Excellent piece. I would hasten to add another very effective strategy in this war to take back our classrooms - Woke-proof your kids! My kids have developed a keen radar for woke nonsense, not that it's hard to detect.
When a transgender activist (a man posing as a woman athlete) was invited to speak my kids' high school, my daughter told her teacher that she was not allowed to attend - and referred the teacher to me if he had questions. And to my surprise and delight, the teacher (an assistant boys football coach) sent me an e-mail explaining, "Mr. Campbell, trust me, I completely understand." He added that he would ensure that my daughter (and as it turned out, other kids, who also objected) had productive time to study and catch up on assignments during the assembly.
The angry rejection of woke radicalism in classrooms is widespread. It includes parents, teachers, non-white minorities and yes, our own kids. My youngest daughter has a strong conservative political (and Christian) worldview and she has strong support among her school friends. They find a certain belonging within their group.
It's also important to remember that this is NOT a "white people vs the world" scenario. One boy in my daughter's little conservative friend clique is from an Indian family - They're Hindu. He tells my daughter that his parents are extremely traditional and have no use for bizarre and dogmatic claims about gender identity and sexual morality. And my own wife, who is Latina, is livid over the word, "Latinx." She has already informed me that if, (her words) "some chicken-lipped, woke white chick says 'Latinx' to me, you better get some bail money together because I am going to beat her unrecognizable."
The left is big on making you an "anti-racist" ally. Well, we have more natural allies than they do. And we need to fully engage our own children and the families of their friends in this fight. Woke-proof your kids.
As an Indian immigrant of color, I find myself agreeing with conservative values (big fan of Rick Tyler). But the GoP seems full of people who believe anyone non-white or non-Christian cannot be a conservative.
I don't want to be a Democrat but the party I want (the GOP) is convinced that I can never be an ally.
Merely pointing out that the importance of a big tent philosophy.
It seems that you are more convinced of something than the GOP is. There are plenty of non-blacks in the party and their number is rising. If it's not for you, then just say so. But don't project a reality that is not there.
I have been involved in GOP politics for twenty years, and have never once encountered the mindset you describe. So I don’t even know what to say about your post.
This comment buys into the myth presented by big media and leftists that GOP is full of racists, etc. You need to get out more and talk to real Republicans instead of believing the lies you're being told. I don't care what color you are or what religion (if any) that you are -- do you hold conservative values?
I am Indian too and while I agree with you about the spineless cucked republicans not paying too much attention to us, I do think Trump brought a surprising change in that. The politicians suck.
Ajay, as a white (I'm Jewish so who knows what box they put me in?) conservative activist, I will say that I (we?) don't believe that anyone of color cannot be conservative. We are always thrilled when that is the case. But I will admit to a fear of assuming the odds are in our favor. That is a hard challenge to push through. Especially when you live in a very blue area and the leftists are viscous.
Ajay, how would you feel if Chinese and Pakistanis were allowed to flow into India to such a large degree that it changed the demographics of your country? I guarantee you or at least most people in India wouldn't like it either. It has nothing to do with white or non white, it has to do with people trying to flood the country with others for political advantage.
Lots of Desis are conservative & many have joined GOP, Particularly in the last 4-5 years.
Parents don't want their kids being forced to change Genders, we don't want all this crime & violent criminals in our neighborhoods, Riots, looting & burning businesses, schools closed, Trans-sexual agenda in schools, etc.
Lets not forget that Democrats are actively destroying our kids by removing honors classes, because "advanced classes make Black kids unable to succeed" which is nonsense. Democrats also instituting Race-based admissions for Universities & Careers to Exclude Asian kids, which Asian parents are furious about.
Thanks Sally Sue. I'd love to hear from former Dems though - from the horse's mouths so to speak. I HOPE Dems are regaining their sanity, but I need to hear more testimony directly from a former Dem. They should be like rats fleeing a sinking ship but THEY VOTED FOR IT making ALL of us suffer. So I'm not too sympathetic to them but I am glad for their awakening nonetheless!
They are right to be suspicious of any other worldview besides Protestant Chrustianity. It is because:
1) True American conservatism is based a lot on the Protestant worldview - mainly a outcome of confessional Congregationalist teaching. The Great Awakening paved the way for the Declaration. The Hindu worldview will always degenerate into an oligarchy or authoritarian government. Look at India right now. Indians hate guns in the hands of common people, want the government to do everything for them, look down on physical labour. Hindus should own these flaws in their thinking before criticising others of being unaccepting
2) Hinduism in many ways laid the foundation for the 60s sexual revolution setting us on this slippery slope. The worldview encourages relativism.. There's a reason the yoga loving white suburban mom is part of the liberal stereotype.
Hinduism wasn't the foundation of the sexual revolution. Western leftists/hippies hijacked Eastern religions because they thought they validated their degeneracies as opposed to "stolid" Christianity and Judaism. A real Hindu or Buddhist who takes religion seriously laughs off your average white suburbanite virtue signaler.
Yes to real Hindus laughing . But that is because what they see is Westerners peddling yoga to other Westerners using gimmicks. You're not going far enough. 60s were the end of a century old corruption through importing of pagan philosophies through the colonies into England and then the US. The chief of this was Hinduism.
The Hindu worldview eventually will degenerate into an authoritarian rule/ oligarchy scenario. So don't be surprised if they superficially agree with GOP but talk like the Left. The reason they right now are aligned to the GOP is due to its perceived anti-Muslim views. That's all.
"some chicken-lipped, woke white chick says 'Latinx' to me, you better get some bail money together because I am going to beat her unrecognizable." OMGoodness, bail $$, I laughed out loud, I flippin LOVE your wife. I have 5 sons and am shocked (and grateful) that my youngest has a similar friend group as your daughter, of young, respectful, Christians who do a good job just saying "nope, homey don't play that".
The "white ally" is also those who have a guilty racist conscience. Their arrogance and belief in their own intellectual and moral superiority leads them to accuse every pale person of having the same racist conscience. It doesn't occur to them the rest of us are in the modern era, leaving them behind while they were festering their age-old prejudices.
"There are two class problems with the wokeists. Elite leftist minorities know little of the poor and middle-class rural whites whom they demonize—but in reality, do not patronize minorities and are more likely to ignore race entirely. And wealthy woke whites know little and care less about poor and lower-middle-class minorities whom they seem assiduously to avoid—and then virtue-signal their recompensatory guilt.”"
Or just a guilty conscience period. Life sucks, we all screw up, "there is none righteous, no not one" but they INSIST they can become pure, blameless! Ha! Also, they refuse to see what harm they have done. The large cities/inner cities are most all run by Dems (and have been for decades and decades) and LOOK AT THE STATE THEY ARE IN! AND LOOK AT HOW TERRIBLE IT'S BEEN FOR MINORITIES!!! They lie and say it's Republicans fault!! Recently it was Leo Terrel or the guy running for gov now in CA (I love them both) who said "I remember the race riots in the late 60's and 70's, they were RIOTING AGAINST THE ESTABLISHMENT FAT-CAT DEMS WHO WHERE RUNNING THE INNER CITIES!" Since the early '60s when LBJ did the "New, new deal", the USA tax payer has paid about 22 TRILLION DOLLARS on all of our social programs (HUD rental asst., SS, food stamps, utility pay help, Medicaid, etc.) AND YET POVERTY HAS ONLY GONE DONE BY 1 PERCENT OR SO. I'd say there's some mismanagement, abuse and fraud that's gone on over the decades! 22 TRILLION DOLLARS!!
