Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 444 ｜ The Untold Stories of 'Gender Transition'

00:00:00.000 Hey guys, welcome to Relatable. Today I am talking to Brandon Showalter of The Christian

00:00:15.460 Post. His beat is transgenderism and especially what the movement is doing to children. We've

00:00:22.100 talked about this subject quite a lot, but he has a very unique perspective and really

00:00:26.640 has been digging into this for a long time and the consequences that young kids are facing

00:00:32.260 in the name of a social experiment that we haven't even thought through the implications

00:00:37.140 of. And as we can already see, the implications, the consequences are very dire. And this is

00:00:45.320 something that we need to know about. This is something we need to care about. If we care

00:00:48.920 about the least of these, if we care about the most vulnerable, we have to care about this issue.

00:00:53.900 And so this is a fascinating conversation that I had with him, and I'm really excited

00:00:59.920 for you to listen to it. Without further ado, here is Brandon Showalter.

00:01:08.740 Brandon, thank you so much for joining us. Can you tell everyone who you are and what you do?

00:01:14.120 Yes, my name is Brandon Showalter. I am a journalist with The Christian Post and have been since the

00:01:19.140 summer of 2016. Full-time beat reporter based here in Washington, D.C. And on the side, I like to sing

00:01:28.160 and cook and hike mountains.

00:01:32.560 Awesome. Awesome. Something that you focused on a lot over the past few years, you talk about many

00:01:37.380 things, but in particular, I was drawn to your work on transgenderism, transgender activism, and in

00:01:45.400 particular, how this is affecting youth. Can you just talk about where you think we are in this

00:01:51.340 whole, if you want to call it, a movement?

00:01:55.080 Yes. I was first exposed to the transgender movement soon after I started as a full-time

00:02:01.780 reporter. And I hadn't really heard so much about it. My grid for understanding what this was all

00:02:08.380 about was the few transvestites at Mardi Gras. And I mean, I'd heard about it in the news here and

00:02:15.440 there. Wasn't so familiar with the issues. But I noticed pretty soon, about a year after the

00:02:22.380 Obergefell ruling happened, that all of the LGBT groups had totally moved on. Everything was centered

00:02:28.700 around transgender, non-binary, queer, the letters and the acronym beyond LGB. And I thought it was

00:02:36.680 remarkable the speed at which that had taken, the speed with which that had progressed. Everything

00:02:43.740 was about that. And I just thought, wow, that's fast. And I noticed that language was being shifted

00:02:50.060 within the news media where men were being called she and all of these other things. And I knew a

00:02:57.960 little bit about the medical stuff that was going on. I had heard about people that had a few

00:03:03.740 surgeries. But my take on it was, well, I don't think that's ethical. But if they're living their

00:03:09.320 lives peacefully and not bothering anybody, I, you know, okay, didn't think it was ethical, but

00:03:14.400 whatever. But it was in early 2017, when I learned at a cross-partisan panel at the Heritage Foundation

00:03:23.500 that this was being done to children. And specifically, when I learned what puberty blockers were,

00:03:28.820 I've said before, is something inside me just kind of snapped immediately. There was just this visceral

00:03:35.260 gut reaction that I had that I just knew it was horribly wrong, that you don't treat the normal

00:03:41.180 pubertal processes as though they are diseases to be cured, particularly in pursuit of a physical

00:03:47.560 impossibility. And so that's when I started falling down the gender identity rabbit hole, as I like to

00:03:52.660 say. And I've never been the same since. Yeah, we are destroying an entire generation

00:03:59.460 of young people. We are brutalizing their bodies. And the carnage is increasing. A lot of it's in my

00:04:07.380 inbox. And it's so much worse than what people know. They are not only being indoctrinated in schools

00:04:14.140 and through social media influencers, their bodies are being irreparably harmed. They are being drugged

00:04:22.680 with powerful hormones that are not doing them any good. In fact, they're giving them endocrine

00:04:28.260 diseases and putting them at risk for a whole host of other terrible medical complications, heart attacks,

00:04:33.700 strokes, cancers, kidney failures. It's bad. Transgenderism is many things. It's incoherent ideology.

00:04:42.080 It makes no sense. It's a lie. But at base, what it mainly is, is a medical scandal.

00:04:50.020 Can we go back a little bit into your answer when you talked about just how quickly this all happens?

00:04:56.920 You and I know, and probably most people know listening to and watching this, that a Bergefell

00:05:00.900 happened in 2015. This is not something that happened 25, 30 years ago where it's just kind of

00:05:06.440 been this slow growth of a movement. But this has all happened very quickly in just less than

00:05:11.760 six years. Why do you think there was such a quick transition from, okay, we just want gay people

00:05:18.840 to be able to get married. We just want gay rights to, okay, let's subvert the entire natural order in

00:05:25.680 our understanding, our scientific understanding, our historic understanding of what it means to be

00:05:33.040 a man and a woman. What was the reason for that quick switch in priorities?

00:05:41.760 It's a great question. And what's interesting about it is that I've met a lot of even gays and

00:05:49.380 lesbians since that ruling who are adamantly opposed to this shift. So there's a lot of money and there's a

00:05:57.400 lot of power to be had with this movement. I would attribute much of this to the ongoing forces of the

00:06:08.640 sexual revolution. It just grabs power, it devours all kinds of things. We can't expect any of it to

00:06:16.680 be rational because none of it is. Spiritually, I think it is rebellion against God. There's a

00:06:22.760 spiritual component to it, of course. But it is fraught with a lot of contradictions. And the most

00:06:29.940 bewildering aspect of this, as I hear from same-sex attracted people, gays and lesbians, is that youth

00:06:38.520 who are same-sex attracted, whether they've fully identified themselves among the LGB or not, are now being

00:06:44.080 told that their same-sex attraction is actually something to be remedied with synthetic hormones

00:06:48.880 and surgical instruments. It's bewildering. But I mean, I hear these accounts firsthand and they are

00:06:56.380 absolutely horrified. But the other factor that I think is that just cannot be ignored is there is a

00:07:03.220 massive amount of money to be made with this. And so if you go on these hormones, you're going to be

