Warning: Contains descriptions of child sexual abuse that may be disturbing to read.
In a recent column for the Daily, Erin writes that a common concern about “push[ing] men into women’s bathrooms” is only a “dog whistle.” She says it is meant to “mask a deeper meaning.” But she never addresses what many women are afraid of in the first place. Women have always needed private spaces for safety and dignity. That is not a signal or code. It is a real boundary with real purpose.
Erin claims that referring to “biological males” and “biological females” is a “targeted act against intersex and transgender people.” But the categories “male” and “female” come from nature, not from politics. They are recognized in medicine, sports, biology and childbirth. The only way to make them disappear is to demand that we stop describing reality at all. That is unreasonable, and it asks the public to participate in something they know is not true.
The idea that gender is separate from biological sex did not come from healthy research or moral people. It began with Alfred Kinsey, who helped shape modern sex education. In his 1948 book, “Sexual Behavior in the Human Male,” he included Table 34, which recorded what he called “orgasms” in children, even in infants. The information came from men in prison who sexually abused children. Kinsey presented it as data.
Fritz von Balluseck was a Nazi Party official who made Jewish children choose between the gas chamber or being sexually abused by himself. Balluseck kept detailed diaries describing the abuse. He mailed those diaries to Kinsey to contribute to his research. Balluseck was later prosecuted and convicted in West Germany for child sexual abuse.
The next major figure was John Money, a sexologist who popularized the term “gender identity.” He oversaw the case of David Reimer, a baby boy whose circumcision was botched in infancy. Money told the parents to raise him as a girl. During follow-up sessions, David and his twin brother Brian were subjected to what Money called “sexual rehearsal play,” which both later described as deeply abusive. The case left them severely traumatized; both David and Brian Reimer died by suicide in the early 2000s.
Mary Calderone, founder of SIECUS (Sexuality Information Education Council of the United States), praised Kinsey and carried his conclusions forward into sex education. These ideas moved into schools and medical policy, not because they were proven, but because they were pushed.
These are the roots of gender ideology. Not observation. Not compassion. Not truth. They rest on the belief that children are sexual from birth, a claim pushed by Kinsey and those who followed him. They rest on abuse, coercion and the denial of biological reality.
Erin writes, “If someone wants to commit violence, is a bathroom sign going to stop them?” A sign cannot stop a criminal, but it can prevent a space from being opened to whoever claims to belong there. Women do not create boundaries because they think men are confused. They create boundaries because men can be dangerous. Women do not owe access to their private spaces to anyone who asks.
Erin says that acknowledging biological sex “creates spaces where transgender people are not allowed to exist.” But recognizing two sexes does not erase anyone’s existence. It simply refuses to redefine womanhood into a feeling. A woman is not a costume or a mood. A woman is an adult human female. That truth protects women. Losing it erases them.
This claim that enforcing sex-based boundaries would “require mandatory genital inspections” is false. Schools, hospitals, prisons and sports teams already use sex-based records, medical files and eligibility standards every day. No one is calling for humiliation. Women are simply saying that womanhood must not be redefined by those who do not share female biology.
The reminder in her article to “ask yourself where a certain way of thinking leads” might be the only logical point she makes.
This way of thinking leads back to men who experimented on children and called it science. It leads back to people who denied biological reality so they could justify abuse. It leads back to theories built on trauma and coercion, not truth. When we treat gender as a feeling instead of a biological fact, we are repeating the claims of those researchers. We are not freeing anyone. We are continuing their harm.
People who fall prey to gender ideology deserve the truth about where these ideas came from. They deserve more than theories born from the abuse of children and the rejection of reality. They deserve honesty, clarity and dignity.
We do not need dog whistles. We need the truth.
There are two sexes.
Women deserve privacy.
Protecting women is not hate.
It is responsibility.
It is moral.
And it is common sense.
Self-written bio: Harrison Miller is a junior at Iowa State University studying political science and public relations. He is a father to a daughter and takes seriously the responsibility of safeguarding her future.
