If you sell me a pound a meat and there's only 9/10ths of a pound in the package, someone is going to have to answer for that. Hell, some people will even sue when a company calls their sandwich a Footlong and it's only 11 inches when it is served.
Outright lying about things makes most people a little upset. We can't live in a civilized world if people are allowed to say one thing and do another, or outright dupe us.
I can't walk into a bank and claim to be a gazillionaire and suddenly money I don't have materializes out of thin air and my withdrawal is carried out without any question. Some things just aren't true, even if you believe they are. Even if you tell someone it's true, it doesn't mean it is. And it doesn't mean someone has to accept it just because you say it's true.
I can't go out and buy a Chevy Avalanche, slap a Cadillac grill on it and change a few logos on the interior and sell it to you as an Escalade any more than I can roll back the odometer and tell you it's practically brand new.
That's a lie. It's fraud. And it's still just an Avalanche dressed up to be an Escalade. When you strip it all down, the obvious will become known. Because while an Avalanche and an Escalade are both trucks, they're not the same thing inside.
Things simply are what they are, and that's that.
I write this over an argument I had with someone on X wherein I referred to Caitlyn Jenner as Bruce and called him a he rather than a she.
"You wear your bigotry well," I was told.
No. I have eyes and common sense and I know what I saw before I see what I see now, and that woman was clearly a man. "Was" isn't even the right choice of word because uttering it suggests a past tense situation.
Because nothing changed but the appearance and the name.
When Bruce's final day comes and he's opened up for examination, they aren't going to find a uterus and ovaries. Despite what the package looks like, the inside tells a different story. It speaks to a reality that cannot be denied regardless of whatever fantasies wanted to suggest otherwise.
The thing is, not wanting to play along with the lie does not make me a bigot at all. It does not make me insensitive or cruel. You have the right to pretend, and I have the right to call it out as pretend.
In life I wish I were a lot of things. A rock star, for example. I do write music and play an instrument, and I even record what I do and publish it. It doesn't mean I am actually a rock star, and if I go out and try to fill a stadium full of fans, it's not going to happen regardless of how much I believe people should respect my right to make the claim.
What will I do? Force people to buy a ticket and make them believe my make-believe? Guilt them into coming along for the ride just so I can go home and feel like the rock star only I believe I am?
It sounds like a ridiculous analogy. And maybe it is. You might say, "But that's not even remotely the same thing." But isn't it exactly the same thing?
I say red is blue. It doesn't change the fact that red is red. Even if you go along with it and agree with me that red is blue—red is still red. Nothing changed. In fact, the only thing that did happen is that two people became duped and confused in the same lie.
I don't want to live my life living in a world of fantasy and make believe. I want to live in a world where reality is the path by which we can make sense of the world we live in. If you remove reality and accept fantasy, suddenly you find yourself perpetually confused and unsure of things.
Without order, there is chaos. Calling things other things breeds chaos. Clear lines become blurred.
Bruce can be whatever he wants to be. That's his right, even if I think it is weird. But it is also my right to call him what he is rather than what he wants to be. Because that's the reality. That's the truth. Just like the bank will deny my withdrawal if I don't have the funds to support my claim. Or just like the guy I sell the Escalade to can take me to court and sue me for lying.
No matter what you call yourself today, I'm still going to call you Bruce.
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