Details

Written by Rex M. Rogers

Published: 08 July 2024

What sort of philosophy leads a seemingly intelligent person to conclude that a boy can be a girl, a girl can be a boy, men and women can identify as whatever gender appeals to them?

Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #157 of Discerning What Is Best, a podcast applying unchanging biblical principles in a rapidly changing world, and a Christian worldview to current issues and everyday life.

I don’t remember much about my 0-6 years of life, nor do I remember that I understood the difference in a boy or a girl, in part because I’d just learned I was a boy and what this meant. In grade school, I remember beginning to understand the difference in a boy and a girl, then not liking girls much because, well, they were different. You know, the “ooh” factor; girls had cooties.

Later in junior high school, I recollect beginning to understand that girls are not only different but different in certain interesting ways. I did not know much about this, but Dad gave me a “Birds and the Bees” talk a couple of times.

Dad was a part time barber, so whenever he concluded I’d benefit from a life lesson, he decided I needed a haircut. When you’re in a barber chair you can’t get away. Trapped in a barber chair in an otherwise empty barber shop is a perfect place to hear about the “Birds and the Bees.”

Of course, in the natural process of things, in high school, I decided those ways in which girls were different from boys were downright attractive and a source of endless fascination. God knew this. He planted these inclinations in me and every other human being because he created us male and female, and he did this so that we would be blessed with male/female companionship—remember, “It’s not good that man should be alone” (Gen. 2:18)—so that we would find enjoyment in male/female marriage relationship, and eventually so that we would in the words of the Old Testament book of Genesis, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth,” (1:28), i.e., we’d perpetuate the human race.

Now if you are normal, typical, balanced, healthy, you resonate with what I’m saying. You get it. You likely remember similar maturing thoughts, emotions, and bodies in your youth. Best of all, you too understand the difference in a boy and a girl.

Some of you, like me, were privileged to be present in the room at the birth of your own child, either as the mother delivering the newborn or as the bamboozled new father. You saw for yourself that boys and girls are born with their distinguishing biological differences, and while we couldn’t see them, also born with distinguishing emotional, psychological, and maybe other divinely appointed differences.

Given all this, why are there people walking around today who claim they cannot define the difference in a boy or a girl or a man or a woman? Remember US Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson who during her confirmation hearings was asked by Senator Marsha Blackburn, “Can you define ‘woman’?” Jackson said, “I’m not a biologist. I’m a judge.” She was still confirmed as a Justice.

People say they cannot recognize the difference in the sexes and argue neither can medical professionals. In this view, only the newborn babe can later “say what or who they are.”

So, we are now treated to the insanity of sex education in kindergarten and elementary school, not just the differences in boys and girls, but age-inappropriate teaching, blatantly encouraging children to question their own sex, or what is now called gender.

Obviously, there are moral and scientific implications to this, but there are also practical, educational implications. Time spent on gender nonsense is time not spent on reading, writing, and arithmetic, history, science, and certainly not character or civics education. We trade essential instruction that would benefit students’ futures for elective, unseemly instruction that is not only nonessential but harmful.

Gender fluidity is the cultural soup du jour. 

It’s the latest craze that’s morphed beyond political correctness to indisputable orthodoxy. Dissent is not permitted. If you ask questions, based upon common sense, biology, a few thousand years of human history, or even religious conviction, you’re a bigot, a hater.

Proponents (especially activists) of gender fluidity believe biology is not destiny. In their view, biological sex is mutable, something “assigned” at birth. One’s “real sex” is determined by one’s feelings about gender, conveniently presented as an ever-lengthening spectrum of choices (some social media are offering 112 gender choices).

This gender transition, we are told, liberates and makes the person whole. Except it does not. Neither do any of the other hybrid gender identities ostensibly resulting from the newly declared fact of gender fluidity.

We know that people who experience gender dysphoria often endure genuine painful depression, detachment, fear, anxiety, and distress. Nothing in this podcast suggests gender dysphoria is not real, consequential, or concerning. Certainly, no perspective here suggests people struggling with gender dysphoria are crazy, weird, perverted, or otherwise undeserving of caring and kindness. 

Think about this. Gender dysphoria is not sinful. It’s a feeling, some say rooted in mental disorder, some in emotional and psychological confusion, but gender dysphoria is just feelings, a subjective confusion, and only that unless acted upon.

People with discordant thoughts about sex and gender need compassion not condemnation. They need love, help, caring, and hope.

This podcast is about gender fluidity and the ideology that has grown up supporting it. That ideology is fast becoming a kind of orthodoxy activists are marketing with religious zeal. Corporations, academia and athletics, health and medicine, the military, and governments have climbed on the bandwagon, all in the name of inclusiveness and non-discrimination. 

But let’s think biologically. Approximately 37.2 trillion cells comprise the adult human body. That’s T for trillion, another incredible testimony of the omniscience and omnipotence of our Creator God.