00:07:13.520 enslaved to the medical industrial complex for life. You will never go off of them. And so it

00:07:19.460 behooves us to ask the question, well, who's benefiting from that? It's not a conspiracy theory

00:07:24.980 to think, well, let's follow the money here. I mean, why? I know you've had Abigail Schreier on your

00:07:31.780 program before, and she asks the question in her book, Irreversible Damage, why is it that for the

00:07:37.880 first time in approximately 100 years of diagnostic history, suddenly we see these massive numbers of

00:07:45.520 especially young teenage girls suddenly identifying as the opposite sex and wanting hormones. But this

00:07:51.760 is happening to teen boys as well. It's happening to very young children out of nowhere. And so I think

00:07:57.860 we have to look a lot deeper into the revenue streams as to who's pushing this, because this did

00:08:04.100 not happen organically. This is not a grassroots movement. This is top down. There are very, very

00:08:10.020 wealthy people who are pushing this. And we need to ask those questions a lot more, because it's there

00:08:17.400 if you start to look. You know, we talked about on this podcast how it seems to be that children are

00:08:22.760 very often the subjects of progressive social experiments, whether it's the rearrangement of

00:08:27.980 the family, the hubris that we have in the United States to say that basically men and women are

00:08:32.780 interchangeable. It's okay. If, you know, we create a child artificially and then make sure that they

00:08:38.940 don't have a mom or a dad, that's probably fine. We don't look to human history or to sociology or to

00:08:44.640 psychology to ask ourselves, well, is that okay? If we raise children in a completely different

00:08:50.420 environment than every culture for all of human history has raised them. It's true when it comes to

00:08:56.280 this gender activism and puberty blockers and things like that. It's true when it comes to

00:09:01.680 abortion. That's another social experiment that has been inflicted on kids. It's true when it comes to

00:09:08.140 comprehensive sex education. You don't need 12 to 13 years to teach kids about the biological

00:09:14.860 functions of sex, but we're indoctrinating them with this very confusing sexual ideology and

00:09:20.700 ideas about sexual identity that I think are very harmful to them. It's true in a variety of ways.

00:09:27.440 It just seems like kids are just the convenient subject of social experiments and that very few

00:09:34.280 people, at least the people in charge, are taking a step back and asking, hang on, like, what are the

00:09:40.060 consequences on kids for this kind of stuff? Why is it that, for example, the American Academy of

00:09:47.500 Pediatrics, the people who are supposed to care about kids, aren't taking a stance against this

00:09:52.320 kind of stuff, which is so, like you've said, tangibly damaging to these kids and their bodies?

00:09:58.860 The effects on children have to be the absolute worst. I mean, I see, like I think I just said,

00:10:06.060 I see their brutalized bodies in my inbox. The teenagers who, their parents reach out to me

00:10:11.800 in utter horror and desperation. And why children are the subject of so many social experiments,

00:10:21.660 again, I would just say, from a Christian perspective, from a theological perspective,

00:10:25.860 it's just spiritual warfare. And we see the enemy of our souls just waging war against the image of

00:10:32.400 God. But as far as the American Academy of Pediatrics goes, again, I know I may sound conspiratorial,

00:10:40.840 but I've dug deep into this. And we are seeing the radicalization of so many professions and

00:10:49.900 professional associations. And if radical activists can seize control of a few influential bodies that

00:10:59.040 then govern the messaging to the media, they can completely change the character of a once respected

00:11:06.140 organization. And that's what has happened with the AAP, with the Endocrine Society. While people

00:11:12.980 are sleeping, they accomplish these very awful things by stealth. The radicals get into these

00:11:19.280 organizations, they tweak the guidelines, they sometimes make subtle changes along the way that

00:11:24.140 seem reasonable, but then they have then engineered a social experiment that just explodes given the

00:11:31.220 right environment. It really is that bad. I've interviewed endocrinologists and doctors who

00:11:39.520 object to this. And what they've told me is that your average doctor just wants to practice medicine,

00:11:46.620 live his or her life, be normal. They're not into the politics. They just want to do what they were

00:11:52.960 trained to do. Getting into the politics of the professional organization that govern a lot of their

00:11:59.940 public policy and their stances on issues is not something that many are really interested in

00:12:04.540 doing. But those who are know how to get into those entities and then shape the public mind

00:12:10.260 in keeping with their ideological goals. And so we have to stay watchful because it is not a conspiracy

00:12:18.440 to, when you realize what's happened, to see that there's a very coordinated, synchronized effort

00:12:25.660 that took years of planning, but they've pulled it off. And it happens from the top down. No,

00:12:32.780 American society does not want to see children have their puberty blocked, their healthy puberty

00:12:38.160 blocked with untested hormonal agents, and then put on a lifetime of drugs and be enslaved to

00:12:46.400 being a medical patient. Nobody wants that. Right.

00:12:49.660 But a few key individuals and a few key institutions have engineered that outcome. And there's a lot of

00:12:55.960 money and a lot of power, again, that's attached to all of that.

00:12:58.340 And like you said, not to want to be conspiratorial, but when you do think about where this is coming

00:13:04.400 from, of course, like you and I agree, from a spiritual perspective, we know where it's coming

00:13:09.060 from, that this is spiritual warfare. It's also the result of godlessness. When you reject the idea

00:13:14.580 of any kind of moral lawgiver, everything does become arbitrary. Even things that, you know, atheists,

00:13:19.860 for example, may have claimed are not arbitrary because the science proves it. But what we are finding is

00:13:26.120 that even science itself is becoming subjective when the gatekeepers of science become political,

00:13:32.740 then there is no objective truth, not just moral truth, but also scientific truth. Everything

00:13:39.200 becomes up in the air. It's that, you know, Orwellian line about two plus two equaling five just because

00:13:46.320 the party says so. And so this is kind of the direction of godlessness, the direction of progressive

00:13:53.360 movements, totalitarianism. But I also, and maybe this is a cynical conspiratorial part of me,

00:14:00.120 and I'm not trying to be that way, but in just looking for answers, I wonder how many of our foreign

