Guilty by Reason of Insanity

by David Limbaugh

  There is a broader movement to pass public accommodation laws and policies that ban discrimination on the basis of gender identity in public restrooms. As of March 2017, nineteen states, the District of Columbia, and more than two hundred cities had such laws, which allow transgenders to use public facilities that correspond to their gender identities.19 Jamie Shupe, a retired sergeant first class from the U.S. Army and a former transgender woman, argues that Obama administration policies victimize servicewomen. Despite all the effort to help men appear female to alleviate gender dysphoria, “the charade is a failure. They are and always will remain male.”20 Similar policies in high schools are jeopardizing the health and welfare of young girls. Shupe cites examples of females feeling viscerally threatened when males enter their bathrooms. One student, Alexis Lightcap, sued the Boyertown, Pennsylvania, school district. She says she doesn’t care if transgender people share a bathroom with her as long as they share her biological sex, because identity is not biology. It’s patently unfair to brand those like Lightcap as bigots because they refuse to share a bathroom or locker with males who identify as females. But that’s the nature of the left—demonize and stigmatize all who disagree and refuse to conform with its nonconformity.

  Indeed, the leftist crusade for transgender bathrooms, like so many other leftist causes, is purportedly being pursued on behalf of the people, but, in fact, is advancing without regard for the actual concerns or wishes of children or parents. For example, a school in Alberta discovered that the gender-neutral bathrooms it ordered in 2017 didn’t sit well with students. “Many students avoided them because, as any idiot knows, boys and girls generally feel uncomfortable doing their business in a stall next to a member of the opposite sex,” writes pro-life activist Jonathon Van Maren.21

  CNN host Chris Cuomo tweeted that if a young girl doesn’t want to see male genitalia it must be either because she is the problem or her dad is overprotective and intolerant. “Teach tolerance,” tweeted Cuomo. When challenged, Cuomo responded, “My point was dead clear. This isn’t about a scared girl. It is about an overprotective parent who is afraid without basis. Don’t twist it.” Isn’t it great how liberals can tell whether your feelings and opinions are legitimate and worthy of respect? One person countered, “We need to teach tolerance to 12 yr. old girls who don’t want to see a penis in a locker room. Have you gone insane?” Yes, it is insane for leftists to paint a father’s parental concerns as intolerance.

  Cuomo arrogantly tweeted that there’s “no proof” of a spike in sexual assaults because of gender-identity bathroom policies. How much proof does His Eminence need? How about the November 2015 incident in which a Virginia man, having entered a women’s restroom in drag, was arrested for filming two women and a five-year-old?22 Or the May 2013 affair when a Los Angeles man dressed in drag recorded hours of footage of undressed women from under bathroom stalls?23 Or the 2012 case when a forty-five-year-old biological male identifying as a female lounged naked in a women’s locker room used by girls from six to eighteen years of age?24 Or the time when a man twice entered a changing room of a Washington swimming pool and disrobed—one time in front of a young girl’s swim team—and invoked transgender policies as his authority?25 It’s not enough for leftists like Cuomo to label the rest of us cis-brained people as intolerant; they demand that their twisted notions of tolerance be imposed on others in derogation of their rights and well-being. To them, everything else must take a back seat to their ideology. For all the talk about protecting women and children, neither matters when their rights conflict with the latest absurd leftist theories.

  The Trump Department of Defense implemented a policy allowing transgender people to continue serving in the military but mostly precluding people with gender dysphoria from joining the military. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals enjoined implementation of the policy, but the U.S. Supreme Court lifted the injunction and held that the policy can remain in force as the case works through the appeals process. The Court declined to review the case on the merits while it was in the appeals process in the lower courts.26

  In August 2019, an Obama-appointed judge ruled that taxpayer-funded Medicaid must cover sex-reassignment surgery in Wisconsin.27

