Why do they do it? Why do Megan Rapinoe and Sue Bird defend men in women's sports?

It's not about money. They believe it is the right thing.

There is a lot of handwringing over why Megan Rapinoe and her wife (partner?) Sue Bird are taking the side of yes men should be allowed to compete in women’s sports!

How could they? How can they think this? Can they actually believe it? Neither would have achieved what they did in their sports if the category hadn’t been protected. They must know that the women’s category exists for a reason . . . right? Rapinoe and her USA team famously lost a scrimmage match-up to 15 year old high school boys. If the worst player in the NBA decided that he was a woman we all know he’d kill it in the WNBA. So much for Sue Bird being one of the best players in WNBA history if men could just enter the WNBA. The men would steal all the ‘best’ slots!

People like to speculate . . . follow the money; they’re being paid; virtue signaling to her tribe; she’s so rich she doesn’t care about pulling up the ladder behind her.

I’m actually going to say that none of those are correct, in my humble opinion. The simplest answer — the least complicated and most troublesome — is that Rapinoe and Bird believe it.

They believe that trans women are women.

They believe if you say you’re a woman you are.

They believe that testing for sex with a one time cheek swab is invasive and harmful to all women.

They believe that there are a gazillion “genders” and biology is cryptic and can’t account for them all.

They believe that they are social justice warriors on the front lines of the greatest civil rights issue of our time. They are heroes fighting a worthy battle that is dangerous and they are risking reputation and safety and livelihood to do it. They are heroic (in their own minds), secure in their net worth of $25 million yet daring to battle the evil and backwards right-wing enthusiasts like the IOC and its ilk. (That’s a joke.)

They believe that these poor guys who claim womanhood are the most put upon, vulnerable people in the world and we all need to just give them what they want or else they’ll kill themselves. And if we don’t, we are bigots, plain and simple. Our transphobia and bigotry drives our every move. And there is no possible other explanation such as caring about women’s rights. We’re just bigots.

THEY BELIEVE IT. IT’S THAT SIMPLE.

Why these two specifically believe these things isn’t mine to speculate. They just do. I know people just like them, with their exact politics if not their Olympic medals.

They. Believe. It.

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Bridget Phetasy wrote a piece recently called Leave Me Behind, which I highly recommend. The basic premise of it is I’m getting older and I don’t care if young people like me or not. They don’t know anything, I’m not going to pretend to support their views or actually support them just to stay relevant.

She opens with a Tucker Carlson example. She writes:

“I caught clips of Tucker Carlson interviewing Nick Fuentes, and the thing that struck me was the body language. Here was a man who had the biggest show on cable news, who once commanded an audience of 5 million adults, sitting across from a twenty-something New-Age shock-jock with the energy of a guy trying to impress his son’s friends. See how cool I am? See how I’m not afraid to go there?”

She cites another example, but on the left. Jon Stewart fawning over Mamdani.

The net net with both of these examples — two aging Gen X hosts desperately chasing relevance with a coveted 18-34 year old audience.

I think it goes further than celebs and TV hosts chasing “cool” or more aptly — followers and ratings. It’s my peers and all my Gen X people who are terrified of not being seen as up to date, as progressive, as on the “right side of history.”

It’s Millennials too, who aren’t even young anymore. They are between 30-45 years old. (Rapinoe is 40 by the way, firmly planted in Millennial range.)

They have had their children (some) and they are veering towards no one cares what you say anymore territory. Which is terrifying.

Many, in the Gen X+ category especially, fear they were late on other issues — gay marriage, for instance. They fear they weren’t sufficiently “anti-racist” until it hit them in the face that they were supposed to be in 2020. And now, they have been conditioned to believe that any opposition to transitioning minors is driven by bigotry. (Just as they see any resistance to DEI policies as racist.)

This orientation afflicts hippie boomers, “alternative” Gen Xers and SJW late stage Millennials. They don’t want to get it wrong again.

When we were young our parents may have listened to our rantings when we came home from college. Whatever they may have been. About the evils of capitalism, or opening your mind with unnamed drugs, taking back the night. But our parents didn’t feel obliged to agree with us to prove they were “with it.” They listened, then went about their business. They rolled their eyes if only to themselves, and figured we’d grow out of it when we had to get jobs.