“Each cell of the body contains a full set of chromosomes.”

“Humans have 46 chromosomes in 23 pairs. We inherit 23 chromosomes from our mother and 23 chromosomes from our father. The chromosomes in the first 22 pairs are identical in a normal cell and they are the same in both genders. The 23rd pair is the sex chromosome and therefore determines the sex of the individual.  This chromosome is either XX for female or XY for male.”

“Whatever set of chromosomes a person has when they are born cannot be changed. This is because chromosomes are in all the cells that make up our bodies. To change a person’s chromosomes would mean changing trillion of cells! There’s no technology…that can change a chromosome in all of a person’s cells.”

“While the condition of gender dysphoria…is real and deserves sympathy, it does not erase the fact of biological sex. Human beings are male or female down to the level of their DNA, and males and females have different biochemistry even before they are born.”

Consequently, sex is not “assigned” at birth. It begins with conception and can be determined on ultrasounds prior to birth. Sex is literally hard-wired in the human design via the trillions of cells in the human body.

So, one’s sexuality is deeper than anatomy, appearance, feelings, or expression.  Our sex is part and parcel of who we are, and it cannot be changed no matter what drugs or hormones we might take and no matter what surgical procedures, including extensive gender reassignment surgery, we might choose to endure. 

Remarkable intellect Thomas Sowell once observed, “Reality does not go away when it is ignored.” No amount of Pride parades including transgender people, no number of President Biden’s appointment of trans bureaucrats is ever going to change reality.

Scripture says, “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them” (Gen 1:27). This is truth for God is truth. Transgenderism is an attack on the truth of divine design.

Well, we’ll see you again soon. This podcast is about Discerning What Is Best. If you find this thought-provoking and helpful, follow us on your favorite podcast platform. Download an episode for your friends. For more Christian commentary, check my website, r-e-x-m as in Martin, that’s rexmrogers.com.  

And remember, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm.

© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2024    

*This podcast blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact me or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com/, or connect with me at www.linkedin.com/in/rexmrogers or https://twitter.com/RexMRogers.

Details

Written by Rex M. Rogers

Published: 15 April 2024

Should Christians use preferred pronouns as a matter of respect for other persons, or should Christians decline to use preferred pronouns in order to speak truth?

Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #145 of Discerning What Is Best, a podcast applying unchanging biblical principles in a rapidly changing world, and a Christian worldview to current issuesand everyday life.

“Misgendering,” a word most of us would not have recognized a mere ten years ago, is now a matter of controversy in American culture. Misgendering means “to identify the gender of (a person, such as a nonbinary or transgender person) incorrectly (as by using an incorrect label or pronoun).” For example, call a woman identifying as a man “she,” and you are guilty of misgendering.

“Deadnaming” is a similar, relatively new word, that refers to the act of calling a transgender or non-binary person by a name they used prior to transitioning, such as their birth name. Usually this involves a person who has gone from a masculine or feminine given name to one they believe better aligns with their gender identity.

Enormously successful Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling has been criticized, demeaned, made a victim of efforts to cancel or silence her, and threatened with arrest in Scotland simply because she believes a woman is a woman, values her life experience as a woman, and has had the temerity to say so.

“The issue of gender pronouns has become controversial because some (activists)… want people who self-identify as transgendered to be called by their gender pronouns of choice,” what are now called preferred pronouns.

For fear of offending someone, people are being encouraged, or in many corporate environments required, to say things like: “Hi, I’m John and I go by he/him. Nice to meet you,” or in a meeting: “Hi everyone. I’m Mollie. I’m the senior program manager and I go by she/her” or “Hi, I’m Akeem, and I go by ‘they’ pronouns. How should I refer to you?”

Theoretically, “these actions help make…workplace(s) more inclusive of transgender, gender nonconforming, and gender non-binary people.”

The rationale goes like this: “Using appropriate pronouns (or new names) is a first step toward respecting people's gender identity and creating a more welcoming space for people of all genders…the bottom line is that everyone deserves to have their self-ascribed name and pronouns respected in the workplace.”

“Intentionally calling someone by the wrong pronoun (or old name) can make them feel disrespected or alienated, and can take a toll on their mental health. It is also offensive and can be considered harassment.”

Now, employees in some Christian organizations are declaring they wish to use preferred pronouns, indicating they are personally identifying as, or are at least supporting, gender status other than male or female.

Wheaton College in Wheaton, Illinois, recently updated its policy handbook. “The college explains that stating pronouns violates school policy, and that anything beyond saying "he/him" and "she/her" is outside a “created reality of a biological binary.”

“Houghton University, another evangelical school, recently fired two resident hall directors for putting pronouns in their email signatures.” 

So, this is a current controversy, and it is not going to go away because misgendering, preferred pronouns, deadnaming, and related vocabulary battles are where the ideological wars are being fought. Ideologically driven activists know they cannot win based upon logic or science or history, or if honestly reviewed, historic religion, so they work to win with words. Change the vocabulary of the discussion and you’re halfway to victory.