00:14:05.380 enemies at least are enjoying watching the weakness that we are creating in our youth, not just by

00:14:15.260 destroying their bodies by this social experiment, but also corrupting their minds. Kids who become

00:14:21.860 this sexually confused and this confused about what it means to be male and female, how to use

00:14:27.900 language, gendered language, kids that are that confused, it's hard for me to see them becoming

00:14:34.960 well-adjusted, critically thinking adults. And to me, if I were, you know, a foreign power looking to

00:14:40.980 take down America, I would be really pleased at what's happening in America's schools and in America's

00:14:46.740 institutions to try to weaken kids in that way. It's a good point. It really is. You are destabilizing

00:14:54.880 the minds of the next generation in just an unbelievably horrible way. And sometimes I get

00:15:04.760 asked, you know, some people are like, why are you so obsessed with this issue? You know, why do you

00:15:08.760 report on it so much? And in addition to being assigned by my editors to cover it, I think that,

00:15:15.940 again, the medical stuff is bad enough. But the way in which this movement assaults knowledge itself,

00:15:24.700 it assaults our very means of communication. Language shapes thought. We can't communicate

00:15:31.060 at all if we can't even agree on the basic terms of the most basic things. I may as well be speaking

00:15:39.080 Urdu with a Brooklyn accent to someone who believes that a man can become a woman or that someone is,

00:15:45.660 it's actually possible to be born in the wrong body. It makes no sense. And so it divides our

00:15:51.760 society. It weakens our society. And yes, I imagine that foreign adversaries are cheering this on because

00:15:58.000 there's no stability at all. We can't even function. Right. But I'll also say too, that this

00:16:05.560 movement is global. There is a larger and I believe diabolical movement to target children with this

00:16:12.580 nonsense that's truly nightmarish. It's all across the Western world. It's in Latin America. It's even

00:16:19.720 in Africa. It's especially bad in the developed West, of course. This is largely a rich person's

00:16:26.660 phenomenon. But there are very vulnerable people being lured into this through all kinds of schools

00:16:32.580 and other ways. But this is global in scope because the medical industry, the pharmaceutical

00:16:38.400 industry, the global LGBT rights groups, with the exception of the LGB Alliance, are all pushing

00:16:44.660 this fervently because there's a lot of money to be made and there's a lot of power to be had.

00:16:48.720 And isn't it just so interesting because you were saying this is global and I was thinking at first,

00:17:03.700 I was like, well, it seems to be more Western. And I think that we both agree that it's at least

00:17:08.880 started. It's a result of privilege, honestly. It's a result of having luxury. It's a result of being

00:17:16.040 able to access these kinds of procedures. It's a result of having a lot of time on our hands.

00:17:22.160 And it's something that it doesn't seem like we will see in somewhere like China. I just read

00:17:26.720 recently that they are doing these kind of masculinity camps to defeminize men. I'm not saying

00:17:33.420 that's good. Obviously, I have a lot of problems with China and how they treat their people. But

00:17:39.200 contrast that to what we're doing here in the United States, making a lot of gender confused

00:17:46.420 girls and boys. There seems to be probably some motive behind that too. But it's interesting that

00:17:54.420 a lot of the progressives that support this idea of transgenderism, like you said, there's so many

00:17:59.620 contradictions in it. You know, they also see the Western world as bad. They see America as bad.

00:18:05.820 They see capitalism as bad. And they see everything Eastern is good. Well, the Western world is

00:18:12.680 exporting this confusion to the Eastern world, not the other way around. This is not happening,

00:18:18.540 I don't think, organically in Africa. If it's happening, it's happening because rich people in

00:18:23.680 the West and in the United States are trying to export it there. And yet, the people here who hate

00:18:29.560 colonialism and colonization and imperialization and Western ideas are all for it. It's very

00:18:35.760 confusing to me. You're exactly right. It is the most contradictory phenomenon I've seen.

00:18:44.500 Broadly speaking, the left, again, because I know many voices on the left are adamantly opposed to this

00:18:49.020 gender identity madness that we're speaking of today. But there is a global push by the left,

00:18:56.300 broadly speaking, to push a radical sexual revolutionary ideology on the entire world.

00:19:02.120 It is incoherent. It disrupts and tears apart families. It is incredibly destructive. But again,

00:19:11.980 I just reiterate, there's a lot of money to be made when it is exported. And so we need to follow

00:19:17.340 the money and we need to contend against it because, and I said this the other day to a friend,

00:19:22.420 I think most people in most nations, they just want to live normal lives with their families,

00:19:27.460 with their friends. They don't like this kind of sexual radicalism, but it is the elites and

00:19:33.140 unfettered decadence, like you were just saying, I agree with that completely, that is the fuel behind

00:19:39.320 this. I mean, normal people with, who are busy working their jobs and, you know, raising their

00:19:44.480 families, don't spend their time thinking about how they can confuse children sexually and push all

00:19:50.180 kinds of perversion on other societies. This is not something that the average person does or wants

00:19:57.240 to do. Yeah. And I think also it capitalizes on American and Western tolerance, which in so many

00:20:03.180 ways is great. That is how we have created this very diverse nation that is supposed to be, and it

00:20:10.060 once was, kind of united in values. But I remember hearing Ronald Reagan say that America is the only

00:20:16.840 place in the world where you can, you know, you can be born in another country and live there for 45

00:20:21.800 years, but you move to America, you become a citizen and you are an American. If you lived in Nigeria for

00:20:27.800 45 years and you came to America, became a citizen, you are an American just as much as the person who

00:20:32.840 was born here. And that's, that's not true of any other country in the world. If I moved to France right

00:20:37.500 now, I would not be considered French. I'd always be considered an American. And so the tolerance that

00:20:42.580 America has showed in so many ways is wonderful, but it is also manipulated and capitalized on with

00:20:48.900 these movements because like you said, most people are well-meaning, but they don't want to push back

00:20:53.760 because they don't want to be exclusionary. They don't want to be rude. But let's talk about that

00:20:59.680 kind of, I think I would call toxic tolerance, tolerance towards evil. And what kind of consequences

