freedom and reason

In the year 2038, transhumanism has risen to become a dominant ideology, reshaping society in its wake, protected in DEI policy. Among the youth, it has become a fervent creed, promising liberation from the limitations of the flesh. Two distinct paths have emerged within this movement: individuals who identify as transspecies, referring to themselves as “otherkin” and “therianthropes,” and cyborgs, a synthesis of soft and hard machine.

Otherkin see themselves as nonhuman animals or other creatures. They undergo physical modifications to embody the characteristics of the creature with which they identify. This can involve surgically implanted features like whiskers, claws, scales, or other physical traits associated with their chosen animal identity. A person who identifies as a cat might undergo surgery to have cat-like ears and a tail implanted, while someone who identifies as a reptilian might have scale-like modifications to their skin. These modifications are a way for otherkin to express their identities and feel more aligned with their “true selves” within the framework of transhumanism.

Cyborgs are individuals who have integrated advanced technology with their bodies through neural implants and other technological enhancements. These enhancements can range from cybernetic limbs and organs to neural interfaces that allow direct communication with machines and networks. Like otherkins, cyborgs have embraced the principles of transhumanism, viewing technology to transcend the limitations of the human body and enhance their capabilities. They may undergo elective surgeries and procedures to integrate these technological enhancements seamlessly into their physiology, blurring the line between human and machine. Through their cybernetic enhancements, cyborgs may gain enhanced strength, speed, agility, and cognitive abilities. They may also have access to a vast array of information and communication tools, allowing them to interact with the digital world in ways that were previously unimaginable.

With a passion for sociology and a critical eye for societal shifts, Professor Adam Kessler was determined to unravel the complexities of this new era. He began, “Today, we apply foundational social theories to the phenomenon of youth, drawn to the allure of transformation, modifying their bodies to appear as other species or machines.” Kessler began with the historical materialism of Karl Marx, guiding his students through the concept of alienation. “In a world where connection seems elusive, where the individual feels estranged from their own body, it is no wonder they seek refuge in alteration,” he explained. Transitioning to the ideas of Max Weber, he elucidated the process of disenchantment, where the world loses its mystique and becomes mechanized. “In the pursuit of transcendence, the human spirit craves a release from the mundane, a departure from the banality of existence.” He then turned to Sigmund Freud. “In a civilization built upon consumption, where desires are manufactured and identities commodified, the individual grapples with a profound sense of disconnection.”

As the lecture unfolded, students found themselves drawn into the intricate web of theories. Beneath the academic analysis lay a dark truth, one that spoke to the insidious influence of profit and power. “The medical-industrial complex and tech conglomerates profit from the commodification of the body, perpetuating a cycle of modification fueled by consumerism.” Kessler finally came to it in the most concrete and immediate sense of the phenomenon: “The industry capitalize on the insecurities of youth, peddling promises of transcendence in exchange for a hefty price.”

In the aftermath of Professor Kessler’s lecture, a palpable tension lingered in the air. Among the students sat a group of transhuman individuals, their identities woven into the fabric of their being, their experiences colored by the very theories Kessler had dissected in the classroom. Gathering their resolve, they convened outside the dean’s office, their voices raised in solidarity against the injustice they had endured in Kessler’s class. With a collective determination, they invoked the school’s policy against misrepresenting transhumanism, demanding accountability for the harm inflicted upon their community.

Acknowledging the gravity of the situation, Dean Katherine Graves summoned Professor Kessler to her office. She informed him of the consequences of his actions, reminding him of the responsibility he bore as an educator entrusted with the minds and well-being of his students. “Professor Kessler, it has come to my attention that your recent lecture has violated our school’s commitment to inclusivity and respect for all identities. As such, you will be required to undergo professional development to ensure that such oversights do not occur in the future.”

Fearing for his reputation, Kessler acquiesced to the dean’s judgment. The students found solace in the acknowledgment of their grievances, their voices amplified by a system that, though imperfect (it had, after all, awarded tenure to a bigot like Kessler), remained committed to progress. And as they returned to their studies, a newfound sense of empowerment stirred within them. The transhumans had the state at their back.

“Our reverence for the truth might be a distraction that’s getting in the way of finding common ground and getting things done.” — NPR’s CEO Katherine Maher on the truth

The “might be” is rhetorical. Maher is asserting that propaganda in the service of woke progressivism is of greater value than reverence for the truth. Hiding the truth of Biden family corruption and manufacturing stories about Trump family corruption is a way of finding common ground and getting things done.

