The phrase MY TRUTH needs to go away

Or we may lose the notion of objective truth forever.

Ever since the me too movement took hold of our collective consciousness in 2017, the phrase “my truth” has become common parlance. And then Oprah kind of set the whole term aflame to spread like wildfire in her 2018 Golden Globes’ Cecil B. DeMille Award acceptance speech when she said:

“What I know for sure is that speaking your truth is the most powerful tool we all have.”

Close. But no. Speaking THE truth is the most powerful tool we all have.

The phrase always bugged me. It makes truth subjective in a way that it is not. We don’t always know the truth, but it is quite objective and something that can be known, if we strive for it.

An experience is subjective. Truth is not.

What I experienced training in gymnastics was different than what my coaches experienced while coaching me. I experienced bullying, fat-shaming, enforced starvation and being forced to train in extreme pain — on bones that were, in fact, broken. I was in no way exceptional in this treatment; it was standard operating procedure. It was a feature, not a bug, in the coaching methodology.

From my coaches’ perspective, it was just “tough coaching.” But if they were to describe their experience of coaching gymnasts on their team for over 5 decades, they would have to reflect on the following facts:

• Young athletes were weighed in twice a day, and if anyone gained even 1/4 pound, she was scolded and forced to do extra conditioning after a 6-7 hour practice.

• Gymnasts trained on broken bones. A doctor came to the gym regularly at the behest of the coaches to administer cortisone shots to minors so that these young athletes could keep going.

• Yelling and name-calling were par for the course, and directed at athletes as young as 7, like the girl in this CNN documentary — who is training in a leg cast, because her leg is broken.

• Young athletes were belittled on the competition floor. Like here — Coach Donna Strauss (often called The Mrs. in the sport) says to gymnast Annie Fogerty Good job Annie, way to give up! Was that a try you just did? What kind of a try? Is there such a thing as a quitter’s try?

Those are all facts, some recorded on video. There isn’t really another interpretation of those facts, despite Strauss’ protestation that her behaviors were taken out of context in the recordings. She and her staff were misrepresented — tricked! — Strauss said. And, believe it or not, all was forgiven. For a very long time.

But their “tough coaching” euphemism is, and always was, a lie. The lie is meant to obscure an unpleasant and inconvenient truth, in order to protect and shield the liar — in this case, the coaches — from criticism and reputational harm. And perhaps criminal charges. Often times, the liar comes to believe the lie, because it is said so frequently.

“Tough coaching” is language meant to obfuscate. And obfuscate it did.

The CNN documentary ran in 2003. When I saw it I thought to myself: Well, that’ll be the end. USA Gymnastics and Child Protective Services will have to intervene. Nope. Nothing happened. It wasn’t until 2022 that an investigation was initiated and one coach on staff was forced to “retire” amidst the scandal.

And this is why language matters. If euphemisms like “tough coaching” are convincing enough, said with enough energy, passion and conviction — they can come to be accepted as truth. And “tough coaching” was accepted as truth for over 50 years in the sport of gymnastics, including by the governing officials.

In 2019, when I met Aly Raisman — two-time Olympian and 3-time Olympic gold medalist for gymnastics — I encouraged her (gently) to be more affirmative in her assertions. This isn’t just your truth. It’s THE truth.

She was sexually abused by Team USA “doctor” Larry Nassar. Her brave outspokenness, testimony and victim impact statement helped put him in prison for life.

Nassar is a sexual predator who preyed on young girls and women. That is just true, by any objective standard.

By Nassar’s own admission, he performed what he called “pelvic floor adjustments” and called it “medical treatment.” Whether a gymnast came in for back pain or wrist pain. He did it to minors and he did it without their consent; he did it without gloves or explanation. Because it wasn’t medical treatment, no matter what he claims or what euphemism he uses.

There is objective truth and that truth is that Nassar abused hundreds of young athletes. And it went on for 30 years because despite it being reported to authorities by many young women and girls, his truth reigned.

It may seem like a small thing. What difference does it make? It’s just one word. My.

But truth is that which is in accordance with reality. If we accept that reality is fungible, we make way for all manner of sorta, kinda, not-really truths. We make way for feelings to be truths. They aren’t.

I’d argue the widespread adoption of my truth during the height of the me too era, has ushered in widespread use of the term beyond the subject of sexual violence, and the fungibility of the notion of truth more broadly.

Speaking your truth puts personal experience above hard, cold facts. And in a day and age where truth is in the eyes of the beholder, we need to get back to some measure of reality.

My truth has opened the door for what I would consider the most insidious repudiation of material reality and acceptance of feelings as truth: the denial of biological sex.

Biological sex is real. Any honest and serious person knows it. One’s sex is not something felt on a particular day that may perhaps be different the next day, as astrophysicist Neil Degrasse Tyson outlined a few days ago.