They weren’t afraid their kids were right and they were wrong. Hey maybe sometimes we were right! They didn’t care. They weren’t subservient to youth.

I respect it.

Today, not so much. The oldsters chase youth not only in Botox form, but in the realm of ideas as well.

Grown functional adults grovel for the approval of the younger generation as a means of chasing their own youth, I believe.

Don’t get me wrong. I respect young people. I listen to them. I have two adult Gen Z children and I have 4 Gen Z’s that work in my organization. I’m interested in how they see the world. BUT/AND I don’t set aside my own functioning brain to nod along without question. I’m old, not brain dead. I’m in my 50’s. My brain has not yet shriveled.

My leftie (former) friends look to their children for guidance. To know what to think. To be their moral sherpas.

Jewish parents may say to themselves I don’t much care for Mamdani and his antisemitic, socialist ways but my kids like him so I’d better check him out. And then they vote for him.

They might think it’s a tad silly that their children declare themselves non-binary while dressing and presenting in a total gender confirming way. They think: it’s modern. It’s progress. What’s the harm? I will call them they (even when they aren’t here) because I must be respectful and they must just know something I don’t know about the state of biology.

They are supplicants. They are terrified of being seen as bigots.

And honestly, if we can’t get off our knees, stop begging for approval when we’re old, when can we?

Many corporate leaders/CEOs who adopt a social justice stance are chasing their kids approval. They want the spoils, the riches that come from being a CEO. But they want it with the approval of their kids, trained in social justice-y private schools. The CEOs don’t want to be hated. They want to be loved and rich. And viewed as not only not bigoted but aggressively anti bigotry of all kinds.

And so a stance that telegraphs I may have made a lot of money but I’m in it for the doing the right thing seems a tidy answer. Until the companies tank and the money isn’t as available anymore at which point they’ll choose the money and leave the posing behind.

I say all of this because if we are going to fight ideological capture we need to be clear about the capture. If we think it’s money — i.e. they are being paid to say these things — we’ll chart an incorrect path. For the CEOs mentioned above, it was a marketing strategy that they assumed would bear fruit in increased revenues for their company AND adoration from their children and the Gen Z employees. And avert a PR disaster. And they convinced themselves all the things they were saying were true. Nobody sees themselves as a lackey.

But to be clear, Rapinoe and Bird aren’t being paid to say what they say. They believe it. Now they could lose existing endorsements if they took the opposite stance. So in a sense, and I’m correcting myself here to some extent, it is about money.

But not really. I’m telling you — they really do believe it!

The athletes who aren’t speaking up but agree women’s sports should be for women are doing so out of fear of losing endorsements and social standing. That is most definitely true and I know this first hand from speaking with many.

Think about this:

The IOC put a policy into place to protect the women’s category. Do you think they really did so without vetting it with female athletes who currently compete at the Olympic level? Do you think they would risk an onslaught from currently competing athletes saying THIS IS WRONG once they announced the policy? No way. The policy was for sure vetted with not only lawyers but female athletes. Yet, who has spoken up in defense of the policy? (I count one: Kaillie Humphries, 6 time Olympian and medalist in bobsled). They are quietly accepting it. They want it. But they don’t want to risk any lucrative endorsement deals.

Rapinoe could be quiet on the issue. She would risk nothing in doing so. Her endorsement deals would continue. She speaks out against the policy because she believes the policy is wrong. She believes or has convinced herself (same thing) that the policy is harmful to all women — as she states repeatedly.

The parents chasing their kids beliefs also believe the ideas their children passionately defend. Whether they were coerced or forced themselves to think these things is beside the point. They think it now.

The adults who “transition” their children will never accept that it was a mistake even if their children detransition and regret the loss of fertility and sexual function. How could they? That would be to accept mutilating their own child! They will die on the hill of defending “gender affirming care for minors.” If their children end up more depressed, more dysfunctional, the parents will simply believe that this is due to societal bigotry.

Whether Jon Stewart agrees with Mamdani or Tucker agrees with Nick Fuentes is also beside the point. They fawn as if they do, in a never-ending chase to glean some shred of youthful shine.

Like Bridget, I’m not afraid of being left behind. That is going to happen regardless of what inane ideas I choose to accept. I am 2/3 of the way through this thing if I’m lucky. What I have now, is my brain, my freedom, my work. Leave me to it.