00:21:07.400 those are having on young people? You said you get stories all the time of parents who maybe were

00:21:12.780 tolerant or their schools were tolerant or the people around them were tolerant and they ended

00:21:17.040 up brutalizing their bodies because of the quote tolerance that has been allowed and has ended in

00:21:24.340 this kind of violence towards kids. You're absolutely correct. The tolerance has become sort of the word

00:21:32.780 that is wielded to accept all kinds of things that we know instinctively are wrong. And we should not

00:21:38.960 have no tolerance for really destructive bad ideas. We should debate them and scrutinize them. And I do

00:21:45.140 think it is used against us as Americans. We certainly have our problems here. We're not, we're not a perfect

00:21:50.480 nation. And, you know, immigrants have faced some racism and difficulty coming here, but it absolutely

00:21:57.120 is true that you can become an American right away. It's with, there's, that is a wonderful thing about

00:22:04.040 our country and we should applaud that and celebrate that. But speaking to sort of this broader tolerance

00:22:11.840 thing, we do have an obligation to speak up, especially as Christians, against what is wrong. And, you know,

00:22:20.420 we need to be bold in this hour because when it does come to the sanctity and the integrity

00:22:27.140 of a child's body, I mean, can we, can't we say that we have some core values that a child should not be

00:22:38.200 drugged with permanent hormones? And I mean, these are basic things. I mean, people need to listen to

00:22:48.260 their gut. And because I think the law of God's written on everyone's hearts, whether or not they

00:22:53.440 know Christ, you know, we're Christians, but the instincts are not to be dismissed. And, you know,

00:23:00.140 this, this idea that we have to just accept everything. Well, no, since, since when do we just

00:23:06.360 check our brains at the door and say that, yes, you are free to be here and live here and we welcome

00:23:12.360 you. But there has to be order too. Yeah. Talk about some of the stories that you've gotten from

00:23:19.700 parents and their kids who have, who have gone through some of these treatments.

00:23:26.700 Well, I'll just say, brace yourself. They are tremendously horrible. I am currently working

00:23:32.820 on a story where I've been interviewing mothers of teenage boys. Some of these boys have become

00:23:38.180 convinced that they're not only female, but also lesbian. And it, I mean, it just insane stuff,

00:23:45.480 but they, these boys actually believe it. And so that's the kind of confusion that's being sewn

00:23:53.120 into their minds. And that's bad enough, but I'll just, I'll share with you a few examples. I've,

00:23:58.400 I've spoken with many mothers. I do hear from some de-transitioners, these people who once identified as

00:24:03.520 transgender, and then the damage that has been done to their bodies through the hormones or a

00:24:10.220 disfiguring surgery, and they just regret it. And it turns out that all that they were promised,

00:24:15.060 this is going to allow them to live an authentic life, uh, true, prove not to be true. Uh, I got a call,

00:24:23.460 um, from a mother. This is one of the first stories I did. Um, through a school presentation,

00:24:30.260 her daughter became convinced that she was the opposite sex and four years of absolute hell.

00:24:38.720 The mom took her to a gender therapist at first thinking that that was the wise thing to do.

00:24:44.620 And thankfully she managed to desist, but it was four years of utter anguish where everything around

00:24:52.720 her, her daughter in this social environment was telling her that she was a boy. She was celebrated at

00:24:57.700 school as seen as the most brave and popular kid. There's so many social reinforcements of this

00:25:02.980 madness. And so the mom is losing weight. She's losing hair. She's stressed and angry all the time.

00:25:09.380 It tears apart families. She had to move away from her neighborhood because the neighborhood she lived

00:25:14.120 in was all affirming of her daughter. All of her life was just upended. And that's a mild story.

00:25:20.660 I've corresponded with another mother whose daughter ran away from home when she was a teenager,

00:25:26.160 went to a very liberal state, changed her name and legal gender in court. When I think she was 17,

00:25:34.240 got her breasts amputated and underwent a radical hysterectomy without her consent or knowledge,

00:25:40.120 without the mother's consent or knowledge. And most recently she had a phalloplasty surgery. I think

00:25:45.060 this was last year, the year before where they slice off flesh from the arm to fashion a fake penis.

00:25:51.680 And she's had another associated surgery. This girl is now very unhappy, cannot hold a job,

00:26:00.520 struggles to maintain employment, few friends. She's been absolutely brutalized. I've seen pictures

00:26:06.540 of this poor girl. She's been lied to for so many years. Everybody that should have helped her,

00:26:11.960 social workers, teachers, doctors, lawmakers, they failed her. And I mean, I hope she doesn't die,

00:26:19.260 but that's the kind of course that we're setting young people on. These were minors. And these are

00:26:26.340 minors that often have mental health issues, social anxiety. We don't need to be slicing up their bodies

00:26:34.100 to fix their problems. It's just, it makes no sense. And I mean, I cannot tell you what it really is. I

00:26:41.500 would love to just trade places with someone who doesn't get what I do and for them to see

00:26:47.720 the pictures that I do. Because it really, that just puts it to light. I can't share them on social

00:26:53.380 media because they will be banned. They will be blocked. And I wouldn't do that anyway, because

00:26:58.520 these are really kind of grotesque pictures. These are pictures that are sent to me in confidence.

00:27:03.900 But I feel like some days I've just stared into the abyss of evil. And I don't make this comparison

00:27:13.040 lightly. And I hesitate even now to do it. But I can just, I feel comfortable enough to say it

00:27:20.940 because I have had Jewish friends and readers reach out to me as they've been reading my coverage.

00:27:27.920 And they say things to me like, and this since chills up my spine, this is eerily familiar.

00:27:33.900 Hmm. When they think about experiments that were done on Jews during the World War II era.

00:27:42.260 I mean, it's, I mean, that's what they tell me. And so when I consider that that's the kind of thing

00:27:48.460 that I'm reporting on, it certainly feels like a sacred calling because I believe unashamedly as a

00:27:56.960 Christian, but just as a human being who values good science in the integrity of the human body,

00:28:01.560 and that doctors should do medicine in order to heal and not to harm. Yeah. And this convoluted

00:28:08.520 definition of harm under which all of this is being done is so crazy. And medical ethics has almost

00:28:16.060 completely collapsed. But this is just not acceptable. And until the public gets that

00:28:24.140 transgenderism, as I said earlier, is a medical scandal, I don't think it's going to change.