Maher is not speaking for herself. This is how the woke epistemic works. In postmodernism, truth is reduced to and dissolved by discursive formations, with formations to be selected for their power in advancing movement goals, which function to obscure the truth, which has its own integrity.

For example, the truth is that gender is binary and immutable in the human species (all mammalian species, in fact). The woke take is that gender is either a sociocultural construction and performance with no connection to natural history or a transcendent spirit independent of observable reality; however, whatever the case, the individual’s subjectivity stands in place of the truth, so people are what they say they are.

EXCLUSIVE: Katherine Maher says that she abandoned a "free and open" internet as the mission of Wikipedia, because those principles recapitulated a "white male Westernized construct" and "did not end up living into the intentionality of what openness can be." pic.twitter.com/Ved9mgGvJH

— Christopher F. Rufo ⚔️ (@realchrisrufo) April 18, 2024

To be sure, the reduction of truth to individual subjectivity is selective. While a man can be a woman and a lesbian, a white person cannot be a black person. But the disappearance of truth in wokeness makes contradiction irrelevant. You will simply be told that the analogy is fallacious. Not because it is (while it is possible for a white person to be black, the analogy holds), but because the woke movement is righteous; therefore, any rule it invents is correct because it “gets things done.”

This is not a pragmatic take on truth. This is the elevation of ideology over fact and reason. This is the way Nazism worked. The Nazis reduced truth to ideology. Rule and right under Nazism were arbitrary with respect to the truth of the world. The important thing for Nazis was to get things done—according to the ideology. And the goal was the same: advance the interests of the corporate state.

NPR and PBS are are part of the corporate state media machine. Their claim to be apart from the profit-generating side of that machine is an attempt to manufacture the illusion of objectivity. In this way, their existence is more objectionable than their private sector counterparts.

When thinking about who to vote for this November, consider what type of country you want to live in. Here are the two options. These options encompass our past and our present. 

Option 1: A constitutional republic with a robust bill of rights, governed by citizens according to the principles of democratic republicanism, guided by the classically liberal values of free speech, conscience, assembly, association, individualism, and limited government, where the family and community are the core institutions organizing social life, who can depend on government to protect them—their neighborhoods and their livelihoods—from crime and disorder. 

Option 2: A corporate state governed by bureaucrats operating via administrative rule, regulatory control, and technocratic means, guided by the progressive values of censorship, compelled thought, tribalism, collectivism, and expansive intrusive government, where corporations and state agencies organize social life at the expense of family and community. Families and communities cannot depend on the government to protect them from crime and disorder.

Once you decide which country you want to live in, the next question is which political party will help you realize that country. Here we hit a snag since the hegemonic strategy of the ruling elite has been over the last several decades to put before the people two political parties that appeal to different class, cultural, and intellectual sensibilities, while perpetuating the status quo—corporate state control over the masses. This is the uniparty establishment.

Considering this, the question shifts to the history of each party and a determination of which party is reformable. 

One party, the party of the caste, slavery, segregation, and woke is not reformable. It’s the party of the corporate state phoenix that rose from the ashes of the slavocracy. Its rules are exclusive, its operatives tightly controlled. It is moreover the party of those who captured the administrative apparatus—progressives. If you prefer Option 2, then this is your party.

The other party, founded as a populist antislavery party, because it is more open to popular forces in the grassroots, despite having been captured by corporate power and relegated for decades to the role of controlled opposition, is already being transformed internally by reformers who are articulating the vision described in Option 1. So, if a constitutional republic is the country you want to live in, the Republican Party, while not perfect, is the better option.

Restoring the American Republic to greatness requires returning the Republican Party to its roots by supporting populist activists and candidates. The people must do this at the same time they weaken the Democratic Party by withdrawing support for its candidates and refusing to submit to administrative rule. It’s time to return the United States to her people—the American citizen.

If trans men are men, should they go to men’s prisons? Such a practice poses serious risks to trans men given that they are females. Prison would be particularly unsafe for them. But the reverse of this, i.e., trans women in women’s prisons, poses the same problem. If trans men are not safe around male inmates because they are female, then female inmates are not safe around trans women given that trans women are male.

You can’t have it both ways can you 🤔 but apparently you can.

“Trans women are women, of that there is no debate, yet we all know we can’t put trans men in male prisons.”

