When Lady Gaga wrote Born This Way several years ago, it was clear that the pop-music Zeitgeist was now fully on board with sexual preference (or is that an illegal expression nowadays…who can keep track?!) being immutable. Which wasn’t entirely unexpected and neither was it a shock that Lady Gaga held such views. What was also unexpected was that people quickly accepted the “immutability” argument as having moral weight, even though there is nothing about that argument that bears any relevance on ethical issues, whatsoever – but I’m getting ahead of myself.
The fact is that there has been a broad push in media to get people to accept that sexuality is “immutable”…and coincidentally, there has also been a push for people to accept “gender” as fluid. So, society at large is supposed to accept Lady Gaga’s thesis that you’re “Born This Way” and that gender is fluid. But if Gender is fluid, then sexuality is not immutable. Both cannot be true. Certainly, both cannot be true as absolute statements. If Gender is purely a social construct, then homosexuality and heterosexuality are also social constructs – they can’t not be.
Now, many people would naturally want to default back to the “sexuality is immutable” argument and let the trannies fight their own battles on other bases. But that’s not what’s happening. Because the same form of argumentation that was used to push “gay rights” are now being used to push “trans rights”. I put “rights” in quotations because one must wonder in a purely Materialist society whence rights come. But then again, it’s questionable whether many of these people are Materialists at all. Certainly, the Progressive political elites are fundamentally, if not theoretically, Materialist in their orientation. But the fact is that these people believe that rights come from Government. They can’t come from anything else. Or, they believe that “rights” are biologically essential and just exist. Which is a ludicrous argument. And this is not an irrelevant side-point, in fact, the question of “rights” is parallel to the whole conversation about sexuality, gender, and social-engineering.
Materialists, which includes the vast majority of political and social Progressives, accept Darwinism, not only as the explanation of the Origin of Species, but as the Hermeneutical Lens which interprets all data. Darwinism, or Evolutionism may be more appropriate, posits order from chaos, life from non-life, matter from nothing. This hermeneutic then becomes a heuristic to solve all problems in the sciences and humanities, even in theology! Ask a Progressive where Monotheism came from: it evolved. Ask a progressive where Democracy came from: it evolved! Evolution is the solution to literally every problem, which creates a fundamental optimism and a narcissistic level of self-confidence amongst the Technocracy that they can, should, will, and MUST bring in the Utopia. None of them have ever seriously considered David Hume, obvi…cause they’re trying to derive an “ought” from an “is” – or at least an “ought” from a “I-think-it-is”.
Thus, they see “human rights” as a product of Evolution. Don’t ask if there is any moral Truth to these rights. Truth as normal people use the word, to mean something that is objectively correct is not a category that Progressive Social Engineers (Technocrats) even consider. The imperative, the moral imperative, is to be an agent of Progress. It doesn’t matter if that leads to incoherenceis like Ethics divorced from Truth, or the repudiation of Entropy (one of the more well-established theories in Physics), or the positing of Abiogenesis (which Louis Pasteur thought he’d refuted a few centuries back and nobody has been able to demonstrate with experimental evidence that he’s wrong). It simply doesn’t matter. Progressives want Progress and that means a “moral” vision of “rights” that come from nowhere and lead to we know not where, but are crucial and you’re a bigot if you disagree. For a long time Lady Gaga’s mantra was sufficient. Arguing that someone was “Born This Way” was sufficient ground to guarantee that person protections, because, the argument went, if it’s immutable it’s involuntary (not true), and if it’s involuntary it can’t be immoral (not true), and therefore it is irregulable (also not true). This is clearly not true because people are “born with” all manner of desires and impulses that society forces us to suppress so we can conform to society. For instance, anyone who’s been around a small child knows that small children sometimes go into terrifying rages where they scream, hit, threaten, and wish to do major harm to themselves or others. Kids are born that way. It certainly doesn’t make it OK, good, or moral.
Christians recognize that immoral behavior is inherent – Gaga’s right, we ARE born this way, but that doesn’t make it OK. It means that we have to train people to not submit to our natural impulses. Child-rearing is essentially one long exercise in training another person to conquer their impulses and do what is right. It is society telling people to not act how they were born to act. And this is good! But that brings us to my next point.
Downton Abbey is a good show. It’s enjoyable, the characters are well written, it takes place in a fascinating period in World History and, I mean, C’mon, Edwardian clothing was the bomb.com. But the show plays with themes that are at once relevant and poorly framed. In the show several issues are put forth: socialism; women’s lib; homosexuality. In some of these issues, we see a relatively even hand in the portrayal of the conservative and progressive elements of British society (if we can use those terms.) However, when conflict arises over Thomas Barrow’s homosexuality, it’s clear that Thomas was Born This Way and that Society was unkind and unjust – this theme is developed more and more as the show continues. Homosexuality was actively outlawed and prosecuted in England until relatively late. Unlike in other issues where there is an attempt at making sense of the social-order of Edwardian England, we’re simply led to believe that society was wrong (incidentally I wonder how multiculturally appropriate it is to say a culture is wrong…but I digress).