  An eleven-year-old boy known as “Desmond Is Amazing” danced on stage at a New York gay bar while grown men tossed dollar bills at him. The boy was dressed in drag, imitating singer Gwen Stefani, at Brooklyn’s 3 Dollar Bill, which describes itself as “queer owned & operated” and “Brooklyn’s Premiere Queer Bar & Performance Venue.” ABC’s Good Morning America featured Desmond and celebrated his cross-dressing as an example of individuality, praising his parents for supporting his drag hobby. The segment included a surprise appearance of “iconic drag queens” Hedda Lettuce, Shannel, and Alyssa Edwards, who praised the boy as courageous, inspirational, and “the future of drag.”28 Conservative Matt Walsh tweeted, “The Left is applauding the sexual abuse of this child. This is why decent and rational people want nothing at all to do with Leftism. It openly promotes, advocates, and celebrates child sexual abuse.”29

  A ten-year-old girl from South London was suspended from school for a week for asking her teacher permission to be excused from participating in a “Pride Month” gay lesson.30

  Keegan, a nine-year-old from the Austin, Texas, area, performs in drag as Kween KeeKee and spreads “a message of love and inclusiveness as he performs.” When a third-grade teacher asked what her students wanted to be when they grew up, Keegan wrote, “gender creative.”31 Commentators who criticized this insane trend encountered immediate blowback from leftists. “The overt sexualization of elementary school children who don’t know any better, all for the pleasure and entertainment of adults, is acceptable and shouldn’t be condemned,” Peter Heck observed. “I’m left wondering again why God’s parameters for human sexuality aren’t a better alternative for all of us?”

  Activists want to change the image of sex symbol James Bond by having a transgender play him in the next installment of the movie series. British actor Dominic West was on board, encouraging the Bond movie producers to cast Hannah Graf in the role, as she is the “highest-ranking transgender soldier in the British army.” In this case, insanity did not prevail. Bond’s longtime producers, the Broccoli family, have no plans to change Bond’s gender. “Bond is male,” said Barbara Broccoli. “He’s a male character. He was written as a male and I think he’ll probably stay as a male.”32 Although transgenders may have lost out, it appears feminists and intersectionality advocates will be tossed a bone, as media reports indicate the next Bond movie will depict Bond retiring from service and being replaced as 007 by a black, female agent.33

  Right in time, the University of Oklahoma introduced a feminist James Bond course, called “Gender and James Bond,” which “will focus and analyze the James Bond series in full, from the ‘heroic masculinity’ of the main character and theme of the films, to how different sexes, genders, national orientation and other forms of identity are represented in the Bond series.” The course will also focus on gender and intersectionality—but of course—and explore the “problematic representation” of women in the Bond franchise.34

  In 2004, designer and filmmaker Tom Ford, allegedly while drunk, commented that all men should be sexually penetrated at least once in their lifetimes, and he reportedly still stands by the statement. “I think it would help them understand women,” he said. “It’s such a vulnerable position to be in, and it’s such a passive position to be in. And there’s such an invasion, in a way, that even if it’s consensual, it’s just very personal.” Ford has been married to his husband Richard Buckley for two years, though they’ve been together for thirty years and share a four-year old son.35

  A federal judge ordered that twenty-seven-year-old Illinois inmate Deon Strawberry Hampton, a male who identifies as a female and is serving a ten-year sentence for burglary, be transferred to a women’s prison. In court filings Hampton’s lawyers explained that “she” couldn’t comfortabl
y represent herself as female in the male prison, where she couldn’t wear her hair or nails long, which was psychologically devastating. “I feel inhuman,” she said. Following the court order, Strawberry’s attorney Vanessa del Valle hailed the ruling as a triumph for all transgender people.36

  New York mayor Bill de Blasio announced that, as of late 2018, Rikers Island would begin to house transgender inmates in facilities consistent with their gender identity. This order, he said, was part of an effort to bring the Department of Corrections into compliance with an executive order requiring city agencies to allow people to use restrooms and facilities consistent with their gender identities. “It’s the city’s responsibility to protect the rights and safety of all New Yorkers, and that means protecting transgender individuals in city jails as well,” said de Blasio.37

