Blind Prophecy

While the evolutionary science in this Yahoo News story is interesting, I’m cringing at the terminology.

Young male lizards in South Africa imitate females to fool aggressive older males into leaving them alone, in an example of transvestism in the natural world, researchers have found.

…

“Experienced males will chase and bite their young rivals,” said associate professor Martin Whiting of Johannesburg’s University of the Witwatersrand. By delaying the onset of colour to a more convenient period, these males, termed she-males, are making the best of a bad situation.”

These scientists are either being deliberately insulting to the transgender community or are unintentionally giving voice to some horribly offensive ideas about transgender people.

The article points to young lizards using female coloring to obtain access to female lizards. Compare this to the hysterical objections to transgender equality laws that claim predatory men in dresses are out to rape your daughters in ladies’ restrooms. This case of “natural transvestism” is a poor analogy to human transvestism in terms of motivating behavior and it was irresponsible to suggest or imply otherwise by referencing human transvestism within the article.

The article uses the phrase “she-males” in such a way as to give it a sheen of scientific credibility when in fact, this is an aggressively discriminatory phrase on par with “faggot” “nigger” or “retard” in offense and history of violent oppression.

The article refers to not-female-colored males as more “macho” and “dominant.” Meanwhile the female-colored males are “nimble” and playing a “game.”

The article speaks of large hands and Adam’s apples in human transvestism as “flaws.” However, the variation in humanity means that cisgender women can also have large hands and the appearance of an Adam’s apple, while some cisgender men might not exhibit either trait. Regardless, there is no “flaw” in having a body that doesn’t conform to stereotypes about the gender binary.

The scientists who adopted such offensive stereotypes, the reporter who passed them along and the Yahoo News service ought to be ashamed.

Filed under: news by Jere Keys