Here's my new Taki's Magazine column on the current brouhaha condemning a fine piece of longform investigative reporting in Bill Simmons' Grantland by freelancer Caleb Hannan on a con artist who duped Dan Quayle and golf broadcaster Gary McCord. Hannan's crime: prioritizing "fact-finding" over the subject's Pokemon Power Points in the victimism sweepstakes.
Read the whole thing there.
Thanks to my readers who called my attention to this bizarre confirmation of what I've been saying for awhile about what comes next after World War G.
Thanks to my readers who called my attention to this bizarre confirmation of what I've been saying for awhile about what comes next after World War G.
What was the con? Doesn't the putter work?
ReplyDeletewhat comes next after World War G.
ReplyDeleteWorld War H?
A battle seems to be ongoing between a Canadian man wanting to be impgregnated and an American clinic which failed to co-operate.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2014/01/20/transgender_man_seeks_reasons_from_facility_that_refused_to_impregnate_him.html
World War T is not going to happen, Steve.
ReplyDeleteThe gay rights movement in the United States is by and for educated and professional gay men, many of whom work in media. These guys are extremely sensitive to issues of class, and, cant aside, they do not give a damn about a bunch of barely-a-step-above-homeless-streetwalker transexuals.
World War T will fizzle out because gays in editorial positions don't care enough about the issue to push it in more than a cursory fashion.
Harry Baldwin said...
ReplyDelete"The problem from a political-correctness standpoint is that the worst abuses of homosexuals in the world today take place in black Africa or the Muslim Middle East."
"African homophobia doesn't faze leftists. They just blame it on
evangelical Christian missionaries."
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You see, according to The Narrative, blacks have no moral agency. They are simply passive victims...pawns in an eternal, Manichean struggle between saintly liberal whites and demonic non liberal whites. Not a sparrow falls in the black community, but for the malign influence of sinister non liberal whites.
I was waiting for you to get to this latest front in WWT. Simmons' apology was bad but the piece by Christina Kahrl was ominous - basically a declaration that only the trans population was permitted to determine the appropriate content of any story featuring a member of their group. Quite a declaration.
ReplyDeleteWhat a story. I, too, feel sorry for the poor young reporter who got mixed up in this.
ReplyDeleteNow one theory I haven't seen discussed in the transgender debate is the advantage they gain from becoming "women." I know one guy who went that way, and he is currently a high level software engineer who works for Google (formerly Goldman Sachs).
When he was in high school, he was expelled for beating up a girl. Shortly after that incident, he took a female name and began to grow out his red hair. Some years later, he went ahead with the process, had himself castrated -- the whole nine yards.
Last I heard, he had adopted a kid (yay for equality), and was making big money at Google. Now I never knew this guy too well - he was more of an acquaintance than a friend - but it seems to me that the expulsion was a turning point in his life, and he hit on the idea that being a girl would give him an edge. It would give him a sort of invincibility that he never had as a nerdy redheaded boy.
One of the reasons I came to this conclusion is that, in my experience, men who go trans are pretty socially aggressive. They seem to feel that being "female" gives them a license to attack without fear of reprisal. And they genuinely do act that way, too. For a lot of them, I think it's about power. In a twisted way, being female gives them the opportunity to be dominant in a way they couldn't be as men. Men who act on these impulses tend to end up in a cage, but it's tolerated in women, especially in our culture.
If there's any truth to this theory, then that might explain why so many of these guys are so masculine to begin with. The drive to dominate is a primal male instinct that could, paradoxically, lead some men to adopt a female identity if it gives them an advantage in this regard.
As a fifty-something hacker who is straight - but not off the tee - golf is all about finding the 16 year old Korean girl within.
ReplyDeleteGilbert P
Hysterical!
ReplyDeleteRobert Hume
When you mentioned WWT I thought it was Ts vs middle age white guys like me. Turns out WWT is Lesbians vs Pretendbians those Privilege Denying Tranies with their weaponized ladysticks.
ReplyDeletePretendbians: Exactly Like Lesbians, Except Not
We don't hate you, we hate appropriation.
http://pretendbians.com/
http://privilegedenyingtranny.wordpress.com/
Apparently pre op (or maybe never op) transexuals are aggressively courting submissive women at Womyn born Womyn lesbian only events. Can't have that in these here United States.
As ugly as WWT is, I shudder to think of the coming WWP (pedophilia)!
ReplyDeleteHi, Steve.