This is why it is disconcerting to hear Christians, or even conservatives in general, use words like “partner,” for “it denotes no gender, no relationship status that involves exclusivity or fidelity. You can’t cheat on a ‘partner,’ you’re just partners.” This “normalizes whatever someone does sexually, and it removes gender from the mix.” It's even more disconcerting to hear television anchors replace mothers and traditional language with words like “birthing people,” “chest feeders,” “people who menstruate,” “egg producer,” or just “carrier.”

“Gender pronouns are inscrutable, but that’s really the whole point. The bane of the American left is meaning, and they’re engaged in total war…The left understands very well that if they control language, they control thought.”

But, “assenting to someone’s gender pronouns isn’t (just) a matter of politeness, or an easy means to avoid conflict, nor is it a matter of affirming someone’s preference. Bending the knee to…gender pronouns…is affirming a lie. It’s a denial of what we all know intuitively, what classical philosophy recognized as the natural law — that there are only two sexes/genders extant among humans on this planet.”

“Deny(ing) something so primal, so fundamental is intellectually and spiritually suicidal — you host and propagate the worst kind of lie, the kind you tell yourself. In doing so, you cripple your ability to reason, suffocate conscience, and unmoor yourself from reality. Moreover, having accepted the irrational, you become complicit in the self-destruction of those within your power to rescue.”

Does loving our neighbor demand we accept their false values? No. In 1 Jn 3:18, we’re reminded “let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.”

Pronoun madness is a post-Christian culture malady. And now there is an ever-growing list of possible gender identities. As of late last year, 81 possible gender identity hybrids had achieved recognition, and they come with associated pronouns.

New on the block are “neopronouns.” “Neopronoun can be a word created to serve as a pronoun without expressing gender. Examples are ‘xe/xir/xirs,’ ‘ze/zir/zirs,’ ‘ey/em/eir,’ etc. (as opposed to ‘he/him/his’ or ‘she/her/hers’). With neopronouns, a person’s pronouns don’t need to reflect the gender binary. Gender becomes a creation of the individual and loses almost any connection to the physical world.”

“A subset of neopronouns is noun-self pronouns…‘a pre-existing word … drafted into use as a pronoun. Noun-self pronouns can refer to animals — so your pronouns can be… ‘kitten/kittenself.’ Others refer to fantasy characters — ‘vamp/vampself,’ ‘prin/cess/princesself’ …” In other words, a noun-self pronoun doesn’t even need to reflect the fact that you are a human being.”

“If our sexual and gender identities are no longer expressions of our biological sex and our bodies, then there’s no stopping a person from identifying as the opposite sex, no sex, both sexes, or nonhuman things like animals, objects, fictional characters, or abstract concepts. Without the human body as the source of one’s identity, ‘I am a woman trapped in a man’s body’ becomes just as plausible as ‘I am a wolf trapped in a human body.’ One’s identity is limited only by one’s imagination.”

“Pronouns have become expressions of one’s self-proclaimed identity, a claim that proponents insist that everyone must affirm—or else.” “‘Gender’ is no longer correlated to an empirical reality like the body but has become a mere expression of one’s own self-perception or self-declaration. It has become, like so many other things, a mode of expressive individualism.”

Pronoun madness is a spiritual virus to which we must respond, lovingly yes, caringly yes, never hating yes, but still, recognizing there is a different set of values being pushed upon us, upon American culture, and upon the next generations, values that are irrational, nihilistic, ungodly, and deadly.

Even “former President Richard Nixon (a person whose own moral conscience went astray) once observed that many make the mistake of thinking that conflict is the result of misunderstanding rather than difference of belief.” He was correct.

What we are talking about regarding this intentional change of vocabulary is not resolvable via dialogue around a campfire in Aspen. It’s not about two equally worthy points of view with a peaceful consensus somewhere in the middle. It’s about fundamental differences in beliefs about God, the created order, humanity created in God’s image, and truth.

I recognize that “in cases of professional or personal relationships, believers may feel that it’s best to ‘pick their battles’ rather than take a rigid stance on such terms.” I realize that for some, the choice not to use preferred pronouns, i.e. to misgender, could threaten one’s employment.  

Yet, “while Christians need to be careful and respectful, respect cannot extend to endorsing ideas that the Bible calls false.” This helps no one.

Well, we’ll see you again soon. This podcast is about Discerning What Is Best. If you find this thought-provoking and helpful, follow us on your favorite podcast platform. Download an episode for your friends. For more Christian commentary, check my website, r-e-x-m as in Martin, that’s rexmrogers.com.

And remember, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm.

© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2024  

*This podcast blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact me or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com/, or connect with me at www.linkedin.com/in/rexmrogers or https://twitter.com/RexMRogers.

