The Basis is Biology image

The Basis is Biology

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On Christmas Eve Melissa Courtney set a new women’s parkrun world record at Poole parkrun. Melissa is originally from Poole so all our local runners basked in the reflected glory as she ran a time of 15 minutes and 31 seconds.

This was a truly world class performance. There have been millions of parkruns completed by women, but 15:31 is the quickest ever. One of the really fascinating things about it though, is that on the same day, just at Poole, four male runners were quicker than Melissa. Three of whom were teenage boys.

Abigail Favale (The Genesis of Gender, p.122) writes how during a gender theory class discussion,

I noticed some students parroting the line that biological sex is “assigned” at birth by doctors and parents rather than identified or recognized. “Wait a second”, I said. “Is sexual orientation innate, something we are born with?” My students nodded readily. This is well-established dogma. “And you’re also saying that biological sex is a construct, a category arbitrarily ‘assigned’ at birth?” More vigorous nods. “How is that possible? Aren’t those claims contradictory? How is possible to have an innate attraction to something that is merely a social construct?” Aha. In that millisecond, I saw a brief glimmer of light cut through the postmodern haze. Even if they quickly turned away, they had at least recognised the contradiction.

It’s a brilliant observation but the pity is that the postmodern haze is more an impenetrable fog. Biology is objective, essential, given. Male and female bodies are different: even parkrun demonstrates that. Yet in our foggy world the subjective and psychological is accorded a greater ‘reality’.

I sit on the board of an organisation that (very on trend) recently adopted a menopause policy. Under the ‘Definitions’ section of this policy was a statement that while most people who experience the menopause are women, not all of them are.

I contested this definition but was soundly outvoted. The majority of those voting against me were educated, middle-class, ‘cis-gender’, straight, men, in their 50s to 70s. Even that demographic, who might be expected to be more conservative, have been so captured by the cultural narrative that they reject objective reality.

This can all feel rather depressing. It is depressing. Yet I also see light at the end of the tunnel, the fog beginning to disperse. The current gender construct is a house of cards. It has no solid foundation. It is a fairy castle in the air, built on oxymorons and the theorizing of the paedophile Michel Foucault. It cannot stand. At some point the wind will shift and it will fall.

So if you are enduring indoctrination sessions with your work HR department over the correct use of pronouns, stand firm. If a teenager you love has announced they are trans, don’t despair. If you’re flabbergasted by the way Rosie Duffield MP has been treated in Parliament. These things will pass. Sometimes it’s best just to laugh at the craziness of it all, because the postmodern narrative cannot bear to be mocked. Thus, a closing illustration from Abigail Favale:

“What, pray, are you?” asks the caterpillar.
“I’m a woman.”
“Oh are you?”
“Yes, at least…” I pause, suddenly unsure. “I think so?”
“Do you feel like a woman?”
“I’m not sure” I say. “What does it mean to feel like a woman?”
“To feel like a woman is to be a woman”, pronounces the caterpillar, taking a long drag from his hookah.
“But what is a woman?”
“Someone who feels like a woman.”
“But…what does it mean to feel like a woman, if being a woman is defined as feeling like a woman?”
“Transphobe”, puffs the caterpillar.

 

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