If Gender Is Changeable, Why Not Race? Matt Walsh

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Jessica Krug is an author, activist, and professor of African and Latin American studies, who has spoken and written in great personal detail about her black identity. In her bio she has described herself as an “unrepentant and unreformed child of the hood.” The only problem is that the hood was, apparently, a suburb in Missouri. And when she called herself African and black all those years, what she really meant to say is that she’s white and Jewish. Two questions are raised here: 1)  If all of the privilege in America belongs to white people, then why would a white person reject that identity and assume a less privileged one? 2) Perhaps more to the point, why exactly can’t Krug identify as black? Why isn’t her self-identity legitimate? If she says she feels like a black woman, and identifies most strongly with that community, who is to say she’s wrong? Well, I can say she’s wrong. Anyone who rejects the notion of gender fluidity can say she’s wrong, as we believe that a person’s fundamental identity is not something that can be changed on a whim. It is not subjective. Our perception of ourselves may be subjective, but our identity itself — our biology and the demographics to which we belong — are simply facts, no matter how we feel about them. But that’s not the position the Left takes. They say that a woman might be born a woman, with a female body, female DNA, female bone structure, and yet if she finds within herself some sort of vague, undefinable feeling of maleness, then she is a man. So what if she finds a vague, undefinable feeling of blackness? Why is she not then black? 2) Perhaps more to the point, why exactly can’t Krug identify as black? Why isn’t her self-identity legitimate? If she says she feels like a black woman, and identifies most strongly with that community, who is to say she’s wrong? Well, I can say she’s wrong. Anyone who rejects the notion of gender fluidity can say she’s wrong, as we believe that a person’s fundamental identity is not something that can be changed on a whim. It is not subjective. Our perception of ourselves may be subjective, but our identity itself — our biology and the demographics to which we belong — are simply facts, no matter how we feel about them. But that’s not the position the Left takes. They say that a woman might be born a woman, with a female body, female DNA, female bone structure, and yet if she finds within herself some sort of vague, undefinable feeling of maleness, then she is a man. So what if she finds a vague, undefinable feeling of blackness? Why is she not then black? There simply is no valid argument for denying a white person’s right to be black but not a woman’s right to be a man or a man’s right to be a woman. In fact, terms like “fluid” and “socially constructed” apply much more to race than to gender.

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