Perspectives; Thoughts; Comments; Opinions; Discussions

Posts tagged ‘trans pronouns’

Trans pronouns part of larger effort to separate language from reality: CP panelist


By Ian M. Giatti, Christian Post Reporter | TUESDAY, APRIL 25, 2023

Read more at https://www.christianpost.com/news/trans-pronouns-part-of-effort-to-separate-language-from-reality.html/

Jeff Myers, Ph.D., the president of Summit Ministries and co-author of the e-book with The Christian Post’s Brandon Showalter (right), titled “Exposing The Gender Lie,” speaks at an event held at First Baptist Dallas titled, “Unmasking Gender Ideology: Protecting Children, Confronting Transgenderism” alongside counselor Julia Jeffress Sadler (left), on March 23, 2023. | The Christian Post

DALLAS — “Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.”

Voltaire’s famous quote is centuries old, but for Jeff Myers, author and president of Summit Ministries, it’s a warning that is as timely as ever when it comes to the debate over transgenderism.

Speaking at last month’s panel discussion on “Unmasking Gender Ideology: Protecting Children, Confronting Transgenderism” at First Baptist Dallas, Myers said he sees the issue as the “breakdown of language as a way of understanding reality.” Myers compared the path toward human atrocities committed in Nazi Germany and against the Hutu in Rwanda and ongoing efforts to curtail speech as related to the trans movement.

“In those cases, the very first thing that happened is the people in charge dehumanized the vulnerable, stopped calling them human,” he said. “You dehumanize them, and then you can destroy them.”

This tactic has been used multiple times since, most recently by the pro-abortion crowd. Remember the terms they used to describe the baby in the womb? “Lump of tissue”, “Mass of cells”, “Globulin mass”. By “dehumanizing ” the baby, their conscious was seared. Now they are using unhuman terms to describe anyone that doesn’t go along with their terms, definitions and speech.

That same strategy, said Myers, is being used against those who refuse to conform their speech to trans ideology.

“You’ll find that the very people who insist you use language in a particular way, that you use their chosen pronouns, you refer to them using the language that they insist on, if you don’t do it, you will be called all kinds of names — evil, bigoted, transphobic and so forth,” he added.

Get your free book, ‘Exposing the Gender Lie,’ here 

Myers also disagreed with the suggestion that the debate over trans identity and language is simply partisan politics.

“This is not a left versus right issue,” he said. “The vast majority of Americans, Republican, Independent, Democrat, believe that what is happening through transgenderism is wrong.”

He pointed to a recent poll that found only 9% of Americans believe gender transition procedures on young children are acceptable. 

“Yet somehow the nine percent control the agenda for everyone else,” he said

So how can the Church respond in a way that’s both truthful and helpful?

Myers, who co-authored a recent e-book with CP, Exposing The Gender Lie, said Christians must first acknowledge the urgency of the issue and the threat it poses.

“We realized we can’t be silent on the issue of gender ideology because it is an attack on the very idea of truth itself,” said Myers.

He said he’s “very concerned” about transgenderism and pointed to the some 6,500 catalogued biological differences between males and females.

“The idea that you can be a boy and become a girl is a lie, it is a lie about biology and it is a lie about personhood,” he said.

Myers pointed to the teaching of the postmodern view that words are reality — a teaching that stretches back nearly three decades when university students were being taught that no objective reality exists, only “knowable perceptions.” 

“So instead of saying people should seek the truth, now people say you should ‘speak your truth,” he explained. “So if words have no relation to reality, then words like ‘male’ and ‘female’ don’t matter anymore.”

That application, said Myers, underpins the entire ideology of transgenderism, which “twists language” to threaten the livelihoods of those whose very job is to communicate facts and data.

“You’re a journalist, you’ll get fired if you don’t do this,” he said. “If you refer to biological men who identify as women as transgender women, you must use that terminology. 

“If you’re in the corporate world and don’t do it, you’ll be fired.” 

Ian M. Giatti is a reporter for The Christian Post. He can be reached at: ian.giatti@christianpost.com. 

