The Troubles With Genders

How one can change genders and fit into society is today's hot topic  both in society and in the culture wars. How did it get this way?

We have a few problems with genders. For one thing, we live in a society that uses assigned biological sex to categorize us instead of in addition to gender. Meanwhile, we have more genders than our biological sex categories know what to do with. And so what we have is the pigeonhole principle. We end up with people from multiple genders being grouped  into the same biological sex category. And not everyone is happy with who has moved in theirs or other's biological sex neighborhood.

What is causing further tension is that  people are using their favorite ideology, which includes religion, alone to try to understand and solve the problems created by the expanded list of gender identities when science is telling us that biological factors can possibly contribute gender identification. This means that in order to resolve the conflict that arises when we have more gender identities than biological sex categories, people are demanding solutions while either deliberately ignoring or lacking awareness of what science is saying about gender dysphoria and identity. Thus the gender identity battlefield becomes hotly contested because, for many of us, the veracity of our favorite ideology is at stake. And so now many of us have personal investments in how others are categorized by biological sex.

In addition, gender identities don't always sit well in the biological sex categories in which they have been placed. Because we can't conflate the two, when the biological sex of a person makes a significant difference, the emphasis on gender identity is misplaced and those who strongly identify as being other than cisgendered have salt rubbed into their centuries-old wounds.

And speaking of those wounds, we have a long history, again counted in multiple centuries, of people who have a different sexual orientation than heterosexual or are not cisgendered being punished by our laws and marginalized in society. And these people are rightfully demanding equality. But they do not have enough allies in society who are willing and ready to cooperate in making their equality a reality.

From my perspective, those are all of the factors that makes gender identities other than being cisgendered such such a mess for society and a great hardship for those who are demanding their equality now. But again, that is from my perspective.

One common practice of those who are both relying on ideology alone to solve the gender identity problems is that they tend to conflate one's biological sex with one's gender identity. One might assume that only  religiously conservative Christians who are trying to resolve the gender identity problem of conflating biological sex and gender identity. After all, such people try to insist that the presence of the sex chromosomes and the physical appearance of the the genitalia are all the information one needs to know to determine with which gender a person should identify with.

However, there are those from the LGBT community who insist on conflating biological sex with gender identity as well. Their version of conflating the two consists of using only their gender identity to determine their biological sex. They do that despite the fact that gender identity deals with the psychological while biological sex deals with the physical. Because of the differences between one's biological sex and gender identity, one would think that resolving this problem would be a slam-dunk. However, since biological factors might affect gender identity, we have to admit that the distinction could be more complicated than we are willing to admit.

Also, those who insist that their ideology alone can solve the problems that come with gender dysphoria and identity also tend to be overly simplistic in identifying the causes for our gender identity problems. If we take my fellow religiously conservative American Christians for example, they believe that the prime cause for gender identities other than cisgendered is sin. And so the solution would be for the non-cisgendered is to repent and believe in Christ. They believe that because that is what they believe is the cause and solution for all of our social problems. That not everyone, or even enough people, who suffer from gender dysphoria will repent and believe does not alter that religious approach.

Or if we take Robert Jensen's approach where the root cause for gender dysphoria is patriarchy and the solution is provided by radical feminism, we see a leftist version of how many of my fellow religiously conservative American Christians see and want to solve the problems with gender dysphoria. BTW, I hate disagreeing with Jensen because I have learned much from him. But like my fellow religiously conservative American Christians, he does not factor in enough of the biological factors that scientists are telling us are possible causes for gender dysphoria.

However, Jensen makes a very valid point against letting transgendered females participate in women's sports. It is that  they have benefited from being male in that males TEND to make them stronger than cisgendered females--musicians like me, certainly not all musicians, didn't always follow that tendency throughout our lives. And thus regardless of how far a male has transitioned into a female, they tend to have a physical advantage over cisgendered females and thus should not participate in women's sports.

That, along with the bathroom issue is why some of our gender identities don't always sit well with their preferred biological sex category. And these two areas are two of the areas where we see where the problems with gender identity causes the biggest commotion in society.