And Tom’s homosexuality isn’t the only issue that receives the ham-fisted preachy treatment. Women’s lib, particularly that status of “fallen women” is of major concern to the show. And that’s fair enough as it stands. Fallen women were objects of pity and derision and unwed-mothers were considered a serious problem. Dafoe’s Moll Flanders acts as a cautionary tale for women who are thinking about fornicating. Dafoe and British Society’s point is: put your love upon a shelf; don’t accept any lines; and keep your hands to yourself.
And we’re supposed to accept that this was a negative aspect of the Patriarchy and that after abortion was legalized and reliable birth-control methods were invented, then unwanted pregnancy went away, and the bigoted and narrow-minded social vision went away.
But this is failing to accept the Edwardian view for what it was. Bastard children were not the CAUSE of the social ostracism that “fallen women” faced. Rather, fallen women faced social isolation because they acted immorally and attempted to break the rules and subvert society. The child was the result to the offensive behavior, not the cause of the reaction. Why were the Brits so keen on keeping girls’ knees together? The same reason that they had strong antisodomy laws, and the same reason that divorces were so hard to obtain. The Edwardian British mindset cared more about social stability and cohesion than personal happiness. In one episode of Downton, one of the characters speaks about how, back in the old days, people just stayed married and were unhappy, and that perhaps this new liberalizing order, by being lax about divorce, would let people be happier.
Except we know that’s not true. Divorces don’t make people happier – they certainly don’t make kids happier! The social and economic cost of no-fault divorce is staggering, not to mention psychospiritual cost which is incalculable! Homosexuality, fornication, adultery, divorce, these things upset the social order because they undermine the family. Edwardian England had not accepted the atomistic individual view of human rights and obligations. They continued to see threats to the family as threats to society…and they were right…unless of course Progressive social theories just haven’t had long enough to bring in the Utopia, yet.
But, by now, even the Progressives have to have learned that their antifamily, antinatal, and antisocial policies have come at a price that’s already too high and only getting dearer! Philip Jeffrey says this in a review of a critique of the critiques of Capitalism, by Eugene McCarraher:
The best of the Romantic critics in the book are those who were unafraid of coming off as reactionary. None wanted simply to “turn back the clock,” but they also didn’t think everything modernity rejected should remain buried. They freed themselves to question whether the blessings of liberty and progress were really blessings or just shabby replacements for genuine human goods. Take, for instance, one critic who successfully stood apart from “the final incorporation of Romanticism.” Unlike his contemporary Herbert Marcuse, Lewis Mumford doubted that technological and economic progress was on the verge of abolishing material scarcity and enabling the limitless triumph of erotic desire. He anticipated that automated technological systems would come to govern ever more fundamentally human activities—even thinking—because of the centuries-old Baconian goal of mastering nature through mechanism. He wanted to reclaim the pre-modern sense of the sacred. The left, ignoring Mumford, followed Marcuse into sexual revolution and blind faith in technocracy.
Today’s critics of capitalism are gelded by their fear of appearing reactionary. Even McCarraher, who draws heavily on Ruskin and Carlyle, finds it necessary to apologize for their commitment to “reaction” and “hierarchy.” But if the left is to regain the glory McCarraher sees in its past, it will have to admit it took a wrong turn and that it cannot sustainably criticize our throwaway culture for damaging the environment while praising it for damaging families. Pope Francis—whom McCarraher cites as a contemporary example of the Romantic tradition—has made this point. American leftists dare not. Anywhere criticism of capitalism might tread on the toes of sexual liberation, our radicals dare not step. But that may be the only path back to interesting criticism of capitalism at a time when something as fundamental as sex is seen in terms of commodity and consumption.
Lord Grantham’s Downton is portrayed as a place caught in the crossfire of social change, but it’s portrayal, in its more currently-relevant issues, doesn’t give a coherent defense of Edwardian conservative values. The show seems to suggest that simple patriarchal bigotry is the sole justification conservatives had for social policies that led to women and children being left out in the cold. And because it fails to recognize the conservative impulse to preserve a stable society it fails to adequately deal with the issues in any way that isn’t pandering or preaching…or propagandizing.
And that brings us back to Gonzo. Yes, the muppet. Gonzo the muppet baby recently revealed that he’s a tranny and impressed all the other muppets, initially transphobes all of them, when he revealed that he, in fact, was the beautiful Gonzorella! Gonzo explains that he doesn’t want to act how society expects him to act because he wants “to be me”. Gonzo’s quest for authenticity trumps society’s quest for stability and reality. Ms. Piggy apologizes to Gonzo because it wasn’t nice of them to tell him how to dress for the ball. And all the little kids are supposed to learn that it’s OK for boys to wear dresses.
