It’s a lazy Saturday afternoon, almost 3 pm and I haven’t even gotten out of my pajamas yet. I channel surf while sipping my Coke Zero until I come upon “Keeping Up with the Kardashians.” After being bitch slapped repeatedly over the last week with news of Bruce Jenner’s gender reassignment, it was just too tempting to take a peak. I pressed the info button on my remote and saw that it was a recent episode so I had no choice but to let the train wreck unfold as I slowly felt myself losing IQ points.
The first episode showed the Kardashian sisters vacationing in Montana with Kim Kardashian receiving phone therapy for her infertility issues. At the end of their trip, en route to the airport to hop on their private jet, Khloe hit black ice causing her SUV to spin out of control and land in a ditch. Passengers Kim and some other K named chicks (whatever, they all look alike) freak out and scream as they watch their lives flash before the dash mounted camera lense. Unfortunately, they were fine enough to continue filming.
The next episode, or maybe it was the same one. I was sort of hypnotized by its shallow self indulgence. There was a family meeting where Kim (or Kimmy as I like to call her as of 33 minutes ago) starts crying to her collection of K sisters sitting beside her about her step father’s impending interview with Diane Sawyer. Yes, the interview ran last April 2015 on ABCs “20/20” when all gossip shit collectively hit the fan as Bruce Jenner revealed how he as going to get gender reassignment surgery to become a woman. He was living a lie his whole life he said confidently. He was a woman trapped in a man’s body.
Apparently Jenner had been wearing wigs and dressing like a woman for years. Nobody’s really sure if his latest wife Kris Jenner was in the know or not, but if you read the tabloids, I guess she was oblivious.
It got me thinking. While everyone is busy celebrating the transformation of Bruce Jenner into Caitlyn Jenner, praising her for her courage and struggles, has anybody stopped to wonder the lives she’s turned upside down? As Wikipedia rushes to be one the first to win the Tolerance (Look how Forward Progressive we are) Award of Transgender Acceptance Sophistication by quickly changing all of Bruce Jenner’s Olympic wins to give credit to Caitlyn. The Internet social justice warriors were in full gear as they designated Jenner’s 1972 Olympic wins as female world records.
While the Kardashian daughters rally to show their support, especially for increased ratings, it would be pretty remarkable if this event hasn’t caused his daughters, especially Kendell and Kylie (his biological children with Kris Kardashian) some serious trauma.
So, is Caitlyn (formally known as Bruce) Jenner a jerk for allowing herself to carry out what she claimed to be a gigantic charade at the expense of so many others?
I’ve heard that when Caitlyn was Bruce, she was a really nice guy. There’s no reason to believe that Caitlyn won’t be genuine and nice woman as well. Even one of his biological daughters said her father wouldn’t and couldn’t hurt a fly. Comedian and political commenter Dennis Miller has even commented on his podcast that Bruce is one of the nicest guys in Hollywood. And one things for sure, he as a she is certainly way more interesting that I’ll ever hope to be.
But again, I ask, if she’s always known she was psychologically wired to be female, she must have become greatly familiar with the compulsion to give in to these uncontrollable urges. She must have know one day it would overwhelm her. If this desire was so great that she took wigs on business trips, completely altered her face as far back as the 80s and was supposedly on hormone therapy well before cell phones were a thing, it’s insulting to my intelligence that she didn’t see any of this coming. Judgements aside (as they should be), was it selfish to have so many children and leave behind a wife whom Kim claims to be completely shattered and heart broken because for reasons which may include not wanting her career to suffer? Obviously she knew all these years she was living a lie, why did she have to bring SO MANY other people into it?