So what are many of the scientists telling us? For one thing, they are telling us that genetic mutations can contribute to gender dysphoria. In addition, males and females have different brain structures. And it seems that at least some with gender dysphoria are identifying with the sex associated with their brain structure. And so at least some females with gender dysphoria are identifying as males because they have a male brain structure while at least some males identifying as females do so because they have a female brain structure.

Science is also telling us that those with gender dysphoria tend to suffer from depression more than the cisgendered do. Those with gender dysphoria are also more at risk for committing suicide than their cisgendered counterparts. There are several factors that drive this tendency. Those factors range from the discomfort one feels when suffering from gender dysphoria to the negative reactions of family members, friends, and others to both the state of a person's gender dysphoria to their attempted transitioning. 

But there is a very small minority of cases where people who transitioned from male to female or vice-versa regret their decisions.

So, what how should we respond to gender identity problems. One thing we can do is to admit our society's structural weaknesses in solving this problem. One such weakness is how we use a binary approach to categorize people by biological sex. In reality, we have 3 biological sexes: male, female, and intersex. And we need to acknowledge that to show that perhaps the differences between males and females, though significant, are less than what we continue to think they are.

Another societal structural weaknesses is that we don't include gender identity along with biological sex in categorizing people. Using both gender identity and biological sex to categorize people would eliminate how our current pigeonhole principle contributes to the problems with gender identity. That is we would no longer have to have people with more than two different gender identities placed in the same biological sex category. Such a remedy would be costly and require significant changes to our society. These changes would be more than just acknowledging the difference between biological sex and gender on one's birth certificates. It would require changes in how we run sports programs, share bathrooms and shower facilities, group people people schools and colleges for example. And those changes would not be without problems. But we have acknowledge that categorizing people solely by one's biological sex and then trying to force a binary approach to that categorization is a structural weakness that ensures that the mere addressing gender identity problems will forever a highly contentious venture. 

Also, we have to abandon solely relying on preferred ideologies to understand and try to solve the problems that go with acknowledging more than 2 genders. It's not that we abandon our preferred ideologies. It is that we let those ideologies be tempered by what science is telling us. Here we should note that if scientists do not fully understand the causes for gender dysphoria, then those who rely on their preferred ideologies alone who also ignore or are unaware of science is saying about the subject will know even less. But unfortunately, those who know less about gender dysphoria and identity seem to be speaking the loudest about the subject.

Finally, because we live in a democratic society, we must be promoting for and working for the equal rights of those with whom we agree and disagree. That is because in a democratic society, we must become invested in promoting the full equality of others in society. That is because democracy is more than just the majority rule, it is about equality.

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs for May 3, 2023

 April 28

To Heidelblog and Rosaria Butterfield for the segment of Butterfield's article that acts as a public repentance for using the preferred pronouns of those who changed their gender identity due to gender dysphoria.

Butterfield's full article can be found at:

    https://www.reformation21.org/blog/why-i-no-longer-use-transgender-pronouns-and-why-you-shouldnt-either

Besides the fact that Butterfield hardline approach to pronouns and gender identity shows that she currently uses the same kind of thinking which she used as a radical feminist only on the other side of coin, there is a real problem with her whole article. What she said about Transgenderism being satanic can be said about any religion outside of the Christian faith. And yet we rightfully publicly call followers of Islam 'Muslims' rather than 'Satanists.' We call those who don't believe in God 'Atheists' rather than 'Satanists.' And it goes on down the line with other religions. We use those names respectfully because of where those people stand in society. We use those names because we recognize their equal standing with us in society.

Of course, there is another problem with Butterfield's approach here. She seems to be conflating biological sex with gender identity--something that the LGBT community does only from the other side of the coin. Biological sex deals with the physical while gender identity deals with the psychological. And so using preferred pronouns can be respectful of someone's adopted gender identity without denying what the Scriptures say about us being made male and female. 

