President Biden's Good Friday Proclamation Is Not Part of a Regime Conspiracy

About two weeks ago, I was in a local Target store and could not find the shoe department. I saw a person wearing a red vest indicating that he was a Target employee. I approached in an attempt to ask for his help finding the shoe department. When the employee turned to me, I was surprised to see protrusions in his chest area that could not be mistaken for breasts. It immediately occurred to me that the employee might be a transwoman. I couldn’t be sure though, even with the employee’s shoulder-length hair, because the employee answered me in a voice that was clearly masculine.

Was the employee a pre-ops transwoman? I don’t know. The encounter was brief, so I had little information on which to arrive at a conclusive judgment. It was also too trivial a concern for me to make any inquiries. It was disconcerting to me, however, precisely because it had occurred to me to wonder about it, if only for a moment, due to my surprise, or rather, inability to make a final determination about whether I had interacted with a cis man or a transwoman. But for purposes of this essay, let’s assume the employee is a transwoman.

From the perspective of how to treat her, it made no difference to me. Everyone deserves dignity and respect regardless of race, gender, or other identity. But it was disconcerting to me, if only for a moment, because the employee struck me as a bit insecure. I wondered if her awkward demeanor was par for the course, excessively self-conscious about her identity in the presence of a so-called cis man such as myself. It seemed quite reasonable to me that she would assume that the majority of people with whom she interacts on a daily basis consider her “queer”.

Which brings me to queer theory and a bit of controversy that arose on Friday when the Biden administration issued a “A Proclamation on Transgender Day of Visibility, 2024” on the White House website (https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2024/03/29/a-proclamation-on-transgender-day-of-visibility-2024/).

The proclamation sought to “honor the extraordinary courage and contributions of transgender Americans and reaffirm our Nation’s commitment to forming a more perfect Union — where all people are created equal and treated equally throughout their lives.” The proclamation also described the many ways the administration has attempted to support and promote trans people in the nation, with a particular focus on efforts to combat “the bullying and harassment of transgender children and their families.”

So far, so good. It seems to me axiomatic that transgender people face daily challenges that cis people do not - the most fundamental being a feeling of alienation or marginalization in a society overwhelmingly dominated by the presence of cis people (apparently about 1 in 250 people are trans: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5227946/).

The proclamation, however, was also standard fare for a Democratic administration that is instinctively partial to left leaning “woke” ideas - for example, those arising from, in this case, the worldview of queer theory. This is not an essay devised to explain and explore all the pros and cons of queer theory, so for purposes of this essay, suffice to say that the key idea in queer theory is to expose norms as social constructions rather than as natural qualities. As an area of theoretical inquiry, it is an inherently political endeavor that defiantly attempts to question the things we take for granted in society as “normal”, e.g. the nature of what it means to be “male” and “female”.

Perhaps the most controversial aspect of queer theory relates to how it has pushed us to rethink gender identity, especially in light of an increase in the number of people who identify as trans (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5227946/). As the Lia Thomas saga has revealed, there are legitimate concerns about whether allowing transwomen to compete in women’s sports is unfair to cis women who may not share the hormonal developments of a transwoman. There are legitimate doubts to be raised about whether sex is non-binary, as Colin Wright has valiantly, expertly, compellingly, and coherently explained at Quillette (https://quillette.com/2020/06/07/jk-rowling-is-right-sex-is-real-and-it-is-not-a-spectrum/). There are also legitimate concerns about a rise in gender dysphoria and the extent to which the rise in the number of people identifying as trans is a result of increasing acceptance of trans people or the result of increased exposure to “trans ideology” in schools and other institutions that, intentionally or unintentionally, confuse young and naive teens that their insecurities about sex and identity are manifestations of gender dysphoria rather than of an instability in mental health or of normal (no pun intended), though awkward, phases of adolescent development.

These are all worthy concerns that should be discussed and debated in civil, objective, and thoughtful ways in the space of public commentary. Unfortunately, as is so often the case in the polarized arenas of public discussion such as social media platforms like X, it is difficult to do so in light of rhetorical extremities from both the Left and Right. It does not take much exposure to X/Twitter to find reasonable conservative complaints about allowing drag shows in schools and public libraries. But it also does not take much exposure to X/Twitter to find right wing rhetoric referring to trans activists as nefarious “groomers” of children.

Which brings me to James Lindsay, who credits himself with inventing the use of the term “groomer” to identify trans activists and ideologues alleged to be engaged in a campaign to make trans identity not only acceptable but increasingly attractive to naive and credulous young children. The co-author of newly published “The Queering of the American Child: How a New School Religious Cult Poisons the Minds and Bodies of Normal Kids,” Lindsay has become known for his crusade against “transgender ideology” among other issues like Critical Race Theory. In keeping with this crusade, he recently posted a response to the Biden administration’s proclamation promoting a transgender day of visibility on Easter Sunday. In the response, he writes (https://twitter.com/ConceptualJames/status/1774101584307200270) that the proclamation is “a deliberate provocation against Christians that must be understood.” He goes on to accuse the administration of employing a tactic that “derives from Saul Alinsky in Rules for Radicals and has been codified in the updated activism manual called Beautiful Trouble. They do these provocations intentionally, as I have discussed at length in the past, as a means of stoking a reaction they can use to their advantage.”

