She came, she saw, she got crushed

Annika Sorenstam appears to be a decent individual. Her remarks before and after the tournament were appropriately humble and void of the usual girly trash-talk which the women of my generation can’t seem to resist despite never being able to walk the walk. She’s an excellent lady golfer, if occasionally prone to the chokies when playing the majors, though hardly on the scale of lefty or the Great White Shaak.

She is not, however, even close to being able to play with the big boys.

That’s no shame, neither am I. Nor do I take any issue with her playing in a PGA tournament on a sponsor’s exemption. It’s legit by the rules, but let’s face it, the crowds attracted to the novelty of watching Annika play are no bigger than they would be if Pamela Anderson Kid-Rock were out there swinging in a bikini, and they’re no better for the sport of golf.

Then again, is golf actually a sport? I submit that it is only a game masquerading as an athletic event. Have you ever seen Davis Love’s arms? They’re like rubber toothpicks!

So, she played and she was spanked. The actual event was fine, but what was offensive was the constant barrage of condescending politically correct jabber leading up to it, and the instant condemnation of anyone who dared to voice opposition to a woman playing on the men’s tour. Vijay Singh, who backed up his talk rather nicely with a win the week before, was labled a Neanderthal by sportswriters who collectively got the vapors at the notion that any man, anywhere, would object to this “inspirational story” this “gallant,” even “heroic,” sporting endeavor.

They couldn’t imagine why any man would object to Sorenstam’s inclusion, and to be fair, Annika was totally unobjectionable as she refused to portray herself as the Amazon warrior for which Martha Burk, the National Organization for Women and the Title IX Nazis were wishing. Even so, and despite the fact that it would be a mathematical impossibility for me to care less about golf, I hated seeing her in the Colonial field and so did a lot of other guys.

Why? Because as long as I can remember, my generation has had the myth of female superiority shoved down our throats. Turn on the television, and if there is an athletic competition of any type involving a man and a woman, the woman will win. Every single time, with a smile and a shrug as she confesses that she used to play in college or whatnot. This is sheer gynomythology, of course, as anyone who is even half an athlete knows that there’s a reason that runs /throws /hits like a girl is considered to be an insult.

Furthermore, it sticks in my craw that two men cannot sit in a room, smoke cigars and shoot the breeze without a woman brandishing a lawsuit and wanting in. And yet, we have women’s colleges, women’s fitness centers, women’s business conferences, women’s symposiums and women’s golf tours, all of which blithely practice exactly the same gender-based discrimination which women have supposedly been protesting for years.

Now, this may come as a shock to some of you, but I not only like women, I enjoy them on their terms. I know the difference between Valentino and Versace. I know which dresses passed muster on the red carpet, and which ones didn’t. And I’ve not only read “Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood” but thoroughly enjoyed it! OK, I still don’t get the whole Oprah thing.

But like a lot of guys, I am seriously annoyed with being labled a prehistoric brute who doesn’t get it every time a woman has a minor disagreement with me. Equity feminism was one thing, but this gender feminism, this quasi-pagan anti-intellectual misandric vaginacentrism, is straight from the bottom of Hell’s bell curve. I mean, after reading Catherine MacKinnon, I was absolutely convinced that the Founding Fathers were right to deny women the vote.

Then I came down thanks to Camille Paglia and a little Ann Coulter, and I eventually reached the conclusion that if women don’t blame us for Marx and Rousseau, we shouldn’t hold them collectively responsible for MacKinnon, Susan Faludi and Marilyn Friedman.

Nevertheless, men and women really are different. Can anyone imagine Tiger Woods bursting into tears after missing a cut? But fair enough, Annika’s had her shot, so now let’s see how Brian Kontak fares against the big girls of the LPGA.