Also, quoting Genesis 1:27 the way she does shows that she forgets that that passage occurred before the Fall when both man and nature suffered corruption because of Adam's sin. So now, we have 3 biological sexes: male, female, and intersex. And now we have people identifying as a different gender than their biological sex at birth would indicate. We have others who identify as being gender fluid. We should note that gender dysphoria and identifying as a different gender than the biological sex at one's birth existed well before the recent controversy about gender identity came about. We've had cross dressers and men who identified as women in America even before the beginning of the 20th century. But more telling than that, some Native American tribes recognized up to 5 different genders and they honored such people attributing their gender identity to the triumph of the spirt over the flesh. Though their approach to gender identities are different in certain ways than the current approach by the LGBT community, what we see is that adopting a different gender identity than if one was cisgendered is not a new phenomenon that just started in our current time.

Finally, though gender identity is a psychological concept, there are possible biological factors that can influence one's gender identity. For example, the following from a plain language summary on gender dysphoria from an article posted in the National Library of Medicine says the following. (see  https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7415463/   ):

'<b>When research has been conducted in people with Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome, a condition where the testosterone receptor is mutated and faulty, and thus cannot function, gender dysphoria is observed as the body is genetically male but anatomically female. It is known that the structure of male and female brains differs; it is found that people with gender dysphoria have a brain structure more comparable to the gender to which they identify. The review of the literature suggests that there is a disparity between the brains of those who identify differently to their assigned gender at birth, highlighting a multifactorial underpinning of the gender identity.</b>'

We simply don't know all of the factors involved in gender dysphoria and the identifying of being a gender different from one biological sex that occurred at birth. And so for as long as we distinguish, rather than conflate,  biological sex and gender identity, it would be wise for the reputation of the Gospel that we Christians use a person's preferred pronouns when referring to them lest further research on the subject makes us look like some past Christian leaders, such as Calvin and Luther, when they openly mocked those who promoted Heliocentrism, which was later proven to be true.

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April 29

To Michael Weiner and the reposting of his article on Religion's role in America's founding and preservation. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.

Perhaps we should realize that America's religions have failed to provide what religion was tasked with in the above article. And we should note that if religion is the glue that binds society, then the religion that does just that cannot be an exclusive religion unless that exclusive religion becomes the state religion. But such a state of affairs provides a major reason why American religion has failed to deliver the goods promised in the above article.

The above provides some descriptions of America that lack adequate context. The government formed by our Constitution was one that, though providing a more free situation than the aristocracies that existed in Europe at the time, it was written because of and for the protection of America's new elites. The Senate was formed as a hedge against populism. The Constitution itself took a hands off approach to voting rights though few could vote when the document was being written. 

We should note that back then, many people were protesting the economic times in which America's new elites were benefiting from. And these elites looked down on democracy back then because many people want certain practices that would benefit ordinary people. In fact, the writing of The Constitution was written in response to widespread dissent and Shays Rebellion.

If we want to know what should restrain us from exploiting each other, it is found in the meaning of the words 'freedom' or 'liberty,' not in religion. For the formula below goes a long way in telling us how to prevent ourselves from exploiting others:

    Freedom - equality = privilege

With that formula, if we pursue our own freedom, we will also try to avoid being privileged and having a supremacy over others. And with that we will go a long way in not just being free, but in being virtuous as well. Perhaps we will go farther in pursuing freedom and virtue than our nation's forefathers. Then again, regarding our nation's forefathers, if they didn't favor slavery, they definitely believed in white supremacy. Thus they provided a much lower bar than we give them credit for in the pursuit of freedom and virtue.

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For March 15, 2023

Feb 22

To Heidelblog and Ari Schaffer for the part of Schaffer's article that reported on the Buckley Program' Eighth Annual College Student Survey. 