00:28:28.980 We've talked about bathrooms in our society. We've talked about women's sports. We've talked

00:28:33.220 about the harms to women's rights and all that's important. But again, I would just stress

00:28:37.940 transgenderism is a medical scandal. Yeah. And we also need to, I think, as Christians or,

00:28:45.540 you know, as we've talked about the different people who see a problem in this movement,

00:28:50.020 we shouldn't be afraid, as you do so well, to argue our position on its merits. I think a lot of times

00:28:56.100 conservatives and certainly Republican legislators will argue on the basis of freedom or on the basis

00:29:03.300 of logistics. And so, for example, the bathroom issue, they might talk about privacy rights or

00:29:10.120 when it comes to competition, they might talk about, you know, religious liberty, like Christian schools

00:29:17.720 should be able to decide who goes into the bathroom or who competes on certain teams. And yes,

00:29:22.780 those are all good arguments to have, but we shouldn't be afraid to also confront this in

00:29:29.440 the moral sense or talk about this just from the, on the basis of reality that, hey, men and women

00:29:38.500 exist. Biology exists and men and women are different. They're not interchangeable and biology actually

00:29:45.420 matters and the human body is good. And it is the Christian worldview, of course, that informs us.

00:29:51.700 I don't know if you, Brandon, have read Love Thy Body by Nancy Piercy. Have you read that?

00:29:57.900 I have. Nancy is a friend.

00:29:59.480 Yes. And she's so wonderful. We talk a lot about that book on this podcast, but

00:30:03.680 she kind of talks about the underlying philosophy behind this, that the mind and body are separate

00:30:11.280 and that the body is just kind of this, you know, clump of cells, this physical object that we can

00:30:18.140 treat as arbitrarily as we want to based on our social whims or based on what we think and feel

00:30:23.060 in our mind. The Christian worldview says, no, the body matters. God made your body with purpose.

00:30:29.060 God made your body with care and it's good. God made the male and female and he saw that it was

00:30:33.640 very good. So the church and Christians need to be willing to and courageous enough to argue

00:30:42.460 about the subject on its merits, on moral and even theological and yes, scientific grounds. Do you agree?

00:30:51.540 Absolutely. I could be there as a Christian. I can, I absolutely believe that there is no higher

00:30:57.700 affirmation of the human body than the fact that Jesus became one. God became flesh and dwelt among us.

00:31:05.700 That's what I believe as a Christian. And you are your body. Your body is you. You get the body that

00:31:12.420 you get and nobody has ever been born in the wrong one. What we are essentially dealing with is

00:31:17.580 neo-gnosticism. And I think N.T. Wright has actually spoken on that a little bit. I think I've read an

00:31:24.020 editorial where he called it what it is. And yes, this idea that somehow the mind can be or should be

00:31:30.900 separated from the body is a totally pagan idea. But it's one that even a lot of, you know, non-Christians

00:31:39.680 don't believe in. Many feminists and, you know, and some gays and lesbians too, they know this. Like, we all

00:31:47.260 know this. It just makes basic sense. And so, yes, Christians do need to show a lot of courage. And I have been

00:31:52.800 very disappointed seeing Republicans, especially, capitulate to the demands of the Chamber of Commerce

00:31:59.480 who are more, who care more about, you know, how this movement is not going to be good for business

00:32:05.080 if you try to fight it or whatever. And that's just shameful. And in fact, I think that's more

00:32:09.320 shameful than the Democrats who are pushing this nonsense. Because if you don't believe in anything

00:32:15.480 but the bottom line of what might be good for the economy of your state, you don't have any principles

00:32:19.280 and you have no business being a lawmaker. There are a few courageous legislators that are trying

00:32:24.300 to stand up. But and they need to be supported. But I think people of goodwill, regardless of your

00:32:31.940 party affiliation or your political leanings, are going to need to align together and resist this

00:32:37.600 because it's just so unbelievably destructive. And if we can't care about the health and welfare of

00:32:45.960 children, what do we care about at all? Right. And I know that this is a very, this is a peripheral

00:32:54.700 part of it, but I can't help but think about this issue also, not just from the perspective of

00:33:02.140 a mom. And obviously, I care about the future of my kids and them entering restrooms with people of

00:33:08.840 the opposite sex and competition and safety and all that. And them also being introduced and

00:33:13.740 indoctrinated with these very confusing ideas. I worry about all of that. But also as someone

00:33:18.860 who is pregnant, I'm also simply just offended by a lot of this movement. Like when I see,

00:33:26.580 you know, the WHO or NIH saying that we need to start saying chest feeding or gestators or birthing

00:33:34.540 people. I mean, that really offends, that really offends me. Pregnancy and birth and sustaining the life

00:33:43.000 of my kids has, you know, it's been one of the hardest and most challenging, but also the most

00:33:49.400 unique and miraculous things that I've ever experienced. And to say that that's not unique

00:33:53.720 to my woman-ness and that my woman-ness isn't unique to me, that really offends me. And I don't

00:34:00.200 know, I'm sure that there are a lot of women, Christian or not, who feel the same way. Do you think

00:34:04.040 so? Oh, absolutely. It's, this is so offensive. It's not only just your basic intelligence, but

00:34:12.840 it's just so vulgar and crude to refer to human beings, male and female, by, you know,

00:34:22.480 a nickname for their body parts. Or it's just, and the irony is, is that what transgender activists

00:34:28.620 often do is accuse us of being obsessed with genitals. Right. Well, what do you care so much?