ReplyDeleteYou wrote in Taki: “One group of transgender individuals, though, tends to be caricatures of masculine willfulness and egotism. For example, economist Deirdre McCloskey played football at Harvard. In a photo, computer scientist Lynn Conway in a flight suit towers over former national security adviser Brent Scowcroft.”
I haven’t seen you mention this:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/briansolomon/2013/09/16/jennifer-pritzker-becomes-first-transgender-billionaire/
“Pritzker is a retired Army lieutenant colonel with 11 years active duty, followed by 16 years in the U.S. National Guard. Earlier this year, she gave $1.35 million to the Palm Center to create the Transgender Military Service Initiative. The goal of the project is “to sponsor state of-the-art scholarship on transgender military service, and to enhance the quality of public dialogue.
"Pritzker also donated $25 million in April to Norwich University, the school that established the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC). And in 2011 she founded the Pritzker Military Library, a research museum dedicated to “the Citizen Soldier in the preservation of democracy.”
Chicago Girl
African homophobia doesn't faze leftists. They just blame it on evangelical Christian missionaries.
ReplyDeleteProstitution and trafficking don't faze them either. Black academics like Tryon Woods dislike the modern anti-trafficking movement because it takes attention away from the long-dead Trans-Atlantic slave trade and its magical ability to keep the black man down to this day. Google "Anti-Blackness in the Anti-Trafficking Movement: “Modern-Day Slavery” and the Erasure of Racial Slavery" for reasons why whitey should ignore the millions of nonwhites currently oppressed by nonwhites.
Furthermore, liberal feminists like Melissa Gira Grant dismiss the anti-prostitution movement as a moral panic, because it jeopardizes the careers of the few women who go into it for choice.
For the cultural left, anything that puts nonwhites in a bad light must be suppressed. Who-whom, to the end.
The transgender thing is going to prove to be just a bridge way too far for the LBGT movement.
ReplyDeleteIt just splinters into a million kinds of transgenderisms, each more bizarre than the last. And the deep problem they will have in public perception is that they are flagrantly abnormal, in the sense that they appear to be, in almost every case, individuals who would be considered deeply pathological even if their gender identity issues just vanished.
They appear to be, as individuals, deeply confused, often angry, often paranoid, often simply vicious. What gays have going for them in public acceptance is twofold. First, virtually everyone knows somebody who is gay. Two, for the most part, they are not terribly different from others except that they are gay.
Neither of those holds for transgenders. Indeed, some of their pathology may get worse with time on average, because it will attract still more profoundly disturbed individuals who will see gender confusion as the source of their unhappiness, rather than, say, joining the Hare Krishna's.
I'm very curious about McCord's role in all of this. I think he lied about the Quayle conversation, and was actively pumping up Vanderbilt's fake credentials every chance he got.
ReplyDeleteWhy did he suddenly start praising this putter no one had ever heard of during a tournament? To the point where other announcers were ribbing him for it?
It certainly sounds like he was in on the scam. Worth investigating further, IMO.
Trannies ought to be above the law, just like blacks ought to be above the law. They are the darlings/tools of the rich and therefore should partake of this coveted prerogative of the rich.
ReplyDeleteWhat a legacy: his death is being portrayed as a self-sacrifice in the noble cause of press-muzzling. All the people who gave their lives for a free press down through the centuries - he's painted as their opposite number. An anti-saint in the censorship crusade.
"What was the con? Doesn't the putter work?"
ReplyDeleteFake Dr, fake name, fake sex, fake college degrees, fake Vanderbilt family lineage, fake job at DOD, stealing 60,000 dollars from investor.
The putter is run of the mill and there were no scientific breakthroughs involved in its development. You and I could make a putter but the selling point was fake credentials from top secret MIT scientist that uses words like "communique".
Bill, that is an amazing comment. That makes a lot more sense than any other explanation for transgenderism, but of course it will never be studied with that frame in mind.
ReplyDeleteBill, that is an amazing comment. That makes a lot more sense than any other explanation for transgenderism, but of course it will never be studied with that frame in mind.
ReplyDeleteWhy not send an email to one of those Man Who Would Be Queen guys and ask them if most of their patients have a history of social aggression?
If they say it's bullshit, then its bullshit.
Some guy who has met 1 or 2 trannies is hardly going to stumble upon some personality trait that has eluded professionals who have encountered 100s and have never mentioned it.
That Christina Kahrl post was ridiculous:
ReplyDeleteWe can be happy that CeCe McDonald, a trans woman whose only crime was defending herself from a bigot’s assault, was released from prison last week after 19 months in jail
This is a lie that the trans community and their allies have knowingly pushed all along. The court testimony shows that McDonald and his friends crossed a street to confront some yahoos who were shouting at them. If I shanked every asshole who ever yelled something crude and insulting at me, I’d have a lot of notches on my, uh, knife.
They seem to feel that being "female" gives them a license to attack without fear of reprisal.
It’s not being female, because very few of them pass, they know it, and they resent women for it. Look at how they hiss the phrase “cis women” on their Twitters. It’s being trans that counts. Once they transition they’re instantly part of The Most Oppressed Victim Group That Ever Existed, even though the vast majority of murdered trans people are nonwhite males murdered by other nonwhite males. A lot of prominent trans activists are white males from affluent backgrounds. For example, Julia Serano is from the Philly Mainline and his father was a stockbroker. Once he put on a dress, he went right from left enemy number one to victim group du jour.
The drive to dominate is a primal male instinct that could, paradoxically, lead some men to adopt a female identity if it gives them an advantage in this regard.
The phrase “male socialization” is now verboten on the left if you’re talking about trans women, so they tend to have a lot of unexamined entitlement when engaging with women. That they get their insane ideas about womanhood largely from porn doesn’t help matters.
Let me add, the next big moral crusade is lowering dramatically the age of consent. At the forefront are gays and lesbians. One of the poster children is an 18 year old lesbian who had a sexual relationship with a 14 year old, and was imprisoned for it (the parents of said 14 year old don't like it much).
ReplyDeleteThe Vagina Monologues features a 35 year old lesbian having sex with a 14 year old girl. And of course, you have the Jerry Sandusky brigade.
In this, you will find White Upper Middle Class women, the leaders of moral crusades, conflicted. Alpha males including guys like Roman Polanski, and the late Paul Walker, and Woody Allen, tend to like adolescent girls a whole lot. The late Paul Walker entered into a relationship with his girlfriend when he was 33 and she was 16, which continued until his untimely death. Young girls being legally available of course puts women of older ages at a disadvantage. The most beautiful 35 year old woman is no match for a merely pretty 16 year old. Of course, there is the prospect of young horny Alpha studs in High School for women in their twenties and thirties.
So my bet would be that the age of consent gets lowered. I find that appalling but in line with the general decadence you find in matriarchal societies. Strongly patriarchal ones ala Muslim are decadent too, but in different ways.
Gay rights are just the proxy in the eternal war Upper Middle Class women have against middle class beta White males.
http://www.nytimes.com/1996/05/18/us/admiral-in-suicide-note-apologized-to-my-sailors.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm
ReplyDeleteapparently there's a tranny in dallas buyer's club, and she's a contender to win best supporting actor. so world war T has moderate traction.
ReplyDelete"World War T is not going to happen, Steve."
WWT is already underway in california, so it might make it out of there and into other states.
"basically a declaration that only the trans population was permitted to determine the appropriate content of any story featuring a member of their group."
standard rules of culture war in our new society for anybody but heterosexual european men, who apparently have signed a hague convention clause which states they will not return fire at any point when fired upon.
"They seem to feel that being "female" gives them a license to attack without fear of reprisal."
indeed. note the out of control alabama fan at the alabama oklahoma bowl game.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPojG4XpLAY
if that had been a man, they would have got the shit kicked out of them, then booted out of the stadium by security. the authorities don't tolerate this from men: the seattle police department began putting undercover police officers dressed in 49ers clothes in the seahawks stadium in order to draw out and catch violent seahawks fans.
by the way steve, unexplored topic in the burgeoning US civil war: the seahawks refused to sell tickets for the NFC championship to anybody with a california address in their billing address. is this legal? state versus state hatred over the NFL to such a point that they will bar people from the hated state from attending the event? not that WA or CA are enemies in the culture war. they are allies. but it brings the question to bear on how enemy states may function in the future. new york governor cuomo for instance made it as clear as possible that new york is openly hostile in the culture war to historical america - a situation which i predicted after obama was elected. there is no need for these people to hide their true feelings anymore. they can let the mask slip.
"Pretendbians"
best new word of the year.
Golf and ladyboys? This would be Bob Hope's dream story.
