Many Christians consider James Lindsay an expert on Cultural Marxism and reading the culture war. Last week, Evangelical Dark Web reported that James Lindsay was using a Queer Theory tactic, attacking Christians as “homophobic” for rejecting his synthesis of accepting homosexuality into the mainstream. Additionally, we raised the issue of Michael O’Fallon’s sordid gain for monetizing James Lindsay’s anti-Christian content. Taking a deeper dive into the Social Justice Encyclopedia of James Lindsay and Michael O’Fallon’s joint venture, it would appear that the two go woke on the issue of gender.
It’s necessary at this time to establish what the biblical view of gender is. The 1828 Webster’s American Dictionary defines gender is synonymous with sex.
GEN’DER, noun [Latin genus, from geno, gigno; Gr.to beget, or to be born; Eng. kind. Gr. a woman, a wife; Sans. gena, a wife, and genaga, a father. We have begin from the same root. See Begin and Can.]
1. Properly, kind; sort.
2. A sex, male or female. Hence,
3. In grammar, a difference in words to express distinction of sex; usually a difference of termination in nouns, adjectives and participles, to express the distinction of male and female. But although this was the original design of different terminations, yet in the progress of language, other words having no relation to one sex or the other, came to have genders assigned them by custom. Words expressing males are said to be of the masculine gender; those expressing females, of the feminine gender; and in some languages, words expressing things having no sex, are of the neuter or neither gender
GEN’DER, verb transitive To beget; but engender is more generally used.
GEN’DER, verb intransitive To copulate; to breed. Leviticus 19:19.
Our usage of “gender” today has strayed far from this understanding due to feminism and emerging gender theory. But you’ll notice that these “anti-woke” liberal’s worldviews are post WWII constructions.
On New Discourses, gender is made distinct from sex, rather than interchangeable. Their so-called “Social Justice Encyclopedia” contains a list of terms explaining the Social Justice usage prior to providing New Discourses’ commentary. As these pages have no bylines, it is entire fair to yoke O’Fallon to what is likely Lindsay’s writing, as evident by the self-referential material.
After positing that the Critical Theorists view gender as entirely a social construct (thesis), New Discourses turns to the opposing view, that gender is determined soley by sex (antithesis), and brokers a middle ground (synthesis) whereby biology a mere contributing factor to gender.
The relevant question about gender is why gender expressions as social constructions are the ways they are. Gender studies, thus Critical Social Justice Theory, has only one (mostly wrong) answer to this: socialization into a system of power that perpetuates social inequalities and dynamics of dominance and oppression. In reality, it is very likely that human beings evolved tendencies (which need not be hard and fast) to maintain certain intuitions about what it means to be male and what it means to be female because of the vastly different roles the two sexes would have needed to occupy for most of humanity’s pre-technological history. These sorts of ideas are usually explored by the field of evolutionary psychology, which has its own severe limitations, but is considered extremely problematic by the Theory of Critical Social Justice because it hypothesizes that men and women are likely to have evolved to be somewhat psychologically different, at least on average. Similar disdain is offered to biological explanations that appeal to hormone levels and their effects on both development and behavior (despite the fact that hormone treatment is considered an essential part of gender-affirming, formerly gender reassignment, formerly gender transitioning, formerly sex change protocols, and the testimonies of the lived experiences of trans people, both psychologically and physiologically, are quite intense regarding the significance of their influence). [Emphasis added]
The entire basis for disagreement between James Lindsay’s view and the wokest view is that the more woke view is not accommodating enough to Darwinian Evolution.
Nevertheless, it seems exceedingly clear that some relationship exists between sex and gender, though it is not entirely clear what that relationship is. Accordingly, a number of different perspectives exist to try to explain this relationship. These are taken more or less seriously. For example, the arch-nemesis view to that of gender Theory would be sex essentialism (see also, biological essentialism), which would more or less posit that gender is a direct consequence of biology and thus there is no meaningful difference between sex and gender at all (and, in more extreme interpretations, any such disagreement is best attributed to mental illness). This view is also unlikely to be correct and is accordingly becoming quite uncommon and viewed increasingly as antiquated and even sexist or misogynistic (not wholly unfairly).
