About

Transphobic Bathroom Guardian is a nickname bestowed on actor Corey Wells after starring in a public service announcement about transgender bathrooms that gained popularity on 4chan. On imageboards, pictures of Wells making a disapproving face are used to disparage or insult posters, implying that the poster is trans.

Origin

The Transgender Public Service Announcement aired on Fox News in July of 2016 and was uploaded to the Movement Advancement Project channel on July 11th. The video shows a transgender woman narrating about the importance of public bathrooms, while simultaneously walking towards them and being stopped by a waiter (played by Wells), who tries to direct her towards the men's bathroom instead. (shown below)

The clip would remain obscure for the next few years until it was rediscovered and posted on 4chan's board /tv/ in late 2020. While it was posted as early as October^[1], the meme would not pick up and become widespread until December.^[2][3][4]

Spread

The first webm of the video was created in October and immediately started being reposted around /tv/ and other boards such as /pol/.^[5] However, it took until December for the clip to begin appearing in memes. These often will use Wells' face as an exploitable (examples shown below)

Users also discovered other media Wells appeared in and began posting stills from his other films and commercials (examples shown below).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References