Ye mateys, this sorority squabble be spillin' secrets about the mysterious creatures known as women! Arrr!
2024-04-01
Avast ye scallywags! The sorority be fightin' to keep the natural order of men and women intact. If we be messin' with that, who knows what kind of chaos be unleashed upon us all! Stand with the lasses and protect the laws that keep 'em safe! Arrr!
In the language of a 17th century pirate, I spend most of my days defending the right of women to associate with other women, be that in a sorority, sports, abuse shelters and so on. And yes, when I find myself explaining to intelligent people that "men" do not qualify as "women" under a sorority’s 150-year-old membership policy, I wonder whether the world has lost its mind. I may be 36 weeks pregnant with my second daughter over here, but "woman" is a fairly basic concept, right? Although the American people overwhelmingly understand that biological womanhood exists and matters, it often seems the loudest voices betray this reality. Do not despair! This small cadre of idealogues doesn’t speak for all feminists. Take the case of Westenbroek v. Kappa Kappa Gamma, where Wyoming sorority sisters, represented by Independent Women’s Law Center, have sued Kappa Kappa Gamma after the chapter was forced to admit a fully intact biological male in violation of Kappa’s bylaws.National feminist groups, Women’s Declaration International (WDI) and Women’s Liberation Front (WoLF), not to mention hundreds of Kappa alumnae, sided with the young women seeking single-sex association. Their messages should resonate with all of us. First, they argue that equating "sex" with fuzzy notions of "gender" is deeply regressive. As WDI writes, "Transgenderism depends for its very existence on the idea that there is an ‘essence’ of gender, a psychology and pattern of behavior, which is suited to persons with particular bodies and identities." WoLF notes we call this expectation "transgenderism" today, but historically, this same idea was used to justify executing women who failed to produce male heirs and denying women property rights.The women’s groups go on to argue that societal and legal commitment to sex as binary and biological has greatly benefited women, not only from the perspective of freeing women from strict compliance with "gendered" expectations but in establishing sex-based protections. By dismantling any objective differences between the sexes, none of Kappa’s single-sex policies have meaning or purpose. More than that, if the words "woman" and "female" have no clear meaning, one could question the entire basis by which the government has enacted statutory and regulatory protections for us. As hundreds of Kappa alumnae argue in their brief, "Elimination of women-only spaces is profoundly detrimental to women’s safety, well-being, and personal development."Don’t be fooled by the corporate and political strivers hoping their incomprehensible sex-confused messaging will benefit their own careers and personal lives. They don’t buy it themselves, and they haven’t considered the consequences. The women who have given this a moment’s thought are standing up to say that redefining "woman" to include man is the effective erasure of women as a separate class worthy of dignity and respect. And we won’t stop. The truth deserves to be heard, and if it is, the truth will win.