This is where trans ideology self implodes. 🤡‘a.

pic.twitter.com/nKKVqcOS1u

— Mark. (@markasenior29) April 14, 2024

This is where the logic the slogan “Trans women are women” shorthands unravels. The danger to trans men in male prisons is not because of sociocultural constructions of gender. The danger is not subjective. It’s objective. Males represent a particular threat to females. Not all males, of course, but given that most violent crime, especially violent sexual crimes, are perpetrated by males, males as a group represent a statistically significant threat to females as a group. Of the 100 thousand rapes that occurred in the United States in 2022, nearly 95 percent were perpetrated by men, with another 2 percent where the sex of the perpetrator was unknown. Around 90 percent of victims of rape were women that year. This is especially true for prisons, where sexual predators are housed in confined spaces. Of the more than 600 thousand males in US state prisons for perpetrating violent crimes (aggravated assault, murder, etc.), more than 160 thousand of them were convicted of sexual crimes.

We see the logic unravel in a similar way when we consider trans men in contact sports. Since trans men are females, and since the objective difference between males and females is vast, a trans man is at particular risk to be injured by a male player. Of course, it would be very rare for a trans man to make the team given those vast differences, so this problem is for the most part hypothetical. At the same time, however, for the very same reason that a trans man faces heightened risk playing against males in combat sports, so female athletes face heightened risk playing against males in female sports.

This is why it is important to grasp sex/gender as objective facts. When you obscure reality with thought-stopping slogans, you lose the ability to see that trans men in male prisons or male sports is the same problem as trans women in female prisons and female sports. To those who are not ideologically-impaired, this is obvious. It is very difficult to get those dispossessed of the capacity for the obvious by ideology to understand the implication of their demands that trans women be allowed in male prisons and sports. This is why we need the authorities to work from objective grounds in administering sex-segregated institutions. Unfortunately, gender ideology has colonized many of those institutions.

This is sick and disgusting and I want to know why his parents are allowing him to mock female athletes, why his coach is allowing him to cheat, and why these girls' coaches and parents aren't speaking up https://t.co/JYG8KXMU7f

— Meghan Murphy (@MeghanEMurphy) April 13, 2024

Note: to help make the point clearer to those who fallaciously differentiate sex from gender, I have refrained from describing males as men and females as women in the foregoing. So, in this note, I want to reiterate the fact that a man is an adult male human and a woman is adult female human. Males and females come in two types: boys and men and girls and women. Also, the vast physical differences between men and women is not the sole reason for sex segregation in sports. Women’s sports exist as a matter of equity in that institution. It is a violation of women’s rights to compel them to compete against men.

X (Twitter) has been blowing up because Speaker of the House Mike Johnson is introducing legislation to require proof of US citizenship when registering to vote in federal elections. “If an individual only asserts or simply states that they are a citizen, they don’t have to prove it, and they can register that person to vote in a federal election,” Johnson said, adding that “we only want US citizens to vote in US elections.”

People are going to lie to you about this (or more likely profess their ignorance and ideology), so, for the record, as of March 2024, the District of Columbia and municipalities in three states (California, Maryland, and Vermont) allow noncitizens to vote in some or all local elections. Moreover, several states do not have clear impediments to municipalities passing their own voter qualification laws. Having a voter ID card—if one is even required—is not exclusive to citizens in America. This is a very real problem for election integrity.

We’re told not to worry about noncitizens voting in national elections because there is a federal law forbidding it. But if voters are voting in local elections, how will they be excluded from voting in federal elections if they don’t have to provide proof of citizens when registering the vote? How are noncitizens segregated from citizens when receiving their ballot if no proof of citizenship is required—or even proof of registration with a voter ID card?

Why are noncitizens allowed to vote in any election in the United States? A core pillar of constitutional republicanism is election integrity; republics are about citizens; therefore, the franchise should be exclusive to them. States should have clear impediments to noncitizen voting, and the federal government should pressure them to do so. Indeed, failing to stop noncitizens from voting appears to violate the United States Constitution.

The Constitution guarantees US citizens a constitutional republic at both federal and state levels. Article IV, Section 4 of the United States Constitution: “The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.” (Note that the federal government has failed to protect the citizens of the various states from invasion and against domestic violence.)

Allowing noncitizens to vote in local elections violates the foundational principle that, in a republic, only citizens, native and naturalized, are allowed to participate via the ballot box in electing representatives. The political right of citizenship is a special kind of right, a privilege, i.e., an exclusive right, that applies to people born or naturalized in the United States. Citizenship, when not the result of jus soli (birthright), is earned in America. Those who are not citizens have not earned the right to vote in our elections at any level. Noncitizens have no right to come to America and vote in our elections.

