‘Survivor’ contestant Zeke Smith comes out as transgender after being outed
A contestant from the hit show ‘Survivor’ has come out as transgender.
Zeke Smith, who has appeared on the show twice, came out as trans after being outed in front of other contestants.
Jeff Varner, who is out as gay himself, outed the contestant in front of others.
Jeff Varner
The 29-year-old was popular on the Millennials v Gen-X season of the show.
One other contestant, Bret, came out to him on the show.
He then returned for Game Changes, made up of returning players from other seasons.
After Varner was blindsided when Smith decided to get rid of Sandra a week ago, he admitted to host Jeff Probst that he thought he was going to be eliminated.
“There is deception here. Deceptions on levels Jeff that these guys don’t even understand,” Varner explained, looking at Smith.
“Why haven’t you told anyone that you’re transgender?”
Varner apologised multiple times for the outing.
“Being trans and transitioning, it’s a long process; it’s a very difficult process. There are people who know,” Smith said.
He added that he had planned to come out as transgender but he didn’t think he would be outed.
“I got to a point where I stopped telling people, because when people know that about you, that’s sort of who you are. There are questions people ask, people want to know about your life, they want to know about this and that. It sort of overwhelms everything else that they know about you.”
Continuing he said he never wanted to be “the trans Survivor player,” but that he wanted to be known as “Zeke, the Survivor player.”
“Maybe there’s somebody who’s a Survivor fan and me being out on the show helps him or helps her or helps someone else, so maybe this will lead to a greater good,” he continued.
Without voting, the other contestants decided that Varner would be sent home.
