In my previous article I show why it is helpful to begin a conversation about LGBTQ+ ideology by gently questioning the claim of inclusivity and showing that affirming traditional views of sexuality is about love, not judgment. But that only scratched the surface and got the conversation started. A more thorough analysis of the transgender movement, and specifically its claim of inclusivity, is needed to address the crisis and confusion. This article aims to reveal the tactics used by transgender activists and show their deception and contradictions. But let’s first pause and take stock of how we found ourselves in a world where the idea of a “transgender person” is part of normal, everyday life.
Transgender activists, many of whom do not identify as transgender themselves, have shown remarkable shrewdness and have celebrated tremendous success in their efforts to change public opinion about transgender ideology. A decade ago, the idea that someone could be a gender different from one’s biological sex was outlandish to virtually all Americans. Now, even questioning someone’s transgender identity is, in some places, a criminal offense. As a culture how did we go from dismissing the idea of transgenderism as a radical fad that will never last to only a few years later punishing those who pause to question the validity of this ideology?
The answer is inclusivity. Trans activists craftily smuggled this radical sexual ideology into mainstream culture by marketing it under the umbrella of “inclusivity.” For who doesn’t want to be inclusive? But in reality, inclusivity, which is a good thing in itself if properly understood, was the Trojan Horse to unleash transgender ideology upon the culture, normalize deviant sexual behavior and erroneous beliefs about human sexuality, and change the minds of the average American. And they have been incredibly successful. But it doesn’t stop there. Ultimately, the goal is to enforce total submission to the dogmas of transgender ideology or else risk excommunication from our now “trans-affirming” society. Trans activists proudly wave their victory flags as they continue to issue new, ever-changing, always-conflicting doctrines and mete out punishment upon the heretics. What was once dismissed as silliness is now the new rigid orthodoxy. The transgender movement is a strategy of deception that is contrary to science, reason, and authentic human flourishing. Unfortunately, many have been thoroughly deceived, others have been coerced to step in line, and some courageous enough to call out the lies have been forcefully silenced.
“Inclusivity” was the seemingly-innocent vehicle to unleash this sexual confusion upon the masses. It was the honey used to help the medicine go down the throats of Americans. Now that we see the honey was counterfeit, it’s time also to assess the contents of the sinister concoction that is being forced upon us. The following is an analysis of 10 of the most devastating contradictions, in terms of both logical incoherence and detrimental effects, put forward by trans activists.
The idea that gender identity is “innate” has been gaining ground. Some people are simply born trans, they say. Because gender identity is unchanging, when a person embraces a trans identity he doesn't change from a man to a woman, or vice versa, he simply discovers who he always was.
However, at the same time, we’re told gender is “fluid.” According to this CNN article, “how one identifies can change every day or even every few hours.” Gender, which refers to the psychological and cultural characteristics associated with sex, is considered malleable and wholly separate from biological sex.
These cannot both be true. (In reality, neither is true, but the point here is simply to call out the contradiction.) Gender identity cannot both be “innate and unchanging” and “fluid.” But rather than being consistent and sticking with one, trans activists will assert both, depending what is convenient at the time.
It’s worth lingering for a moment on the logical consequences of this. If gender is fluid, we could never know with absolute certainty if anyone was male or female. Think about it. If gender is fluid and can change “every few hours,” what if someone died unexpectedly before being able to update his current gender on social media? Even the skeletal remains of those who have lived generations ago would provide no evidence of their gender since gender isn’t tied to biology, they say. Perhaps then no one could say with confidence that anyone had a great-grandfather. How could it be proved that we don’t all have four great-grandmothers?
LGBT advocates bemoan the restrictive usage of rigid gender stereotypes. As they should. Men are not less masculine if they help with the dishes and women are not less feminine if they are assertive in board meetings.