Constitutional republics with presidential systems place a strong emphasis on citizenship as a prerequisite for voting rights because the central role of the citizen in governance is emphasized under these arrangements. This emphasis stems from key principles. In these systems, the legitimacy of the government is derived from the consent of the governed, which means the citizens. Citizens are seen as having a special connection to the state and a stake in its decisions and policies, which justifies their exclusive participation in the electoral process.

One might argue that, as a democratic principle, non-citizens have a say-so because they are also governed. However, in republics, citizenship is closely tied to the concept of national sovereignty. Citizens are considered members of a political community and are vested with certain rights and responsibilities, including the right to vote and participate in shaping the country’s future. Non-citizens are guests. They are governed by law, to be sure, but they do not have a right to determine those laws because they are not citizens. If all this sounds circular, that’s because it is; it’s axiomatic.

Democratic-republican arrangements prioritize political equality among citizens, ensuring that each citizen has an equal voice and influence in the political process (at least in principle). Granting voting rights exclusively to citizens maintains this principle by ensuring that all those who have a shared stake in the nation’s future have the power to determine that future. The legal frameworks of constitutional republics reflect these principles by explicitly defining voting rights and eligibility criteria, which typically include citizenship requirements.

Progressives are apoplectic about this, cloaking their desire to run up the popular vote by leveraging noncitizens by claiming that proof of citizenship will effectively disenfranchisement American citizens who cannot prove their citizenship. This is a variation on the opposition to voter ID. If this concern were legitimate, then progressives would be mobilizing to make sure that all eligible voters have the proper paperwork to register and vote in elections.

Am I saying that, if an individual cannot meet the burden of proving they’re a US citizen, then they don’t get a ballot? Absolutely. Think about it: if the argument is that people who cannot prove they are citizens should be allowed to vote, then the argument that noncitizens cannot vote in US election is disingenuous. It’s a ruse to allow noncitizens to influence the direction of a nation to which they do not belong.

A Pew poll found, in 2020, that there are 25 million noncitizens residing in America (remember that they wouldn’t let the Trump administration ask this question on the 2020 census). As of the first of this year, at the US southern border alone, there has been a record of more than 6 million migrant encounters at and between ports of entry since Biden took office in January 2021, according to data from the Office of Homeland Security Statistics. As readers of this blog know, hundreds of thousands more have come through since then. This figure does not include the millions of getaways; it is likely that the actual number exceeds 10 million. Many of the millions encountered have been allowed to reside in the United States. (See The Mass Immigration Swindle.)

How can we trust the outcome of the 2024 election without a rule requiring proof of citizenship to vote? And after the debacle of November 2020. We can’t. But we can be sure of this: we will be gaslit when we object to the outcome.

In an X (Twitter) discussion about the innate ability of humans to detect gender, I responded in the thread that I call this the “gender-detection module” (see Neutralizing the Gender-Detection Brain Module). Think of it like the linguistic acquisition module or device, I wrote, elaborating that it works in a way analogous to factor analysis but with evolved assumptions. I then noted that the gender programmers are working aggressively to disrupt the system early in life since brain modules need priming and proper development to function correctly. Queer activists know what they’re doing. This is why the ideology has colonized our public school system and cultural programming targeting children.

Somebody in the thread thought she was correcting me when she wrote, “Sex detection. Gender is the problem because it is essentially sex role stereotype. The scaffolding all involved in this ridiculous & reductive performance rely on is an attraction to outdated external opposite sex trope preferences-toys, clothes, colour etc.” As I have shown in essays on Freedom and Reason, the purported distinction between sex and gender is queer and corporate propaganda. Outside of queer theory and the medical industrial complex, sex and gender are synonyms. (See Sex and Gender are Interchangeable Terms; Gender and Sex. Once More for People in the Back. See also Manipulating Reality by Manipulating Words; There’s No Obligation to Speak Like a Queer Theorist. Doing so Misrepresents Reality; Denying Reality: The Tyranny of Gender-Inclusive Language.)

It is crucial to deconstruct the discursive formations that constitute queer and corporate propaganda for those engaged in the struggle against gender ideology. Accepting the distortions of the other side undermines the efficacy of the movement for sanity and a return to scientific materialism. The fact is that anthropology and sociology used “sex role” and “gender role” interchangeably for decades until they were corrupted by woke progressivism. Biology used “sex” and “gender” interchangeably for centuries. When you live in the gender ideology bubble, when you play by their rules with their linguistic tricks, you have ceded authority to them. Queer theory and sexology are crackpot. Don’t define the world using their terms.

