Lee Davy shares an op-ed based on his experience of playing poker with a transgender, and Doyle Brunson’s outspoken reaction to Bruce Jenner’s decision to become a woman.
I recently played poker with someone who is transgender. At least I think I did? I liked it. It piqued my curiosity. I’m not a cat. I’m the kid who stared at his Grandmothers moustache.
I grew up in a little mining village. Asian people worked in restaurants, Indian people ran corner shops, and there was only one black man in the whole village. I don’t know what he did? I don’t even know if I am allowed to call him black?
Then there was the kid who was not really Chinese, and not really white. He was a bit of an oddity. His name was Lee.
I know a bit about being the kernel in the popcorn. So forgive my fascination when a woman who looks like a man, but is a woman at heart, and a man in physical appearance, sits down at my poker table and starts kicking ass.
She sat down and everything changed. There was an awkwardness at the table. It wasn’t there before. There was confusion during a hand. Somebody called her him by mistake. Cheeks reddened. Hope that the male vernacular had not passed those pearl earrings not doing enough to fan the flames.
For several hours prior to this young woman taking her seat, some of the players were saying the word ‘ladies’ each time a pair of queens was shown to the table. The tone of the word was queer. Someone uttered it once, after the young woman sat down. Once again blusher was applied. I never heard it muttered again.
Maybe I got it wrong?
Who hasn’t congratulated someone for being of child only to be told that they weren’t?
Mistakes happen.
But if my prediction is spot on. If she had been born a man, but was a woman in her heart, mind and soul. How fucked up must that have been for her? I can’t begin to imagine how difficult her life must have been – the lies, the charade, the bigots and the plain curious.
I am one of the curious.
I am interested in the why? I like to ask questions. I like to understand what makes people tick. Is there anything wrong with that? It’s true. She might want me to mind my own business. But she might also be fed up with disingenuous humanity. How many people treat her normally? How many people take a shot? How many people skate carefully around the thin ice, too scared that it will break?
I also wondered what the right approach would have been if she had won the tournament? Would it have been a good thing for the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Community (LGBT) to advertise the fact that a member of the transgender community had won? Would it give more members of the LGBT community confidence to play live poker?
Or
Are we once again in the territory of ‘it’s none of your fucking business?’
I wonder what Doyle Brunson would have said had he been at the table? Unless you have been living in North Korea you surely would have heard that Brunson was none too pleased when he heard that his hero Bruce Jenner was preparing to undergo surgery to become a woman.
I can’t believe Bruce Jenner is trying to become a woman? He was a hero of mine since I was involved in track long ago.#Sayitsnottrue
— Doyle Brunson (@TexDolly) January 31, 2015
Once again I saw a scab.
I wanted to pick it.
Had I said what Brunson had said I would have been crucified. People would have gone on the attack. I would have been punched all over the social media ring, ostracized by the community, and turned into a pariah for being such a bigot.
But this was Doyle Brunson.
Legend.
Hero. What would the response be?
It was mixed.
There were a lot of people giving him high fives for speaking his mind, there were those that pilloried him, wished he was dead, and called him a bigot; and then there was the professional poker playing voice who handled the whole affair with kid gloves.
It reminded me of the time your friend, who wasn’t really your friend, told you that Santa Claus didn’t exist. It’s not something you wanted to know, and once you did, you couldn’t push that shit back into the bottle and keep the lid on. Dreams were shattered.
It reminded how fragile hero status is, and made me consider who our heroes really are. The Stranglers sang ‘No More Heroes Anymore.’ I pogoed with the boys. I fell into latrines, punching and kicking. Maybe they were right. Perhaps, they have all gone?
Bruce Jenner used to be a hero to Doyle Brunson. Not anymore; and all because he revealed that he knew he was a woman from the age of five. This means that when he won his Olympic gold medal in 1976 he knew he was a woman. That bothers Brunson.
@KaraOTR Kara, this man was an Olympic champion that set all kind of records. That’s a woman? My hero? Come on!
— Doyle Brunson (@TexDolly) February 1, 2015
Doyle Brunson has over 400,000 Twitter followers. A lot of those people cast Brunson as a hero because of his poker accomplishments. Unfortunately, a lot of people will now cast him as a hero because of his views on the transgender community.
At first I felt sympathy.
I’ve put my foot in it more times than most. I operate on the speak-first, think-second philosophy. I have upset countless people before going back on my word. But he kept going on. He kept defending his view. It was obvious that the Jenner thing was really bothering him. It wasn’t just a view. It was a jab at his values.
I get it.
He’s 81-years old.
This is a modern world.
But surely there is an understanding that with power comes responsibility. Doyle has power. Having 400,000 Twitter followers is power. Getting on the front of TMZ is power.
Words have been spoken. The ripples are now reverberating around the world. What does it mean to Bruce Jenner? What does it mean to the young woman who sat down at my table? Has life become easier for them, or has a hero of poker now normalized a prejudiced way of behaving at our poker tables?
They are not the actions of a hero in my eyes.
I respect Doyle Brunson for what he has done in the game. He may even be a legend…but hero? I don’t think so.
A hero is a person of distinguished courage or ability, admired for brave deeds and noble qualities. A hero takes risks, and perseveres in the face of enormous odds.
Is that Doyle Brunson? Is that Bruce Jenner? Is that the brave young woman who I am guessing is a member of the transgender community?
I’ll leave that one up to you to decide.
