FLORIDA, LIKE COLORADO, IS A LARGE STATE WITH APPARENTLY ONLY ONE BAKERY: Florida Publix refuses to write ‘trans’ on customers’ cake.
Dandelion Hill, co-founder of the Orlando-based non-profit Peer Support Space, was heading to the organization’s Trans Joy Event on April 26, and stopped at the Colonialtown Publix to pick up a cake for the celebration.
Hill, who is trans and uses they/them pronouns, asked if the bakery could write a simple, “wholesome” message in pink icing on the sheet cake: “Trans people deserve joy.”
Hill immediately began to feel like something wasn’t right after the bakery worker hesitated.
“The person working at the bakery said, ‘I will be right back’,” Hill told The Post on Thursday. “I was kind of stewing in anxiety because I had a feeling like, ‘Uh oh, I think something’s brewing, I think something’s wrong.”
After waiting for what “felt like an eternity,” a manager from the bakery “comes back, looks me directly in the eyes and says, ‘I’m sorry we can’t write that. Publix is not allowed to take a stance on this issue,’” Hill said.
The refusal made Hill “shut down” from shock.
“I’m trying to give a message of hope to our community and I feel like I’m getting shot down right at that moment,” they said. “It was really just hurtful.”
Both states provide a huge opportunity for an enterprising baker to siphon off some of the business from pastry makers who must be utterly exhausted from being overworked.