Details

Written by Rex M. Rogers

Published: 24 July 2023

If you’re a well-balanced individual, you haven’t thought much about child sex-trafficking, but it’s real, if ugly, so will you join me in thinking for a few minutes about sin, darkness, and hope?

Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #99 of Discerning What Is Best, a podcast applying unchanging biblical principles in a rapidly changing world, and a Christian worldview to current issues and everyday life. 

My wife and I recently went to the cinema to watch “Sound of Freedom,” the movie featuring “Passion of the Christ” Jim Caviezel as a federal agent who pursues sex traffickers to rescue a child. As you might expect with a topic like this, not all the scenes are easy to watch, but for my money, I think the director and actors did a good job of drawing attention to this global evil in a way that hopefully raises consciousness, concern, and action.

"’Sound of Freedom’ draws upon the real life of Tim Ballard, a U.S. Department of Homeland Security agent who is credited with saving countless children, largely from outside the U.S., from traffickers who force them into prostitution rings aimed at pedophiles.”

Jim Caveziel plays Tim Ballard in the film, and his wife is portrayed by actress Mira Sorvino. Her part is small but important in this film.

Years earlier in 2005, Sorvino played the lead role as a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent in a television miniseries called “Human Trafficking.” Her boss in the miniseries is portrayed by actor Donald Sutherland.

The miniseries followed the stories of three women and girls kidnapped and sold into sex slavery, all of them eventually working out of New York City for an enormously wealthy and ruthless Russian crime boss. The miniseries is especially good at portraying how women and girls get sucked into the trade. This is most assuredly not a so-called “victimless crime.”

“Human trafficking involves the use of force, fraud, or coercion to obtain some type of labor or commercial sex act.” To lure victims into trafficking situations, traffickers use various approaches, like violence, manipulation, false promises of well-paying jobs, or romantic relationships.

Remember the first “Taken” movie starring Liam Neeson? In it, a retired CIA operative—Neeson—crosses the globe to rescue his 17-year-old daughter after she had been kidnapped by a group of Albanian smugglers while traveling in France.

She and her friend were first enticed by meeting a charming young Frenchman, then she is betrayed, kidnapped, and sold into the sex trade. Of course, this and the later “Taken” films are primarily vehicles for showcasing Neeson as an action hero, but the first film is especially on point as to how even teenagers can be duped and, well, “taken.”

If you are interested in going deeper, several other films or documentaries have been made that examine various aspects of this evil perversion, one that combines greed, sexual hedonism, crime, power, politics, and corruption. Hyperlinks to these sources may be found in the transcript of this podcast.

After her earlier miniseries role, Mira Sorvino stayed involved with this heinous crime. “From 2009 to 2012 she was a United Nations Goodwill ambassador for combatting human trafficking,” I recommend Sorvino’s miniseries, “Human Trafficking,” which you can acquire inexpensively online.

Back to the new film, “Sound of Freedom”— You’d think that, if anything, the ideological Left might find morally compelling the fact that children are being coerced and abused by a huge international sex trade. But believe it or not, I’ve read several reviews of “Sound of Freedom” that seem oblivious to this issue involving children, choosing rather to politicize the motives of the producers and actors, accusing them of conspiracy theories and being tools of the Far Right, yada yada. Really? People can’t even agree that child trafficking is an unholy scourge.

Well, I for one recommend you watch “Sound of Freedom.” I respect Jim Caviezel and Mira Sorvino for their involvement, not just as professional actors but as people who care about human beings. The film presents a real issue, and for all the wretchedness, there is hope in the end.

It is estimated—that’s right, I said “estimated” because one of the problems with stopping human trafficking is getting reliable numbers. Who’s going to provide them? Law enforcement counts what it knows, but criminals know far more,

and they aren’t going to volunteer information. So, it is “estimated that approximately 1,000,000 people are trafficked each year globally and that between 20,000 and 50,000 are trafficked into the United States, which is one of the largest destinations for victims of the sex-trafficking trade.” Based on multiple sources I read, I think the number of trafficked people, and children, is far higher.

“There are tremendous numbers of kids, a multitude of kids that are being sold as sex slaves today in America. These are American kids, American-born, 50 percent to 60 percent of them coming out of the foster care industry…If you are trafficked in the United States, 85 percent of victims that are trafficked here are from here.”

“The United Nations (UN) divides human trafficking into three categories— sex trafficking, labor trafficking, and the removal of organs—and defines human trafficking as the induction by force, fraud, or coercion of a person to engage in the sex trade, or the harboring, transportation, or obtaining of a person for labor service or organ removal.” “Sex slavery involves males and females, both adults and children, and constitutes an estimated 58 percent of all trafficking activities.”

“California consistently has the highest human trafficking rates in the United States…This is followed by Texas…Florida…and New York. These four states with the highest human trafficking rates have the highest populations in the U.S., which can explain why their numbers of cases are significantly higher than other states and have very high immigrant populations. This, combined with certain industries such as agriculture, creates prime environments for forced labor.”