00:34:33.340 I was just like, you know, look, I think genitals are great because they're a part of the human body

00:34:38.000 and it's a miraculous thing. So yeah, okay. I'll own that. I am obsessed because I care about

00:34:42.440 all of these wonderful things that we need to care about. And I think human sexuality is a wonderful

00:34:46.960 thing. I mean, but the implication that they're trying to make is that we're a bunch of dirty perverts

00:34:51.500 who just spend our time thinking about what's going on downstairs in the underpants of people who are

00:34:56.320 confused about their gender. And it's a manipulative rhetorical device. And so I just say to people,

00:35:00.860 don't fall for it and just turn it back and throw it back in their faces and say, no, you will not tell

00:35:06.960 me that I am a front hole or a chest feeder. This is stupid. It's lame. Yeah. And don't be intimidated

00:35:13.420 by it. And yes, it is offensive. I mean, I, women are bearing the brunt of this scourge. There's no

00:35:20.140 question about it. It obviously is affecting boys and men in some disastrous ways. But as, um,

00:35:25.860 as my feminist friends frequently point out, this movement is awash in ferocious misogyny.

00:35:32.820 Yeah. It is virulently anti-woman. Uh, and I, I think that's just from, again,

00:35:38.460 from a spiritual perspective, I see the devil's fingerprints all over that because women,

00:35:43.660 you know, are wondrous, you know, creatures. They, they give life, they bring life into the world.

00:35:48.740 And I think it'd even be argued from the Bible that Satan hates women more than he does men because,

00:35:53.500 you know, Eve is the crown of creation. She was the last thing God made. And there's just a wonder

00:35:58.840 to a woman. And yeah, I'm just not surprised at all that women are bearing, uh, the brunt of

00:36:07.640 transgender activist wrath. It's brutal for them. And my heart goes out to them and we need more men

00:36:11.780 to stick up for them and to carry the torch and fight this. The women are mostly fighting this.

00:36:16.560 And you're right. Sadly, when they tell people about how they are abused by transgender activists,

00:36:22.020 I mean, many have been doxxed and harassed and sent violent threats, rape threats, death threats.

00:36:27.920 They aren't believed, but it's happening and it's vile.

00:36:31.400 You're absolutely right. I love what you said about men sticking up for this too.

00:36:45.380 I think, um, not to speak against all, all feminists, certainly there are a lot of feminists

00:36:51.020 who agree with us on this, but this has almost been a feminist mantra. For example, in relation

00:36:55.840 to abortion, no uterus, no opinion, you don't get to speak on women's issues unless you are

00:37:01.140 agreeing with the mainstream. And so I do think some men have been taught that they need to shut

00:37:06.220 up when it comes to issues that are hurting, um, that are hurting women, even affecting their

00:37:11.560 daughters. But you're absolutely right. We need men to stand up to this because at the end of the

00:37:15.920 day, like what we are confronting is some kind of masculine assault on women. And I, you know,

00:37:22.860 I asked the sexologist who is not a Christian and who is very progressive in a lot of ways,

00:37:28.460 but sees the problems with all of this. Why is it like, why are women bearing the brunt? Like,

00:37:33.080 why is there so much conversation about changing the language around pregnancy and breastfeeding?

00:37:39.660 And why is there so much conversation about entering women's bathrooms and women's sports?

00:37:44.800 And she just said, well, you know, she kind of stopped and she was like, well, I don't want to

00:37:49.740 get in trouble by saying what I want to say, but think about what you know about the two genders

00:37:55.160 and how different they are. And I think that would tell you why that is. Yes, because women are always

00:38:01.260 the victims when it comes to male domination. Like women are always the weaker sex when it comes to

00:38:07.020 that. And so, um, just in the very practical and historical sense, it's easy to see why women are

00:38:13.640 bearing the brunt of this because we are women. Um, but also, like you said, from the spiritual sense,

00:38:19.000 it goes back to the garden. We are still being asked today, did God really say that he made the

00:38:26.360 male and female? Did God really say that you're unique and different? Did God really give you that

00:38:31.460 role? And I think women are being deceived. Yes. And I just, I also think that we do need to build

00:38:38.760 bridges with people. I mean, people who do not share our theology, certainly. And at base,

00:38:43.880 at the Christian Post, we did a 2017 series on this issue because we saw how it was taking off

00:38:50.100 in culture. And so we wanted to address the many angles from which to engage this, including the

00:38:55.620 theological angles. Um, but I, I think that, and again, in addition to being a medical scandal,

00:39:01.960 this is an assault on the divine imprint on every human being. I believe as a Christian that we are

00:39:08.680 made male and female in God's image and that maleness and femaleness are that divine imprint.

00:39:12.940 And so transgenderism assaults that in the most brutal fashion. But even if you don't believe in

00:39:18.140 any of that, um, you just believe in the, that human beings are sexually dimorphic. We are male and

00:39:24.180 female scientifically. And that's a basic fact. And we should care about that. And that it's not,

00:39:31.200 we're not obsessed with anything, you know, perverse or unimportant when we're trying to

00:39:38.420 defend reality. Uh, and I do think that especially your third wave feminism is in support of all this,

00:39:45.080 but I've learned a tremendous amount from my radical feminist friends who see that women on the basis of

00:39:51.500 their biology, I think it's spiritual too. But, you know, I, as a Christian, I'm certainly opposed to

00:39:56.280 prostitution and to, uh, surrogacy, to the sex trade, to pornography, all of these scourges that

00:40:04.340 disproportionately harm women. We need to care about that and recognize the myriad ways in which

00:40:10.560 women are harmed gravely. So, uh, and be people of goodwill and contend against this.

00:40:18.700 Yeah. And continue to be a refuge for women. Nancy Piercy also talks about in her book, how

00:40:24.280 the church throughout history has been a refuge for women who were the victims of various kinds

00:40:30.120 of objectification. And I think affirming the uniqueness and the beauty and the made in the

00:40:34.840 image of Godness, uh, of the female body and of women is a way that churches can continue to be

00:40:42.040 that refuge. Because honestly, sometimes it's the only thing that I feel like is giving me

00:40:47.000 my sanity that I, that I do ascribe to a truth that is higher than what the NIH says or what the

00:40:53.780 American Academy of Pediatrics say, what this administration says, that I don't get my truth

00:41:00.660 from the so-called party or for, from big brother. Um, it's the only thing that sometimes grounds me

00:41:06.500 that, okay, there's an eternal reality and eternal moral lawgiver that says what is and what is it,

00:41:12.280 which is also why I think there's such an assault on Christianity too, because it is the resistance

00:41:17.100 between sanity and insanity, or it's the barrier between those things. Um, can you give parents

00:41:24.140 or just people in general, um, encouragement, advice? How do they push back on this when it comes

00:41:31.220 to their kids' school, when it comes to their churches, when it comes to everyday life? Like,

00:41:35.880 how do they stand up against this just in the small spheres that they occupy?

