Recently, Dr. Brett Salkeld wrote an important and thoughtful piece for Our Sunday Visitor asking if Catholics must accept third genders. Lest there be an ambiguity at the outset, I wholly endorse the article. I write this column to commend Dr. Salkeld’s piece and to elaborate on its central thesis. (Of course, he is not responsible for the content of this column, nor my possible misreading of his.)
Dr. Salkeld’s article is in response to the transgender movement, which peddles the pseudo-scientific ideology that a plurality of genders exists, and none of them has anything to do with a person’s genetics, reproductive biology or sexual physiology. Dr. Salkeld suggests that this ideology effectively eliminates the category of “tomboy,” for example, because it asserts that girls who exhibit behaviors typically associated with boys are obviously “transgender boys.” If this is true, Salkeld implicitly concludes, it implies that only boys play with cars and only girls play with dolls.
Or, to put it another way, if a child plays with cars, the child is a boy; if a child plays with dolls, the child is a girl. If the former has female genitalia or the latter has male, they must be put on puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones. This is to save a child from experiencing the “wrong puberty,” so the pseudo-science goes. Later, these children must have mutilating surgery so that their genitalia and secondary sex characteristics (e.g., body hair, Adam’s apple and voice timbre) match their true “gender.”
Of course, this is all irrational nonsense. But it is precisely because it is irrational nonsense that no rational discussion can take place with transgender ideologues. The irrationality makes it more dangerous, not less. The ideology is riddled with contradictions, but its dogmatic adherents don’t care. They are not bothered by the fundamental irrationality of their ideology. Anyone who points it out is labeled a transphobe by the true believers. Merely to suggest that sex is fixed and immutable is “genocide.”
Let’s look at two of the more important contradictions in transgender ideology. While far from an exhaustive catalog, these noteworthy contradictions illustrate the impossibility of rational discussion with transgender idealogues. (In a forthcoming column, I will explore the difference between authentic cases of gender dysphoria and the exhibitionist fetish known as autogynephilia.)
Both denying and affirming gender stereotypes
The first contradiction is the one implicitly analyzed by Dr. Salkeld’s article. An absolute foundation of all modern gender theory is that gender “roles” are culturally imposed stereotypes that have nothing to do with one’s actual sex. If one suggests, for example, that boys are naturally attracted to playing with cars, or girls with dolls, one is imposing a cultural stereotype. These are oppressive “performances,” so the theory goes, enforced by deeply entrenched patriarchal, cisgender, heteronormative systems of domination (or some such). In some hypothetical cultural vacuum, the ideology continues, one could not predict which sex would gravitate to which interests.
But this bedrock principle of gender theory is implicitly denied by the same people who propound it. On the one hand, to assert that playing with dolls is an indication of femininity is oppressive chauvinism. But if a boy plays with dolls, on the other hand, that shows that his “gender” is really female. And the girl who plays with balls and trucks is really a transgender boy. Thus, rather than to allow for a range of overlapping interests among boys and girls, trans ideologues categorize children as “transgender” based upon stereotypes that they have already denied. Dr. Salkeld perfectly eviscerates this contradiction when he writes, “[I]f Joan of Arc is a tomboy, or the medieval French equivalent, then women really can lead armies. But if she’s trans, they really can’t.”
Both denying and affirming correlation of sexual physiology with gender
A second contradiction of transgender ideology is closely related to the first. Ideologues insist that sex is not defined by genetic attributes and sexual physiology. Rather, they insist, gender is “assigned” by misguided health care workers when a child is born. These delusional professionals mistakenly believe that if one is born with a penis, one is “male,” and that a baby with a vagina is a “female.” The ideology claims that one cannot know the gender of the child based upon these physiological characteristics. Reproductive physiology and sexual anatomy have nothing whatsoever to do with gender or gender identity, so the ideology goes. The two are completely unrelated.
But these same ideologues insist that children can be “born in the wrong body.” Thus, they must be administered puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and, ultimately, mutilating surgery. Why? So that their anatomy “matches” their gender identity. Yes, the same anatomy that is completely unrelated to gender identity. Genitals are not related to gender. But we must change the genitals to match the alleged identity. How do trans ideologues address this irrational contradiction? By calling the person who points it out a Nazi transphobe.
Transgender ideology is not dangerous merely because it is false and flies in the face of sound science. Rather, it is dangerous because it does not care about science or reason. Transgender theory is an irrational assertion of pure political ideology. It is about power, not rational inquiry. This makes it all the more insidious.