There is a fine line between "woke-proofing" a child, and teaching them to hate what you hate, fear what you fear, and refuse to learn that which you, their parent, do not understand.
Perhaps the most exciting thing about Substack is how it has unleashed thoughtful writers left, right, and center to write intelligent, well-argued, long form pieces dissenting against wokism and other aspects of corporate media monoculture. (Quillette too.) During the Trump years I took uneasy shelter on team Maga. Now these thoughtful dissenters have made me feel like I have finally found my team again.
“Transgender people aren’t a threat to America,” but the transgender craze threatens to destroy our daughters by seducing them and doing irreversible damage? I think I need some clarification of terms.
How are the increasing numbers of biological males invading every conceivable women’s private space (by right of law) not a threat to (American) women? And how is the widespread catechesis of “Zir, Zee” nonsensical jabberwock in schools not a threat to our (American) children? How are the direct threats to parental rights by the state to remove a minor child from the supposedly harmful home environment and then administering hormone therapy and mastectomies over parental objections not a threat to our (American) children.
Do I believe transgenders are in cahoots with the Iranians and the North Koreans to undermine our national security? No. But there are many ways to threaten America.
I agree with all your examples and have no desire to push back against any of them. What you describe is accurate and horrifying. Still, I believe that what Abigail is trying to say, but failed to make clear because she wasn't specific enough, is that many (most? especially if older) trans people are garden variety nice people, not ideologues or bullies. If pressed, they will acknowledge that they are biologically one sex or the other, but have a condition called "gender dysphoria" that they treat medically in order to feel better. They try their best to blend in and live their lives in peace, and in some cases, especially trans men, are able to live without being discovered (this is called being "stealth").
I believe that Abigail is afraid that in our zeal to shut down transgender stupidity we will step on the human rights of people who don't deserve to be punished.
This begs the question: why, if there are reasonable trans people who know better, are they not speaking out on behalf of the rights of women and children and the realities of human biology? The answer will probably not satisfy you. It doesn't satisfy me either, but from a humane perspective I understand it. It is that trans activists are notoriously malevolent, and they will stop at nothing to destroy the reputations and livelihoods of anybody who disagrees with them. They doxx people and harass them 24 hours a day. (They even resort to violence, as we saw recently in France where they assaulted lesbians in a gay parade.)
There are rare, public-facing trans people, usually older, who transitioned years ago, who support women's rights and have not eschewed biology for metaphysics; for instance, Buck Angel, Blaire White, and Corinna Cohn. But the average trans person cannot be counted on to take that risk. It's just too dangerous. I think it's important not to demonize the entire population of trans people, because beyond the social contagion and the cracked ideology of "gender," there are real people who deserve their human rights and their privacy...as long as, and only if, they are not stepping on the rights and bodies of women and children. I wish more of them would come forward.
The trans identified people you named are pariahs. We need to "dispel with the fiction" (to borrow a turn of phrase) that this demographic is mostly reasonable, harmless individuals being poorly represented.
The people I named are not exactly pariahs, but they are very controversial and yes, hated by some people. This is consistent with what I described above regarding the manner in which trans activists try to destroy the lives of gender-critical people. But Blaire White, for instance, has just shy of a million followers on YouTube, not exactly a pariah. Buck Angel, while controversial, is greatly admired by many trans people, particularly trans men. (Cohn keeps a low profile and only occasionally appears with an article on Quillette.) All of them are very intelligent and articulate, and they reach a wide, diverse audience.
'm going to respectfully disagree with your assessment that this demographic is mostly unreasonable, harmful individuals. Here's why. "This demographic" is huge and consists of many types of people of different ages, including people who transitioned years ago, before gender ideology had become an ideological juggernaut. Also, there's no way to know how many, but one very large cohort is adolescents between the ages of 12 and 25. And horribly, more and more children under 12 are being captured and inculcated by their teachers, psychologists, and well-meaning parents who are terrified of having their kids taken away from them. Since you're here on Abigail's Substack, you've read her exposes of these issues, as well as her book. So you know that these children and young adults are victims, most, if not all, of whom are gender nonconforming or suffering from a co-morbidity that has nothing to do with gender identity. The emotional suffering of these kids is real, but the solutions they've been so cynically presented with -- puberty blockers, hormones, and surgeries -- are medieval. More and more, they end up detransitioning, and that's when you hear the truth about what they've been through and why. I invite you to take a look at the detransitioner subreddit on Reddit, r/detrans. (To give you a sense of how this population is growing, in February 2020 this subreddit had 9,000 members. Today it has over 21,000.) This subreddit provides a window into the distorted thinking and underlying issues (sexual abuse, homophobia, OCD and the like) of this young and impressionable cohort. It may give you some compassion regarding their struggles.
Children who've been brainwashed...I can't view them as evil doers with an agenda. I just can't.
When my US Army medic father invaded Germany in WWII, he told me the Hitler Youth often would not surrender. Their indoctrination did not involve the "trans" self-mutilation discussed here, and they were nonetheless so determined to carry out their vision of "making the world a better place" that they could not receive compassion, fighting to the end. Watch the series on the Hitler Youth now on Prime. It will look familiar. Very familiar. "Fundamentally change" a nation in one generation? Woke in schools. How? Promise utopias, present a savior class, take power, use unlimited propaganda, and assign a scapegoat group(s) for each "victim" group. Not only race, but also the celebration of unbounded sexuality, promise of "safety" (from guns, climate change, COVID, etc) and freedom from religion. The reason that abortion is relevant is that it touches on the fundamental question of what is a human being and why? Who decides? Your answers will guide your views on GLBTQ+ dogma, and on end of life issues and on one's religious freedom related to these issues. It will guide your decisions about if certain "races" aren't quite human, especially if they are the designated "oppressor" group of your your particular victim group. It is related via the intersectional "social justice" movement through which you claim society's resources and opportunities by your membership in one or more victim groups supposedly oppressed by other groups (white, male, Christian primarily). Watch the flags and speakers at the far left rallies. We must confront the whole Woke movement as it is, not as we wish it. We must confront all of it, all the "allies" because when we confront any one part, all of it will respond against us. Good luck my friends and remember, better Awake, not Woke.
There's a difference between living a non-conforming life and being a radical. There are men and women who feel more comfortable appearing to be the other sex and who may also feel more comfortable in the historically stereotypical roles of the other sex. Then there are those who want to force anti-science on us, legislate out any speech that doesn't suit them, and deny females all the rights and protections of the Constitution.
Saw you on Tucker several times about the trans madness and can’t thank you and Rufo enough for all you do!
I’m a single parent of 9 and 16 year old daughters who’s trapped deep behind enemy lines in blue-blooded elitist Nor-Cal replete with phony ‘woke’ charlatan neighbors of all stripes, spewing their verbal fuckery on the daily!
Fear not though, there ARE many of us clear-thinking, yet heretofore silent red-pilled patriots lurking amongst these virtue signaling frauds!
There’s power in numbers and as long as we band together to emphatically say “NO!” at a grass roots level in the schools we can excise this coming cancer before it metastasizes any further!
We’ve got your back 100%, keep up the righteous fight!
