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Let Me Be Clear

[Oh, no. When the president says this, he's not clear at all!--ed.] I'll try to do better.

Not long ago, an "ism" used to be a bad idea that had some portion of truth, but had twisted some aspect of human life, becoming dangerous in large doses. Now, our "isms" are completely fictional; people are asking us the equivalent of believing in unicorns. I'm not sure what "cisgenderism" is exactly, but I call it "reality."

I read another stupid word today: "ageism." Now, I certainly believe it's possible to unjustly discriminate against an aged person, (or a young one) but the word itself is a fig-leaf to cover the fact that old people aren't supposed to be working. We are indeed too individualized, too atomized, if our elders continue working out of necessity. That's a discussion for another day.

I like smart women. Thoughtful, feisty, independent women. You know what, though? Pretty much the peak of womanhood is being a wife and a mother. Is it the only way to live? Of course not. Do those two roles exhaust the entire meaning of "woman"? No. Are they constituitive of it? Yes, absolutely. And the people who say otherwise are denying reality. I don't recall giving anyone permission to decide that wives and mothers by their very existence as such were perpetuating oppression. How patently absurd.

But as I'm sure you realize, we live in the absurd now. People think that "man" and "woman" are just cultural constructs; they actually think you can change it, like you change a shirt. Not long ago, we'd have suggested that a man who thought he was a woman was mentally ill; now, he's the hero, and the one more likely to be committed is me.

The beauty of the natural law is that I know, maybe buried pretty deep in any one case, that people don't really believe most of the stuff they say; they are wounded and confused. Of course, you can't say this, either. To "love" people, they say, you have to take them at their word, as secure, balanced people. If that were true, however, you wouldn't be offended by everything.

This elicits no small amount of sympathy from me normally, but for the fact that many of these people hold actual power over others. Feel free to ask our fellows in the 20th century how that tends to go.

So, somebody has to take the risk of being unpopular, for love of others. I might suggest to Christ's vice-shepherds that it's not enough to argue for "religious freedom." Pluralism in fact is a concession to unreality; you don't beg for scraps from the table when your Father made the table, and all the "food" on it, and everything else.




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