00:41:39.820 Well, first, I just want to say that I agree completely with what you were just saying there,

00:41:45.080 and we need virtuous men to be a refuge in those churches, because there are some churches that

00:41:50.180 have not been safe for women. But yes, I mean, we absolutely need that. And, uh, my, I could not do

00:41:58.720 the reporting that I do if I didn't have the Lord, if I wasn't informed by that higher truth that you

00:42:05.340 were speaking of just there. And for people who have managed to resist this, my, I just salute

00:42:10.980 them so much, because if I didn't have that undergirding me, it would, it would just destroy

00:42:15.400 me. It's, it's because it really is that bad. And I'll, I'll say that to sort of segue into parents

00:42:21.480 who are concerned. I cannot tell them what to do specifically, except, especially if they're

00:42:29.380 Christians, ask God and then just obey, but do something and do not be afraid to describe the

00:42:36.960 grisly realities in visceral detail as they are, because the house is not only in fire and the,

00:42:45.140 the fox is not just in the chicken, the hen house, our children are being devoured. So somehow you've got

00:42:52.160 to speak up in whatever context and trust that your little action means something. And so I don't

00:42:59.580 care what people do. I mean, just gather together and start speaking the truth, be willing to lose

00:43:05.260 friends, but tell the truth in unvarnished fashion and just speak it and start making noise and be

00:43:13.500 willing to pay the cost. It will be hard, but it's, it's absolutely horrible what is happening to our

00:43:21.060 children. I mean, I was talking with a feminist friend and we were talking about this and just

00:43:25.840 how, what can we do to message the public to make them get that we're not all crazy because we do sound

00:43:33.520 crazy when we're talking about pharmaceuticals, pushing this to give you, because everybody knows

00:43:39.000 their local pharmacists and it, you know, they, they think they're nice. They don't think that there

00:43:43.460 can be that kind of high level wickedness and corruption, but it's really real. You have to believe us.

00:43:48.220 And so the one thing I will say that parents need to do is really get educated. You can follow my

00:43:53.520 stuff at the Christian post. I would very much recommend the 11th hour blog, which is by a woman

00:43:59.400 named Jennifer Bielek, who has done stunning work into the revenue streams that are fueling this.

00:44:05.880 Madeline Kearns at National Review has done terrific reporting on this. The Federalist is also a great

00:44:10.800 source of information. The Women's Liberation Front and the Women's Human Rights Campaign are some

00:44:16.900 feminist groups that are contending against this very bravely. There are voices out there. If you

00:44:21.980 look, you may not find them on Google, but they're out there. And so educate yourself. That's the

00:44:26.240 biggest thing. You have to understand the issue as it really is before you can contend against it in

00:44:31.380 any meaningful way. But once you understand it, be as bold as you can possibly be because the bodies

00:44:36.460 of children are literally on the line. Yes. Amen. And be emboldened by everything that you just said

00:44:43.000 and the realization that not only are you on the right side of this, you're on the right side of

00:44:47.160 morality, you're on the right side of science, you're on the right side of reality, but also

00:44:52.600 that the vast majority of people, when you really get down to these issues, agree with this. Now,

00:45:00.180 of course, they would say, like you and I would say, of course, transgender people deserve rights.

00:45:04.280 Of course, they're made in the image of God. Of course, they're worthy people of dignity and all of

00:45:08.920 that. But when it comes down to the safety of our kids, transitioning at the age of kids, what we're

00:45:16.300 teaching our kids, entering girls' spaces, most people say, whoa, whoa, whoa, I'm not okay with

00:45:22.520 that. So also be empowered by the fact that this is the majority opinion, right? But you have to speak

00:45:30.420 up because if you don't, the very few who have seized control of so many entities and so many

00:45:36.520 institutions will set the narrative and they will govern how things are done. So don't expect other

00:45:42.560 people to do it. A lot of people have thought, oh, well, this will get taken care of. We have, you know,

00:45:47.440 institutional checks and, you know, mechanisms that will keep a lot of this radicalism out of my sphere.

00:45:54.780 That's not true. Yeah. Yes, it is absolutely much worse in, I think, liberal blue states. But I get calls from

00:46:02.240 the ruby red deep south. Anywhere there's Wi-Fi, this movement is affecting your kids.

00:46:06.940 Yep. And so it's everywhere. And so start speaking up while you still can. I don't mean to sound like

00:46:12.340 Chicken Little, but it really is that bad. Yeah, absolutely. And a lot of people I've got,

00:46:17.380 people in my life, I know that they say, well, that's not going to happen here. That's not going

00:46:20.700 to be taught at my kids' public school. You can't assume that. You cannot assume that.

00:46:24.720 You can't assume that. You know, the encouragement that I give people that's right in line with what

00:46:29.120 you just said is, you know, Solzhenitsyn, I think, has been a big encouragement for a lot of people,

00:46:35.520 the Soviet dissident, who there are a lot of quotables by him. But one that I think I've

00:46:40.720 heard repeated over and over again recently is just to live not by lies. And so I think it's my

00:46:47.080 advice is just as simple as yours. Refuse to tell lies, refuse to accept lies, protect your kids from

00:46:54.160 lies, refuse to believe lies. And where you see a lie being said, say something. Don't be afraid to

00:47:00.640 say that's not true. And do not buy into this worldly redefinition of what it means to love

00:47:08.240 your neighbor. Absolutely love your neighbor. Be hospitable and kind to all of your neighbors,

00:47:12.620 no matter what they look like or how they identify. Love does not mean the tolerance or

00:47:18.480 the acceptance of that which we know is not good and right and true. It's never loving to lie.