I agree Philip, most all of the voters that are in the GOP camp are entirely embarrassed and angry at the spineless leadership. It really is the answer to the Trump phenomenon. I attempt to explain this often to those that don't understand how a reasonable GOP voter could be okay with Trump as President. The point is it is about Trump and then again it is more than that. He is the first leader of the GOP that actually brings a gun to a gunfight so to speak. Too many times we see examples like the "mother versus birthing people" debate handled so stupidly. Desperate for a fighter to save basic things like our civil liberties and blowing off the ridiculous wokeness of today.
Transgenderism, not transgenders is a very distinct threat to this nation for the simplest of reasons: When reality itself can simply be self-declared--I say I'm a woman and therefore I am--AND that assertion is backed by government coercion, then two plus two CAN equal five and be backed by the same coercion.
Transgenderism is a threat on two fronts: first, it seeks to erase womanhood itself. When people say things like 'birthing people' and 'chest feeding' with straight faces, that's next-level newspeak. Second, it is tremendously destabilizing to gay people or to those who do not conform to gender stereotypes. The vast majority of either group grows up to become either happily straight or gay. This movement would cheerfully subject them to medical experimentation, including surgical intervention.
If a person wanted to remove a limb or an eye that was working perfectly well, we would right suggest that person is mentally off balance. Yet, we are supposed to accept the same action when it regards genitalia as perfectly normal.
Transgenderism is not a thing in and of itself. It has no being. It is simply a collection of ideas and behaviors which have been peddled.
Ideas are not like goldfish, which exist whether you think about them or not. Ideas are like unicorns. They only exist in the heads of people. You can’t have ideas apart from people. And the first peddlers of this pernicious set of ideas were overwhelmingly transgenders.
When the transgender is invading our women's prisons and they are given condoms to deal with it, and when they are in our restrooms and locker rooms, that's more than and "idea."
"It has no being. It is simply a collection of ideas and behaviors which have been peddled."
But those ideas do have being in the physical presence of the human who espouses the idea. Nazism was just an idea but it's physical manifestation was quite deadly.
Cogent argument. I always enjoy The Truth Fairy and Shrier’s willingness to take on the tough current cultural issues. And while I agree that conservatives many times shoot themselves in the foot when taking on the left I also think moderates are the cowards in this battle. They are perfectly content to sit on the sidelines and spectate the war between right and left and then they fall in behind the winner, whomever it may be, because they have no real convictions of their own. You are correct, the right needs to smarten up, but moderates need to grow a backbone.
Well done. Nobody likes the ignorant and bellicose conservative anymore then they like their intellectual equal on the opposite side of the ideological spectrum. However, the most frustrating conservatives have always been those you labeled “Aw shucks.” Those conservatives were coined RINOs as result of their constant attempts to play fair with an adversary that was not an honest broker. They are also the reason why Trump was elected. As crazy and in your face as he was, it was exactly the “go and fight for us, for Christ sake!!” feeling that had been bubbling under the surface since the incredibly flaccid presidential loses of Romney and McCain. Those two fools would take public beatings in debates and all but thank their opener for it. It was horrifying to watch. Trump arrives on scene and stands in between Ben Carson and Jen Bush. Conservatives are like, “Well, we’re screwed again…” Then Trump basically starts punching everyone in the face. EVERYONE. Up to that point conservatives were like those sponges that were dry an water thin, that had suddenly been duped in water. It was glorious. It was also fascinating. You just knew it couldn’t last, that Trump would be his own assassin. Sure enough… I think that we’re seeing a growth in the fact based and cogent conservative population. We’ve been here for some time, most of us grew up cutting our teeth on the climate change issue. But because COVID effected all of us, our ranks grew rather large as we battled everything that just didn’t sound right. We studied, looked up the facts, and argued from an informed position. I think you’re going to continue to see the growth of voters that have suddenly realized that the government, media and politicians are truly deceitful and have been feeding us a load of crap for a very long time. Of course it helps when the left attempts to jump the shark, which is a stunt they seem to love. As soon as we realize that there really isn’t going to be a political way that makes black lives better, or white lives less guilt free (or whatever it is that’s driving all these educated white peoples to the cliffs like lemmings), the sooner we vote in more pragmatic ways, instead of religiously sticking to a party for “the party’s” sake. And I’ll go as far as to say this very clearly - if you’re voting for a democrat, you’re f@cking up. That party is toxic right now. Conservatives may be dopey and aw shucks, but at this very moment in time they’re not trying to wreck the constitutional order. And if you think that your democrat won’t be a part of that, it would be wise for you to look up just how monolithic the House democrats have been. They vote together, tightly, on almost every topic. Much more so then Republicans. So no, your (fake) moderate dem candidate is going to vote to federalize elections, and applaud when dudes are offered positions on the female Olympic team.
Chris Ruffo is an important voice in American right now but so are you, Abigail. I wondered how I would respond in the event someone referred to me as a birthing person - now I know!
"Abortion is an important moral and political question—but not every other serious issue we face bears upon it or derives from it. And neither same-sex marriage nor Caitlyn Jenner poses any threat to children."
You decry conservatives being polite and naive, then you make this statement. Let's start with the latter statement here. What is a marriage and why do we have them? Marriage is the establishment of a stable, lifelong union between a man and a woman for the creation of children and raising of children by those creators.
Through the explosion of divorce, the promiscuity culture of the 1960s, and yes, gay marriage, this institution has been pretty much stabbed to death. Same-sex marriage was the final nail in the coffin for the institution of marriage. Children, suffering from enormous divorce rates among their parents and with many of them never having had their parents marry at all, end up neglected by parents who pay them little heed or mind and frequently regard them as anything from novelty items to inconveniences.
This then ties in to the abortion issue, which is the ultimate expression of contempt for children, literally snuffing out their lives for the sake of mommy's convenience. Children are not people, they are disposable objects, as easily discarded as plastic shrink wrap. If you can murder the most helpless and innocent and deprive them of the most basic right -- the right to life, required for all other rights to exist, while posturing with indignation, you can violate the rights of anybody for anything. That's what makes the abortion issue so fundamental.
As for Bruce Jenner, the dude's a nut. Him declaring that he's a woman no more makes him one than it makes me a hippo-house hybrid simply because I insist I'm one. It just makes him delusional. However, by mainstreaming this it enables predatory attitudes towards women and children, and we have no obligation to treat mental illness as a protected class. Boys can self-identify as girls to use their locker rooms and creep in on them. A week or so ago, there was an article about a man with a full beard who walked into a hot tub of a couple of naked women and a naked 6-year old girl, plopped himself down, and declared himself to be "the woman with a penis."
Don't be polite and naive. It's time to acknowledge the threat for what it is.
Social conservatives have to stop operating in the realm of ideological consistency and purity, and start engaging with how the real world works. We keep making the perfect the enemy of the good. We need laserlike focus and coalition building on key issues, letting each stand on their own.
I am pro life and pro “normal” marriage Christian. We’ve lost the debates on abortion and marriage for right now. Perhaps they can be relitigated in the future, but for now that’s not happening. If we insist on chaining the fight against this very pressing and dangerous insanity to those fights we already lost, we simply deprive ourselves of any natural allies who would make common cause with us on this issue, but who oppose us on the issues we lost. And then we lose this issue.