Apparently, the Biden administration, standing at the helm of “Woke Theosophy”, has issued a proclamation designed as part of an operation to “drag faithful Christians into reactionary stances.” In particular, “Operation Christian Nationalism,” in attempting to frame Christian nationalism as “one of the most dangerous threats to ‘democracy’ in the world today,” deliberately sets about trying to provoke Christians into reactions that will “prove” that they are a threat. The idea is that the proclamation, or “This provocation”, “is overwhelmingly likely aiming to feed into those prevailing active measures ("ops") meant to drag Christians into a positions of fruitful reaction that the Regime can use to clamp down on them.” In short, a proclamation declaring support for transgender people, while drawing attention to the bullying and other discriminatory challenges often faced by trans people, is in fact a secret operation, now exposed by Lindsay, to bait Christians into an “overreaction” that can be used against them.

How so? Because the proclamation was issued on Good Friday and declared that the Transgender Day of Visibility would occur on Easter Sunday, for many Christians the holiest day of the year, which makes a proclamation about what many consider an aberrant ideology an affront to the Christian faith. An atheist, Lindsay nonetheless puts himself forth as a kind of white knight for whom “the dynamic must be explained.” He urges Christians to “cleave to your faith with wisdom and discernment.” He encourages Christians to “celebrate your Christianity as loudly and publicly as you want, and you should do so aware that a reaction is being solicited from you.” He even nobly urges them to “pray for these evil ‘leaders’ that they repent of this wickedness.” In short, he urges Christians to be Christians - celebrate Easter unapologetically, and do not succumb to the provocations of the Regime. “Keep your faith and keep your head. These are trying times.”

Nowhere, however, does Lindsay, or many other right-wing accounts on X complaining about Biden’s proclamation, acknowledge or point out that March 31 happens to be Transgender Day of Visibility every year. It just happens to be the case that Easter Sunday also falls on March 31 this year. As economist Jeremy Horpedahl posted on X (https://twitter.com/jmhorp/status/1774138974589554900), “Transgender Day of Visibility always falls on March 31, it just happens to coincide with Easter this year. Biden didn't invent it, though he was the first President to recognize it in 2021. This is easily verified with Wikipedia.”

It is, of course, reasonable to consider whether it was wise or prudent for Biden to be so vocal as to issue a public proclamation aligning the institution of the presidency with what many view as an aberrant ideology on the holiest day of the year for Christians. It is much more reasonable, however, to assume that Biden sought to align his administration with the rights and concerns of transgender people on Easter Sunday because, after all, a core message of Christianity is that all of us are welcome in the kingdom of God. As I implied in the beginning of this essay, it does not seem a stretch to view trans people as among the most marginalized individuals in our society? Without a doubt, trans activism tends to be militant, brooking little compromise with people inclined to question whether, for example, Lia Thomas should be allowed to compete in women’s swimming competitions. But it is possible to engage in critique of “transgender ideology” without engaging in the kind of conspiratorial speculation that accuses the Biden administration of engaging in a Regime operation to deliberately provoke Christians so as to justify future crackdowns on them.

It is also quite plausible, and in fact more likely, that to the extent the Biden administration chose to highlight the Transgender Day of Visibility precisely because it fell on Easter, it was in the spirit of Christian love rather than conspiratorial respite against Christian nationalism. After all, it is well known that Biden is a devoted Catholic - in fact, only the second Catholic president in the history of a nation which has not always been kind or friendly to Catholic immigrants. Perhaps Biden knows, or remembers, something about such historical discrimination, and felt compelled to align his Catholic (Christian) faith with support for transgender individuals who, perhaps like the awkward Target employee with whom I interacted a few weeks ago, often feel alienated in everyday society. That sounds a lot more plausible than the story of a conspiratorial Regime operation to advance the cause of so-called “Woke Theosophy.”

In any case, it is likely a simple matter of Biden expressing his support for transgender people in the spirit of Christian love on the Easter holiday. As explained by White House spokesperson Andrew Bates in a statement (https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/white-house-responds-to-gop-criticism-as-transgender-day-of-visibility-falls-on-easter/ar-BB1kOtAN?ocid=msedgntp&pc=HCTS&cvid=35f8e8912a5c4584b27e64276ee9fd80&ei=10):

“As a Christian who celebrates Easter with Family, President Biden stands for bringing people together and upholding the dignity and freedoms of every American.”