Bethenny Frankel Is Getting Called Out Over Transphobic Comments

Outspoken reality star and Skinny Girl Margarita magnate Bethenny Frankel is in hot water over transphobic comments she made on the September 23 episode of her podcast, Just B with Bethenny Frankel.

Going on a bit of a rant, the Real Housewives of New York alum opened the show with a discussion of gender identity and recent experiences surrounding her daughter, Brynn, 11. She started by sharing her frustrations over having to have the "pronoun conversation" with her daughter's teachers.

"We have to go into the fact that I did a Zoom for my daughter's school and [had] the pronouns conversation with each teacher, each parent, each child," she described. "And my daughter says in school, too, that everybody has to say their pronouns."

"And my daughter didn't even know what hers were ... [She said], 'I know what I am or what I think I am, but I have never said it out loud. It hasn't come up for me.' So she said she didn't know," Frankel added.

While that's all a bit cringe-worthy, it's what Frankel said next that left listeners disgusted. The story she told took place at her daughter's summer camp, and in it she conflated anatomy, gender identity, and sexuality.

"It's an all-girls camp and a person with a penis, who identifies as being a girl, went to the camp and was in the bunk with the girls. And the girls saw her -- because it's her because it's a male anatomy but identifying as a woman -- so the other girls saw a penis. They're 9, 10 years old, so the parents obviously weren't that happy," she said, adding that she had also heard that, "this girl with a penis was making out with a lot of different girls at the camp."

Frankel implied she wouldn't feel comfortable allowing her daughter to share a bunk with a transgender child, saying, "It's an interesting conversation about a girl, female anatomy being in a male anatomy bunk or vice versa. OK?"

Continuing her thoughts on the topic, Frankel also suggested that being trans could just be a phase. "What happens if a child isn't ready to make a decision? Don't a lot of girls in college have a lesbian phase and then they realize that they're not? Maybe they're going through something, maybe they want attention, maybe they're going through a bad breakup," she said. "What is the age that someone's absolutely positive who they are? There's got to be gray area. ... I've heard of situations when [people] unmake that decision. What does that mean for that camp? What does that mean for that bunk? Maybe a mother isn't ready for her child to see a penis in a bunk and understand that child identifies as a girl."

Listeners were understandably upset and voiced their opinions on Frankel's comments on social media.

In response to the backlash, Frankel has doubled down.