Serving the High Plains
I’m continuing from my last column, examining modern transgender ideology. At the outset, let me stress that I’m not attacking individuals. As far as I’m concerned, you do you. I wish you the best. I’m critiquing the ideology that encourages so-called “transitioning” for children.
I wrote that the modern movement is based on a neo-platonic idea that the physical world we live in does not define “reality.” It’s what you feel in your heart or choose to believe. That’s what’s really real. This is true even when the idea in your head is flatly contradicted by the objective facts of nature that we can all see.
However, as a prominent debater has said, “Inconsistency is the sign of a failed argument.”
This maxim is true. It aligns with the biblical notion that God is always consistent with himself. To be logical, we must not contradict ourselves.
Transgender ideology is self-contradictory and thus fails as a system of truth. The inconsistency is this: It is declared that physical, biological markers of sexuality, which make us male or female, have nothing at all to do with determining what a woman is, for instance. It’s perfectly fine for a woman to have all the male parts. Or, a man with all the female parts is nonetheless a completely valid man. The pieces and parts don’t matter.
However, once people declare themselves to be the gender opposite their reproductive organs, what happens? Well, we decide such people would be greatly helped by “transitioning.”
Note the inconsistency. Either the physical, observable reality doesn’t matter at all, and has nothing to do with gender, or it really does matter. If a woman can have a penis and be a real woman, why, as soon as she decides this, do we think that drastic changes should be made to her body? The physical reality doesn’t matter, right? People want to live in a world where the inward and outward match. Inherently, they know this is how it is, or should be.
Another inconsistency involves the oft-repeated mantra that gender is just a social construct. This is chanted like a self-evident truth. “Social construct” is code-language for “probably invented by white supremacists a long time ago, for no good reason except to control everybody.” The same language is used in universities for things like the nuclear family, free markets, and (nowadays) even math. All the old rules are social constructs, so it’s OK to throw them out.
The inconsistency here is that those who say this invariably want to keep a grip on certain, long-accepted principles of morality. They still want you to go along with them because of things like “love thy neighbor” and “judge not.” Apparently, there’s some space carved out in which it’s OK to affirm that morality itself is not a social construct.
But, the same tyrants who came up with the social constructs you hate, also codified the moral precepts you bludgeon your opponents with. There can’t be right or wrong ways to deal with transgender people if right and wrong are merely social constructs.
If your god routinely puts men in female bodies, what grounds do you have for believing that up is not down, in this god’s mind? That light and dark are not interchangeable? Or, that the command to love your enemies is not best obeyed by hating them?
The Bible doesn’t show us such a god. It presents us with a God whose word is sure and steadfast, and makes up the fabric of the universe.
Gordan Runyan is the pastor of Immanuel Baptist Church in Tucumcari. Contact him at: