Research before speaking

Not every topic needs your input—but at least educate yourself

My YouTube algorithm is a mess.

This I blame on my occupation in misinformation and pseudoscience research. I’m regularly watching and clipping videos for my work here and on Conspirituality. In some ways, I’m grateful: the robots do plenty of heavy lifting, as randomly surfing for wellness scams and bigoted influencers isn’t exactly enjoyable.

Neither is what the algorithm feeds me. So when the trailer for a new anti-trans “sports comedy” by The Daily Wire pops up, the last thing I want to do is click. Rubbernecker that I am, my index finger pounces on the trackpad. 

I’m not going to link to it here. The movie isn’t hard to find, considering it has over 13 million views in a week. Suffice to say that for two minutes and 55 seconds you’re fed every trope about trangender people imaginable.

The irony of the movie’s premise—that men compete in women’s sports simply so they can win—is at odds with the hypermasculine audience The Daily Wire cultivates. As a recent New Yorker article by S.C. Cornell points out, 

Anyone who thinks that legions of men will declare themselves women only to compete in an easier division is, I think, missing something crucial about the nature of masculine pride.

Such an irony would never occur to Daily Wire staff. This is the same media company that once ran the most fifties-era hypermasculine segment imaginable, in which four hosts discuss eschewing laundry and dishwashing chores, as those duties belong to their wives.

Yes, some of these same hosts “act” in the new movie.

Instead of focusing on bigots brokering in binaries, let’s turn to Cornell’s excellent article, for it sheds light on the trans inclusion in sports.

Honest investigation

One thing I’ve learned from co-hosting Conspirituality is that I don’t have to comment on everything. Another thing: I’m comfortable not having an answer on certain topics. Both play a role in today’s column.

In truth, I didn’t pay much attention to the transgender community before the pandemic. No close friends or family members are trans. I now live in a city with a vocal and public transgender community, which has given me more exposure. And exposure is essential for understanding.

In general, I’ve previously treated transgender people as I do many communities I’m not familiar with: with respect, though ignorant about what their lives entail. 

Since the topic has become a culture war hot button, and since a portion of our listenership is transgender, I began educating myself in 2020. Philosopher and queer theorist Judith Butler helped fill in gaps in my knowledge. This excellent video is a good starting point.

During my educational process, I’ve noticed how often people confuse sexuality with gender identity. The most vitriolic detesters of the trans community often make this mistake. Their conflation does a lot of damage, as does the refusal to recognize that gender identity has always been fluid. 

This shows up in brain scans, for one. Biology and neurology professor, Robert Sapolsky, writes that certain brain regions of transgender individuals resemble “the sex of the person they had always felt themselves to be, not their ‘actual’ sex.” He continues,

In other words, it’s not the case that transgender individuals think they’re a different gender than they actually are. It’s more like they got stuck with the bodies of a different sex from who they actually are.

Physician and biologist Siddhartha Mukherjee also writes about genetic differences, comparing transgender identity to the Swyer syndrome of identity:

Gender and gender identity are from from binary… their chromosomal and anatomical gender is male (or female), but their chromosomal/anatomical state does not generate a synonymous signal in their brains.

Cat Bohannon, a PhD in the evolution of narrative and cognition, frames it succinctly:

The trans experience of identifying as a gender is as authentic as anyone else’s, and equally driven by ancient biology. Having a brain-based gender identity that doesn’t neatly match a society’s expectations for the rest of the body it’s housed in doesn’t make that identity less real than it would be in people who do “match.”

I’ll trust research conducted by scientific and medical experts over rhetoric vomited by pundits any day.

All of this has helped me expand my understanding of gender identity, and empower me with a language to push back on the hateful misinformation I regularly encounter on social media. Dehumanizing any group of people never leads to good outcomes, and right now there’s an increasing frenzy around acceptance of the humanity of trans people.

But there’s still the question of sports.