Then how do I confront CRT racism when the LGBTQ+ political machinery arrives to beat me up and take my job? Even their flags are routinely flown together. They rally together. They jointly fund raise. Challenge one and ALL the "allies" counter-attack. Don't we have to begin with simple statements of what is true, such as addressing what it means to be a human being and then apply that to each of the utopias (race, unbounded sexuality, safety (from climate change, guns, COVID, etc.), freedom from religion) that Woke presents as a better alternative to reality?
It's pretty defeatist to say that conservatives have "lost the debates on abortion", polls I've seen have shown barely any movement at all on the issue post-Roe and it's not gaining in popularity, access, or legality anywhere. Maybe you could say that the status quo is a loss, but I wouldn't say that.
When there are more Black babies aborted than live births of Black babies in NYC in a given year, I call that “not winning the debate” at the very least.
But do try to follow my argument. If we anchor a common self defense against the transgendered Rainbow Borg to opposition to abortion and gay marriage, we lose potential allies who are pro-choicers and potential allies who are fine with gay marriage. And that’s not an insignificant number of people.
Yes, I would call the abortion debate essentially a truce post-Roe, and that's very different than say, for example, post-Brown attitudes on race or post-Obergefell on same-sex marriage. But as such, it really depends on how you see the status quo, abortion is legal but restricted in most cases and socially still fairly taboo. But yes, the coalition to oppose the "Rainbow Borg" needs to include liberals, who are generally pro-choice and fine with gay marriage.
I sort of agree . . . I actually think that over time the pro-life position will prevail . . . in 1973, the development of the fetus inside of the womb was pretty much a mystery, but now as science advances, we pretty much know exactly what's going on in there, and it's increasingly clear that it's a unique individual person never seen before never to be seen again if aborted, maybe not from the exact "moment of conception", but very soon thereafter. That knowledge will continue to seep into the consciousness of the population eroding support for abortion over time. I think the crazies know that and that's why they're willing to take the hits behind standing up for late term (or post birth!) abortions.
Every traditional marriage I've ever witnessed breaking apart had no gay couple in the vicinity egging them on. No-fault divorce and the promiscuity of the 60's were probably the biggest factors hurting commitment and marriage. While traditional marriage was breaking apart, gay couples were fighting for legal recognition of their commitment to each other. Whether or not it would have been more appropriate to recognize a civil union instead of "marriage," I'll leave others to debate. Abigail is correct to say not every issue we face derives or bears on abortion, but instead of talking about pregnancy and abortion, let's go back further and talk about the willy-nilly dumping of genetic material that is known to often lead to conception. There was an interesting study done by a graduate student and I read this back in the 80's. I don't remember the source, but what the student found in comparing birth records and marriage records in colonial America, most of the couples would have been pregnant prior to the marriage, even accounting for some early deliveries. In other words, once the male lay with a woman he married her. Today not so much, the sex partner is disposable, for the convenience of the male (and now the female). This is also contempt for children and contempt for commitment. The alarm bells should have gone off long ago. It's late to the party after the genetic material has already been left behind. Start with the male and there will be many fewer abortions. Cross-dressers (or trans) are not in and of themselves a threat, including Jenner. In fact (s)he's shut down the Left on males in female sports. As far as I know Jenner has never advocated for males, trans or otherwise, in female private spaces. In fact I don't know of any incident among my friends and relatives where a trans male or cross-dresser tried to invade female spaces, but I do know a few incidents where straight males tried to violate those spaces. That doesn't make most straight males a general threat, it's just the predatory ones to worry about, whether in dress or pants.
"contempt for commitment" - Excellent choice of words. Perhaps, even the point of this essay. The "Aw shucks" want not to show a committed opposition, get along go along. The bombast at least is noisy but doesn't want the commitment of debate, perhaps because they don't understand themselves or their opposition. Commitment requires some self standards that I can hope we strive towards.
And leaves this unanswered question. What it will take to replace enough Republican senators and congressmen to have at least a fighting chance? and how long will it take?
Depends on what you're trying to replace them with. Hopefully you dont mean more Democrats. They should all be replaced by true Constitutionalist, Individualist, Libertarians.
Great article Abigail. You have overtaken Bari Weiss as my hero (along with Chris Rufo).
I am fed up with the David French's of this world and their "holier than thow" proselytizing about true Conservatism. They all think they are William F. Buckley reincarnate, but in truth they are narcissistic intellectual light weights.
The trans thing is an easy one too... because the entirety of the left preaches that biological sex and psychological gender are distinctly different things... and it drives me insane that nobody on the national stage says: "Great! Since women's sports were created specifically to keep biological women from having to compete against biological men, and you all agree that psychological gender is not the equivalent of biological sex, then it is obvious that psychological gender can't be used as a qualifier to play women's sports, since the designated qualified (again, the reason women's sports exist in the first place) is that you have to be a biological woman."
They would say the category for sports is simply "women's" and since trans women *are* women, then everything you said from the word "biological" ( a dog whistle to suggest trans women are not really women, and we already established as a fact that trans women *are* women) onwards is invalid and transphobic. I think if there was a simple logical retort that would make them come to their senses, it would have been found and used by now. This is a religious-like belief, and anyone challenging it is uttering blasphemies. You are never going to convince a Christian fundamentalists that Jesus Christ was just a human being, not the Son of God. The best that can be done is to portray it widely for what it is, a strange cult and then hope it goes the way of strange cults: most people don't join them because they're widely understood to be cults and for those that do, some are able to quit and join reality.
Why my pet peeve against using the adjective "biological" when using the words male or female. Saying "biological male" is like saying "writing journalists" or ""water-immersed swimmers." Redundant and implies there are non-biological kinds of males and females and meant to sow confusion and change the language. The next step in language transformation will be to find any use of the words male and female offensive.
I totally agree, and think that "natal" sex, "birth" sex, "natal" females are even worse in having the the reifying effect of implying that sex can be changed later in life in agreement with the sex-change ideology called "trans." Regrettably, Shrier does this "natal" adjective bit in her otherwise wonderful "Irreversible Damage" book. Makes my teeth itch.
I also have a pet peeve with the use of the word "transition." Nobody is transitioning to the other sex any more than males taking testosterone are "transitioning" into being more of a male, or females with breast implants "transition" into more of a female. It's quite a farce to describe cosmetic surgery and hormone treatment as a magical journey capable of changing one's sex.
Excellent piece. I would hasten to add another very effective strategy in this war to take back our classrooms - Woke-proof your kids! My kids have developed a keen radar for woke nonsense, not that it's hard to detect.
When a transgender activist (a man posing as a woman athlete) was invited to speak my kids' high school, my daughter told her teacher that she was not allowed to attend - and referred the teacher to me if he had questions. And to my surprise and delight, the teacher (an assistant boys football coach) sent me an e-mail explaining, "Mr. Campbell, trust me, I completely understand." He added that he would ensure that my daughter (and as it turned out, other kids, who also objected) had productive time to study and catch up on assignments during the assembly.
The angry rejection of woke radicalism in classrooms is widespread. It includes parents, teachers, non-white minorities and yes, our own kids. My youngest daughter has a strong conservative political (and Christian) worldview and she has strong support among her school friends. They find a certain belonging within their group.