The survey has some problems in the options provided. One major problem is that many of the categories for the choice of answers are not well-defined. For example, when asking students if they feel uncomfortable with giving a dissenting opinion to classmates or professors, the selection of answers are 'Frequently,' 'Sometimes,' 'Rarely,' and 'Never.' Three of those answers are not well-defined. In addition, 'Frequently' and 'Sometimes' are grouped as categorized as 'Often' whereas 'Rarely' and 'Never' are counted as 'Not Often.'  To further complicate the issue, the mathematical definition of the word 'some' is at least 1. That could mean that when students answered 'Sometimes,' they could have meant 'Rarely' and vice-versa.

In addition, the existence of free speech is expressed in binary terms. If hate speech, and that goes undefined, is allowed, then this is counted as being an infringement on free speech and the First Amendment. But yelling 'fire' in a public space is against the law. Is that an infringement on Free Speech? Would some forms of labeling or describing people from a particular race, religion, sexual orientation, or gender identity a threat to society be similar yelling 'fire' in a public place when some of those statements led to violence against those of a given race, religion, sexual orientation, or gender identity?

Are we aware that denying the Holocaust is illegal in some European countries? If that was the case here, would that be an infringement on the First Amendment? Is denying the existence of systemic racism in America today on par with denying the Holocaust in some European countries? 

And why isn't this blog post including the efforts of Governors DeSantis and Abbott in their report on Free Speech on campuses? Why are teachers and professors afraid of talking about America's past in certain states like Florida or Texas?

Finally, without providing definitions for both socialism and capitalism, the data is insignificant. Which form of capitalism was referred to in the survey? Was it the Bretton-Woods System or Neoliberal Capitalism? This is an important question because the conservative definitions of capitalism and socialism since the Bretton-Woods system of capitalism allows for far more government intervention than Neoliberal Capitalism. 

Which form of socialism was referred to in the survey? Was it Stalinism, which many Marxists do not think of as Socialism, or was it the form that emphasizes the redistribution of power to the workers? Here we should note that Germany's codetermination. laws makes Germany's economic system a hybrid of both Marxism and capitalism.  Or, again, did students use the conservative definition of socialism--big government--while answering the question? Were the students who answered the question about capitalism and socialism aware of all of those distinctions?

The above findings are flawed because the survey was flawed by utilizing not well-defined terms in its answers. But that won't stop some conservatives from using the change in statistics over the years to sound the alarm and incite fear where fear is not warranted.

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Feb 25

To Thaddeus Kozinski and his article that reviews what has occurred since the end of Christendom and calls for Christendom's return. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.

When we look at what has blossomed since the end of Christendom, as listed in the above article, we must realize one point: what Christendom has suppressed. And when we look at what Christendom has suppressed and what has flourished in its absence, we need to ask why would we ever want a return to Christendom.

We should note in this Post Modern age, that Pre Modernism and Modernism has not totally left the world. Pre Modernism is alive and well within most of the major players who're engaged in committing atrocities today. That means that we can't scapegoat secularism for today's threats. And where we can blame secularism, we should note a common thread that is shared by those remnants of Pre Modernism that is producing atrocities: authoritarianism. And when one looks at the definition of Christendom, we need to ask if it is possible to have a Christendom that is lacking in authoritarianism.

Until we can find a form of Christendom that is void of authoritarianism, selling  Christendom today should be near impossible to the outside world. In fact, if we look at how we should share society with those who believe differently, perhaps we should leave Christendom on the ash heap of history and then go on to study how we Christians can contribute to a truly pluralistic and peaceful society and world. Of course one way in which we can contribute to such a world is to tolerate all others who seek such a society and world. But such toleration means forsaking our authoritarian proclivities.

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To Joseph Mussomeli and his article on the Russian war against Ukraine. In his article, Musomelli has criticized the American involvement in the war as a search for the perfect war. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.

Though lessons from WW II abound on both sides of Russia's war against Ukraine, to make Hitler the focal point in trying to understand Putin is a grave error.

The lessons that abound from WW II involve Russia's history with invasions from the West and Europe's history with Imperial dreams starting with one invasion and then advancing an invasion or concession at a time. Both sensitivities are valid. And what goes unmentioned is that NATO's move eastward violated the understanding of the agreement made between Bush I and Gorbachev. Gorbachev stated that in his book, <I>The New Russia</I>.

But to understand what we can from Putin, we should keep our eyes focused on Russian history rather than turning our gaze toward Hitler. Before the October, 1917 Revolution stood the Russian Empire governed by the Tsars. For most of those Tsars, authoritarianism was to Russia what Christendom was to America. The Tsars so identified themselves with the nation of Russia that they believed that any opposition to them was a challenge to the nation itself. Lenin continued that same mentality only with using different labels such as 'proletariat' or 'revolution' for 'Russia' and 'Soviet Union' for 'Russian Empire.'  Stalin was Lenin on steroids. Khrushchev brought a brief reprieve that was only repeated by his successors. And it wasn't until Gorbachev that we saw a significantly real break in Russia's authoritarianism. That authoritarianism started to resurrect itself when Yeltsin had power.

Who knows what Putin wants and what is going on in his mind? Nobody knows enough for sure, but we are seeing repeats of Russian and Soviet Union history in Putin's words and actions. And we only need to look at Putin's authoritarian rule over his own people, his history in Chechnya and Georgia,  and his stated reasons, which seemed to have resembled Bush II when defending his own invasion of Iraq, for the invasion against Ukraine.

Putin is attempting to silence Russians's opposition to the war with arrests and imprisonment at home and threats and attempts at intimidation outside of Russia. Putin claims that Ukrainians are Russians. Putin, via the Archbishop of the Russian Orthodox Church, has stated that the 'special operation' is necessary to protect Russia from Western decadence. And, btw, it is Putin who is pointing to the Nazis by claiming that he trying to de-nazify Ukraine. Putin has made references to the NATO threat to Russia from Ukraine. And Putin has reportedly written about renewing the Russian Empire. If that is true, and there is evidence that supports that in Belarus, then though Germany is safe, quite a few other nations are not. There is also the Rodney Dangerfield complaint that Putin believes that Russia gets no respect. That complaint was one of the reported reasons why Khrushchev put missiles in Cuba.

It appears that no current world leader has either read the Russell-Einstein Manifesto or, if they had remembers it. That Manifesto clearly states that in the nuclear age we have a choice between relying on war and existence. And yet, imperialism cannot be tolerated--a lesson learned from WW II. That puts us between a rock and a hard place, none of which was recognized in the above article despite the some of the good but irrelevant points it made.

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March 7

To Scott McDermand and the first of 2 planned articles which partially layout a case for and defend the Regulative Principle of worship as promoted by the Reformers. This article was posted by Heidelblog.

There are multiple problems with the regulative principle for worship. They include:

1.   The interpretation of the 2nd Commandment used to claim and defend the regulative principle goes well beyond any plain reading of the that commandment. For in that commandment, God only tells us about a certain set of objects that we cannot make as well as a worship practice that we must not employ.  That is simply the plain reading of the 2nd Commandment. To say anything beyond that is to read into the Scriptures.

2.    Yes, other parts of the Old Testament specify exactly how God must be worshiped, but those ways are based on both man's standing with God before Christ died and rose again and how those ways of worship were shadows of and thus what would be fulfilled and thus made useless by Christ's 1st coming. To insist on the regulative principle is to employ an Old Testament mentality on the New Testament community. Here, we should remember about what Jesus said to the woman at the well in John 4: that there will come a time when instead of having to go to Jerusalem, we must worship God in spirit and in truth.

Having said that, there is something to learn from the regulative principle. That care must be taken in how we approach the worship of God. When we are not reverent enough in how we approach the worship of God, it is because we are being presumptuous about our standing before God. For we can only stand before and worship God because of God's grace and mercy which has been shown to and showered on those who believe in Christ. Again, we are to worship God in spirit and in truth. Thus, we must worship God in reverence acknowledging our unworthiness, outside of what Christ has done for us, to worship God in His house.

3.    The regulative principle was not practiced by Jesus nor by the Jews both before and when Jesus came to earth. In fact, there is no regulative principle described in the New Testament. Paul does describe how believers were coming together to worship; but that was simply a description, not an exclusive set of rules.

We should note something else here. When the regulative principle is generalized to other practices and approaches outside of worship, we, paradoxically, limit how we can use the New Testament to guide how we live when we meet circumstances and situations that were not experienced in the New Testament. 

At the same time, we must remember Romans 14 when fellowshipping with fellow believers who adhere to the regulative principle as they must do the same with fellowshipping with fellow believers who abide by the normative principle. The latter says that we must refrain from worshiping and living before God in ways forbidden by God's Word.

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March 9

To R. Scott Clark and his blog post against Christian Transformationalism because the New Testament calls us to be pilgrims and aliens, not transformers. This appeared in Heidelblog.

A weakness in Transformationalism which Clark did not point out is that, in the end, it is antithetical to democracy. In the end, it seeks a privileged position for Christianity in and over society. 

It is true that we are aliens in the world, though our lifestyles might not reflect that when we are financially privileged. But what does being an alien in this world prohibit Christians from doing when interacting with the world?

There are 2 weaknesses with 2KT, which is Clark's position. The first is its failure to acknowledge that to extent that it pushes natural law on society, it too is a form of transformationalism. This is especially apparent in how it views sexual issues, especially homosexuality. That same sex behavior is demonstrated in around 1,500 species of animals shows that the natural law being pushed by 2KT is a Christian view of natural law.

The 2nd weakness of 2KT is that it prohibits the Church from speaking out as an institution against corporate sins. Corporate sins such as systemic racism, economic exploitation and classism, sexism and patriarchy, immoral wars, a renewed arms race and militarism, and destroying the earth's ability to adequately sustain human life either because of pollution and/or climate change must be visibly opposed by the Church as an institution. When the Church does not publicly speak out against these sins, it becomes complicit with them. 

And though I  disagree with Clark's overall position here, I do agree  with him when he says that the Church is not charged to bring a golden age onto the earth. But opposing corporate sins and working for social justice does not imply that one is working for an ecclesiastical golden age. Neither does opposing corporate sins and working for social justice imply that one is working to establish a  privileged place for the Church in society. 

If we want to look at a good example of the Church as an institution speaking out against corporate sins, then we need to look no farther than what Martin Luther King Jr. and the SCLC did and said during the era of the Civil Rights Movement. Though King had golden age visions, what he and the SCLC opposed and what they promoted neither brought a golden age to America nor did it establish a privileged position for the Church in and over society. King and the SCLC simply opposed the sins of racism, economic exploitation, and militarism while promoting the rights and welfare of people without respect to religion. And where the Church was silent on racism, economic exploitation, and militarism back then, it was complicit with those sins just as the Church would be complicit if it didn't warn people against sexual immorality.

Of course, there is an immediate earthly advantage for the Church to be silent about corporate sins. That advantage is that that silence allows the Church to support those with wealth and power when those with wealth and power benefit from the committing of those corporate sins. But that kind of support should offend the Church since those in the Church are called to be aliens in this world.

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To Heidelblog and Carl Trueman for the portion of Trueman's article that was quoted from in this particular Heidelblog post. Trueman's article challenged evangelical leaders to be as courageous as J.K. Rowling was when she claimed that trans women are not women.

Trueman's article can be found at:

https://wng.org/opinions/are-evangelical-leaders-as-courageous-as-j-k-rowling-1677156614

 Carl's article contains nothing more than an authoritarian discourse aimed at refusing to distinguish those who have been helped by gender affirming care from those who are not. 

It is authoritarian because it involves a kind of all-or-nothing thinking about those who have been helped from receiving some level of gender-affirming care and those who provide it. His lack of precision and making distinctions in the different kinds of treatments that children with gender dysphoria are given is another example of a kind of all-or-nothing thinking he employs. And that kind of thinking is seen in his calling people evil in an emotional rant wrapped in  labels. In addition, Trueman's view of gender-affirming care do not seem to reflect J.K. Rowling on transgenderism. Rather, it seems that Trueman's mentality and approach to the subject has more in common with the critics of Rowling than Rowling herself.

