Gender Identity is Obvious

What's wrong with gender? Why can't we be boys or girls, seeing as that's what we all really are?

A Nebraska school district has issued a handout which purports to deal with 'gender identity issues', whatever that means. We've labored under the impression that your gender is what you're born with, but apparently we need to discover our 'authentic selves', whatever that means. The handout was developed by a group calling itself (itself seems the appropriate term here) Gender Spectrum. They're the ones seeking their authentic selves, unlike the rest of us simple males and females who aren't seeking anything like that. Indeed, if we have a decent sense of self, we aren't seeking anything like that at all.

There are times when we don't know what to say. This is one of them. What do you say to someone who doesn't know what they are, when the choices are pretty obvious? You're a guy or a gal; it doesn't seem necessary, or wise, to go beyond that. Quite honestly, it doesn't seem as though there can be any confusion about that. Unless, perhaps, you want to be confused.

And there's the rub. What we have here is a prime example of the tyranny of the individual: I'm whoever I say I am. I won't be defined by society. I won't even by defined by my DNA. I'm me, gosh darn it, and no one is going to place a definition on me except me.

Well, sister, or brother, or, or, it, we've got news for you. Society is going to define you, and the terms it will use will be accurate if not pretty. Only decorum prevents us from printing them here. But trust us: the labels are indeed accurate.