Another idiot has come out of the woodwork to take a shot at Caitlyn Jenner. This time it's someone named Jennifer Bradford, who has gathered 3,444 petitions asking the International Olympic Committee to strip Jenner of the medals she won while competing as Bruce Jenner.
Here is the text of the petition:
Dear International Olympic Committee,
It has recently come to light that gold medalist Bruce Jenner is in fact transgender, and therefore, identifies as a woman. We congratulate Ms. Jenner on these new developments and wish her the best. However, this creates somewhat of a problem as Ms. Jenner (as talented as she is) claims that she has always believed herself to be truly female, and therefore, was in violation of committee rules regarding women competing in men's sports and vice versa. Therefore, it is with a heavy heart that we must ask whether or not it is proper that Ms. Jenner should retain her olympic records in light of this, as we must now either claim that Bruce Jenner and Caitlyn Jenner are two entirely different people (which we know is not true), or that Bruce Jenner was, in fact, a woman participating in a men's event. It is only fair to all involved that women receive their credit as champions of the Decathalon and that the men racing Ms. Jenner are not expected to compete with a superior, streamlined being such as herself.
We urge Ms. Jenner to support the transgender community by giving up the medals earned by competing against the wrong gender.
Thank you, and congratulations to Ms. Jenner for her courage!
#givebackthegold
A reader, Bert, alerted Outsports to this and has contacted Change.org to remove the petition for being disrespectful. "The only reasoning I can even fathom this person using to start a petition to call on revoking Caitlyn's gold medal earned when she was Bruce would be based on some sort of ignorance or hate for transgendered people," Bert said. "Just because Caitlyn at the time felt like a woman, doesn't invalidate everything she did before she transitioned and to suggest otherwise is being disrespectful of the struggle and journey Caitlyn has taken to this point in her life. Plus in all seriousness, 'she has always believed herself to be truly female' is not against the Olympic rules, and to suggest it is, is well just plain asinine."
Fortunately, people on Twitter have taken to the hashtag to push back.
The petition is not only disrespectful, but it's also the work of someone clueless about sports. Women have never done a decathlon in the Olympics, which is 10 events. In 1976, the year Jenner won the Olympic decathlon gold, women competed in the five-event pentathlon. In 1984, that was switched the the seven-event pentathlon. Also, regardless of how Caitlyn Jenner always saw her gender, in 1976 she was publicly identified as a man and competed as such and won the medal fair and square.
I hate even giving this attention but more than 3,000 people have already signed it and maybe Change.org will do the right thing and remove it. It seems to violate their rules against hate speech, bullying and focusing on someone's personal characteristics. There are still no rules that prohibit people from being stupid.
