The Emperor is as Naked as a Jaybird
Americans are confronted daily with portrayals of reality that go against actual reality, and are told to celebrate it. Nowhere is this more true than as it pertains to transgender ideology and stories. Men claiming to be women, and women declaring they are men are so common now in our culture that it hardly raises an eyebrow. Couple that with the breakneck pace new gender identifications are being created—in the last count I saw was 12, but that is outdated by the time you are reading this—and it is a scenario most can’t keep up with, and loathe even attempting to.
But we can’t say that. At least not out loud.
We are expected to act as if these things are totally normal behavior and decisions. Our culture looks at our response to gauge whether or not we have accepted our new education in what gender is, or isn’t, despite thousands of years of humans having a fairly simple grasp of how gender worked, at least before our elites and intelligentsia told us we were wrong.
A man who identifies as a woman is competing in the weight-lifting competition in the 2021 Olympics in Tokyo. Laurel Hubbard, the transgender Olympian I’m referring to, has made history as the oldest person to qualify for the weightlifting competition at the Olympics at 43-years-old. We are told, “Isn’t that amazing?! Wow!”
It’s not amazing. Do you know why Laurel broke the record as the oldest person to qualify for the weightlifting category at the Olympics? Because Laurel is a man competing in the women’s division in an event that is totally predicated on strength. So instead of biological women being able to make the team, this man who identifies as a woman takes their place. This 43-year-old man is competing against biological women in a strength competition.
And everyone applauds and celebrates.
But how many people are applauding and celebrating because they believe it’s actually virtuous and worthy of praise for its exceptional nature? And how many are applauding because to not applaud receives boos? How many are simply nodding their heads, taking their medicine, and doing what is expected of them?
I suspect many.
Of all the people observing these things, and many other examples, Christians should be people who refuse to celebrate this silliness. We do not believe Laurel is healthy mentally or spiritually, and we certainly don’t think reinforcing a lie helps that case. We do not need to be derogatory or repulsive in order to dissent. But we must, at a minimum tell the truth.
Even writing this article is going to bring out haters and boo-birds because I’m not towing the party line. Some will even profess to be Christians. It’s amazing to me that some professing Christians are willing to speak out against an article like this because they perceive it isn’t nice towards the LGBTQ+ community. Niceness to them is more virtuous than truth, and saying anything confrontational relative to modern norms is more sinful than actually denying God’s design for male and female.
A parable written by a Danish author in 1837 is as relevant today as it ever was. In the story, a vain emperor gets swindled by two visitors to his city. They pretend to be able to make the most lavish clothes in the world, but the catch is the clothes are invisible to stupid and incompetent people. The emperor gives them provisions to build facilities to make their clothes, but the looms are empty. Officials come to check on the progress, but they see nothing. However, none of them can admit they see nothing, lest they be considered fools who are unable to see. The two men eventually tell the emperor the clothes are finished, strip him naked and “clothe” him in his new attire. But he has nothing on. A procession is setup with the whole town in attendance to see the emperor’s new clothes. He walks through the street, proud of his attire. Everyone applauds and celebrates as he strolls the city. But finally, a child, who doesn’t feel or understand the pressure to fit in and pretend to see the clothes, blurts out that the emperor is naked.
Everyone knew the emperor was naked, but they had been fooled into thinking that saying something meant they were stupid and incompetent. So they played along. They went with the lie because everyone else seemed to see it. Everyone else said it was normal.
We are living in this reality today. Everywhere we turn we have people telling us the definitions we had before are outdated and insufficient. Marriage, gender, sexuality, and women’s reproductive rights all mean something different today than they did generations prior. And we are told what we must feel about these new definitions.
“Celebrate,” we are told.
“How brave!,” we are reminded.
It’s time for Christians to just say what it is, “The emperor is naked as a jaybird!”