Misha Brown, a 37-year-old influencer, actor, and host of the Wondery podcast The Big Flop, revealed in a TikTok video on July 17 that he had received an apology from his former high school bully — 20 years after graduation — after the bully’s 15-year-old son came out as gay.
“Hey man, I just felt like I needed to tell you that I’m sorry I was a damn jerk in school,” the message read. “Really, I’m sorry. But I’ve been following what you’ve done lately and it’s really cool. I’m proud of you. You’re like really helping people. The reason I wanted to tell you all this is I’ve got a son now. He’s 15, and he told me he’s gay. Man, all I thought about when he told me that was how I hope people are nicer to him than I was to you. It makes me proud to be his dad. And hopefully that makes up for something.”
Brown grew emotional as he shared the message, his eyes welling and his voice breaking.
“I would say that makes up for something, and I told him as much, but, wow. What a cool feeling to get that moment. I guess people can change,” Brown said in the video, which has since earned over 2.4 million views on TikTok.
Brown told PEOPLE he “didn’t know what to expect” when he first saw the message.
“I couldn’t think of a single reason as to why he’d reach out,” he said. “But there it was, and I opened it.”
Brown eventually reached out to his former bully and accepted the apology.
Growing up in a small town in Western New York, Brown stood out as a kid who loved Whitney Houston songs and Polly Pocket toys. He says he was bullied early on for not fitting masculine stereotypes.
“Being bullied as a child truly shaped the entire experience of growing up,” he told the magazine. “I overanalyzed every part of myself. How was I standing? Was I too loud? Was I safe in my surroundings?”
Brown told PEOPLE that after nearly two decades of healing, introspection, and sobriety, he learned to embrace himself and block out negativity — lessons he now shares with his 4 million social media followers.
Brown, author of the upcoming book Be Your Own Bestie (out next February), said parents of LGBTQ youth often share his content with their children to show they deserve a full, authentic life.
Brown hopes his reconciliation with his former bully can inspire others in similar situations.
“So many people have struggled through similar experiences, and maybe they can find a little healing of their own through this apology from my bully,” he said. “We can’t change other people or will them to give us retribution, but we can control how we show up for ourselves. I’m grateful that I got this moment, but I’m more lucky that I am in a place to accept it.”
Four people are dead and at least 13 others injured after a street racer fleeing police lost control and crashed into a popular LGBTQ nightclub in Tampa, Florida.
Surveillance video from the club shows pedestrians running for safety as a silver Toyota Camry careens through an intersection and into a crowd of more than a dozen people outside Bradley's on 7th.
The crash occurred around 12:45 a.m. on Saturday, just 15 minutes before drag performers were scheduled to take the stage, according to the New York Post.
Lucien Bates, a transgender man, says security guards threatened to arrest him after he used the women’s restroom at a Round1 arcade inside the North Riverside Park Mall in suburban Chicago. Bates, an Indiana resident, was visiting the venue on September 28 with his fiancé and a friend to play Dance Dance Revolution.
Bates, who presents as alt-masculine with facial hair and piercings, had just arrived at the arcade when he needed to use the restroom. He chose the women’s restroom, a decision he often makes in public because he feels safer there and is less likely to be harassed.
U.S. Rep. Julie Johnson, one of several Democrats targeted in Texas's latest gerrymander, says she will seek reelection after a federal three-judge panel blocked a Republican-backed congressional map that would have drawn her out of her Dallas-area district for 2026.
The lesbian congresswoman is one of five Texas Democrats whose districts were reshaped to give Republicans a 2026 edge, and among several Democrats who were effectively drawn out of the seats they currently represent.
In Johnson's case, the proposed map would have stretched her Dallas-based 32nd District into Republican-leaning Rockwall County and rural East Texas, while shifting her hometown of Farmers Branch into GOP Rep. Beth Van Duyne's 24th District, a seat Trump won by 16 points in 2024.
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