Is Glenn Beck a brony?
Thanks to his recent public support of a 9-year-old My Little Pony fan, it’s not a wholly ridiculous question.
Grayson Bruce, 9, made national news this week after his school took the peculiar anti-bullying stance of telling him to hide his My Little Pony lunchbag to avoid being teased by other kids.
Instead of attempting to curb the bullying or turn the situation into a teachable moment about gender roles, his North Carolina elementary school decided that the best thing to do was avoid the topic altogether.
“Saying a lunchbox is a trigger for bullying is like saying a short skirt is a trigger for rape,” said his mother to a local news station. “It’s flawed logic, it doesn’t make any sense.”
Thanks to the news coverage, Grayson caught the attention of the My Little Pony fandom, with over 25,000 people Liking a Facebook page called Support For Grayson.
He’s also gotten some support from an unlikely source: right-wing TV and radio host Glenn Beck, who said, “I thought it was important to send a very clear message to Grayson and everybody else that it’s okay to be different.”
Beck also urged people to show solidarity using the #StandWithGrayson hashtag on Twitter, meaning that for the first and probably last time ever, the goals of the Brony subculture and a famous conservative pundit are one and the same.
If a multi-million dollar corporation can accept me having a 3ft Rarity plushie on my desk, why cant an elementary school #StandWithGrayson?
— Suhosin (Unicorn) (@suhosinpony) March 18, 2014
#StandWithGrayson @glennbeck here’s the mlp toy on my desk at work pic.twitter.com/mxM0vTa7Ym
— Richard Crosby (@evelbug) March 18, 2014
So, #standwithgrayson with my Rarity in my open-space. Eeyup. Proudly standing on my desk. #MLPFiM pic.twitter.com/HJWDAcFGgU
— Florian Strzelecki (@Exirel) March 18, 2014
Gender shouldn’t determine how children express themselves. Gender norms are a lie. Punish the bullies not the bullied. #standwithgrayson
— Shaun Kronenfeld (@bigred_13) March 18, 2014
Grayson Bruce’s mother told The Blaze that Glenn Beck’s support was probably the nicest message they’d heard from a public figure so far, saying that Beck was an example that “not everyone out there is mean.”
Glenn Beck: All-round nice guy and role model for young kids. Who could’ve predicted that?
Screencap via Youtube