  One can reasonably wonder whether the left’s incessant vilification of men has led to misandry, such as that expressed in an open letter to “Men” published in the Jewish left-wing magazine The Forward. In the letter, a “straight woman” explains she is not available for dating men at this time, noting that her sexuality “dooms” her to wander the earth trying to mate with people who are the greatest statistical threat to her health. After detailing how dangerous men are, she says, “Listen, it’s not that I think you’re a predator—I know most of you aren’t. I think you happen to have been born into a patriarchal society that you’ve done little to dismantle, and that’s just not really lighting my fire anymore. Why would your polite supremacy endear you to anyone?”38

  Stephens College, an all-girls school in Columbia, Missouri, began accepting biological men who identify as women and biological women who identify as non-binary in fall 2019. The college announced it has expanded its definition of womanhood to include both sex and gender.39

  Girls sometimes get the short end of the stick as transgenderism marches on unabated. We’ve seen this especially in biological male transgenders entering into female sports and annihilating their competition, such as the 220-pound Australian Hannah Mousey, who transitioned to female and dominated women’s handball at the Asian Championship in Japan. As recently as May 2016, Mousey played for the Australian men’s handball team.40

  Marathon champion Paula Radcliffe, the fastest women’s marathon runner in history, was bullied when she spoke out against transgenders competing in elite women’s sports. She made the unforgivable mistake of distinguishing between transgender athletes and “normal” athletes. Despite the avalanche of abuse she endured on social media, Radcliffe said she was going to continue speaking her mind because she believes her daughter should be able to participate in sports against fair competition.41

  Though she’s a lesbian, tennis icon Martina Navratilova outraged the left when she penned an op-ed in the Sunday Times on trans athletes in women’s sports. “You can’t just proclaim yourself a female and be able to compete against women,” she wrote. “There must be some standards.” After critics accused her of transphobia, she researched the issue and then doubled down. “If anything, my views have strengthened,” she said. “To put the argument at its most basic: a man can decide to be female, take hormones if required by whatever sporting organization is concerned, win everything in sight and perhaps even earn a small fortune, and then reverse his decision and go back to making babies if he desires. It’s insane and it’s cheating. I am happy to address a transgender woman in whatever form she prefers, but I would not be happy to compete against her. It would not be fair.” Predictably, the tennis legend came under savage attack by trans activists. Athlete Ally, a New York–based gay sports advocacy group, proclaimed, “Trans women are women, period.” “There is no evidence at all,” they claimed, that “the average trans woman is any bigger, stronger, or faster than the average cisgender woman.”42 They are women, period? No evidence that biological males are bigger, stronger, or faster than biological females? Tell that to any girls who have finished behind transgender athletes in sports competitions.

  Amidst the vilification, Navratilova apologized for the cheating remark but did not withdraw her overall concerns. Liberal Piers Morgan captured the essence of this ludicrous outrage. “It’s grotesquely unfair for transgender women to compete in women’s sports, and outrageous for trans people to bully and vilify LGBT heroine Martina Navratilova for stating the obvious.”43 Of course, Navratilova’s apology did not appease the Stalinist activists, who likened her to Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels.44 The irony is breathtaking.

  Sixteen-year-old Selina Soule missed qualifying for the fifty-five-meter dash in the New England regionals by two spots, each of which were taken by biological boys. “It’s very frustrating and heartbreaking when us girls are at the start of the race and we already know that these athletes are going to come out and win no matter how hard you try,” said Selina. “They took away the spots of deserving girls, athletes… me being included.”45

  Transgender Christina Ginther, a marathon runner and second degree blackbelt in karate, won $10,000 for emotional distress and $10,000 in punitive damages when he was barred from playing on the Independent Women’s Football League. This, despite the league’s stated policy that “a player may not play in the IWFL, unless they are now, and always have been, legally and medically a female, as determined by their birth certificate and driver’s license.”46

