There has been a good bit of talk of late, here and here, about why the lie of trans ideology is dying a steady death. But this is happening while support for so-called same-sex marriage [SSM] has declined only slightly for all U.S. adults of late, though notably among conservatives.
Why is this?
Noted University of Texas sociologist Mark Regnerus explains over at Public Discourse why trans ideology is the “bridge-too-far” which might cause more to question all the others lies of the sexual revolutionaries. As he explained to the Daily Citizen, “The winds have shifted.”
Of trans ideology, professor Regnerus states in his article, “What might have seemed like the next progressive triumph-in-waiting is instead running off the rails.” Thus, “There are at least four key reasons why the gender saga has not enjoyed the same cultural, popular, and legal success that SSM has.”
First, while gay marriage radically redefined a vital social institution, trans ideology redefines the human person. Regnerus explains, “Just listen to the difference between a man saying, ‘I’m allowed to marry another man,’ and the same man saying, ‘I am able to become a woman.’ There is indeed a massive difference. One is a mistaken choice someone can make. The other is an impossible ontological claim about the person making the claim. In fact, the majority in Obergefell v. Hodges assured us in their opinion (p. 27) that any citizen has the right to disagree with same-sex marriage. Try disagreeing that a neighbor or co-worker is not the “woman” he claims to be. It will not go well for you with those who have bought the lie that male and female are chosen identities.
Regnerus explains, “It’s why same-sex marriage seems a no-brainer to an author like J. K. Rowling, but transgender claims are not just uncomfortable but an offense, an unacceptable transgression of the social contract – a bridge too far.”
Second, Regnerus explains, “Same-sex marriage was only possible because the demand for marriage and the respect that the institution long commanded had been eroding for more than forty years.” No-fault divorce laws severed marriage of any lasting meaning, allowing the party ending the marriage, for any or no reason, all the power while the faithful spouse had none. “Obergefell was also a reflection of how much marriage has been bled of its understanding as a reproductive union,” Regnerus reminds us. He rightly states, “Without the contraceptive revolution, SSM would never have occurred.”
Third, same-sex marriage is an incorrect, but straightforward, proposition. It redefines marriage to allow same-sex couplings. Transgender ideology can be many sorts of things, so we’re told, determined by the individual’s imagination and we are all expected to be on board for all of it.
“Trans” can involve changes in clothing, name, physicality, and appearance in a binary or non-binary way. It can also include someone’s mere pronouncement of change without any actual change whatsoever. Just the claim makes it “true.”
Furthermore, there were years of public debate over same-sex marriage, as anemic and disingenuous as it was. There has been none on the “trans” question. Everyone was just expected to get onboard. Regnerus correctly notes, “The pace at which consensus is sought, then declared, in this entire domain has been ridiculously rapid, a political rather than empirical move.” It was done by edict and power politics.
Fourth and finally, trans ideology was more easily seen by the larger culture as a violation of child protection that same-sex marriage was not. Yes, gay marriage placed children in intentionally motherless or fatherless homes simply to satisfy adult wishes. But fawning media profiles of the adults constructing such “families” papered over this. Trans ideology, however, mutilated their bodies and messed with their minds. Too many of us saw this carnage in our own extended families and neighbors.
These are four major reasons why the spread of “trans” ideology was a bridge too far for so many people who are now rejecting it, even while they largely support the radical redefinition of the family that gay marriage wrought.
Let us hope the lie of transgenderism ends up revealing the destructive fiction of same-sex marriage and the family to more citizens.
Image from Shutterstock.