James Lindsay then denies that sex and gender are interchangeable terms, as was commonly understood 200 years ago. This would be the biblical notion of gender, that it is indistinguishable from sex outside of language. Yet New Discourses falt out denies this biblical reality. Linking his own material, Lindsay reference his own article titled, “The Pendulum Need Not Swing: Why Gender Roles are Not the Answer to Blank Slatism” He argues in that article:
The liberal approach has been a resoundingly successful overarching strategy to improving human flourishing, and thus it would be unethical to go back to morally enforced essentializations of gender, even if we could. The fact is that having been freed from the expectations laid upon their genders, few people would go back to a state where they are told how to be, even if they end up conforming strongly to what those roles would prescribe. At this point, there is no putting that genie back in the bottle, taking away equal opportunities, contraception, and all the rest and returning to an expectation that one’s genitals must define how one live one’s life and what one is interested in.
The argument that 2nd Wave Feminism which is largely associated with the Sexual Revolution has increased human flourishing is quite laughable, especially when you look at the rates of antidepressants usage, income vs inflation, decreasing birthrates, and an increase of broken families. Then it posits that contraception is essential to maintain. Presumably this includes abortion, as well.
It is essential, when considering gender relations, to recognize that we are still adapting to changes in rights, freedoms and expectations which have happened astoundingly fast in the last sixty years. Men and women are still working on optimizing the balance between work and family responsibilities since women have joined the workforce in vast numbers. We are also still working on our relations with each other since ideas of sexual morality have changed from expectations of chastity (particularly for women) and monogamy to expectations of consideration and clear consent.
Again, this isn’t something that Christians would celebrate. The article concludes:
The only thing which will help our current culture wars is to accept the reality that men and women are different on average but have the same psychological and cognitive traits in overlapping degrees, that individuals could fit anywhere along the spectrum of more typically male and more typically female traits, and that very few will conform to all averages for their sex. The most productive and ethical thing we can do to reduce social pressure one way or the other and enable individuals to realize their individual potential in both interests and abilities it to prioritize treating people as individuals.
The pendulum which so many see as swinging wildly disadvantaging one sex and then another need not do so if we make our stance on this evidence-based and liberal in the broadest sense. If we can accept that we are overlapping populations with much variation but significant differences on aggregate; if we can respect people’s rights to find gender roles meaningful and fulfilling to them and their right not to; if we can treat each other as individuals with the same right to every opportunity, dignity and respect, the pendulum can rest.
If this is your view on gender, that men and woman are on a spectrum with overlap, then what chance do you stand against transgenderism which posits that a man identifying as a woman thus becomes one.
Rather a the biblical understanding of gender and sex, but I repeat myself, is the most formidable view against such vain ideologies like transgenderism. James Lindsay’s view is a synthesis built on Darwinian Evolution and the parts of Gender Theory that he accepts. This view cannot hold up against the slippery slope of liberalism.
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That’s atheist objectivism for you. No matter how hard they try, they always end up spouting off a bunch of baseless, circularly-reasoned, technocratic, moral relativist gobbledygook, that references back to nothing but opinion – opinion which is informed by “scientific” pursuits that intentionally factor out God from the start.
The same applies to fake professing Christians who reject creation.
If it’s just a way people supposedly “evolved”, out of necessity or whatever postulated reason, then it is constantly “evolving” and therefore could “evolve” otherwise. Totally baseless.
I don’t know what makes them think their baseless reasoning is any stronger than the critical theorists baseless reasoning. “my moral relativism is better than your moral relativism!”. Reprobate, prideful minds arguing over which of them get’s to take God’s place.
I can tell them, on all sides, truly born again Christians are never going to fit with their atheistic theories, no matter how much they theorize. We don’t reject the Creator, and therefore they will never understand us.