  Some South Dakota legislators proposed a bill to invalidate a policy allowing transgender students to play on the athletic team that matches their gender identity, but it failed to pass the House. The bill’s sponsor, House Majority Leader Lee Qualm, noted that Texas had already passed such a law. “This is all about fair competition,” said Qualm. “Boys competing against boys, girls competing against girls, based on their birth certificate.” But Libby Skarin of the ACLU of South Dakota insisted that all kids should be able to play high school sports with their personal dignity respected. “No one is harmed by allowing transgender people to compete consistent with who they are,” she said.47

  South Dakota lawmakers also rejected measures to limit teaching about gender dysphoria in public schools and to allow parents to refuse consent to healthcare treatments for minor children if the parent thinks the treatments would induce, confirm, or promote a child’s belief that his gender identity differs from his biological sex.48 More and more we see the tyrannical nature of transgender activism as its proponents trample over parents’ rights and expose kids to indoctrination based on highly dubious science. Margot Cleveland notes that the failure of this simple affirmation of parental rights to pass committee in a solidly red state should horrify parents. It exposes transgender activists’ impulse to “use the government to force parents to affirm a false sex for their child, agree to hormone blockers, and accept a transition to their son or daughter’s preferred gender. If parents refuse? Removal of the child from the family, due to alleged medical neglect.” This strategy has come in two waves: in the context of child custody cases and in hospitals and medical professionals referring noncompliant parents to Child Protective Services.49

  Poor feminists. Leftist actress Debra Messing caught holy hell when she posted on Instagram, “Happy International Women’s Day! Powerful, beautiful, and sweet,” along with an image of cupcakes that looked like vaginas. Unlucky Debra! She forgot that all women don’t have vaginas anymore. Accusing her of transphobia, leftist critics shamed her into issuing a preposterous apology that perfectly captures the bizarre fixations of both feminists and trans activists: “I want to apologize to my trans sisters. This photo was supposed to be light, & sassy. The first thing I thought when I saw this photo was ‘wow how wonderful. Each one is unique in color and shape and size. The porn industry has perpetuated this myth of what a ‘beautiful’ vagina looks like and as a result there are women who feel shame or insecure about the shape of the vulva. I loved that this picture said ‘every single one is beautiful and unique and that’s powerful.’ I did not, however, think ‘but there are innumerable beautiful, unique, and powerful women who don’
t have a vagina.’ And I should have. And for that I am so sorry.”50 As Hadley Heath Manning writes in The Federalist, “The left pretends to champion women while actually erasing them.”51

  Feminists also got a comeuppance at Mount Holyoke College in Massachusetts. When they tried to create a new school logo to include the female gender symbol, students and faculty who don’t identify as women were outraged. As a result, the school scrapped the idea and apologized in a statement pledging its commitment to “diversity, equity, and inclusion by assuring that what we produce supports a future that is bold, distinctive, and affirms gender variance as a core part of the human experience—and particularly at Mount Holyoke College.”52

  It can be argued that feminists made gains for their gender in certain areas. But just as with abortion and gay activism, many of them are not satisfied, insisting that all must agree with them or be shamed, in total disregard for others’ choices. For leftists of all types, complete surrender and total ideological conformity is mandatory. In The Federalist, Stefanie Stiles describes her earlier friendship with another professionally ambitious young woman, Jane. Stiles relates that she became an academic and Jane worked as a lawyer, but Stiles eventually left academia to become a stay-at-home mom while her husband continued working. Some years later, Stiles and Jane engaged in a social media debate, and that night Jane sent her a text saying, “It’s not my fault you’re bitter about being a failure. That’s on you for making bad decisions.” “It was an unexpected punch in the gut,” writes Stiles. “My stock fell in my old friend’s eyes. I had left the ranks of ‘young professional women’ and had descended into the sub-caste of ‘stay-at-home moms.’ And to Jane, a strong self-identified feminist, being a stay-at-home mom meant being a failure.”