Hard to believe, but in the United States, “Human trafficking wasn't illegal until 2000, when the Trafficking Victims Protection Act was passed, which made it a federal crime.”

“In the US, there is no official number of human trafficking victims, but estimates place it in the hundreds of thousands.”

“Globally, an estimated //www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/@dgreports/@dcomm/documents/publication/wcms_575479.pdf">25 million people are subjected to human trafficking and forced labor, which is responsible for an estimated $150 billion annually in illicit profits.”

To say the least, human sex trafficking is a heinous crime that violates the basic principles of human dignity. It involves the coercion, abduction, and exploitation of individuals, primarily women and children, for the purpose of sexual exploitation.

At its core, human sex trafficking strips victims of their humanity, freedom, dignity, and autonomy, subjected to physical and emotional abuse, and forced into a life of sexual servitude. The traffickers, driven by greed and power, exploit vulnerable individuals, preying on their desperation, poverty, or lack of social support. This cruel industry thrives on the suffering of its victims and the insidious demand for commercial sex.

The consequences of human sex trafficking on its victims are profound and long-lasting. Physically, victims may endure sexually transmitted infections, unwanted pregnancies, physical injuries, and drug addiction. Emotionally and spiritually, they suffer from trauma, depression, anxiety, and post-traumatic stress disorder, often requiring extensive therapy and rehabilitation to regain a sense of normalcy.

Furthermore, the social stigma associated with sex trafficking can leave victims isolated and shunned by society, exacerbating their suffering.

Human sex trafficking not only harms individual victims but also has detrimental effects on society as a whole. The thriving underground market perpetuates violence, organized crime, and corruption. It undermines the rule of law, weakens institutions, and fosters an environment of fear and exploitation. Additionally, sex trafficking contributes to the spread of sexually transmitted and other diseases, including HIV/AIDS, and places an enormous burden on public health systems.

As “Sound of Freedom” demonstrates, children are the most vulnerable and tragic victims of human sex trafficking. “It is believed that one in five human trafficking victims are children, exploited for begging, child pornography, or child labor.”

Often kidnapped or coerced into the trade, they are robbed of their innocence and subjected to unimaginable horrors. The emotional, spiritual, psychological, and often physical scars inflicted on these young souls can haunt them for a lifetime, hindering their development and impeding their ability to lead fulfilling lives. Protecting children from exploitation should be a top priority for every society.

Human sex trafficking is abhorrent. It treats human beings as non-entities, perpetuates violence, undermines law and order in free societies, and is an example of man’s inhumanity to man, an evil straight out of the pit.

There are Christian organizations, among them Women At Risk International, that combat human trafficking and work to help women, girls, and boys enslaved.

Sexual sin and slavery are together as old as mankind. Both sins violate the character of God and the fact that He created every man, woman, boy, and girl in his image.

Let’s pray, and let’s take action to assure “Sound of Freedom” sows seeds that fall on good soil. It could be our children, our loved ones that we save.

Well, we’ll see you again soon. This podcast is about Discerning What Is Best. If you find this thought-provoking and helpful, follow us on your favorite podcast platform. Download an episode for your friends. For more Christian commentary, check my website, r-e-x-m as in Martin, that’s rexmrogers.com. 

And remember, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm.

© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2023  

*This podcast blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact me or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com/, or connect with me at www.linkedin.com/in/rexmrogers.  

Details

Written by Rex M. Rogers

Published: 17 July 2023

Were you startled in March 2022, when United States Supreme Court Justice nominee Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson responded to Sen. Marsha Blackburn’s request that she provide a definition of “woman” and Judge Jackson said, “I’m not a biologist”?

Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #98 of Discerning What Is Best, a podcast applying unchanging biblical principles in a rapidly changing world, and a Christian worldview to current issues and everyday life.

Senator Marsha Blackburn (R, TN) full questions to Judge Jackson was “Can you provide a definition for the word ‘woman’?” The confused chaos of contemporary America’s intellectual elite led Judge Jackson to give a wiggle room answer, actually a non-answer. Ironically, now Justice Jackson, were she asked this question today, would probably not say she’s not a biologist, not because she now can answer the question, but because the Left no longer trusts science, if it ever did.

“What is a woman?” Yes, we’ve come to this. American, or Western, culture has dipped so low in its sophisticated ignorance that we’ve talked ourselves into an intellectual cul-de-sac where one of the easiest and most obvious questions in life cannot be answered for fear of offending someone or otherwise creating a political backlash.

This is the context into which conservative commentator Matt Walsh stepped when he decided to produce and feature in his documentary, What Is a Woman? This film was released in June 2022, but I just watched it a few days ago.

Walsh’s documentary reminded me of actor Ben Stein’s 2008 film, Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, in which Stein attempted to engage intellectuals on their basic presuppositions about God, or at least an intelligence, but found that many of them could not or would not engage, and even the ones who did, eventually offered outlandish leaps of logic regarding their assumptions.