It's also important to remember that this is NOT a "white people vs the world" scenario. One boy in my daughter's little conservative friend clique is from an Indian family - They're Hindu. He tells my daughter that his parents are extremely traditional and have no use for bizarre and dogmatic claims about gender identity and sexual morality. And my own wife, who is Latina, is livid over the word, "Latinx." She has already informed me that if, (her words) "some chicken-lipped, woke white chick says 'Latinx' to me, you better get some bail money together because I am going to beat her unrecognizable."
The left is big on making you an "anti-racist" ally. Well, we have more natural allies than they do. And we need to fully engage our own children and the families of their friends in this fight. Woke-proof your kids.
As an Indian immigrant of color, I find myself agreeing with conservative values (big fan of Rick Tyler). But the GoP seems full of people who believe anyone non-white or non-Christian cannot be a conservative.
I don't want to be a Democrat but the party I want (the GOP) is convinced that I can never be an ally.
Merely pointing out that the importance of a big tent philosophy.
It seems that you are more convinced of something than the GOP is. There are plenty of non-blacks in the party and their number is rising. If it's not for you, then just say so. But don't project a reality that is not there.
I have been involved in GOP politics for twenty years, and have never once encountered the mindset you describe. So I don’t even know what to say about your post.
This comment buys into the myth presented by big media and leftists that GOP is full of racists, etc. You need to get out more and talk to real Republicans instead of believing the lies you're being told. I don't care what color you are or what religion (if any) that you are -- do you hold conservative values?
I am Indian too and while I agree with you about the spineless cucked republicans not paying too much attention to us, I do think Trump brought a surprising change in that. The politicians suck.
Ajay, as a white (I'm Jewish so who knows what box they put me in?) conservative activist, I will say that I (we?) don't believe that anyone of color cannot be conservative. We are always thrilled when that is the case. But I will admit to a fear of assuming the odds are in our favor. That is a hard challenge to push through. Especially when you live in a very blue area and the leftists are viscous.
Ajay, how would you feel if Chinese and Pakistanis were allowed to flow into India to such a large degree that it changed the demographics of your country? I guarantee you or at least most people in India wouldn't like it either. It has nothing to do with white or non white, it has to do with people trying to flood the country with others for political advantage.
Lots of Desis are conservative & many have joined GOP, Particularly in the last 4-5 years.
Parents don't want their kids being forced to change Genders, we don't want all this crime & violent criminals in our neighborhoods, Riots, looting & burning businesses, schools closed, Trans-sexual agenda in schools, etc.
Lets not forget that Democrats are actively destroying our kids by removing honors classes, because "advanced classes make Black kids unable to succeed" which is nonsense. Democrats also instituting Race-based admissions for Universities & Careers to Exclude Asian kids, which Asian parents are furious about.
Thanks Sally Sue. I'd love to hear from former Dems though - from the horse's mouths so to speak. I HOPE Dems are regaining their sanity, but I need to hear more testimony directly from a former Dem. They should be like rats fleeing a sinking ship but THEY VOTED FOR IT making ALL of us suffer. So I'm not too sympathetic to them but I am glad for their awakening nonetheless!
They are right to be suspicious of any other worldview besides Protestant Chrustianity. It is because:
1) True American conservatism is based a lot on the Protestant worldview - mainly a outcome of confessional Congregationalist teaching. The Great Awakening paved the way for the Declaration. The Hindu worldview will always degenerate into an oligarchy or authoritarian government. Look at India right now. Indians hate guns in the hands of common people, want the government to do everything for them, look down on physical labour. Hindus should own these flaws in their thinking before criticising others of being unaccepting
2) Hinduism in many ways laid the foundation for the 60s sexual revolution setting us on this slippery slope. The worldview encourages relativism.. There's a reason the yoga loving white suburban mom is part of the liberal stereotype.
Hinduism wasn't the foundation of the sexual revolution. Western leftists/hippies hijacked Eastern religions because they thought they validated their degeneracies as opposed to "stolid" Christianity and Judaism. A real Hindu or Buddhist who takes religion seriously laughs off your average white suburbanite virtue signaler.
Yes to real Hindus laughing . But that is because what they see is Westerners peddling yoga to other Westerners using gimmicks. You're not going far enough. 60s were the end of a century old corruption through importing of pagan philosophies through the colonies into England and then the US. The chief of this was Hinduism.
The Hindu worldview eventually will degenerate into an authoritarian rule/ oligarchy scenario. So don't be surprised if they superficially agree with GOP but talk like the Left. The reason they right now are aligned to the GOP is due to its perceived anti-Muslim views. That's all.
"some chicken-lipped, woke white chick says 'Latinx' to me, you better get some bail money together because I am going to beat her unrecognizable." OMGoodness, bail $$, I laughed out loud, I flippin LOVE your wife. I have 5 sons and am shocked (and grateful) that my youngest has a similar friend group as your daughter, of young, respectful, Christians who do a good job just saying "nope, homey don't play that".
A "white ally" is someone who wants other white people to pay reparations.
The "white ally" is also those who have a guilty racist conscience. Their arrogance and belief in their own intellectual and moral superiority leads them to accuse every pale person of having the same racist conscience. It doesn't occur to them the rest of us are in the modern era, leaving them behind while they were festering their age-old prejudices.
"There are two class problems with the wokeists. Elite leftist minorities know little of the poor and middle-class rural whites whom they demonize—but in reality, do not patronize minorities and are more likely to ignore race entirely. And wealthy woke whites know little and care less about poor and lower-middle-class minorities whom they seem assiduously to avoid—and then virtue-signal their recompensatory guilt.”"
- Victor Davis Hanson
https://amgreatness.com/2021/04/25/the-new-antiracism-is-the-old-racism/
Or just a guilty conscience period. Life sucks, we all screw up, "there is none righteous, no not one" but they INSIST they can become pure, blameless! Ha! Also, they refuse to see what harm they have done. The large cities/inner cities are most all run by Dems (and have been for decades and decades) and LOOK AT THE STATE THEY ARE IN! AND LOOK AT HOW TERRIBLE IT'S BEEN FOR MINORITIES!!! They lie and say it's Republicans fault!! Recently it was Leo Terrel or the guy running for gov now in CA (I love them both) who said "I remember the race riots in the late 60's and 70's, they were RIOTING AGAINST THE ESTABLISHMENT FAT-CAT DEMS WHO WHERE RUNNING THE INNER CITIES!" Since the early '60s when LBJ did the "New, new deal", the USA tax payer has paid about 22 TRILLION DOLLARS on all of our social programs (HUD rental asst., SS, food stamps, utility pay help, Medicaid, etc.) AND YET POVERTY HAS ONLY GONE DONE BY 1 PERCENT OR SO. I'd say there's some mismanagement, abuse and fraud that's gone on over the decades! 22 TRILLION DOLLARS!!
Don't forget Pell grants!
There is a fine line between "woke-proofing" a child, and teaching them to hate what you hate, fear what you fear, and refuse to learn that which you, their parent, do not understand.
Perhaps the most exciting thing about Substack is how it has unleashed thoughtful writers left, right, and center to write intelligent, well-argued, long form pieces dissenting against wokism and other aspects of corporate media monoculture. (Quillette too.) During the Trump years I took uneasy shelter on team Maga. Now these thoughtful dissenters have made me feel like I have finally found my team again.
Well, perhaps Quilette has lost a little of their fastball... Seems Co-Vid has gotten the better of their objective mind.
