Via email and via PM a couple people have asked me to react to this story. I have never watched "Keeping up with the Kardashians" (I am not going to start now) and only know of this story through mainstream news. I do not have a particular reaction to Caitlyn's transition . . . or maybe I do . . . but my reaction has more to do with timing.
Bruce was married three times and has at least two children with each of his ex wives. Caitlyn is now 66 years old. Why make this change now? What does the timing accomplish? What is her message to young people? What is she now going to do as a female that she did not feel comfortable doing as a male? Is she going to date now? I suppose I am having difficulty understanding the goal of this transition at the age of 66. “Be true to yourself… love yourself… realize your potential…” are messages we can all presumably endorse, but (assuming he lives to 80) making this change in the last 14 years of life is the part I have difficulty understanding. At what point do we say “why bother?” If Caitlyn were 77, 88, or 99 years old would the message of her change still have resonance or would we be shrugging our collective shoulders and asking, why bother?
More than anything that is my reaction to this transition: why bother? The time to do it was many years ago. And I would be saying the same thing if he were coming out as a gay man at 66 or 77. Why bother? You have lived your life as a man. Now you are an old man. What is the point of becoming a woman in the last few years of your life? I ask this question with no disrespect, venom, or ill will but out of a true lack of understanding.