However, while claiming to reject gender stereotypes, trans activists rely on these very stereotypes to determine if someone may have a trans identity. Instead of rejecting gender stereotypes and allowing a 4-year old boy to wear pink or a 12-year old girl to prefer dressing in baggy “boy clothes” who simultaneously exhibits unusually aggressive behavior, those in the medical community who affirm transgender ideology see this as evidence for a trans identity that needs to be affirmed for the wellbeing of the child. Rigid gender stereotypes should be rejected, and because they should be rejected, we should let boys be boys and girls be girls in the broadest sense of the phrase. This means boys should be free to enjoy stereotypical girl activities, such as playing with dolls over racing trucks in the mud, and girls should be free to enjoy stereotypical boy activities, such as watching football over figure skating, without calling into question their gender.
I once asked a friend who endorses transgender ideology if he would affirm me one day if I were to tell him I now identify as a 5-foot tall, Chinese grandmother. After much hesitation, he admitted he could never accept that that is who I truly was, even if I was fully convinced of it myself. I admit I was a bit surprised but relieved by his common sense response. But the question is why. Why can feelings determine reality when it comes to sex but not when it comes to other biological factors including age, height, race, or even species?
Trans activists cannot give a reasonable let alone unified answer. On the latter point, some are willing to bite the bullet and say, “Yes, if you truly feel that you are a cat then I affirm that you are a cat. Who am I to say otherwise? I don’t want to judge, and anyone is free to be whoever or whatever they want to be.” Thankfully, claiming that someone can become a cat still seems ridiculous to the average person, even those who otherwise affirm transgender ideology. Nearly everyone would still be willing to say, as a matter of conscience, “No, I’m sorry if this hurts your feelings, but you are not a cat. I simply can’t affirm what you are not.” Now we just need to take one more step back into reality where we can all reaffirm, without judgement and as a matter of fact, that one cannot become the other sex just because one feels like it.
Insisting that others didn’t feel something they actually did is the height of hypocrisy and ideological oppression. And this is exactly what the trans community does when they reject those who detransition. Sadly, the growing number of people who detransition are often labeled “traitors” or are told that they were never really trans in the first place, even though they are simply coming to believe that who they truly are is not in conflict with their biological sex as they mistakenly believed.
This happened to Chloe Cole, one of the brave individuals who was a victim of gender ideology and has been traveling the country sharing her story to warn others about the dangers of transitioning. She started medically transitioning at 13 with the full support of the medical staff, had a double mastectomy at 15, then detransitioned only a year later at age 16. As a preteen she was a social outcast for her tomboy personality and thought that transitioning would resolve her anxiety and hatred of her body based on the glamorous stories she found posted by the online trans community. However, transitioning only increased her suffering, and she realized her gender dysphoria was only a phase brought on by receiving unwanted attention to her body when she underwent puberty earlier than her classmates. Detransitioning resolved her identity crises but it can never undue the harm that she was allowed to inflict upon herself as an anxious and confused teenager.
Hudson Byblow has also widely-shared his story of struggling with his sexual identity. His earliest memories involve cross-dressing, and as a young boy he daydreamed what it would be like to be a girl. He first experienced pornography around the age of 9, which had a profound effect on him. A combination of moving on to gay and trans porn, which gave a bigger high than his initial porn experience, and being molested by a man as a teenager, led him to begin internalizing the identity of gay and then trans. He never medically transitioned, just as many who identify as trans don’t. But he soon found that his unwanted homosexual desires didn’t define him and his true identity could not be separated from his biological sex. Ultimately, the only way Hudson found peace was by rejecting these false identities and returning to his Catholic faith.
Many others have shared publicly that they were lied to by medical professionals and that transitioning did not provide lasting relief or resolve their underlying issues. Rather, social and especially medical transitioning increased their suffering. It’s time we take the stories of detransitions seriously. There are real men and women, boys and girls being harmed by LGBT ideology, many of whom now have to face the very practical, life-altering consequences of being encouraged and assisted in destroying their bodies.
