Why “Caitlyn” Jenner Matters
By JAMES K. FITZPATRICK
My initial reaction to the surgical attempts by Bruce Jenner to transform himself into a woman was to ignore them, in the same way that I ignore the reality shows about bizarre behaviors that I come across when I am switching TV channels, everything from the fattest people on Earth to suburban swingers to people who pierce and tattoo every piece of flesh they can find.
It is a decision that works for me. I have no idea what takes place on the shows about the Kardashians and the “housewives” from New Jersey, Beverly Hills, and Atlanta. And I like it that way. I guess it could be argued that I should make an effort to keep up with what is going on in the world of pop culture. Sorry; it is a bridge too far.
But what is happening with Bruce Jenner is a different story. The way the country reacts to the propaganda push from the secular left about his transformation into “Caitlyn” cannot be ignored. It could be — what’s the right word? A watershed moment? A turning point? A milestone?
Permit me to reminisce a bit to make my point. When I first started to date my late wife in the mid-1960s, I would frequently wait for her in my car outside her office building on 43rd Street in Manhattan, where she was a secretary at The New York Times. (Back in those days it was possible to find a parking spot in the Times Square area; really.)
At least two or three times when I was waiting, I would see a man in his 20s who would parade as a transvestite in the Times Square area. There was no mistaking the image he was seeking to project. His body was obviously male, but he was heavily made up, and wore flamboyant wigs, bright jewelry, short-shorts, and high heels. The reaction to him from passersby was always the same, in one of two categories.
The first reaction was from young men in groups who would mock him with catcalls and whistles. The transvestite responded in kind, sometimes with flirtatious gestures, at other times with an angry string of expletives. The other reaction was from groups of theatergoers and commuters who struck me as not wanting to be cruel. They would make a studied effort to ignore the man. If they had children with them, they would find some way to persuade the kids to look at something else going on in the area.
I could not read the minds of the people in this latter group, but my impression was that they felt sorry for the transvestite; that they saw him as someone with a psychological problem not of his own choosing. At the time, this was considered the kind and progressive way to react. We were told by the enlightened sectors of society that those who mocked or resorted to physical violence against a young man like this were to be deplored because confused sexual identity was a condition that required counseling, not scorn or contempt.
Times have changed, haven’t they? What society is being asked to accept by those in the media and show business creating a positive picture of Jenner’s “alternate” sexuality is something new. We are still being told that it is wrong to mock Jenner, because he did not choose to think of himself as a woman. But there is a new angle: We are also being told that it is backward thinking to call for him to be given psychological counseling, because his choice about his sexual identity has no moral dimensions; that he is not abnormal, only different, in the way it is “different” to be left-handed or a redhead.
In certain instances the argument is made that God — or Mother Nature — made people with different forms of sexuality and that society has to learn to accept that fact. It is what Jenner means when he says in his new reality show, “I’m the new normal.”
What is the motive for pushing this angle? I can find no explanation other than Jenner is being used by the secular left as part of an agenda to discredit the biblical teaching that there are sexual urges and longings that a virtuous person is obliged to forsake; that it is backward-thinking for society or religious groups to call for self-denial in matters of sex; that “Caitlyn” Jenner and homosexuals in general should not be required to say “no” to themselves when they experience sexual desires different from the rest of society.
You know the buzz words: “What business is it of yours how people seek to express themselves sexually?” “Who gave you the right to interfere with how an individual seeks love?” “Who are you to judge?”
We could answer by pointing out that it is not we who are judging, but the homosexual activists who are trying to impose their new morality on those who hold to the teachings of the Bible and the two-thousand-year heritage of the Christian West. They call us homophobes and bigots. That’s judgmental, no?
But there might be a better way to approach the question. The key to the argument that society has no right to judge Jenner or anyone else with same-sex attractions is the insistence that no one should be required to deny himself or herself in matters of sex; that these are personal and private matters.
Which leaves me scratching my head. Have you noticed that, except for fringe groups, the same people championing Jenner’s and the LGBT “community’s” right to express themselves sexually in whatever manner they choose, have a long list of people they expect to say “no” when it comes to sex.
We can go down the list: Pedophiles are expected to say no to their longings. They get little sympathy if they protest that they didn’t choose their sexual desires, but were born with them and realized it from an early age. We arrest men who watch child pornography on their computers; it makes no difference if they swear up and down that they were born with the urge to do so.
Men and women with strong urges to cheat on their spouses are not encouraged to satisfy that longing, even if they insist that they did not choose to feel the way they do about the woman next door or the man in the office; they are expected to say no to that temptation. Society calls them “sluts” and “whore-mongers” when they do not. And, I’m sure you noticed: The media are cutting Josh Duggar no slack for not saying no to the sexual urges that led him to inappropriately touch young girls when he was a teenager.
The bottom line: There is more going on in this campaign to normalize Bruce Jenner’s sex-change surgeries than sympathy for Jenner. Rush Limbaugh says it is an effort to depict those who defend traditional Judeo-Christian beliefs about sex and marriage as weirdos. Rush is on the mark. And the stakes are high.