If Trueman were to actually employ a rational argument, he would make meaningful distinctions like some of the ones mentioned above. If here were to employ a rational argument, he could borrow an argument from Robert Jensen, who is a leftist,  who looks at the Transgender issue from a feminist perspective. In arguing against allowing males who have transgendered into females to participate in women's sports, Jensen points out that one cannot  conflate gender identity with biological sex because while the former is psychological, the latter is biological--btw, that seems to be J.K. Rowling's view from what I read. Thus the two, biological sex and gender identity, could never be merged. And that those who started as biological males had a physical  advantage over cisgendered females in sports.

But then again, to refuse to conflate gender identity with biological sex on a consistent basis, Trueman and others would have to admit that biological sex is not the only factor involved in one's gender identity. But such an admission would go against a conservative authoritarian mindset.

Because many people have received help from gender affirming care and because we don't know all of the factors involved with  what causes people to experience gender dysphoria and seek a change in genders, we need to both talk with the awareness that  when talking we are walking on thin ice while remaining firm with our Scriptural convictions that transgenderism is wrong. That means that the issue of transgenderism is complicated. But those who prefer to make authoritarian appeals view complexity in the same way that Superman regards kryptonite.

Keeping up with the times in terms of knowledge does not imply that we must change our moral beliefs or shed religiously conservative convictions. Keeping up with the times means that we need to seek wisdom and understanding in order to grapple with today's issues while remaining faithful to the Scriptures. The kind of thinking involved in authoritarianism sees little to no need to seek wisdom and understanding here.

 

We Need A New Approach To Achieving Justice For The Transgendered

 Sometimes those who seek justice for a persecuted group imitate their enemies. Lenin did that when finishing the overthrow of the Tsar. Unfortunately, this is what is occurring for the Transgendered and those seeking to change genders.

Such as those from other groups in the LGBT community, the Transgendered have been sorely marginalized and abused. And there is no excuse for that. That marginalization and abuse is often the result of what has been taught in the name of Christ. Many of my fellow Christians wish to just marginalize the everyone in the LGBT community so that society teaches what the conservative Church teaches about sexual orientation and gender identity. That desire to marginalize the LGBT community is wrong and immoral.

One of the reasons why many of my fellow religiously conservative Christians believe in their efforts to marginalize the Transgendered community is that they equate one's biological sex status from birth with gender so that the biological sex status one is born with is the only factor one uses to determine one's gender identity.

Those who are or are seeking to be Transgendered rightfully disagree with how my fellow religiously conservative Christians think about one's biological sex status from birth and gender for society. Why would I say that my fellow Christians are wrong here? It comes from reading about how Native Americans approached gender identity. Some tribes recognized up to five different genders and their different gender identification groups did not always neatly follow the LGBT model of thinking. For example, men who more identified as women and women who more identified as men would work side by side and doing the work of those whose gender they most identified with. And this gender reassignment implied nothing about sexual orientation.  What we should note is that Native Americans recognized that gender identity can be determined by other factors besides the biological sex status one is born with. Our failure to consider that reality is a cause for the attempts by some to marginalize the Transgendered.

So what did these Native American tribes do differently from both my fellow religiously conservative Christians and LGBT community? What the latter two groups have in common is this equation between gender identity and one's biological sex status. For many of my fellow religiously conservative Christians, they equate one's biological sexual status with one's gender identity so that the former overrides the latter. But for those who are or are seeking to be transgendered, they too equate one's biological sex status with gender identity only in their case, they work to have their gender identity override the biological sex status they were born with.

The overriding of either biological sex status one was born with or one's gender identity is quite simply a denial of reality. Though I cannot relate to those who suffer from gender dysphoria, it is wrong for me to deny the reality of their gender identity. I can say what the Scriptures say about gender identification, but I must never deny the reality they live with.

