Caitlyn Jenner is very grateful that “Orange is the New Black” star Laverne Cox supported her debut as a woman on the cover of Vanity Fair.
Calling the actress “fierce and fabulous,” Jenner took to Facebook on Wednesday to thank Cox for her support and for her activism for the trans community, using the hashtag for Cox’s social media campaign, #TransIsBeautiful.
“Laverne Cox, you are fierce and fabulous! Your support means the world,” Jenner wrote. “Thank you for all that you do for the community.”
Jenner’s message comes after Cox wrote a blog earlier this month expressing her thoughts on Jenner’s post-transition debut, using it as a marker of the progress made by the trans community since her own groundbreaking cover of Time Magazine in 2014.
“Yes, Caitlyn looks amazing and is beautiful, but what I think is most beautiful about her is her heart and soul, the ways she has allowed the world into her vulnerabilities,” Cox wrote. “The love and devotion she has for her family and that they have for her. Her courage to move past denial into her truth so publicly. These things are beyond beautiful to me.”
But she also cautioned that trans people need to be celebrated for more than their outward appearance, because magazine cover photos aren’t typical of the average trans person’s experience.
“There are many trans folks because of genetics and/or lack of material access who will never be able to embody these standards,” Cox wrote. “More importantly many trans folks don’t want to embody them and we shouldn’t have to to be seen as ourselves and respected as ourselves.”
Cox had previously launched the #TransIsBeautiful hashtag, “as a way to celebrate all those things that make trans folks uniquely trans, those things that don’t necessarily align with cisnormative beauty standards.”