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The Disgraceful Lia Thomas
I’ve written elsewhere about this fellow, the guy who poses as a woman and crushes the hopes and dreams of real female college athletes. Finally one woman has come out publicly to complain about it, as reported in this blunt but excellent piece in the Spectator:
Reka Gyorgy showed commendable courage this weekend for finally speaking out against the National College Athletic Association’s rules regarding trans competitors. The Virginia Tech swimmer and Olympian was bumped out of a finals spot in the 500 free due to transgender University of Pennsylvania swimmer Lia Thomas’s participation.
I applaud her for having the guts to use her real name when challenging the debased orthodoxy. I’m sorry that she still felt compelled to pay lip service to Mr. Thomas, express her support for him, etc. But coming out opposed to this travesty of competitive justice is long overdue, and I’m glad to see it beginning.
I will continue to assume that Mr. Thomas suffers from some pretty serious psychiatric disorders, and that’s why he behaves so abominably and is so utterly devoid of pride, self-respect, and consideration for his teammates.
On a positive note, he and people like him will, I expect, finally turn the tide of public opinion away from the destructive foolishness that is the so-called “trans” movement.
Published in Culture
It will. They just have to do it.
People on the outside have been speaking up for quite awhile, but nothing has changed. But even flatworms recoil from pain. Make them hurt. Stop being “nice.” “Nice” got us to this point. Stop being nice and “do good,” even if it means not being nice. Because those aren’t synonyms.
I recommend against referring to Mr. Thomas by his female assumed name, “Lia.” I consider this to be Newspeak, and an important concession that frames the debate. As an example, the title of the OP would be The Disgraceful “Lia” Thomas.
My recollection of the general common law rule about name changes is that a person may adopt any name he or she wants, with a few narrow exceptions, such as not misleading or perpetrating a fraud. In my view, the adoption of a female first name by a male, or vice versa, is intended precisely to be misleading and to perpetrate a fraud. The apparent purpose is to give the false impression that, for example, “Lia” Thomas is a woman. He is not.
It will be interesting when the only ones left in college women’s sports are biological males.
I think of it something like the situation in Ukraine. Before the invasion we really did not know the degree to which Ukrainians at all level of society wanted to keep their own country and keep Putin’s government out. It would have been foolish and dangerous for the United States to get overly involved in a fight that the Ukrainians were not especially willing to fight for themselves, even though it is in our best interests and NATO’s best interests to keep Russia from expanding.
But now that the Ukrainians have made known how much they care and what kind of sacrifices they are willing to make, it’s good for us to help them as much as we reasonably can. (Which does not mean going in and fighting the Russians ourselves.)
Similarly, I’m not going to get involved in an issue that the women athletes don’t really care about as much as we think they should. But we should support them if they do care.
It would be even better if De Santis can somehow arrange for her to get the same prize/scholarship/whatever treatment that the “official” NCAA winner gets, and then some.
lulz?
Most non-trans people aren’t competing unfairly against trans people the way female athletes are.
Most non-trans people aren’t competing unfairly against trans people the way female athletes are. They have no “skin in the game.”
And once the “women’s” teams are all men too, it will be exactly the same as it was In The Before Time.
Wait until HR revises company policy
I hope you’re right, but we’ll see. There are two actual Republican governors who vetoed anti-transgender bill. How do you like them apples?
Politicians, as a class, are not the bravest folk. They want to get re-elected, and they’re acutely aware of how their actions will be perceived.
I suspect — though I don’t know the stats — that virtually all pro-transgender nonsense comes from Democrats and the Democrat-aligned. I suspect that virtually all pushback against it comes from Republicans and the Republican-aligned. That matters to me.
Ron DeSantis is being attacked by the press, on billboards, and on the news for his support of a very modest and sensible Florida bill. DeSantis is a rock star; most governors would love to have his reputation and support. But most of them don’t, and they have to wonder what will happen to them if they get targeted by the progressive attack machine.
I’m not defending cold feed. I’m just suggesting that, as more Americans make their opinions known and express their opposition to transgender nonsense and their support of more responsible public school policies, more of the people we elect will be able to take a principled stand without feeling like they’re going to get replaced by a Democrat if they do.
Did anyone else notice that on “transitioning”, William Thomas chose a name that sounds/spells almost exactly the same as the word, “liar”?
Is the whole thing a hoax? To be eventually revealed in a best-selling, tell-all autobiography?
By the way, it was harder than I expected to find out Lia Thomas’ original name. Remarkably, Wikipedia doesn’t include it. Other websites simply lie outright and insist the name never changed.
If Snopes is to be believed, Reka Gyorgy is not on Twitter; and the Twitter account bearing her name was shut down as a fake.
When Republican governors get cold feet, it often seems to be the business community warning them off.
“Who will bell the cat” is how the medieval fable poses the general problem. Economics calls it positive externality. The one who bears the cost has only a small share of the benefit; so acts beneficial to all may remain undone.
I held that opinion once on same sex “marriage”. I thought it would fade in time. I was so wrong and on reflecting on that I realized how much the country had changed. I don’t recognize the new generation. I’m suspecting you don’t either.
There’s an important difference between same-sex “marriage” (I also use the scare quotes) and the trans movement. As much as I opposed same-sex “marriage,” I didn’t believe that it would be a daily afront to normal people, and still do not.
In contrast, the trans movement directly impacts normal people. It threatens them with legal and personal consequences if they don’t use the correct speech; it forces their wives and daughters to share intimate personal spaces (restrooms, locker rooms) with men; and it destroys athletic careers for young women.
I find it personally distasteful to see Pete Buttigieg and his partner prancing around on screen, but I’d feel the same if they weren’t “married.” What sticks in my craw is being told that I’m supposed to pretend that Caitlin and Lia are women, and that I’m somehow mistaken if I don’t go along with that fiction.
I guess that’s the difference. I can (and do) avoid ever saying “husband,” “wife,” and “marriage” when referring to same-sex couples. No one even notices. But I won’t use words for the fantasy sex when referring to so-called “trans” people, and people do notice that. I don’t mind being noticed that way, but some people do, and the “trans” nonsense is a burden for them.
Same-sex “marriage” is here to stay because it’s unobjectionable in our daily living. “Trans” will, I think, go out of fashion.
Agreed. I thought SSM was BS that would fade away. Now gay is the flavor of the decade with all wanting parts of it for the benefits. It seems to me that about 30% of the young population are some version of gay by their own saying and conservative heroes such as David Ruben is SSM and is currently both fathers two children and is being celebrated. I am resigned that Trans thing is done and so will the group marriage and who knows what else. There seems to be no stopping it. The only certain thing is that God and morality is leaving the playing field.
The problem is the gender thing. We need a word we can all use to describe anybody of any sex and we can move on. Maybe refer to everybody as it. What I fear is when I use the wrong pronoun by accident and end up jobless and blacklisted. I just want them to leave me alone but they do not seem able too.
I understand that a lot of people share your fear.
Those of us who don’t have that fear will have to keep speaking up, so that people like the parents of the young women Lia Thomas is cheating out of their athletic futures know that they are not alone.
And no, I don’t think we should butcher the language.