If a man could be “stuck inside a woman’s body” it’s necessary to know what a man is and what a woman is for this statement to have any meaning. The problem is, no coherent answer can be given by trans activists. “A woman is anyone who identifies as a woman” is as meaningful as saying “a triangle is anything that is a triangle.” A definition based on the word it seeks to define is circular and therefore meaningless. If someone identifies a four-sided object as a triangle, that identification would be wrong based on the definition of a triangle. For a triangle to be a triangle, it must have three sides, and only three sides.
It’s not enough to critique an obviously false idea. So what is a man and what is a woman? A man is an adult human being ordered towards impregnation. A woman is an adult human being ordered towards gestation. These definitions do not reduce persons to mere reproductive functions, but it is necessary to define sex by looking to biological reproductive capacities. Jason Evert quotes Neuroscientist Dr. Deborah Soh who explains that “Sex is defined … by gametes, which are mature reproductive cells.” Soh continues, “There are only two types of gametes: small ones called sperm that are produced by males, and large ones called eggs that are produced by females. There are no intermediate types of gametes, between egg and sperm cells. It is not a spectrum” (Male, Female, Other?, 56). The ability to produce one of the two gametes is determined at the moment of conception and is embedded in our DNA.
The fact that in rare cases someone’s biological sex cannot easily be determined does not disprove the sexual binary and leave open the possibility of a third gender. Even the difficult intersex cases rely on the sexual binary as there could be ambiguous genitalia of the two sexes. There is no third gamete; sex is not a spectrum.
Likewise, infertility does not somehow render the sexual binary void. If someone is blind that doesn’t somehow mean there are some people who are “transvisual.” Infertility involves damaged organs, and an infertile man is no less a man than a fertile one. A blind man is a man who has visual organs that don’t work properly, and an infertile man is a man who has reproductive organs that don’t work properly.
While some make the unscientific claim there is such a thing as a “trans brain,” many trans activists are content to abandon the body entirely as a means to determining gender. (Of course, many won’t shy away from claiming both that there is a “trans brain” and that gender is not based on biology. Needless to say, that’s another contradiction in and of itself.) Biology does not determine gender. Whatever gender (or nongender) they feel like in the moment, apart from any physical or biological features, is who they truly are.
Ironically, even though gender is said not to be based on the body, bodily transitioning is seen as a necessary solution for those who identify as a gender at odds with their biological sex. To put it another way, our bodies don’t determine our gender but bodily transformation in line with rigid gender stereotypes is necessary to affirm our gender. Either way, the claim is our bodies don’t matter but they do matter. Which is it?
“Gender-affirming care” is promoted as life-saving medical treatment when in reality it is a euphemism for unprecedented experimentation of the human body and entails grave and wide-spread medical abuse. A study has shown that those who have medically transitioned are at 19 times greater risk of suicide compared to the general population. While this doesn’t prove causality, it should elicit caution in promoting medical transitions. At the very least, it provides strong evidence that the underlying issues of those experiencing gender dysphoria are not resolved after transitioning. Additionally, the American College of Pediatricians explains that 80 to 95 percent of children experiencing gender dysphoria naturally grow out of it after passing through puberty. Yet we find that trans-affirming medical professionals, instead of cautiously working to understand the possible underlying causes of gender dysphoria, including childhood trauma, psychological disorders, and learning disabilities, and allow time for the gender dysphoria to likely dissipate on its own, maddeningly choose to fast-track children to embark on gender transitions with life-altering consequences.
Space does not permit an extensive survey of the medical abuses involved, but I will list a few of the consequences of so-called “gender-affirming care.” What should be emphasized, however, is that all forms of medical treatment that seeks to reinforce a transgender identity involve medical abuse because the efforts work under the false belief that one’s true gender could be at odds with one’s biological sex.
