Saturday, December 11, 2010

Gender Confusion Doublespeak

Gender Benders Wage War On Sports
Kye Allums, a shooting guard on the George Washington University women's basketball team, has decided that she is a he. Changing her name from "Kay-Kay," Allums is believed to be the first Division I college basketball player to go public about being a "transgender" person.

The obvious question is whether Allums would still be able to compete. You can't have men playing in a women's basketball program, and it's more than awkward to have a man showering with the women in the locker room. Spurred by a track-and-field controversy four years ago, NCAA rules prohibit sexual reassignment surgery or hormone treatments for athletes to retain their eligibility. Allums, a junior, has pledged to forego those steps while she retains her eligibility for college basketball.

But in the meantime, in the midst of a culture that doesn't dare utter a discouraging word about gender denial and genital self-mutilation, Allums is listed on the GWU website as a male member of the women's basketball team. All the press reports swoon about how "he" -- who remains a woman in every biological way -- is handling this so bravely as a role model: "I'm trying to be an example for other people to not be afraid of who they are."
So let's get this straight (so to speak). A woman expects to be an example to others of one who is not afraid to be who she is. She intends to do this by pretending to not be a woman. Her statement is ridiculously irrational. In fact, one might call it 'hysterical'. Far worse is the absence of any challenge to it. Apparently, her bizarre, deluded assertion is being condoned and accommodated by the GW sports program and whatever media is reporting on her denial of who she is. As a result, she gets no help to learn to become comfortable with her sexuality. In addition, she is a role-model, but one that encourages others who are sexually confused to embrace their confusion and deny their gender rather than to overcome whatever trauma led to their fear.

I'm reminded of Romans 1:18-32, but also of G.K. Chesterton's The Oracle of the Dog wherein Chesterton's recurring character Father Brown says, "It's the first effect of not believing in God that you lose your common sense and can't see things as they are."

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