Mario Lopez has apologized for comments
he made about raising transgender children.
During an appearance on the Candace
Owens podcast last month, Lopez was asked about Hollywood celebrities
who are raising transgender children.
“I am trying to understand it myself,
and please don’t lump me into that whole,” he said. “I’m kind
of blown away, too. Look, I’m never one to tell anyone how to
parent their kids, obviously, and I think if you come from a place of
love, you really can’t go wrong. But at the same time, my God, if
you’re three-years-old and you’re saying you’re feeling a
certain way or you think you’re a boy or a girl or whatever the
case may be.”
“I Just think it’s dangerous as a
parent to make that determination then – 'Okay, well then you’re
going to be a boy or a girl,’ whatever the case may be. It’s sort
of alarming and my gosh, I just think about the repercussions later
on.”
Lopez added that parents should wait
until a child's “formative years” before supporting such a
decision.
Jonathan Van Ness and Karamo Brown of
Queer Eye were among those who criticized Lopez's comments.
“If you're not raising a child who is
part of the LGBTQ+ community, you should really be quiet,” Van Ness
said in a tweet. “You don't need to understand what you do not
know.”
Brown called Lopez's comments
“disappointing.”
“[I believe Lopez] should be given
the opportunity to learn why his comments are harmful to trans youth
and their parents. Mario, I'm ready to talk when you are,” he
tweeted.
In a statement given to PEOPLE, Lopez
called his comments “ignorant.”
“The comments I made were ignorant
and insensitive, and I now have a deeper understanding of how hurtful
they were,” he said.