Politics and ideology often make for strange bedfellows โ and no topic makes that clearer than transgenderism.
Take, for example, the concept of a โTERFโ (trans-exclusionary radical feminist).
Thereโs not much conservative about a radical feminist. In fact, radical feminism is about as antithetical to conservatism as transgenderism is, and yet, when it comes to boys and girls suddenly deciding that theyโre not a boy or a girl, conservatives and TERFs are actually in wholehearted agreement.erhaps the most famous TERF going right now is Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling, but donโt discount tennis legend Martina Navratilova.
Sheโs another woman who is sick and tired of men spontaneously deciding that the womenโs bathroom is right for them or that womenโs sports are fair game for athletes who are naturally bigger, faster and stronger than women.One female athlete who doesnโt seem to care as much about men running rampant in womenโs sports is soon-to-be-retired soccer star Megan Rapinoe โ and Navratilova took her to task over it.
On Monday, Time magazine published a puff-piece interview with Rapinoe in which the U.S. Womenโs National Team player tore into the people trying to preserve the integrity of womenโs sports.โWe as a country are trying to legislate away peopleโs full humanity,โ Rapinoe said.
โItโs particularly frustrating when womenโs sports is weaponized,โ she continued. โOh, now we care about fairness? Now we care about womenโs sports? Thatโs total bulls***.
โAnd show me all the trans people who are nefariously taking advantage of being trans in sports. Itโs just not happening.โ (Well, it is happening, actually.)I donโt want to mince words about it,โ Rapinoe said. โDave Chappelle making jokes about trans people directly leads to violence, whether itโs verbal or otherwise, against trans people.
โWhen Martina [Navratilova] or [ESPN host Sage Steele] or whoever are talking about this, people arenโt hearing it just in the context of elite sports. Theyโre saying, โThe rest of my life, this is how Iโm going to treat trans people.โโAfter Rapinoe directly called out Navratilova, the tennis icon returned fire, at first merely expressing shock at Rapinoeโs comments, which were reported on by CNN.
โYikesโฆโ Navratilova tweeted.It didnโt take long for her to go after Rapinoe by name, however.
โHmmm,โ she wrote the next day. โReally Megan?โPerhaps the worst part of the Rapinoe interview was when she said she would have โabsolutelyโ no problem with a transgender โwomanโ taking the place of a real woman on the U.S. womenโs soccer team.
โโYouโre taking a โrealโ womanโs place,โ thatโs the part of the argument thatโs still extremely transphobic,โ she said. โI see trans women as real women. What youโre saying automatically in the argument โ youโre sort of telling on yourself already โ is you donโt believe these people are women. โฆ I donโt feel that way.โ
Gee, what an awfully convenient bit of virtue-signaling right as Rapinoeโs forthcoming retirement ensures this hypothetical trans athlete canโt take her spot on the USWNT.
โInteresting how these women at the end of their career or have retired kick the ladder from under younger female athletes to appear progressive. They are a disgrace,โ one Twitter user said.โI really donโt get it,โ Navratilova responded.
Thereโs not much to get. Rapinoe is accumulating as much clout as she can before she fades into relative obscurity; itโs just a shame that she can use the โpro-LGBTโ label as a guise for it. (Her โwife,โ WNBA star Sue Bird, also recently retired, leaving the LGBT power couple to face the frightening prospect of life outside the spotlight.)
Who cares if future generations of female athletes are sidelined while men take the winnersโ podium if youโre on your way out anyway?
Rapinoe has milked every last bit of personal gain that she can out of womenโs sports, so who cares if it gets razed to the ground now?
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