Category:

Culture, Political

Tagged with:

Parents, teachers sue to stop Virginia school district’s trans pronoun policy


Reported By Michael Gryboski, Mainline Church Editor 

Read more at https://www.christianpost.com/news/parents-teachers-sue-virginia-school-district-over-trans-pronoun-policy.html/

A sign outside a classroom taken in 2016. | REUTERS/Tami Chappell

A group of parents and teachers have sued a Virginia school district over a policy requiring teachers to use the preferred pronouns of trans-identified students. The plaintiffs, whose names have been redacted, filed a lawsuit last week in the Circuit Court of Rockingham County against the leadership of Harrisonburg City Public Schools.

At issue is the school board’s decision to add “gender identity” to the school district’s nondiscrimination policy. The policy forces teachers to use students’ preferred pronouns and withhold information about students’ gender identity from their parents if the student requests they do so. The lawsuit claims the policy “compels teachers to violate their religious convictions about gender and honesty” and “violates parents’ rights by interfering with their ability to direct the upbringing and education of their children.”

“Plaintiffs … are HCPS teachers and parents who object to HCPS’s policy on free-speech, religious-freedom, and parental-rights grounds,” the complaint reads.

“Plaintiffs deeply care about their students and children. They see the growing number of children struggling with gender dysphoria and want those children to experience love and support. But like many, Plaintiffs recognize that a policy of immediate social transition and unquestioning affirmation without parental involvement for every case of gender dysphoria in minors is harmful, not to mention contrary to science.”

The plaintiffs are represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative legal nonprofit that has filed similar litigation against other school districts.

“Public schools should never hide information from or lie to parents about a
child’s mental health,” the complaint reads. “And schools should never compel teachers to perpetrate such a deception.” 

ADF Senior Counsel Ryan Bangert said in a statement that he believes parents “have the fundamental right to direct the upbringing, care, and education of their children.”

“Teachers and staff cannot willfully hide kids’ mental health information from their parents, especially as some of the decisions children are making at school have potentially life-altering ramifications,” Bangert stated.

“As the clients we represent believe, a teacher’s role is to support, not supplant, the role of the parent.”

HCPS posted a statement on its website stating that the school board “maintains a strong commitment to its inclusivity statement.”

“In specific student situations, the focus is always to foster a team approach that includes and supports the unique needs of the student and family on a case-by-case basis,” stated HCPS.

“We are dismayed that this complaint is coming to us in the form of a lawsuit in lieu of the collaborative approach we invite and take to address specific needs or concerns, an approach that we believe best serves the interests of our students, staff, and families.”

HCPS adopted the policy after the Virginia Department of Education mandated school divisions adopt similar policies to a model policy that it supported during the 2021-2022 school year. Other school districts adopted similar policies. In addition to the HCPS lawsuit, ADF oversees litigation against Loudon County Public Schools in Virginia over a similar measure known as Policy 8040.

According to the Loudon County policy enacted last year, school faculty and staff must use the chosen name and pronouns of a student who identifies as “gender-expansive or transgender.”

“School staff shall, at the request of a student or parent/legal guardian, when using a name or pronoun to address the student, use the name and pronoun that correspond to their consistently asserted gender identity,” read the policy.

“The use of gender-neutral pronouns is appropriate. Inadvertent slips in the use of names or pronouns may occur; however, staff or students who intentionally and persistently refuse to respect a student’s gender identity by using the wrong name and gender pronoun are in violation of this policy.” 

Last year, the Loudoun County Schools suspended teacher Tanner Cross after he voiced objection to what at the time was a proposed Policy 8040 during a school board hearing. He said the policy would “damage children” and “defile the holy image of God.” He argued that affirming students’ preferred pronouns is “lying to a child.”

After a judge ordered the school district to reinstate Cross, the school district argued that it had received complaints from students and parents who “expressed fear, hurt and disappointment about coming to school” in light of Cross’ comments. Loudoun County Schools said addressing those concerns was “paramount to the school division’s goal to provide a safe, welcoming and affirming learning environment for all students.”

The Virginia Supreme Court rejected the school district’s appeal of the court’s order to reinstate Cross. 

Follow Michael Gryboski on Twitter or Facebook

Category:

Education, Political

Tagged with:

Tag Cloud