It's time to get rude about transgenderism

Lives are very much at stake. Stop being polite and scared.

If you feel any amount of despair as the iniquities of the transgender movement continually come to light—as we realize the full extent to which the medical industry has been co-opted to facilitate the irreversible genital/bodily mutilation of children and of vulnerable adults, for instance—you might naturally find yourself asking: “What can I do to help stop this?” 

It’s an important question. Bringing this terrible epoch to an end is going to be a full-scale effort. There are indeed things you can do—share as much information as you can with as many people as you can, lobby lawmakers to pass laws outlawing the surgical maiming of vulnerable demographics, protesting institutions that actively work to irreversibly mutilate and ruin the lives of confused 13-year-old boys and girls—but among the most important things you can do is this: Stop playing along with all of it. That is more critical than most people realize. We got here, in large part, because most of us essentially played along with the whole experiment, even if we were privately opposed to it. Most of us have already effectively ceded the primary question of transgenderism itself: We cheerfully and easily use the “pronouns” of people who identify as the opposite sex, more or less agreeing—publicly and with no objection—to the basic premise of gender ideology itself. 

It should be no surprise, then, that the gender ideologues are effectively winning on every front right now. Why shouldn’t they be, since we collectively and easily surrendered to them with very minimal resistance? We refer to men as “she” and are surprised when those men demand and gain access to women’s locker rooms and restrooms; we refer to women as “he” and are surprised when they begin carving up their bodies in a desperate attempt to appear male; we are surprised when children look at this demented vogue and decide that they, too, want to be a part of it. Why, exactly, are we surprised by any of this? 

It is eminently worth repeating that even the nominal critics of transgender ideology—conservatives, broadly speaking—are mostly as guilty of this as anyone else is. Fox News, the great conservative boogeyman of the media world, happily refers to Ellen Page as “he,” as does the Daily Caller. National Review uses “she” pronouns to refer to Bruce Jenner. Even the arch-conservative Daily Wire is too scared to speak honestly about this, twisting its news copy about Bruce Jenner in a clumsy, awkward way so that it never refers to his pronouns at all. Breitbart did the same thing to refer to transgender superstar “Jazz” Jennings.

Of course transgenderism is winning: The ideology has so thoroughly cowed so much of the population that even its alleged antagonists can’t bring themselves to antagonize it. We cannot possibly hope to turn the tide on any of this if we are facilitating the tide itself. That would be like demanding higher math standards in American schools while openly proclaiming that 2+2=5. It is a nonsensical, self-defeating argument. 

The people who would prefer not to go along with this movement often explain that they do so only because they wish to be “respectful” or “polite.” I think it is time to take the opposite approach: We must get comfortable with being rude. We must accept that being rude is the price we will have to pay for being both factually and morally correct and bringing an end to a terrible and destructive zeitgeist.

“Rude,” of course, is a relative descriptor here: It is not actually “rude” to assert truthful things, especially when the issue is one of helping vulnerable people overcome their debilitating and dangerous delusions. It would not be “rude” to stop someone from jumping off a cliff, even if they sincerely and emotively believed that they would float gently down to the canyon below if they did. Nor would it be “rude” to stop someone from drinking poison even if they had a sincere conviction that the poison was actually coffee. It is likewise not “rude” to call a little girl “she” even if she insists she is in fact a “he,” a boy. Because she’s not a boy—she cannot be, and any reference toward her confusion only serves to hurt her instead of help her.

So let’s not do that. Let’s just speak plainly and truthfully. At the very least there is absolutely no reason to play along with the transgender delusion when there are no “transgender” individuals nearby, any more than you would pretend to believe any other falsehood. Refusing to go along with the charade in the presence of this demographic is a more delicate proposition, though to me the answer seems very much the same.

This will unfortunately require no small amount of bravery. A fairly large and very vocal part of society will attempt to end your career and ruin your life if you take the plain and truthful approach. Even close friends and family members may disparage you and disown you if you refuse to play along—indeed, precious familial bonds can be severed even if you merely decline to use the “pronouns” of celebrities or public figures that neither of you know personally. There is an all-consuming, comprehensive nature to this ideology, one that absolutely, positively can brook no compromise at all. 

Well, this is our row to hoe. It’s not an easy one, but we are not ever promised anything easy in our lives. It’s time we stopped being polite and started being truthful. We’ve seen what the alternative is, after all, and it is brutal, permanent, and laced with lifelong cowardice. Rudeness, by any comparison, is preferable.