Laverne Cox is speaking out about experiencing a transphobic attack over the weekend.
In an IGTV video posted on Saturday (November 28,) the actress shared that she and a male friend had been walking in Los Angeles' Griffith Park earlier that day when a man "very aggressively" asked for the time. Cox's friend told him what time it was, after which the man asked, "Guy or girl?"
"The friend that I’m with looks at his watch and tells him the time, and then the guy who asked for the time says to my friend: ‘Guy or girl?'” Cox recounted, implying that the man was referring to her. "My friend says, ‘F–k off'… then all of a sudden, the guy was attacking my friend."
She continued, “I look back and I’m like, ‘What is happening?’ The guy is like hitting my friend… I pull out my phone and I call to dial 911, and all of a sudden it’s over and the guy is gone.”
“It’s not safe in the world. And I don’t like to think about that a lot, but it is the truth,” she said in the video. “It’s the truth and it’s not safe if you’re a trans person. Obviously, I know this well. It’s just really sad.”
"I don’t know why it matters. At the end of the day, it’s like who cares?" she added. "I’m in a hoodie and yoga pants, I’m completely covered up, I’ve got my mask on — who cares if I’m trans? How does this affect your life?”
The Orange Is the New Black star said that even though she's faced transphobic incidents before, she was still very stunned by the recent event.
"Obviously, this is my life. I've dealt with this a lot, but it never fails to be shocking," she said. "It doesn't matter who you are. You can be, like, Laverne Cox, whatever that means. If you're trans, you're going to experience stuff like this."
Luckily, she and her friend are safe and doing fine. Cox reminded her followers to not blame themselves if similar things happen to them.
"When these things happen, it’s not your fault. It’s not your fault that people are not cool with you existing in the world," she said. "We have a right to walk in the park."