“Transgender people aren’t a threat to America,” but the transgender craze threatens to destroy our daughters by seducing them and doing irreversible damage? I think I need some clarification of terms.
How are the increasing numbers of biological males invading every conceivable women’s private space (by right of law) not a threat to (American) women? And how is the widespread catechesis of “Zir, Zee” nonsensical jabberwock in schools not a threat to our (American) children? How are the direct threats to parental rights by the state to remove a minor child from the supposedly harmful home environment and then administering hormone therapy and mastectomies over parental objections not a threat to our (American) children.
Do I believe transgenders are in cahoots with the Iranians and the North Koreans to undermine our national security? No. But there are many ways to threaten America.
I agree with all your examples and have no desire to push back against any of them. What you describe is accurate and horrifying. Still, I believe that what Abigail is trying to say, but failed to make clear because she wasn't specific enough, is that many (most? especially if older) trans people are garden variety nice people, not ideologues or bullies. If pressed, they will acknowledge that they are biologically one sex or the other, but have a condition called "gender dysphoria" that they treat medically in order to feel better. They try their best to blend in and live their lives in peace, and in some cases, especially trans men, are able to live without being discovered (this is called being "stealth").
I believe that Abigail is afraid that in our zeal to shut down transgender stupidity we will step on the human rights of people who don't deserve to be punished.
This begs the question: why, if there are reasonable trans people who know better, are they not speaking out on behalf of the rights of women and children and the realities of human biology? The answer will probably not satisfy you. It doesn't satisfy me either, but from a humane perspective I understand it. It is that trans activists are notoriously malevolent, and they will stop at nothing to destroy the reputations and livelihoods of anybody who disagrees with them. They doxx people and harass them 24 hours a day. (They even resort to violence, as we saw recently in France where they assaulted lesbians in a gay parade.)
There are rare, public-facing trans people, usually older, who transitioned years ago, who support women's rights and have not eschewed biology for metaphysics; for instance, Buck Angel, Blaire White, and Corinna Cohn. But the average trans person cannot be counted on to take that risk. It's just too dangerous. I think it's important not to demonize the entire population of trans people, because beyond the social contagion and the cracked ideology of "gender," there are real people who deserve their human rights and their privacy...as long as, and only if, they are not stepping on the rights and bodies of women and children. I wish more of them would come forward.
The trans identified people you named are pariahs. We need to "dispel with the fiction" (to borrow a turn of phrase) that this demographic is mostly reasonable, harmless individuals being poorly represented.
The people I named are not exactly pariahs, but they are very controversial and yes, hated by some people. This is consistent with what I described above regarding the manner in which trans activists try to destroy the lives of gender-critical people. But Blaire White, for instance, has just shy of a million followers on YouTube, not exactly a pariah. Buck Angel, while controversial, is greatly admired by many trans people, particularly trans men. (Cohn keeps a low profile and only occasionally appears with an article on Quillette.) All of them are very intelligent and articulate, and they reach a wide, diverse audience.
'm going to respectfully disagree with your assessment that this demographic is mostly unreasonable, harmful individuals. Here's why. "This demographic" is huge and consists of many types of people of different ages, including people who transitioned years ago, before gender ideology had become an ideological juggernaut. Also, there's no way to know how many, but one very large cohort is adolescents between the ages of 12 and 25. And horribly, more and more children under 12 are being captured and inculcated by their teachers, psychologists, and well-meaning parents who are terrified of having their kids taken away from them. Since you're here on Abigail's Substack, you've read her exposes of these issues, as well as her book. So you know that these children and young adults are victims, most, if not all, of whom are gender nonconforming or suffering from a co-morbidity that has nothing to do with gender identity. The emotional suffering of these kids is real, but the solutions they've been so cynically presented with -- puberty blockers, hormones, and surgeries -- are medieval. More and more, they end up detransitioning, and that's when you hear the truth about what they've been through and why. I invite you to take a look at the detransitioner subreddit on Reddit, r/detrans. (To give you a sense of how this population is growing, in February 2020 this subreddit had 9,000 members. Today it has over 21,000.) This subreddit provides a window into the distorted thinking and underlying issues (sexual abuse, homophobia, OCD and the like) of this young and impressionable cohort. It may give you some compassion regarding their struggles.
Children who've been brainwashed...I can't view them as evil doers with an agenda. I just can't.
When my US Army medic father invaded Germany in WWII, he told me the Hitler Youth often would not surrender. Their indoctrination did not involve the "trans" self-mutilation discussed here, and they were nonetheless so determined to carry out their vision of "making the world a better place" that they could not receive compassion, fighting to the end. Watch the series on the Hitler Youth now on Prime. It will look familiar. Very familiar. "Fundamentally change" a nation in one generation? Woke in schools. How? Promise utopias, present a savior class, take power, use unlimited propaganda, and assign a scapegoat group(s) for each "victim" group. Not only race, but also the celebration of unbounded sexuality, promise of "safety" (from guns, climate change, COVID, etc) and freedom from religion. The reason that abortion is relevant is that it touches on the fundamental question of what is a human being and why? Who decides? Your answers will guide your views on GLBTQ+ dogma, and on end of life issues and on one's religious freedom related to these issues. It will guide your decisions about if certain "races" aren't quite human, especially if they are the designated "oppressor" group of your your particular victim group. It is related via the intersectional "social justice" movement through which you claim society's resources and opportunities by your membership in one or more victim groups supposedly oppressed by other groups (white, male, Christian primarily). Watch the flags and speakers at the far left rallies. We must confront the whole Woke movement as it is, not as we wish it. We must confront all of it, all the "allies" because when we confront any one part, all of it will respond against us. Good luck my friends and remember, better Awake, not Woke.
Well said. As far as I can tell, very few are reasonable, harmless, or being poorly represented.
There's a difference between living a non-conforming life and being a radical. There are men and women who feel more comfortable appearing to be the other sex and who may also feel more comfortable in the historically stereotypical roles of the other sex. Then there are those who want to force anti-science on us, legislate out any speech that doesn't suit them, and deny females all the rights and protections of the Constitution.
Completely agree, Yoda.
YES, Abigail !!!!!
Saw you on Tucker several times about the trans madness and can’t thank you and Rufo enough for all you do!
I’m a single parent of 9 and 16 year old daughters who’s trapped deep behind enemy lines in blue-blooded elitist Nor-Cal replete with phony ‘woke’ charlatan neighbors of all stripes, spewing their verbal fuckery on the daily!
Fear not though, there ARE many of us clear-thinking, yet heretofore silent red-pilled patriots lurking amongst these virtue signaling frauds!
There’s power in numbers and as long as we band together to emphatically say “NO!” at a grass roots level in the schools we can excise this coming cancer before it metastasizes any further!
We’ve got your back 100%, keep up the righteous fight!
OH MY GOD YES!!! What a magnificent piece, and it needed to be said. The Republican Party is not worthy of its voters.
Thank you so much!
I agree Philip, most all of the voters that are in the GOP camp are entirely embarrassed and angry at the spineless leadership. It really is the answer to the Trump phenomenon. I attempt to explain this often to those that don't understand how a reasonable GOP voter could be okay with Trump as President. The point is it is about Trump and then again it is more than that. He is the first leader of the GOP that actually brings a gun to a gunfight so to speak. Too many times we see examples like the "mother versus birthing people" debate handled so stupidly. Desperate for a fighter to save basic things like our civil liberties and blowing off the ridiculous wokeness of today.