Yet activists and ideologues and even doctors demand that we assign truth about sex in accordance with feelings. And they demand we further the lie.

And furthering that lie allows for publications like The Atlantic to publish things like this:

Which includes this quote:

“Maintaining this binary in youth sports reinforces the idea that boys are inherently bigger, faster, and stronger than girls in a competitive setting—a notion that’s been challenged by scientists for years.”

Boys are inherently bigger, faster and stronger than girls.

This notion has never credibly been challenged by serious scientists. Ever.

Reality has never challenged this notion either.

Are there exceptions on occasion — meaning an exceptional female might be extraordinarily tall and strong and better at a sport than an average male? Yes. But the exceptions do not govern the rule. And I dare you to find an elite level female athlete in any sport that could beat an elite level male athlete of her approximate level in that same sport. You can’t.

Can a person feel female in a male-sexed body? Sure, I suppose. Though I’d argue fewer gendered stereotypes could render this somewhat null and void. What does it mean to feel female? Generally what I hear from folks like Neil Degrasse Tyson is it means you want to wear make-up and wear dresses. (Side note: if there is no such thing as a gender binary, how can a person feel female or male, anyway?)

Can this same person choose to present as female, in accordance with feelings? Yes.

Can they actually be female? No. They cannot. And no amount of surgery to alter that person’s appearance will make them actually biologically female. If we all go along with this lie/my truth assertion, we commit to living in a world where reality no longer matters. And you get statements like this, from The Atlantic reporter Maggie Mertens:

“And though sex differences in sports show advantages for men, researchers today still don’t know how much of this to attribute to biological difference versus the lack of support provided to women athletes to reach their highest potential.”

And everyone nods along with the absurdity. It is not a lack of support. Because of Title IX, sports programs for women and girls abound. It is fundamental biology that confers advantage to males in sport.

But if we all nod along with absurdities, we will inevitably, eventually, get to a point, as Mertens recommends, where there are no sex categories in sports at all. And girls and women will be denied all of the athletic and educational opportunities that a fair playing field allows.

Because, the situation will always go beyond simply nodding along to ridiculous statements. Those ridiculous statements will go on to inform policy. These ridiculous statements become politicized. And as George Orwell wrote:

“Political language is designed to make lies sound truthful.”

When those lies sound truthful — or don’t, but are accepted anyway as a matter of habit — then we get policy based on lies. Harmful policy such as adolescent surgical “transition."

Or covid policy:

• We must close the schools because (and here’s the lie) children are drivers of covid spread. And they are resilient (another lie) so they will be fine.

• We must close everything (lockdown) because everyone is potentially sick even without symptoms and asymptomatic spread drives covid.

• Everyone must get vaccinated for covid because everyone is at risk equally and everyone is a super spreader and it doesn’t matter if the risk profile of the vaccine is high for some people, they need to do it anyway.

And here’s another problem: my truth cuts both ways. Larry Nassar’s truth is that he did nothing wrong, committed no crime. He was administering medical treatment. Now, he may know in his heart of hearts that that was never true; but he said it for so long — for over 3 decades — that he probably convinced himself of its veracity.

His truth also convinced police and other investigators for close to 3 decades and he was permitted to continue abusing all that time. But Raisman’s truth is the truth. Not Nassar’s.

I think women are more prone to this type of linguistic softening. It’s our way of floating our thoughts out there without putting too fine a point on them. It’s our way of not fully believing that what we see and experience is true, because we’ve been told we have a female perspective, implying that we can not be observers of objective truth. It’s our way of internalizing that we may be emotional or off in some way therefore our experience is open to interpretation. Lastly, it is also our way of exhibiting compassion for another’s view, someone who may have experienced an event differently.

In 2008, when my first book — Chalked Up — came out and I was pilloried as a liar and a grifter for the first time, I softened my language consistently in interviews. I would say: This is not an indictment of the sport of gymnastics. This was just my experience (a precursor to my truth).

But that was bullshit. I was trying to protect myself from the onslaught of criticism by narrowing my claims and dulling them into such subjectivity that my attackers couldn’t criticize them. And perhaps give the critics’ assertions some degree of validity as a measure of compassion. I didn’t want to call them liars. That seemed too mean.

But the criticisms kept coming and I got stronger not weaker. I wasn’t cowed. The opposite, in fact. I stopped saying this was just my experience. And I started to say: The sport is rife with abuse. My experience is just one person’s story of what it is actually like more broadly. Not just in the 80s, but now. This is how it is. This is the truth. And the sport needs to change. The coaches and officials are lying.

It isn’t compassionate to endorse a lie. If we go along with lies, they never end. And people like Nassar continue abusing and we get extremely harmful policies like prolonged public school closures.

And, most frighteningly, we may lose the notion of objective truth forever.