In his What Is a Woman film, Walsh travels around the United States, and also across the pond to the Maasai tribe in Africa, simply asking, “What is a woman?” This is a question he considers a defining question of our generation.

Walsh also asked, what is truth? He talks to people on the street, academics who purport to be experts in fields related to gender studies or psychology, medical and psychiatric doctors, elected politicians, transgender people and former transgender or so-called “de-transitioned” people, and counselors, most of whom disagree with his views, along with a couple of key older professionals who share Walsh’s values and concerns.

Since the film was released, predictably, liberal and left-leaning political sources have castigated Walsh and the documentary in harsh, nasty, and angry terms, accusing him of among other things, being a bigot, a hater, and a cheap provocateur. But nowhere in the documentary does Walsh attack anyone, act disrespectfully or dismissively toward them (though some of his interviewees and their supporters do this to him), or otherwise speak down to or angrily at anyone. In interviews, no matter how outrageous the person’s comments, Walsh keeps a straight and serious face.

Only near the end of the documentary, when Walsh gets a couple of minutes to speak to the Loudoun County School Board in Virginia, a district that has experienced sexual assaults on children, and a district one report called the epicenter of the parental rights movement, does Walsh speak forcefully or aggressively from a prepared text. Yet review after review calls him out for perceived bad behavior, and what is this? Walsh dares to ask questions, dares to say he believes in objective truth, dares to wonder aloud if sex surgeries on minors is indeed healthy and moral, and dares to believe those to whom he directs his questions might want to respond. Interestingly, more than one of his interviewees stopped or walked out on the interview.

To those who disagree with him, he produced a “right wing transphobic doc.”  Another reviewer said, the film is “utterly devoid of curiosity or generosity. It’s fueled by anger and fear, and partisan calculation. Walsh poses like a wise man, but he’s a cyberbully.”

I don’t agree. In fact, I recommend you watch this film. It is worth the 90 minutes required, and since it is online, you can watch in segments as you have time if you need to do so. You can find it easily in your search engine, but to aid you I have posted a link to the film in the description of this podcast. (The full documentary is available at this link: https://rumble.com/v26fs5y-what-is-a-woman-full-documentary.html.)

It’s telling, I think, how Walsh is attacked, and I do mean verbally attacked in the abusive vocabulary, for exercising his free speech, not by making arguments, but simply for asking a question. Liberal and left sources decry Walsh’s question as illegitimate, disrespectful, threatening even for making people “feel unsafe,” and do not want to allow him to speak. Liberals and the left preach openness, tolerance, anything goes—unless you disagree with them. Then they become authoritarian in their demand that not simply your argument be refuted but that you be delegitimized, possibly silenced, preferably cancelled.

Several people with whom he talked, asked him, “Why do you care?” They wanted to know why he cared what a transgender person did or became, even a minor, why this should matter to him, because in their worldview, anyone should be permitted or even encouraged to do anything at any time. They see this as compassion and liberation, but this is undiagnosed anarchy. It’s what the Bible said of the days when Israel had no king, “Every man did that which was right in his own eyes,” (Judges 17:6).

Among other things, what the question, “Why do you care,” assumes is that individual behavior creates no ripple effects and in no way affects others. It assumes that people should be free to do whatever they wish, for by definition, this is “right.” It isa as Proverbs said, “Every way of a man is right in his own eyes,” (21:2).

But because people want to do something does not make it correct or good or moral. People are not islands. People who jettison personal morality affect everything about the people and culture around them.

Doing sex surgeries on children will affect their own health and well-being, their families, and their community for the rest of their lives. Promoting transgender ideology and actions is not just a matter of meeting the individual desires of a given person, because transgender behavior is fundamentally divisive and destructive to the foundational order of a free society. Why? Because society is binary and has been since creation.

But transgenders, in fact all LGBQ individuals, want what they want, so they reject God, reality, and life itself. Is this surprising? Heterosexuals who wish to sin do the same thing, reject God, reality, and sometimes life itself.

“Whether it’s the idolatry of climate, sexual politics or anything else, this estrangement from God is in keeping with the strategic goals of authoritarians. They do not wish to compete with God for the devotion of the people so it’s necessary to replace Him with something else. The result is ideological idolatry designed to estrange us from God in our personal and civic lives.”

“The ideologies of the left are about more than enacting policies that history has proved to be failures. They’re about dissolving our relationship with God in pursuit of a destructive agenda that cements power among a select group of elites at the expense of individual liberty. We need to understand this because to know and reject this American Idolatry is to reject tyranny.”

Tulsi Gabbard, former Democratic Congresswoman from Hawaii, said this about gender politics: "They are asking us to take something that is clearly not real and believe that it is real...Are we going to live in a society of common sense and reality or are we going to buy into this insanity and this fantasy?"