ReplyDeleteA nice essay, Mr. Sailer. You may lack touch with your putter (probably the result of just being older), but you sure have a deft hand with your pen (or keyboard). I especially liked your line: "There were striking advances in club technology toward the end of the Cold War as aerospace engineers took their titanium and carbon fiber skills to innovative firms such as Callaway to beat their swords into pitching wedges." That's very good.
ReplyDeleteWhy not send an email to one of those Man Who Would Be Queen guys and ask them if most of their patients have a history of social aggression?
ReplyDeleteIf they say it's bullshit, then its bullshit.
Some guy who has met 1 or 2 trannies is hardly going to stumble upon some personality trait that has eluded professionals who have encountered 100s and have never mentioned it.
-anonymous
Why would they have to mention it? Isn't demanding that others call you a woman when they don't agree prima facie evidence of social aggression?
Only Steve and three other writers, one of them gone (H. Allen Smith) can make sports interesting. And he's the only one of the bunch who can make golf clubs interesting. Linked, quoted and riffed on, with an interesting golf illustration, here:
ReplyDeleteGolf, transgenders, and the politics of victimization.
>professionals [...] have never mentioned it<
ReplyDeleteMentioning it might be a ticket to overnight infamy.
I suspect another reason for PC among sportswriters is is more straightforward: they must be aware that their subject matter has a lot less gravitas than that of most other journalists, so they are anxious to demonstrate that they're sophisticated thinkers too. The media being what it is, "sophisticated thought" means Cultural Marxist orthodoxy.
ReplyDeleteSimmons is a PC pussyboy. Been saying it for years.
ReplyDeleteDan in DC
The original Dr. V article is fascinating, and, from your Taki take on it, the embedded links are of particular interest. Of those links, the one to "Tiger's Republican Shaming" contains a graph that shows the voting habits and political affiliations of fans of each sport. A few surprising points from that graph:
ReplyDelete1) Minor league baseball fans skew slightly Democrat, even though MLB fans skew slightly Republican. With minor league baseball's fan base presumably coming from the small towns where the teams play, I would have thought that it would skew heavily Republican, and certainly more Republican than the MLB fan base, which has a notably heavy concentration in the Northeast.
2) WWE skews heavily Democrat. What explains that?
3) The NBA also skews heavily Democrat. Obviously, the NBA appeals more to blacks than other sports do, but, like in the cases of college basketball and the NFL, I would have thought the majority of its fans would still be Republican voting, red-blooded, white males. So a slight Democratic lean wouldn't have shocked me, but such a large lean does.
And on the NBA and its stars: the NBA markets itself around its stars by far the most of any major sport. It's no wonder, then, that celebrity-watcher Simmons is also most into the star-worshipping NBA. There's sort of a congruence between watching Kim Kardashian's every move and following every tweet from LeBron.
wiseguy
Two, for the most part, they are not terribly different from others except that they are gay.
ReplyDeleteRight, they're like other people, only worse.
Using "SAT words" is always a giveaway that the person is uneducated and is trying too hard to impress.
ReplyDeleteExactly right.
Jody:
ReplyDeleteapparently there's a tranny in dallas buyer's club, and she's a contender to win best supporting actor
Can iSteve's comments section get ever more weird? Jared Leto is a transsexual? What is it that you are smoking?
One of the reasons I came to this conclusion is that, in my experience, men who go trans are pretty socially aggressive. They seem to feel that being "female" gives them a license to attack without fear of reprisal. And they genuinely do act that way, too. For a lot of them, I think it's about power. In a twisted way, being female gives them the opportunity to be dominant in a way they couldn't be as men. Men who act on these impulses tend to end up in a cage, but it's tolerated in women, especially in our culture.
ReplyDeleteIn Santa monica there were 3 different cross dressers that were raping women in the ladies restrooms.It was barely reported and no follow ups but there was a small write up and a few warning handouts
"Can iSteve's comments section get ever more weird? Jared Leto is a transsexual? What is it that you are smoking?"
ReplyDeletethe character is a tranny.
Good piece, though I spent more time re-reading "The Last Hurdle in Sports," one of your best Takimag-era columns, pound for pound bringing more crazy historical facts than a typical professional revisionist delivers over a long publishing career. Also I consider ESPN Simmons a slave to c.w. and a lousy excuse for a sportswriter, who just quotes irrelevant stats to appear glib. Btw did you know the Grizzlies are 60-325 against former ABA teams coached by Catholic school alums who scouted for Indiana before daylight savings time was adopted
ReplyDelete