Transgenderism, not transgenders is a very distinct threat to this nation for the simplest of reasons: When reality itself can simply be self-declared--I say I'm a woman and therefore I am--AND that assertion is backed by government coercion, then two plus two CAN equal five and be backed by the same coercion.
That is the essence of totalitarianism.
Transgenderism is a threat on two fronts: first, it seeks to erase womanhood itself. When people say things like 'birthing people' and 'chest feeding' with straight faces, that's next-level newspeak. Second, it is tremendously destabilizing to gay people or to those who do not conform to gender stereotypes. The vast majority of either group grows up to become either happily straight or gay. This movement would cheerfully subject them to medical experimentation, including surgical intervention.
If a person wanted to remove a limb or an eye that was working perfectly well, we would right suggest that person is mentally off balance. Yet, we are supposed to accept the same action when it regards genitalia as perfectly normal.
Transgenderism is not a thing in and of itself. It has no being. It is simply a collection of ideas and behaviors which have been peddled.
Ideas are not like goldfish, which exist whether you think about them or not. Ideas are like unicorns. They only exist in the heads of people. You can’t have ideas apart from people. And the first peddlers of this pernicious set of ideas were overwhelmingly transgenders.
When the transgender is invading our women's prisons and they are given condoms to deal with it, and when they are in our restrooms and locker rooms, that's more than and "idea."
"It has no being. It is simply a collection of ideas and behaviors which have been peddled."
But those ideas do have being in the physical presence of the human who espouses the idea. Nazism was just an idea but it's physical manifestation was quite deadly.
Cogent argument. I always enjoy The Truth Fairy and Shrier’s willingness to take on the tough current cultural issues. And while I agree that conservatives many times shoot themselves in the foot when taking on the left I also think moderates are the cowards in this battle. They are perfectly content to sit on the sidelines and spectate the war between right and left and then they fall in behind the winner, whomever it may be, because they have no real convictions of their own. You are correct, the right needs to smarten up, but moderates need to grow a backbone.
Well done. Nobody likes the ignorant and bellicose conservative anymore then they like their intellectual equal on the opposite side of the ideological spectrum. However, the most frustrating conservatives have always been those you labeled “Aw shucks.” Those conservatives were coined RINOs as result of their constant attempts to play fair with an adversary that was not an honest broker. They are also the reason why Trump was elected. As crazy and in your face as he was, it was exactly the “go and fight for us, for Christ sake!!” feeling that had been bubbling under the surface since the incredibly flaccid presidential loses of Romney and McCain. Those two fools would take public beatings in debates and all but thank their opener for it. It was horrifying to watch. Trump arrives on scene and stands in between Ben Carson and Jen Bush. Conservatives are like, “Well, we’re screwed again…” Then Trump basically starts punching everyone in the face. EVERYONE. Up to that point conservatives were like those sponges that were dry an water thin, that had suddenly been duped in water. It was glorious. It was also fascinating. You just knew it couldn’t last, that Trump would be his own assassin. Sure enough… I think that we’re seeing a growth in the fact based and cogent conservative population. We’ve been here for some time, most of us grew up cutting our teeth on the climate change issue. But because COVID effected all of us, our ranks grew rather large as we battled everything that just didn’t sound right. We studied, looked up the facts, and argued from an informed position. I think you’re going to continue to see the growth of voters that have suddenly realized that the government, media and politicians are truly deceitful and have been feeding us a load of crap for a very long time. Of course it helps when the left attempts to jump the shark, which is a stunt they seem to love. As soon as we realize that there really isn’t going to be a political way that makes black lives better, or white lives less guilt free (or whatever it is that’s driving all these educated white peoples to the cliffs like lemmings), the sooner we vote in more pragmatic ways, instead of religiously sticking to a party for “the party’s” sake. And I’ll go as far as to say this very clearly - if you’re voting for a democrat, you’re f@cking up. That party is toxic right now. Conservatives may be dopey and aw shucks, but at this very moment in time they’re not trying to wreck the constitutional order. And if you think that your democrat won’t be a part of that, it would be wise for you to look up just how monolithic the House democrats have been. They vote together, tightly, on almost every topic. Much more so then Republicans. So no, your (fake) moderate dem candidate is going to vote to federalize elections, and applaud when dudes are offered positions on the female Olympic team.
I got thru it okay, despite it's length. Good points. The Bushes were fleckless RINOS too in many ways.
I'd read your comment if it was divided up into smaller paragraphs. Unreadable the way it is
Ya. And there’s more than a few auto correct mistakes too. Oh well.
Enjoy you last 18 months.
🤔
Chris Ruffo is an important voice in American right now but so are you, Abigail. I wondered how I would respond in the event someone referred to me as a birthing person - now I know!
Lol. Birthing person. The left has gone f…n crazy. Believe the science on Covid by not two sexes God creates. Insanity
"Abortion is an important moral and political question—but not every other serious issue we face bears upon it or derives from it. And neither same-sex marriage nor Caitlyn Jenner poses any threat to children."
You decry conservatives being polite and naive, then you make this statement. Let's start with the latter statement here. What is a marriage and why do we have them? Marriage is the establishment of a stable, lifelong union between a man and a woman for the creation of children and raising of children by those creators.
Through the explosion of divorce, the promiscuity culture of the 1960s, and yes, gay marriage, this institution has been pretty much stabbed to death. Same-sex marriage was the final nail in the coffin for the institution of marriage. Children, suffering from enormous divorce rates among their parents and with many of them never having had their parents marry at all, end up neglected by parents who pay them little heed or mind and frequently regard them as anything from novelty items to inconveniences.
This then ties in to the abortion issue, which is the ultimate expression of contempt for children, literally snuffing out their lives for the sake of mommy's convenience. Children are not people, they are disposable objects, as easily discarded as plastic shrink wrap. If you can murder the most helpless and innocent and deprive them of the most basic right -- the right to life, required for all other rights to exist, while posturing with indignation, you can violate the rights of anybody for anything. That's what makes the abortion issue so fundamental.
As for Bruce Jenner, the dude's a nut. Him declaring that he's a woman no more makes him one than it makes me a hippo-house hybrid simply because I insist I'm one. It just makes him delusional. However, by mainstreaming this it enables predatory attitudes towards women and children, and we have no obligation to treat mental illness as a protected class. Boys can self-identify as girls to use their locker rooms and creep in on them. A week or so ago, there was an article about a man with a full beard who walked into a hot tub of a couple of naked women and a naked 6-year old girl, plopped himself down, and declared himself to be "the woman with a penis."
Don't be polite and naive. It's time to acknowledge the threat for what it is.
Social conservatives have to stop operating in the realm of ideological consistency and purity, and start engaging with how the real world works. We keep making the perfect the enemy of the good. We need laserlike focus and coalition building on key issues, letting each stand on their own.
I am pro life and pro “normal” marriage Christian. We’ve lost the debates on abortion and marriage for right now. Perhaps they can be relitigated in the future, but for now that’s not happening. If we insist on chaining the fight against this very pressing and dangerous insanity to those fights we already lost, we simply deprive ourselves of any natural allies who would make common cause with us on this issue, but who oppose us on the issues we lost. And then we lose this issue.
