The controversy over trans athletes competing in school sports has come to Keller, thanks to a “joke” the owner of the city’s only butcher shop put up on his company’s Facebook page Wednesday night, Feb. 10.

“Public Service Announcement: Since everything is now equal, we’ve decided we will be showing our Prize Winning Bull next year in the Ft. Worth Stock Show Heifer division. Best of luck to all the contestants,” read the post on the Z Bar Cattle Co. page, time-stamped at 10:40 p.m. Feb. 10. Z Bar Cattle Co. butcher shop, owned by Stephen and Kristin Kirkland, and Stephen Kirkland seems to be the one who put the post on Facebook. The post includes a photo of the shop’s Fort Worth Stock Show champion bull, adorned with ribbons and banners.

The post has since garnered more than 320 comments — ranging from those laughing at Kirkland’s joke to those criticizing him for being transphobic and hateful — and has been shared more than 40 times. Those sharing also span the spectrum from fans who think it’s hilarious to outraged critics.

By around 1 a.m. Friday, Feb. 12, Kirkland decided to follow up with a post making sure everyone knows he and his company don’t in any way support transgender athletes and that in his earlier post he was using humor to declare his faith-opposition. Since some folks seemed to be misinterpreting his intention and to let others know he didn’t care about their criticism, he decided to make it clear:

“I’m Not ashamed to be a Christian in a fallen world. Just because I own a business I will not leave my faith at the door. I’ll replace my humor with scripture in hopes it will lead even one to repent.
1 Corinthians 6:9
Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites,
10 nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God.
11 And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.
#notashamed”

By noon today (Saturday, Feb. 13), the second post also had earned more than 300 comments and had been shared more than 20 times. And again, comments and shares ranged from supportive to critical.

Z Bar Cattle Co. butcher shop features grass-fed beef from cattle raised on the Kirkland’s Z Bar Cattle Co. Ranch in Sunset, Texas, located between Decatur and Bowie on Highway 287. According to the Z Bar Cattle Co. website, Stephen (from Arkansas) and Kristin (from Mississippi) Kirkland met when they were both college students working as wranglers on a guest ranch in Colorado. They married and moved to the Fort Worth area where he attended TCU’s ranch management program. They both worked at Christ’s Haven for Children and developed Haven’s Horses Therapeutic Riding program for children with disabilities while Stephen also managed the ranch program at Christ’s Haven.

Stephen Kirkland established Zanzibar Cattle Co. in 2008 to “fill the need for replacement cattle.” They bought the ranch in Sunset and moved there from Keller in 2013, then began their grass-fed cattle business in 2015, soon after opening the butcher shop to sell the beef from their ranch.

— Tammye Nash