pluralism and diversity, and there is this liberal intolerance that says that anyone who dares follow the biblical teaching of marriage — that is, the union of one man and one woman — must be persecuted, must be fined, must be driven out of business.”
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Related: WATCH: Actress Ellen Page Goes On Tirade, Blames Pence For Smollett Attack: ‘Connect The Dots’