So perhaps we need to restructure how we think about gender identity so that we try to neither deny the reality of the biological sex status each person is born with nor the reality of one's gender identity. Realize that this different approach is not the approach that should be taken in the Church; it should be taken in society only. The difference is because the Church should be ruled by the Scriptures while society should seek to practice democracy.

So when it comes to bathrooms, sports, and what other spheres that gender identity touches, we need to divide groups by gender rather than by just the biological sex status one was born with. Society needs to recognize both the biological sex status one was born with and gender identity and classify people by gender with the caveat that we recognize that there are more than two genders. In doing so, we avoid denying some undeniable realities and perhaps we will do more to recognize the rights of all involved, both the rights of those who are or are seeking to be transgendered and those who are cisgender.

Part X Of What Is Wrong With Today's Church

Religiously conservative American Christians suffer from a sabotaging flaw. That flaw is described as sabotaging rather than fatal because that flaw won't threaten the faith of the believer directly. However, it will undo our ability to carry out the Great Commission. And without carrying out the Great Commission, the Church gradually dies from attrition.

That flaw is easily demonstrated in R. Scott Clark's (click here for a short bio) recent blogpost entitled The Tyranny Of The New State-Religion Incoherence (click here for the article). His article laments the firing of Virginia public school teacher for not using the proper gender pronouns as requested by a student in gender transition. To Clark, this is an open-and-shut case of the rejection of objective truth by those who wish to force teachers to adhere to the gender desired pronouns of those in transition rather than letting those teachers refer to students by gender pronouns based on biological facts. Clark regards the required pronouns to be based on irrationality for those suffering from gender dysphoria while the latter is described as being rational because the pronouns fit what can be observed.

Unfortunately for Clark, neither all cultures, and culture includes religion, nor do all scientists, at least many who are members of the AMA agree with him. As for the view of gender by some Native American tribes is that of recognizing 3 to 4 different genders. Those genders included feminine males and masculine females. And, again, since cultural values are influenced by religion, then, if we are going to recognize freedom of religion,  we have to recognize this expanded view of genders acknowledged by some Native American tribes. And all of that conflicts with the open-and-shut case presented by Clark.

But furthermore, many scientists have been advocating for the use of gender preferred pronouns as determined by the individual, especially those who suffer from gender dysphoria (click here). Furthermore, there are mixed results as to whether one's gender identity is the result of genetics (click here and there and there again). We should note that the three cited articles recognize that gender identity relies on many factors and a couple of those articles state that gender identity may not be as static as Clark believes it to be.

Now while Clark would be standing on solid ground if he were to base his binary view of gender identity solely on the Scriptures, he needs to cite scientists, and not just simple observation that assumes one genitals are the sole factor in determining gender identity, who objectively support his approach. His neglect of citing scientists is the weakness of his argument since he is championing the objective approach to determining gender by appealing to biology. For the scientific approach says that both the causes for gender identity are too complicated and that we don't know enough to say.

With this article, Clark demonstrates a trait that all of us religiously conservative Christians have: our insularity and self-righteousness makes us unaware of how we come across to unbelievers. To us, the world is simple and that emboldens us to look down on those who disagree as if they have lost all touch with reality. Our insularity, which is our tendency to circle the wagons as it pertains to reading about the world around us, reinforces our insularity and self-righteousness.

In addition, our mission of sharing the Gospel sometimes causes us to have a higher view of ourselves, as compared to others, than we should. And that reinforces our insularity.

I agree with Clark with how the Scriptures define gender. However, we should note that we share society with unbelievers. And either we look to share society with others as equals or, if we assume ourselves to be superior to unbelievers, we feel entitled to rule over unbelievers in society so we can better carry out the Great Commission. And if we are going to share society with others as equals and we wish to appeal to objectivity and science, then we we appeal to reason and science in order to prove what Clark has claimed. And Clark's failure to appeal to science and reason while assuming he did is his the major fault here. And that shows his lack of awareness for how he comes across.