"We have leaders in the Democratic Party unfortunately and those in our society who are pushing this fantasy," she continued. "They are asking us to take something that is clearly not real and believe that it’s real. They're asking us to take something that is very clearly a mental illness that creates this delusion where you have people saying 'why, I’m a man in a woman’s body' and vice versa, and then doctors committing, in the case of children especially, this medical malpractice trying to turn this fantasy into reality and creating incredibly negative short and long-term consequences both physically and psychologically."

"Are we going to live in a society of common sense and reality or are we going buy into this insanity and this fantasy?" she asked rhetorically. "This is one of the reasons why I left the Democratic Party, because we have the Democratic Party today selling this fantasy and catering to it and giving credibility to this fantasy, these mental delusions all because they think it’ll give them more political power, a party that is willing to do anything, especially things that are damaging to children, all for the sake of political power should be frightening to everybody."

Matt Walsh’s question, “What is a woman?” is basic, but it opens a giant philosophic wormhole into which our culture has been drawn.

The entire sexual liberation movement, particularly as now manifested by LGBTQ+ politics with a focus on the point of the spear, transgender ideology, undermines a whole list of Judeo-Christian values that helped American culture flourish:

o   Belief in a Sovereign God, as Thomas Jefferson noted in the Declaration of Independence, “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.”

o   Belief in truth, as the Declaration of Independence began, “We hold these truths to be self-evident.”

o   Belief in God’s created order, including humanity, as in “So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them,” (Gen. 1:27).

o   Belief that children belong to parents, that parents have authority and rights, as in “Children are a heritage from the Lord, offspring a reward from him,” (Ps 127:3).

There’s more, but perhaps you get the picture. I know family and friends who do not like to talk about LGBTQ+ or gender issues, much less child sex trafficking, pornography, or similar perversions. I get this, and I respect it.

But I also think we are living in a time when Satan is launching a full-blown onslaught on the very foundations of families, churches, American society, and the potential for individual and religious freedom over and against tyranny. And it seems that many Christians are willingly uninformed and unaware.

Whether you agree with everything Matt Walsh, says or concludes, his What Is a Woman? documentary is worth your time. It is not a diatribe, not a right-wing screed, certainly not religious sermonizing. It just asks a question because it presumes truth exists.

It’s a question no one would have seriously asked just a decade ago. But now, the need to ask it reveals, yes, we’ve come to this.

Well, we’ll see you again soon. This podcast is about Discerning What Is Best. If you find this thought-provoking and helpful, follow us on your favorite podcast platform. Download an episode for your friends. For more Christian commentary, check my website, r-e-x-m as in Martin, that’s rexmrogers.com. 

And remember, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm.

© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2023  

*This podcast blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact me or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com/, or connect with me at www.linkedin.com/in/rexmrogers.  

Details

Written by Rex M. Rogers

Published: 03 March 2023

America’s children are at risk as never before, partly due to our increasingly licentious culture, partly due to the Internet, but is there anything we can do about it? 

Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #73 of Discerning What Is Best, a podcast applying unchanging biblical principles in a rapidly changing world, and a Christian worldview to current issues and everyday life.

There are certain topics I do not want to think about, much less spend time researching and writing about them. This includes pornography, the subject of the last podcast, and it certainly includes the sexualizing of children and youth.

These are ugly, debauched, perverse, dark side subjects that—and I am serious now—make my stomach turn as I learn more about what is actually taking place.

Yet if we are not informed, how can we do what we should do as salt and light? If we do not have some understanding of the sexualization of children trends gripping our culture, how can we fulfill Jesus’ statement in John 17?

Jesus prayed to the Heavenly Father in what is the true Lord’s Prayer, “I have revealed you to those whom you gave me out of the world.” 

“My prayer,” Jesus said, “is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. They are not of the world, even as I am not of it. Sanctify them by the truth, your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world,” (John 17:6, 15-18).

So, believers are in the world, are to be not of the world, and yet are to go into the world as ambassadors of reconciliation.

Do we do this best in ignorance? Of course not. We fulfill our calling as unto the Lord if like the ancient men of Israel who God called to leadership, we become “from Issachar, men who understood the times and knew what Israel should do,” (1 Chron. 12:32).

For some time now, “the far left has been hard at work normalizing the sexualization of young children. Attempts to expose children to sexual material are pervasive in schools across the country and often involve teaching the leftist gender and sexual ideology. 

From obscene books in school libraries to explicit content in entertainment, children from preschool to high school are faced with sexually charged content while their parents are kept in the dark.”

“Children are being exposed to numerous sexual messages every day of their lives. In fact, by the time a child reaches puberty, she or he has likely been exposed to thousands if not tens of thousands of sexualized messages…Often, these sexual messages are not only explicit but also violent and demeaning in nature.”

“The biggest impact, however, that the super-sexualization of children can have is its overall looming effect on the day-to-day existence of kids. Sexuality becomes much more of a player than it should, irrespective of the child's age. It's as if children's normal curiosity towards sexuality gets ratcheted up a number of notches as if on steroids.”