Then how do I confront CRT racism when the LGBTQ+ political machinery arrives to beat me up and take my job? Even their flags are routinely flown together. They rally together. They jointly fund raise. Challenge one and ALL the "allies" counter-attack. Don't we have to begin with simple statements of what is true, such as addressing what it means to be a human being and then apply that to each of the utopias (race, unbounded sexuality, safety (from climate change, guns, COVID, etc.), freedom from religion) that Woke presents as a better alternative to reality?
It's pretty defeatist to say that conservatives have "lost the debates on abortion", polls I've seen have shown barely any movement at all on the issue post-Roe and it's not gaining in popularity, access, or legality anywhere. Maybe you could say that the status quo is a loss, but I wouldn't say that.
When there are more Black babies aborted than live births of Black babies in NYC in a given year, I call that “not winning the debate” at the very least.
But do try to follow my argument. If we anchor a common self defense against the transgendered Rainbow Borg to opposition to abortion and gay marriage, we lose potential allies who are pro-choicers and potential allies who are fine with gay marriage. And that’s not an insignificant number of people.
Yes, I would call the abortion debate essentially a truce post-Roe, and that's very different than say, for example, post-Brown attitudes on race or post-Obergefell on same-sex marriage. But as such, it really depends on how you see the status quo, abortion is legal but restricted in most cases and socially still fairly taboo. But yes, the coalition to oppose the "Rainbow Borg" needs to include liberals, who are generally pro-choice and fine with gay marriage.
Very odd to see a conservative argue that specifically black lives matter qua their race.
I sort of agree . . . I actually think that over time the pro-life position will prevail . . . in 1973, the development of the fetus inside of the womb was pretty much a mystery, but now as science advances, we pretty much know exactly what's going on in there, and it's increasingly clear that it's a unique individual person never seen before never to be seen again if aborted, maybe not from the exact "moment of conception", but very soon thereafter. That knowledge will continue to seep into the consciousness of the population eroding support for abortion over time. I think the crazies know that and that's why they're willing to take the hits behind standing up for late term (or post birth!) abortions.
Every traditional marriage I've ever witnessed breaking apart had no gay couple in the vicinity egging them on. No-fault divorce and the promiscuity of the 60's were probably the biggest factors hurting commitment and marriage. While traditional marriage was breaking apart, gay couples were fighting for legal recognition of their commitment to each other. Whether or not it would have been more appropriate to recognize a civil union instead of "marriage," I'll leave others to debate. Abigail is correct to say not every issue we face derives or bears on abortion, but instead of talking about pregnancy and abortion, let's go back further and talk about the willy-nilly dumping of genetic material that is known to often lead to conception. There was an interesting study done by a graduate student and I read this back in the 80's. I don't remember the source, but what the student found in comparing birth records and marriage records in colonial America, most of the couples would have been pregnant prior to the marriage, even accounting for some early deliveries. In other words, once the male lay with a woman he married her. Today not so much, the sex partner is disposable, for the convenience of the male (and now the female). This is also contempt for children and contempt for commitment. The alarm bells should have gone off long ago. It's late to the party after the genetic material has already been left behind. Start with the male and there will be many fewer abortions. Cross-dressers (or trans) are not in and of themselves a threat, including Jenner. In fact (s)he's shut down the Left on males in female sports. As far as I know Jenner has never advocated for males, trans or otherwise, in female private spaces. In fact I don't know of any incident among my friends and relatives where a trans male or cross-dresser tried to invade female spaces, but I do know a few incidents where straight males tried to violate those spaces. That doesn't make most straight males a general threat, it's just the predatory ones to worry about, whether in dress or pants.
"contempt for commitment" - Excellent choice of words. Perhaps, even the point of this essay. The "Aw shucks" want not to show a committed opposition, get along go along. The bombast at least is noisy but doesn't want the commitment of debate, perhaps because they don't understand themselves or their opposition. Commitment requires some self standards that I can hope we strive towards.
“You don’t object on the basis of victimhood—because American women, for the most part, are no one’s victims. You object on the basis of dignity.”
Thank you Ms Shrier for a wonderful article, and especially for these two closing sentences. Profound. Powerful.
Powerful words and excellent advice for all in this fight.
This pretty much summarizes my sentiments.
And leaves this unanswered question. What it will take to replace enough Republican senators and congressmen to have at least a fighting chance? and how long will it take?
Depends on what you're trying to replace them with. Hopefully you dont mean more Democrats. They should all be replaced by true Constitutionalist, Individualist, Libertarians.
exactly
Great article Abigail. You have overtaken Bari Weiss as my hero (along with Chris Rufo).
I am fed up with the David French's of this world and their "holier than thow" proselytizing about true Conservatism. They all think they are William F. Buckley reincarnate, but in truth they are narcissistic intellectual light weights.
David French is indeed the worst. That awful NYT piece against laws banning CRT was embarrassingly puerile.
The trans thing is an easy one too... because the entirety of the left preaches that biological sex and psychological gender are distinctly different things... and it drives me insane that nobody on the national stage says: "Great! Since women's sports were created specifically to keep biological women from having to compete against biological men, and you all agree that psychological gender is not the equivalent of biological sex, then it is obvious that psychological gender can't be used as a qualifier to play women's sports, since the designated qualified (again, the reason women's sports exist in the first place) is that you have to be a biological woman."
They would say the category for sports is simply "women's" and since trans women *are* women, then everything you said from the word "biological" ( a dog whistle to suggest trans women are not really women, and we already established as a fact that trans women *are* women) onwards is invalid and transphobic. I think if there was a simple logical retort that would make them come to their senses, it would have been found and used by now. This is a religious-like belief, and anyone challenging it is uttering blasphemies. You are never going to convince a Christian fundamentalists that Jesus Christ was just a human being, not the Son of God. The best that can be done is to portray it widely for what it is, a strange cult and then hope it goes the way of strange cults: most people don't join them because they're widely understood to be cults and for those that do, some are able to quit and join reality.
Why my pet peeve against using the adjective "biological" when using the words male or female. Saying "biological male" is like saying "writing journalists" or ""water-immersed swimmers." Redundant and implies there are non-biological kinds of males and females and meant to sow confusion and change the language. The next step in language transformation will be to find any use of the words male and female offensive.
Agreed. Perhaps Chromosomal Male/Female would take the air out of the "Trans" sails. It's all about the science, you know.
I totally agree, and think that "natal" sex, "birth" sex, "natal" females are even worse in having the the reifying effect of implying that sex can be changed later in life in agreement with the sex-change ideology called "trans." Regrettably, Shrier does this "natal" adjective bit in her otherwise wonderful "Irreversible Damage" book. Makes my teeth itch.
I also have a pet peeve with the use of the word "transition." Nobody is transitioning to the other sex any more than males taking testosterone are "transitioning" into being more of a male, or females with breast implants "transition" into more of a female. It's quite a farce to describe cosmetic surgery and hormone treatment as a magical journey capable of changing one's sex.
Agree about avoiding the use of "trans" words, but with one exception. The word "transvestite" is quite accurate. Any man can wear a dress.
Yes, Irreversible Damage is an excellent book, in spite of the "natal" adjective.
Unfortunately, that doesn't work anymore. https://jessesingal.substack.com/p/why-so-many-progressives-are-arguing.
Well put!