The holiday film season has arrived! There is so much fun in store! Is everyone ready for Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget? Or how about Queen Bey’s Renaissance: A Film By Beyoncé? Or the super-seasonal Candy Cane Lane? There’s so much!

So why, then, am I seemingly buried in promos for Lady Ballers, the comic romp from the goofy gang at The Daily Wire? Billed as “the most triggering comedy in years,” the trailer gives us a peek into the laugh-riot world of, simply put, men dressing up in wigs and fake tits to identify as Trans women in the sporting arena and beat the pants off those cis sisters.

While you won’t find it in theaters — it’s a DailyWire+ exclusive — you will find it filled with all your fascist faves!

Ohai, Matt “What Is a Woman?” Walsh. Who’s that referee? Why it’s The Daily Wire’s Editor Emeritus Ben “You can’t magically change your gender” Shapiro. And our favorite kooky Canadian, Jordan “[Acceptance of Trans people is a sign of] civilization collapsing” Peterson.

We’re promised an appearance by Candace “The Trans movement … is actually satanic” Owens. And hold onto your cowboy hats, it’s Texas Republican Sen. Ted “Engaging in homosexual conduct is a choice” Cruz. Ted’s likely been angling for some screen time ever since getting triggered himself by Stacey Abrams’s turn as the president of United Earth on an episode of Star Trek: Discovery.

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Honestly, it’s sad enough that this putrid pile of (motion) pic dropped (plopped?) on World AIDS Day, Dec. 1. They may as well have launched a few days earlier for an even more triggering tie-in to Transgender Day of Remembrance on Nov. 20. It would’ve been perfectly appropriate, in that Lady Ballers seems primarily an exercise in comic cruelty.

The deflated ball this basket of deplorables (Thank you, Mme. Secretary) is running with comes out of the right wing’s new issue: Trans girls and women in sports.

While I’m certainly not paying a dime to sit through this thing, this meh-vie seems to exist in a world where anyone can instantly self-identify as any gender or variation thereof they like, oppressively and unfairly claiming some supposed series of advantages over the upstanding, God-fearing majority, who have simply reached the limit on how much of this cultural craziness they’re willing to take.

It’s particularly galling in school sports, because won’t somebody please think of the children? No, not the part about gun violence being the No. 1 killer of American kids. No, not that.

Transgender people, nonbinary, gender-fluid folks have always been part of the human family. It’s common enough in Iran that gender-affirmation surgery is government-sponsored. Even a regime that executes gay people has to acknowledge that trans people are simply part of the genetic equation.

You can hate trans people for their gender identity, pass laws to dehumanize them, discriminate with gusto, but trans people always have been — and presumably always will be — part of the tribe.

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As for sports, specifically, let’s take a look at the easy-breezy advantages those many duplicitous bio boys are claiming on the pitch. Claiming, that is, after they’ve had their testosterone levels checked.

“At its Jan 2022 meeting, the NCAA Board of Governors updated the transgender student-athlete participation policy to incorporate sport-by-sport eligibility requirements that align with the Olympic movement,” advises the National Collegiate Athletics Association, offering an example of one American institution’s thoughtful protocols.

“These procedures do not replace or change the requirements related to the NCAA Medical Exception Documentation Reporting Form which must be separately submitted by the school and approved by the NCAA before any student-athlete using any anabolic agent, hormone and metabolic modulator, or peptide hormone, growth factor, related substances and mimetics is allowed to participate in competition.”

Not exactly “Tell ’em you’re a girl and go nuts!”

Then again, maybe these right-wing culture warriors deserve a little slack. After all, sometimes the call is coming from inside the house.

A day before his expulsion from the government garden, the GOP’s famously “Jew-ish” and gay George Santos posted a quick snippet on X offering, “Hey, boys and girls. Trust the science: two genders.” If there’s been a bigger waste of 4 seconds, I’ve yet to experience it.

While, rightly, nobody gives a shit what George has to say, actor Daniel Radcliffe’s views are welcome. He wrote for The Trevor Project in June, in part, “Transgender women are women. Any statement to the contrary erases the identity and dignity of transgender people and goes against all advice given by professional health care associations who have far more expertise on this subject matter than either [J.K. Rowling] or I.”

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Radcliffe was countering Harry Potter author Rowling’s anti-trans statements. In October, as reported by The Advocate, the legendary lesbian hero, tennis superstar Martina Navratilova responded to Radcliffe on X: “Just be quiet Daniel. Be quiet.”

Considering the number of times I’ve absolutely crushed it in the shower with my rendition of Phranc’s “M-A-R-T-I-N-A,” this was heartbreaking. Seriously, Ms. Navratilova, do you not see the mere sliver of space between transphobia and homophobia? No nice cis ladies were ever bothered by sharing the locker room with lesbians?

But if Morrissey can lean into xenophobia in his dotage, Martina can have her transphobia. Certainly, no community has a monopoly on “Fuck you, I got mine.” That’s one resource of which there is, ironically, plenty to share.

Back to the Lady Ballers ethos, this is entertainment in the same vein as the high school hot jock tripping the unpopular kid in the cafeteria. Plenty of other kids laugh. Adults are supposed to know better.

As Human Rights Campaign President Kelley Robinson offered when marking TDoR this year, “The epidemic of violence against transgender and gender non-conforming people is a national tragedy and a national embarrassment. Each of the lives taken is the result of a society that demeans and devalues anyone who dares challenge the gender binary.”

Robinson for the win.

And if the Lady Ballers team truly wanted to trigger people, why not just remake a movie recasting a previously male character with a woman? Or a white character with a Black one? Now that’s the recipe for a bonkers level of triggering.

Will O’Bryan is a former Metro Weekly managing editor, living in D.C. with his husband. He is online at www.LifeInFlights.com.