On the last point, consider body integrity identity disorder (BIID) which is a psychological disorder that causes one to believe a limb or body part should not be a part of one’s body. Rather than amputating a healthy limb, which would be a serious act of medical abuse, reputable clinics would seek to resolve the psychological disorder and help the patient to feel comfortable with his body. This clinic says, “Ethically, surgeons and providers won’t perform an amputation on a healthy limb without a clear medical need. This goes against the ‘do no harm’ principle of healthcare.” When it comes to the psychological disorder called gender dysphoria, the same “do no harm” principle should be heeded and healthy reproductive organs should not be removed. (Unfortunately, the same clinic opposed to amputating a healthy limb, has no qualms about removing healthy reproductive organs.) Rather, as a matter of proper and ethical medical intervention, medical professionals should help one feel comfortable with one’s biological sex and address the underlying issues that may have led to the onset of gender dysphoria.
Needless to say, there are many dangerous consequences of “gender-affirming care,” many of which are irreversible. Given the experiential nature of transgender medical intervention and the numerous known short-term and long-term effects, “gender-affirming care” can be likened to the horrors of lobotomy, a not-so-distant dark period in medical history, and is a case of rampant medical abuse harming those we love.
Care must be taken to find reasonable accommodations for those experiencing gender dysphoria or who identify as trans. (These are not the same thing; one could identify as trans without experiencing any discomfort or anxiety about one’s body, unlike someone experiencing gender dysphoria.) For example, opening unisex restroom facilities for those who identify as trans who otherwise might feel uncomfortable in a restroom aligning with their biological sex would help to protect their privacy. But this isn’t good enough for trans activists. Trans activists demand that those who identify as trans have unrestricted and unquestioned access to things such as public restrooms and school locker rooms that align with one’s gender identity rather than one’s biological sex.
But what about the safety of other vulnerable individuals, including girls and women who have suffered from sexual abuse? If a biological man can simply claim to be a woman and walk into a girl’s bathroom, locker room, or battered women’s shelter unimpeded (since even questioning or requiring some sort of evidence of one’s gender identity is considered discriminatory), what is to prevent a sexual predator from taking advantage of this policy? Unfortunately, there are increasing reports of this occurring. Even if the risk of this may be remote, the increased possibility itself can be psychologically debilitating for girls and women. Being forced to share facilities with the opposite sex is inappropriate and dismissive of the very real concerns of some of the most vulnerable in our society and in our schools.
Segregating restrooms based on sex is not bigotry, it’s a simple matter of biology. Men’s and women’s bodies are biologically different, and the concerns of biological girls and boys having to share facilities with those of the opposite sex cannot be flippantly dismissed.
In schools with trans-affirming staff, children with special needs are especially vulnerable to a mistaken claim of “privacy.” Due to inflexible black-and-white thinking, children with autism in particular have a higher likelihood of experiencing gender dysphoria if they don’t easily fit into a masculine or feminine stereotype. They could have a hard time developing an understanding that it’s okay to be a boy who doesn’t like certain “boy things” or to be a girl who isn’t “girly” because their concept of gender is fixed upon simplistic gender stereotypes. This means autistic children have an outsized risk of being encouraged to embrace a false trans identity.
Autistic or not, in some schools, in order to “protect the privacy” of a child who identifies as trans, the staff will use the child’s preferred pronouns in class but will revert back to pronouns aligning with the child’s biological sex when communicating with the child’s parents if the parents are found to be unsupportive of the trans identity. This is troubling on many levels with any child involved, but especially if the child is autistic. If a child with anorexia identifies as obese, would it be supportive or abusive to secretly encourage this false identity and withhold this information from the child’s parents? To say that it’s idiodic and unethical to trust a psychologically impaired child’s feelings as the basis for reality—let alone any child’s—while simultaneously lying to a child’s parents as a matter of “privacy,” is a gross understatement.
“Everything is about the ‘T’ now, entirely eclipsing the ‘L,’ ‘G,’ and ‘B,’” says lesbian feminist Julia Beck. She continues, “‘T’ is diametrically opposed to the first three letters in the acronym.”