“The "facts of life" have not changed, but ‘inclusivity’ and ‘sex positivity’ and other popular buzz-word concepts have changed sex education. Despite studies showing that modern sex education fails to achieve its stated goals and results in increased student sexual activity, school systems are devoting up to 70 hours of classroom time per child to sex education.”

“A troubling trend in sex education is the push to teach ‘sexual consent,’ presumably to equip kids to resist committing, or being a victim of, sexual assault.”

“But many parents aren’t buying it. Consider this statement from a ‘Get Real’ trainer at Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts: ‘Building skills around consent means moving beyond the ‘how to say no’ model of teaching refusal skills to also teach young people how to ask for consent...’”

But “consenting to a sex act does not make that act healthy, acceptable, or safe—especially when the actors are children! The ‘consent’ movement seems less about avoiding assault and more about promoting sex and sexual rights.”

Sex education “lessons can be highly manipulative—carefully designed to get children to approve of the concept of sexual rights and fluid sexual “identities,” and to reject their religious beliefs, the authority of their parents, and even physical reality itself.”

Sexualizing children, I mean 5-16-year-olds, is shocking enough. But even more shocking is that what I’ve listed illustratively thus far just skims the surface. This isn’t happening in some clandestine, back-alley way. It’s taking place every day in America’s schools, and increasingly, teachers charged with purveying this so-called sex education are told not to inform parents, or students are told not to inform parents, especially when transgender issues are involved.

But schools are only one battleground. Rapid sexualization of children is even more pervasive on the Internet.

Law enforcement officials are talking about a “global sextortion crisis.”

Sextortion involves “cases where children are coerced into sending explicit images online before being extorted for money are increasing dramatically, with more boys falling prey.”

“Sextortion cases where local children are being coerced into sending nude and explicit content online is being fueled by a growing overseas market.”

“Once a perpetrator has a photo or video, they can then turn around and use it to either extract money or more photos and videos from the victim.”

“Typically…with boys…the extortion or the motivation for the extortion is cash or money or some monetary benefit…With the girls…the currency is more photos.”

“The sextortion cases are mainly occurring on digital platforms where children are spending their screen time. Phones, gaming consoles and computers by way of social media, gaming websites or video chat are often used by predators posing with fake accounts as girls of a similar age, deceiving boys into sending explicit photos or videos... Offenders then typically threaten to release the photos unless the victim sends payment. And in many cases, the predator will release the images anyway.”

“The sexualization of young girls is an ongoing problem in America that’s leading to a myriad of problems, from exposing girls to societal pressures to perpetuating sexualized violence. Sexualization is negatively impacting many girls’ cognitive functioning as well as their physical and mental health.”

“Girls, in general, experience more mental health issues than boys and sexualization often factors into the way girls identity themselves and measure their self-worth. When girls experience sexualization or objectification first-hand, it can stir up a wide range of emotions. Depending on the severity of the instance, it can lead to anxiety, depression, or even PTSD.” 

And more: low self-esteem, eating disorders, self-harm, and suicidal thoughts. Sexualization in any form is different from but often turns into sexual abuse.

Hypersexuality in media is like toxic air. It’s everywhere and always harmful.

Sexualization of children in America is happening for several reasons, 

1) first and foremost, sin. Remember that word? People’s hearts are deceitful and wicked and if they can find ways to do wrong, they will.

2) Another reason is money. Bad actors make money off the sexualization of children, whether through sextortion or trafficking or kiddie porn or sex appeal marketing. (“Advertisements and programming that target and sell commodities to children, particularly girls. Such items include Bratz Baby Dolls, which target six-year-olds with fishnet stocking and miniskirts, and padded bras on bikinis sold for seven-year-olds, raising national controversy on the dangers of encouraging females to portray their identities using sexual items from a young age.”

3) There are people who embrace a Leftist philosophy that socially and politically rejects Judeo-Christian values and traditional religion like Christianity, and promoting the sexualization of children is a direct hit on parental rights, family values, and the nuclear family as a basic unit of society.

4) Smart phones, the Internet – technology does not cause sexualization, but it certainly is a means by which it can happen, quickly, globally, without boundaries or borders.

I don’t suppose I need to develop a theology of why sexualization of children is wrong and injurious. But it wouldn’t take much time in Scripture to do so.

The wisest thing I think I can say is: “Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that the family of believers throughout the world is undergoing the same kind of sufferings” (1 Peter 5:8-9).

Well, we’ll see you again soon. This podcast is about Discerning What Is Best. If you find this thought-provoking and helpful, follow us on your favorite podcast platform. Download an episode for your friends. For more Christian commentary, check my website, r-e-x-m as in Martin, that’s rexmrogers.com. 

And remember, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm.

© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2023   

*This podcast blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact me or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com/, or connect with me at www.linkedin.com/in/rexmrogers.