That may be the foremost problem with the theory of theistic evolution. It dictates that creation is still ongoing. And that is irreconcilable with any scripture, from the first verse to the last.
The prevalence of belief in Evolution (big E), and the technocratic appeal to the theorizations of mankind, is the main reason why we will continue to lose the so-called “culture wars”. It’s probably the main reason why things will continue to get worse for us, as we near the end times. We will continue to lose the battle against technocratic pseudo-science.
And I believe, that’s why the last two chapters of the Bible, Revelation 21 and 22, both reiterate yet again, in closing of the entire Book, that cowards, faithless, and everyone who loves and practices falsehood (technocratic pseudo-science for example), will be thrown into the lake of fire, right along with the unrighteous – murderers, sexually immoral, etc. The Lord is condemning all “sides” except His own.
“Science” cannot substantiate the existence of moral absolutes.
Attempts to infer morality from what passes for “science” these days, which intentionally factors out the one and only source of moral absolutes from the start, are inherently irrational, and are guaranteed to remain irrationally baseless, no matter how obfuscated the circular reasoning may be. The illogic may be well disguised, but it’s always there.
The reasons it cannot work are very simple, very practical, and very obvious. Yet another is that the postulations, theories, and apparent knowledge of mankind is continually changing every minute of every day. Those goalposts are constantly moving.
Even if you could derive some small measure of moral notions of right and wrong, that house would still be built on shifting sand. Everything underpinning your conclusion could, and probably would, change five minutes later. And because of the nature of it, you can’t rationally take a snapshot at some point in time, pin it down, and say “this is absolutely correct”
The ever-changing nature of their efforts is great for their job security and wallet, but it’s extremely damaging and destructive to the rest of us.
I rummaged through my books and checked the following dictionaries.
World Book dictionary published in 1964. Gender = sex.
Websters New World student dictionary published in 1966. Gender = sex.
Merriam Webster dictionary published in 1997. Gender = sex.
And a couple of things that show how far we’ve fallen …
A Websters New World student dictionary Elementary Edition which only contains the one definition pertaining to grammar, because the other definitions were deemed inappropriate for elementary school aged children.
And the World Book dictionary from 1964, listed above, includes a reference to 2 Tim 2:23 (KJV) in one of the definitions of the word gender – apparently short for engender.
Interestingly, the verse applies …
“Have nothing to do with foolish, ignorant controversies; you know that they breed quarrel” – 2 Tim. 2:23 (kinda like foolish arguments over which form of moral relativism is superior to the other)
I was a software engineer for many years, up until about a decade ago. Worked with hundreds of databases, hundreds of systems, for several employers, from very small to multi-national corporations. Probably millions of lines of code, written by myself and hundreds of other engineers. So on and so forth.
I never saw a field or variable named “sex”. It was always labeled it “gender” in order to keep the language clean, and the meaning was always “sex”, male or female.
This widespread attempt to redefine the word “gender” to mean something other than “sex” is very recent – I’d say within the last decade, at most.
Forms only gave the option male or female. There was tons of validation at ever level to ensure the input was only male or female. So on and so forth.
If I were to look at some of those systems now, I’d wager they’ve changed every bit of it. Probably added support for “pronouns” and every other abomination imaginable.
But this was just a decade ago. Fairly recent.
That is why I never went back into programming. I kept coding a bit on the side, laying low because the courts have yet to clearly decide whether or not a Christian can be forced to sin by supporting sin, up through Joe Biden’s first day in office, when he signed a bunch of EOs imposing it on the country.
After that, I got out of it as quickly as possible while I still could.
But during that time I only worked with my own code, so I can’t speak to whether or not the imposition of the gender mess happened more recently than about a decade ago, at least as it relates to my own experience and the systems I worked with.
I’ve probably got code examples and documentation from Microsoft and other left-leaning companies that are now woke, as recent as just a few years ago, that only support male and female, and which use the word “gender” to refer to sex.
It’s very recent.