XY Games

I heard a very interesting story on Talk of the Nation this morning about gender testing at the Olympics. For years, all female Olympians were subjected to a pretty degrading physical examination to determine whether or not they were in fact women. Male Olympians were not subjected to testing. I'll infer that the organizers believed that men would disguise themselves as women in order to compete against "lesser athletes" and have a better chance of winning but that women would not disguise themselves as men. This value judgment does not strike me as entirely valid. I imagine there have been women that wanted to compete in events that were not open to women and therefore disguised themselves as men. Moreover, there are many events were men and women can compete on an equal footing, I'm sure. For instance, would women competing in equestrian events be subjected to testing? I think male and female equestrians compete against each other. I digress. The point is, in China, they plan to perform genetic testing on some female athletes if their gender comes into question. The 'genetic test' label gives the results the appearance of scientific authority. However, apparently gender is not always black and white. There are certain syndromes that cause individuals to test positive for some markers of the opposite gender. These people have no knowledge of this condition. They told the story of an Indian marathoner who "tested" male but was a woman. She looked like a woman and had always identified as a woman. Nonetheless, she was stripped of her medal and demonized in the media. This phenomenon whereby some people may appear on a genetic level to not be 100% female or 100% male was fascinating to me. I'd love to learn more about it.

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Back assward

Haiti just ratified Michele Pierre-Louis as prime minister. She is the second female prime minister in the country's history. Haiti has had two female prime ministers. Haiti. Sigh.


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I *Heart* My Vagina

Our house painter - and new best friend - is the kind of guy we wish we could clone. Instead of buying himself a monster truck and tailgating us to show off his macho prowess, he hangs a demure little sign from the rear view mirror of his Toyota: "I *heart* my penis."

Is it just me, or would the world be a better place if more men had this kind of sense of humor and sense of confidence about their masculinity?

Our friend tells us most women who see this sign want one of their own - specific to their own genitalia, of course. I told him, send them to The V-Store. There, you can get all the gear you need to become a Vagina Warrior. If you don't yet know about Eve Ensler and The Vagina Monologues, you need to check this site out and get on board in this global effort to end violence against women. "V-Men" welcome too!

Cowboys and Prairie Fairies

Gotta love the title of this article posted on The Huffington Post:

Cowboys, Prairie Fairies, and Mother Earth: The Political Psychology of Gendering Nature Female

... written by Stephen J. Ducat, Ph.D., a clinical psychologist from the San Francisco Bay Area and author of The Wimp Factor: Gender Gaps, Holy Wars, and the Politics of Anxious Masculinity.