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Republicans Demand Creepy Genital Inspectors In Georgia
These anti-trans laws are about marginalizing anyone who doesn’t fit the binary standards of archaic bigotry.https://thebanter.substack.com/p/republicans-demand-creepy-genital
WASHINGTON, DC -- I should probably preface this article by noting that I don’t take sports all that seriously. It’s not that I hate or even dislike sports. As a kid, I played nearly every major sport and was occasionally good at baseball and soccer -- later, weight training and road cycling became obsessions of mine that I still pursue to this day, so I at least have a general understanding of the climate in and around youth athletics. Consequently, I know enough to observe that grownups take it way too seriously -- not just professional sports, but namely sports for kids. See also movies like Friday Night Lights to observe just how unnecessarily rabid we are about it. I’ve always bristled at the unreasonable amount of pressure we assign to kids who, in many cases, don’t even have a driver’s license yet but whose games are often broadcast on local radio, generating media scrutiny as if these athletes are first-round draft choices in the NFL. I won’t even get into the parental stress inflicted upon our kids as desperation and wistful memories manufacture insurmountable expectations on children who should probably be more focused on actual schoolwork, as well as merely being a kid. But this story has less to do with sports and more to do with perverse bigotry and glaring Red Hat contradictions that are turning youth athletics into yet another political hot potato.
The latest wedge issue to be created by Republicans from coast to coast is the suppression of transgender rights. A few years ago, trans equality was bastardized by GOP fuddy-duddies who invented a crisis around trans women using women’s public bathrooms. Republicans warned us that if trans women are allowed to continue using those bathrooms (by, presumably, the bathroom patrol?) there’d be a crime wave of men pretending to be trans in order to sexually assault women. The rate of sexual assault as a consequence of trans civil rights laws? Zero. The rate of sexual assaults by cis men dressed as women in public bathrooms? Also, zero. It just doesn’t happen. And when a predator actually does sexually assault someone, irrespective of the circumstances, it’s already against the law and punishable by commensurate prison sentences. Banning trans women from public bathrooms is like banning police officers from patrolling the streets because someone might dress up like a cop and commit a crime. It’s an issue invented to justify discriminatory policies. This was and always will be a matter of intolerance and oppression. And now, a law introduced in Georgia is taking this obscenity to new levels by sanctioning sexual assault against girls in youth sports -- and it’s almost exclusively trans girls they’re freaking out about.
House Bill 372 would redefine gender as “a person’s biological sex at birth” in state law, require state-funded schools and associations to ban participants they deem not “biologically” male or female from sports, and calls for a panel to examine information about the genitalia or chromosomes of any participant who petitions otherwise. The panel would be made up of three physicians tasked with examining the “reproductive organs” of girls -- children -- who object to the ban. In other words, if you’re trans or are believed to be trans, the only way to participate in sports is to expose yourself to a panel of strangers appointed by the state. And the Republicans say they’re against big government. Their wafer-thin concerns are twofold. Bigoted parental groups are nervous that their non-trans kids won’t be able to compete against trans girls who are genetically male, given the potential existence of testosterone and muscle development -- in some cases. Not all youth athletes are post-pubescent, and many trans athletes use exogenous hormones to counter the effect of testosterone so the hormone issue is, rationally speaking, a non-starter. The other concern is similar to the bathroom nonsense. Parents and lawmakers are concerned that trans girls will ogle the non-trans girls in locker rooms and so forth. If Georgia Republicans are so worried about non-trans girls being ogled in locker rooms, why are they insisting upon forming these panels of grownups who will, yes, ogle trans girls who choose to play high school sports?
The answer is simple: it’s an anti-trans Jim Crow law designed to discourage trans athletes from even trying to play, while encouraging non-trans students to single out and perhaps even bully trans classmates. As for the competitive angle, this is where Republicans and parents take these sports way too seriously. First of all, it’s confounding that Republicans believe trans girls are a major crisis but a panel of genital inspectors is fine and dandy. Likewise, who cares if there are trans girls who might be a little taller or stronger than the other girls? There are plenty of non-trans girls who are physically broader and taller than average, but they’re not banned. In fact, they’re often recruited to participate. Ultimately, we’ve already been through a similar issue and it was finally resolved by Branch Rickey and Jackie Robinson. Prior to the desegregation of professional sports, the exclusively white bugaboo was that Black athletes had a biological advantage, creating lopsided competition -- almost exactly the same nonsense they’re using against trans athletes. And just as the anti-choice position on reproductive rights is about controlling women, these anti-trans laws are about marginalizing anyone who doesn’t fit the binary standards of archaic bigotry. Amateur sports are supposed to be about good-natured competition and fun. If there’s any context for the ideals of tolerance, outreach, and the unifying of differing cultures, races, lifestyles, and, yes, genders, it’s sports. As such, we’d do well to take youth sports and little less seriously and these aforementioned ideals a lot more seriously.
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