Except it isn’t. It’s wrong, and also it’s antifeminist. And also, it’s incoherent.
If Gender is fluid, then how does Gonzo know how the “real” Gonzo is? There is no “real Gonzo” because it’s fluid. Gonzo’s quest for authenticity is inevitably going to be Quixotic because if you’re looking for solid ground in something that’s shifting you will not find it. You can’t find the “real” you in anything fluid…especially something as fluid and mutable as a “social construct”!
And the problem is that for the trans-rightsers gender can’t be ENTIRELY a social construct – otherwise why have the surgeries? Why have the clothes? If having a penis or a vagina doesn’t make you a man, or woman, respectively, then how does getting one cut-off or sewn-on make you a man or a woman? What’s the point of the surgery if the surgery doesn’t matter because they possession of genitalia is irrelevant anyways? Saying that you want your “insides to match your outsides” simply reinforces the anti-genital-mutliation argument. Why? Because if you way you want the surgery then you are admitting, necessarily admitting, that you’re not the sex you say you are. But if that’s the case then why have the surgery at all?! If this is confusing and seems incoherent: it is. It’s incoherent because it’s a position posited by people suffering from a mental illness. Don’t argue with crazy-people! Help them. Pity them. Pray for them. But don’t expect logic from them!
And the same argument follows for transvestism. If wearing a dress shows that you’re a girl then either wearing a dress is inherently feminine and NOT a social construct, or it is, and you’re reinforcing the social constructs that you’re rebelling against. Which, by the way, doesn’t sound very Feminist, to say that girls wear dresses!
But the height of irony is that this happens at a ball! Now, I’ve been to a gala or two in my life, but never anything as grand as a royal ball. But here’s the thing – royal ball’s are ENTIRELY AND ONLY ABOUT social expectations. Trying to enjoy the royal ball while flouting the social conventions of boys dressing like boys is hypocritical and incoherent. It’s eating your cake and having it too!
But the rainbow thread that gilds this tapestry is that in every case, in Lady Gaga’s song, in Lord Grantham’s Downton, and at Gonzo’s ball, the fundamental moral imperative is that society doesn’t have the right to tell me what to do. Which is an utterly ludicrous argument. And it’s hypocritical since you’re trying to tell society to tell people that society doesn’t get to tell people what to do! It’s lunacy! We could refine it and say “society cannot tell me to do things contrary to how I feel”, but again, that’s simply anarchy. Society socializes people for the good of society. And societies are complex, functioning as Organisms more than Mechanisms.
However, our Progressive, Materialist, Social-Engineer-Technocrats view society as a Mechanism: a Mechanism that they, and they alone, incidentally, are smart enough to manage. They can reorder society according to their vision and bring about human flourishing. Needless to say the Materialist Utopia is yet to materialize. But, they don’t care; they are entirely unperturbed, to quote Boramir, “they care not”, because, to quote Maria Von Trapp “they have confidence in confidence alone; they have confidence in themselves.” Just give them time; somewhere over the rainbow they’ll figure out (if they haven’t already) which levers to pull and which toggles to switch and which buttons to push and then we’ll all be happy, flourishing people. Their confidence is unearned. They’ve not demonstrated that any of their agenda brings both human flourishing and social cohesion. All their alleged victories are victories of technology and Enlightenment theories, motifs, and praxis. Any good ideas are plagiarized from Theism. They rob from Liberalism to give to Statism. They insist that the recalcitrant who have the audacity to oppose gay-marriage and transnormativity be silenced and that society change, while, trying to create their own new social vision. They reject the normative to renormalize, not to erase norms. It’s one big bad-faith string of gaslightings, motte-and-baileys, and out-and-out lies.
The Progressive vision wants to cut RECOGNIZED ties with Theism and the broad Western tradition. It doesn’t really want to scrap the Western Tradition or Theism because it needs the Christian moral ethic and the language of human rights and the principle of the sovereignty of the individual. But it wants to claim them for its own, as if Progressivism came up with these ideas, like they just EVOLVED! Like the Communists of post-war Germany they cry: “Ohne Gott und Sonnen schein Holen Wir Die Ernte ein!” Without God or sunshine, we will bring the harvest in. But this confidence in the human ability to create morality, ethics, rights, or political, economic, and social cohesion ex nihilo is as ludicrous as the USSR’s confidence they could feed people without God or sunshine.
I cannot say strongly enough that the Progressivist Project has failed and is failing. But our Technocratic leaders are doubling down. Media, Education, even the Military are getting in on the act as it’s all-hands-on-deck to try to save the good ship Progressivism. And they might just weather this storm. But that ship ain’t seaworthy. It will either be swamped by the winds and waves of the sea of economic reality or dashed on the rocks of social and psychological disintegration.
And when the Progressive Project fails, as it must, I pray that the Church will finally wake up to our need to present a Christ-like social vision, built upon the twin principles of individual worth and individual sacrifice.