Chromosomes, not pronouns
Related:
Music:
The Kinks, “Lola” https://thehomelessblogger.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/05-lola.mp3
The Romantics, “What I Like About You” https://thehomelessblogger.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/01-what-i-like-about-you-album-version.mp3
Script:
It’s The William Tell Show. I call myself William Tell; you can call me Bill. Thank you for including me in your world. And don’t mistake the gist of this episode: I want EVERYONE to feel included.
We’ve been going at the transgender thing for some years now, and at long last I’ve come to a conclusion: I oppose transgenderism. First of all, it’s an “-ism,” an ideology, like Communism or populism; and I oppose all ideologies.
On the one hand, I don’t plan to invest much energy in this opposition. On the other hand, I do not approve at all of harassing or persecuting these individuals, as is happening in more and more states around the country, especially in Florida.
I have three items. Two are recent articles about efforts to induce gender confusion in small children. The third is the story of David Reimer, in whom others sought to compel a change of sexual identity.
Three-year old Ashton Shearhod told his preschool teacher he wanted to get his fingernails painted. The teacher replied, “That’s only for girls.” When his father, Christian Shearhod, heard about this, he told the teacher he didn’t want her to say such things to his son. He took the boy to a nail parlor to get his fingernails and toenails polished, and recorded a TikTok of the whole affair. The video got celebrated in People magazine and on NBC. He says he wants his son to grow up without gender norms.
I’m a lot less concerned about the son than I am about the father. This man looks like he’s unfit to be a father to anyone. He claims to be a schoolteacher, but it turns out he got suspended from that job after posting what are called — “thirsty” — selfies online. And the music he chose for background to the video was “Pretty Girls Walk.” I have mentioned or will mention that song in another blog post; the song is full of obscenities, and inappropriate for any adult to expose a child to.
Time for the commercial break. The second segment today may be long.
[Commercial break]
Second story. This English couple pulled their four-year old son out of a Church of England preschool, because the teacher presented a book, My Shadow is Pink, by Scott Stuart, about a boy who is uncomfortable with male stereotypes and wears dresses. The boy’s father tells him,
“Your shadow is pink, I see now it’s true, it’s not just your shadow, it’s your innermost you.”
The author may have shadows confused with auras. I’ve never seen anyone with a pink shadow. A pink aura — No one’s aura is ever just one color. If there is a lot of pink in a person’s aura, it doesn’t mean the person’s effeminate. Male or female, it means the person’s amorous.
Gender norms derive ultimately from biology, and they will assert themselves regardless of ideology.
Women and men both have both testosterone and estrogens, with levels varying across a spectrum as to each one. There is also a spectrum as to how a person’s tissues respond to the hormones present in the person’s body. Gay people, female or male, have brains more similar to those of straight people of the opposite sex, than those of straight people of their own sex.
And then there are very rare cases, like that of the South African sprinter Caster Semenya, who has male chromosomes but, to all appearances, female genitalia. Yet her testosterone levels are off the chart.
As I said at the outset, gender norms depend on the individual person’s biology. Which brings us to the case of David Reimer.
David Reimer was born on August 22nd, 1965. A botched circumcision caused the loss of most of his penis. His parents consulted Dr. John Money, of the Johns Hopkins University, who at the time was one of the most pre-eminent sex researchers in the world. Money believed that sexual identity is wholly a matter of contextual stimuli, and counseled that David would do best living life as a female.
Various surgeries and hormone treatments took place. David and his identical twin brother would visit John Money once a year, in which sessions he forced the two of them to engage in what may be called “sex play” — The Wikipedia article goes into some detail. — with David acting out the role of a girl. This traumatized both boys, who said that John Money treated them harshly.
Money published reports that David’s transition from male to female was a complete success. In fact, it was a complete failure. David re-asserted a male sexual identity at every turn. He married a woman and adopted her three children. But he never outgrew the childhood trauma of the attempted sex change.
David Reimer committed suicide on May 4th, 2004.
Adults can and will do whatever they like. Activists need to stop messing with small children.
There are two musical selections today. First is “Lola,” by The Kinks, which I’ll get back to in a moment. The second is “What I Like About You,” by The Romantics. I’m including that because, until now, I always thought that was by The Kinks, too. Until now, I’d never heard of The Romantics. They sure sound like The Kinks.
“Lola” came out in 1970, and — and how times have changed. A transvestite picked up Ray Davies in a bar. At the time, the song was eye-opening and funny, making many people aware who had not been, of the existence of transvestites and homosexuals, and of society’s freedom to accept these people just as they are. Transgenderism, trans-sexualism, as yet had not been conceived of, let alone today’s strident hue and cry that society should re-invent itself in such folks’ image.
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