The Deconstruction of Reality
by Babette Francis
Bruce Jenner was a college football player who after a knee injury was persuaded to try the decathalon. After rigorous training he went on to win the gold medal for the Men's Decathalon at the Montreal Summer Olympics in 1976, and set three subsequent world records. He has been married three times and has fathered six children. In April 2015 he announced a "gender identity" change as a trans woman and that his new name was Caitlyn Marie Jenner.
I spoke about Bruce Jenner's gender identity change at Phyllis Schlafly's Eagle Council in St. Louis, Missouri, in September 2015 [My full paper entitled "The Deconstruction of Gender" is on our website: www.endeavourforum.org.au] and I said that Jenner was regarded as courageous claiming to be a woman, but a man who said he was a chicken would be regarded as crazy. Jokingly I asked why don't we provide such a man with feather implants and beak surgery, why do feminists accept the transgendered but not the trans-species? I am now nervous about telling jokes - jokes are a kind of exaggeration of reality - but my joke has become reality: An Englishman, Ted Richards, identifies with parrots and has had his face tattoed with feathers, and both his ears removed, and is looking for a surgeon to alter his nose to a beak. (Herald Sun, 19/10/15). No doubt he might soon ask for the legal right to marry a chick. Some doctors have commented that it was unethical for surgeons to remove his ears, but what of the surgeons who castrate young men or cut off the breasts of young women so that they can "come out" as the opposite sex?
Vampires
After I spoke on "The Deconstruction of Gender" at Eagle
Council a delegate emailed me to say I had not mentioned
vampires - so here goes. Apparently Idaho has a number
of vampires who are being studied by Idaho State University
sociology professor D. J. Williams, who says that
some suffer so severely from lethargy that they believe they
require extra energy in the form of blood or psychic energy.
His research was published in the latest Journal of Critical
Social Work. Along with co-author Emily Prior of the Center
for Positive Sexuality in Los Angeles, Williams said his
paper, "Do We Always Practice What We Preach? Real Vampires'
Fears of Coming out of the Coffin to Social Workers
and Helping Professionals," is aimed at making clinicians
more aware of the growing vampire community.
"We live in an age of technology and live in a time when people can select new, alternate identities to fit how they understand themselves better," Williams said. "We really need to understand some of these new identities and new ways to identify ourselves, and some of these new identities do not fit into stereotypes. Helping professionals of all varieties need more education on these kinds of topics."
Williams said all the vampires that took part in the study reported that they would be uncomfortable sharing their identity with a professional out of fear of being stereotyped and judged. Vampires cross all religious and socio-economic boundaries: "It's not a religion. It's akin to our sexual orientation - It's their identity, and it's an important part of who they are." Williams said he himself is not a vampire.
Williams said real vampires who drink blood represent a small percentage of vampires. "It's not uncommon to make a small incision on a chest. Usually the blood is from a donor or their partner," Williams said. "In the vampire community, there is a focus on safety, and vampires who drink blood need to be tested regularly for blood-borne disease. Vampires who crave psychic energy might go to a concert or another large gathering to absorb it. (A report on vampires was published in the Idaho State Journal so I presume this is what passes for academic scholarship these days.)
Witch v Warlock
And then I read the Associated Press report (27/10/15)
about a witch suing a warlock: Lori Sforza, who runs a
Salem witchcraft shop and leads a pagan church, filed for
court-ordered protection against harassment from Christian
Day, whose website calls him the 'world's best-known warlock'.
Lori, who calls herself a witch priestess accused Mr
Day of harassing her online and over the phone for three
years. A lawyer representing Mr Day declined to comment.
Mr Day owns occult shops in Salem and New Orleans, according
to his website.
The 75-year-old Ms Sforza accused Mr Day, 45, of repeatedly calling her late at night from a private number and swearing at her, said Fiore Porreca, a lawyer representing her. Ms Sforza, who goes by the business name Lori Bruno, also alleged that Mr Day made malicious posts about her on social media: The pair were once business associates in Salem, home of the 17th century witch trials. It has a tourism industry built around the occult that reaches fever pitch in October. The city is home to several witchcraft stores, museums dedicated to the trials and Halloweenthemed attractions.
Mr Porreca said the harassment has hurt his client's business.
On her website, Ms Sforza calls herself a psychic and
a clairvoyant. She claims to be a descendent of Italian
witches who healed victims of the bubonic plague. The
Salem District Court and the lawyers in the case would not
provide a copy of the order filed by Ms Sforza, but she won
her case and Mr. Day was ordered to stop phoning her.
And no, I am not going to make any jokes about vampires
or witches: my jokes may become reality and who knows,
we may get a vampire in the White House or a witch on the
US Supreme Court bench - or both.
