Prince William said that he would “fully support” his child if one of them came out as gay, bisexual, or transgender.
The second in line to the British throne made the comments during a visit on Wednesday to a charity that supports homeless LGBT young people. When he was asked what he would think if Prince George, five, Princess Charlotte, four, or Prince Louis, one, came out as gay or transgender he responded: “…obviously absolutely fine by me”.
“The one thing I’d be worried about is how they – particularly the roles my children fill – is how that is going to be interpreted and seen… It worries me, not because of them being gay, it worries me as to how everyone else will react and perceive it and then the pressure is then on them,” the Duke of Cambridge continued, in comments reported by The Telegraph.
Later during a group discussion, Prince William said that he “wish[ed] we lived in a world where… it’s really normal and cool” to be transgender and gay, “but particularly for my family and the position that we are in, that’s the bit I’m nervous about”.
“I support whatever decision they make, but it does worry me from a parent’s point of view how many barriers, hateful words, persecution and discrimination that might come. That’s the bit that troubles me a little bit,” the future king added.
Prince William is not the only royal to champion sexual diversity, with his brother, Prince Harry, having praised transgender children’s charity Mermaids — whose work he had once described as “amazing” — recently inviting the trans activist group to join the Royal Foundation’s work on mental illness.
The UK-based charity that campaigns to lift age restrictions of when children can receive medical intervention to swap sexes has come under criticism from medical professionals who condemned the charity for falsely claiming that delaying fertility-compromising and irreversible gender reassignment treatments has caused children to commit suicide.
In 2017, a judge banned Mermaids from contacting a seven-year-old boy whose mother, who was being advised by the activist group, had forced him to live as a girl.