One of the most flagrant contradictions of LGBT ideology is that the sexual ideologies represented by the letters “LGBT” are in internal, irreconcilable conflict with one another. (This is before adding any other letters, numbers, or symbols, such as the dizzying “2SLGBTQIA+” advertised on the website of one trans activist organization. One may wonder at which point a movement loses all hope of meaning when the average person cannot understand an acronym even after it is decoded with the latest round of coined terms and definitions.)
The feminist movement fought hard to establish women as equal to men. This is not without merit as men and women are different but complementary and indeed equal in dignity. However, with the emergence of transgenderism, the “T” is undermining the gains made by feminists. If the feminist movement is about elevating women, the transgender movement is about destroying the very idea of women. And if feminists don’t get along with the program and allow “trans women” to pass as real women, they are silenced and labeled “transphobic,” which is ironic considering “L” came on the scene first, both historically and in the acronym LGBT.
Recall Julia Beck’s video linked in the previous section. As a lesbian feminist, she goes on to explain that she was ousted from the Baltimore mayor’s LGBT Commission. For what? Refusing to refer to a male rapist by his preferred female pronouns. He was a rapist, and she is the one guilty of “violence.” You heard that right. This is not a fight between conservatives and liberals. This is a fight between transgender activists and the rest of the world, including feminists on the far left.
Transgender ideology did not pop up in a vacuum. There are several philosophical principles that have been eroding and reshaping the modern mind, one of which is relativism, the idea that there is no objective truth. Reality is whatever individuals subjectively believe it to be, the world tells us. There is nothing that is objectively right or wrong; whatever feels good—go for it.
It is not hard to see how this permeates and energizes the transgender movement. Without anything objective out in the world which is true and real for everyone, we can turn into ourselves and determine our own reality. Our bodies are no exception. “Male” and “female” have no objective meaning as discovered in nature. Rather, these are simply terms to be reshaped or abandoned if it does not align with one’s ever-evolving inner sense of self.
Therefore, affirming one’s subjective beliefs without question is at the heart of transgender ideology. However, this poses an immediate problem. What if someone’s subjective beliefs are at odds with someone else’s? Consider a homosexual couple where one partner transitions and now identifies as a woman. If the other male partner stays in the relationship, must he affirm he is now in a heterosexual partnership? Can someone’s subjective beliefs change objective reality for others? What if my subjective feeling is that someone identifying as a “trans woman” is not really a woman? Once again, transgender ideology collapses under the oppressive weight of its own incoherence.
Conclusion
The question of who we are—our identity—is not a mild hunger. It is our pressing question, and we are starving without a satisfying answer. In a truth-starved world we are offered false solutions, transgenderism being among the most menacing. Wholly untethered from truth, it is not surprising that this mangled ideology peddled by trans activists is hopelessly confused and filled with contradictions. It remains unruly and dangerous, but when transgenderism is brought into the light, its true form is revealed; it’s vanquished of its only real power, its power of deception. This article is far from an attack on those who have embraced a lie—it is a beacon of hope shining in the darkness, illuminating a path of escape from the shape-shifting fiend prowling about in the shadows seeking the destruction of embodied souls.
For those struggling with gender dysphoria, my heart goes out to you. This is a heavy cross, one I have not had to endure. The Church has not always loved you well, I fully admit, but I believe with everything I have that the Church is the only place you can be accepted where you are while being called to embrace your true identity. Your loving Father made you in his image and likeness, either male or female at the moment of conception, and he loves you unconditionally. This is your identity, and we all share in the beautiful God-given gift of our human sexuality. There is hope in the Truth.
Many others reading this do not struggle with gender dysphoria but struggle to comprehend the mysterious world of transgenderism. It is a dystopian nightmare manifesting itself before us, and it’s deeply unsettling and confusing, causing harm to those we know and love. My hope is this article provides clarity to this often foreign set of ideas and that you are now better prepared to think through this more carefully and engage others more effectively and charitably. To learn more, I highly encourage checking out the resources below.
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