00:47:26.080 It's never, ever loving to lie. Don't let anyone force you to lie. You've lost your freedom once you

00:47:31.800 agree with that. Yes. And it was Orwell that said freedom is the ability to say two plus two equals

00:47:37.960 four. And so to keep our own sanity. Yeah, go ahead. No, that sums it up. It's absolutely perfect.

00:47:45.140 I mean, I, especially as a journalist, you will never get me to lie. I will not. I will always tell

00:47:54.720 the truth. And whether that's about someone that I respect or like, if I see corruption, I will say

00:47:59.240 so. And we need to, we need to love the truth again. And just, and not be afraid to describe things

00:48:07.340 as they are and be willing to offend people. Now do so in love. But sometimes people need to be jolted

00:48:14.280 out of their stupor. And if ever there was a human rights atrocity, a crime against humanity,

00:48:21.060 this is it. I'm not being hyperbolic. We, it is no, I mentioned the 11th hour blog and Jennifer

00:48:29.100 Bielek, who's done this stunning research into the money. One of the things that I've heard her say,

00:48:33.620 and I have to just give her a shout out now is that no self-respecting, this is about love and

00:48:38.760 self-respect that no self-respecting government or country or culture or civilization would ever allow

00:48:47.600 children to be drugged and butchered. No, no more. We're done. This has to stop.

00:48:56.340 Yep. Yes. And amen. Well, thank you so much. Thank you for your courage. Courage begets courage.

00:49:01.440 Um, and you speaking out does more than maybe you even realize. Um, and I know a lot of people

00:49:07.500 are encouraged by this conversation. So people can follow you at the Christian post. Can they

00:49:11.740 follow you on social media as well? Yes, I, I do keep my Facebook for friends only. I just,

00:49:19.240 that's a rule that I have, but I am on Twitter, Brandon M show. I've wondered how long I'll be on

00:49:24.720 Twitter because they are now censoring anybody who is critical of this. They used to just censor

00:49:29.880 radical feminists who, uh, who, who said men cannot be women. But I think Dave, the daily

00:49:35.580 citizen out of focus on the family was just taken down because they said that a man could not be a

00:49:40.540 woman or that the Biden nominee was a man who thinks he's a woman. And that's now they got porn

00:49:46.280 on Twitter, but in violent stuff on Twitter, but you know, saying a man cannot be a woman is apparently

00:49:50.800 offensive to the Orwellian news speak of the day. So yeah, I'm there for now. Uh, but you can definitely

00:49:56.320 find me at the Christian post. Uh, we haven't been taken down and we will never, and we will never

00:50:00.620 stop speaking the truth at my publication. And I'm grateful to my editors for their,

00:50:05.020 their principled stand on this. Well, I'm very thankful for that too. Thank you so much for

00:50:10.100 taking the time to talk to us. Thank you, Allie. I appreciate the opportunity. Really do. Thank you.

00:50:14.960 Thank you. So I hope you guys enjoyed that conversation. Um, I just, I, I do want to add

00:50:25.020 it in there and I meant to add it in that conversation. Of course, there are people who

00:50:28.900 have the disorder of gender dysphoria, but it is a disorder when your mind, um, feels like it doesn't

00:50:36.380 match your body or your mind feels like you are in the wrong body. It's actually transsexuality was

00:50:42.060 the real term until recently when we started having these new definitions of, uh, gender identity,

00:50:48.320 which of course are not actually grounded in reality, but are grounded in a progressive,

00:50:52.420 uh, social movement that tries to make men and women arbitrary. But that kind of disorder,

00:50:58.280 that kind of dysphoria is of course real, this deep and long lasting, um, perpetual discomfort

00:51:05.460 in the body that you were born with. Of course, we don't believe that the way to rectify

00:51:11.880 that is to actually assault the person's body, but through love and through care, um, and,

00:51:17.880 uh, through counseling, we do believe in caring for that person. And of course, loving that

00:51:23.060 person and helping that person. But from a Christian perspective, we believe that the body was made

00:51:27.680 with purpose, that it is good, that it is created in God's image. Remember, it's not just, we don't

00:51:33.300 just see them, the importance and the value of the body and the creation account, or even just

00:51:39.560 in the amazing miracle that, uh, we have Emmanuel, that we have God made flesh that shows the importance

00:51:46.060 of the body. But also we believe as believers that we will be resurrected, um, in heavenly spiritual

00:51:52.020 bodies and the body that you were born with will be the body that is resurrected. So there is also a

00:51:57.740 spiritual eternal, uh, eternal significance, uh, to the body that God gave us that he says, uh,

00:52:04.440 he made male and female, and he says he made very good. This idea that the mind or feelings trump

00:52:10.840 physical reality is, is a pagan idea. It's not a Christian one. And that is one of many reasons why

00:52:16.720 Christians should reject it. And of course there is also the existence of intersex people, but again,

00:52:22.040 that is a small, small percentage of people. Um, and it can look in a variety of ways. Uh, they can be

00:52:28.840 androgen, uh, insensitive, for example, but have XY chromosomes. So they have an XY chromosomes,

00:52:34.920 uh, chromosomes, but they actually present as a woman in, um, in most ways. And that is a form of

00:52:41.480 intersex. That's very rare. And again, it is a disorder. It doesn't actually speak against the

00:52:46.160 existence of male and female. That is still the only biological dichotomy that exists. That is the

00:52:52.300 reason why all of us are here and have been, uh, for millennia. So I just wanted to add some

00:52:58.760 some clarity to all of that. Um, and just another reminder to you guys is refuse to live by lies.

00:53:06.720 Do not tell a lie. Do not accept lies. Um, do not allow the people around you as far as you can help

00:53:14.220 it to believe lies. Don't sit in a church that is preaching lies. Speak the truth. Um, especially

00:53:20.520 when it comes to this, because there are physical, tangible consequences on our kids. And we, like I said,

00:53:25.860 need to care about it. All right. That's all I've got for today. We will be back here soon.

00:53:30.220 Bye.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - June 24, 2021

Ep 444 ｜ The Untold Stories of 'Gender Transition' ｜ Guest： Brandon Showalter

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