The word “gender” entered the English language from Old French in the late fourteenth century. Originally, it was used to refer to “kind” or “sort” and was derived from the Latin word “genus,” which meant “kind” or “type.” The usage of “gender” in botanical contexts can be traced back to at least the seventeenth century, and possibly even earlier. Botanists used it to differentiate between male and female reproductive organs or structures in plants. The botanical usage predated the broader biological usage that emerged in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries, encompassing both plants and animals. In modern times, discussions around “gender” have expanded to include social and cultural aspects, such as in the “gender role.” Along side all this, “gender” was also a system of grammatical classifications used to refer to the sex of animals and (oddly) things. Only very recently was “gender” repurposed by queer theorists and sexologists to manufacture an ideological construct for political and corporate purposes.

The word “sex” also entered the English language from Old French in the fourteenth century, derived from the Latin word “sexus,” which referred to the state of being either male or female. In its earliest usage in English, “sex” primarily denoted biological differences between male and female organisms, particularly in terms of reproductive anatomy and functions. Throughout history, “sex” has been used in various contexts, including biology, medicine, and law, to refer to the biological characteristics that differentiate males and females of a species. This usage remains prevalent today, particularly in scientific and medical discourse. In addition to its biological sense, “sex” has also been used to refer to sexual activity or intercourse, a meaning that also emerged in the late fourteenth century. This usage became more prominent over time, especially in colloquial and informal language. In modern times, discussions around “sex” have expanded to include social and cultural aspects, such as in the “sex role” and “sexual orientation.”

In sociology, the concept of “sex role” gained prominence in the twentieth century, particularly within the framework of structural functionalism. Sociologists like Talcott Parsons and Robert K. Merton explored how societies assign different roles and responsibilities to individuals based on their sex. Parsons, for example, described the complementary roles of men (instrumental role) and women (expressive role) within the family structure. Anthropologists began to explore the concept of sex or gender roles in the twentieth century, as part of broader studies on kinship and social organization. Anthropologists such as Margaret Mead and Ruth Benedict conducted ethnographic research that highlighted the variability of gender roles across different cultures. Mead’s work, in particular, challenged Western notions of fixed gender roles by demonstrating the diversity of gender norms and behaviors across societies. Over time, the term “gender role” gradually supplanted “sex role” in academic discourse. This transition coincided with the rise of queer and feminist scholarship, as well a sexology, and the redefinition of gender as a multidimensional construct shaped by culture, power, and socialization. Today, many people use gender as a shorthand for gender or sex role.

A different person in the thread attacked me for being yet another man talking down to women, to which I responded that my claim is easy to confirm. Even Wikipedia recognizes the fact, I wrote, quoting the entry: “Though sex and gender have been used interchangeably at least as early as the fourteenth century, this usage was not common by the late 1900s. Sexologist John Money pioneered the concept of a distinction between biological sex and gender identity in 1955.” In other words, a crackpot manufactured a distinction and many in the gender critical movement have uncritically accepted it. I was criticized for quoting Wikipedia, of course, since it proved my point. But I used a popular source to avoid appealing to my own expertise on the matter, sharing essays from this blog, or posting a lengthy reply with the above content. I also used the Wikipedia quote because the Google result just above it (the first result returned) was Gemini correcting the assumption in my question and instructing me to accept queer and corporate propaganda. I found it amusing that the seriously woke Wikipedia could provide a more truthful answer to my question than a chatbot.

To reiterate in concluding, it is important to critically analyze the ways in which queer and corporate messaging are constructed for those involved in challenging gender ideology. Embracing opposing distortions undermines the effectiveness of efforts for clarity and a return to scientific principles. By conforming to the language and tactics of the gender ideology narrative, individuals inadvertently yield authority to it. Queer theory and sexology are to be viewed skeptically. It is therefore advisable not to adopt their terminology when framing our understandings of the world.

If men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences. — William Issac and Dorothy Swain Thomas (1928)

Is it at least possible that the Wellness Center at the college you or your children attend presumes illness? “If you build it, they will come.” This phrase is appropriated from a line spoken by Ray Kinsella, played by Kevin Costner, in the film Field of Dreams (1989). Some hasten to note that the line is misquoted; however, it preserves the essential meaning: people often don’t know what they seek until you tell them. What you tell them doesn’t necessarily have to be real or necessary; it just needs find them anxious and vulnerable, a condition that may be manufactured by those who are expert at disordering personalities. Those experts are tied to a vast corporate enterprise racking in hundreds of billions of dollars every year. The global mental health industry, showing a compound growth rate of 3.8% annually, is forecasted to grow to more than $532 billion by 2030. It’s truly a field of dreams.

I have covered this matter in depth on Freedom and Reason (See, e.g., Making Patients for the Medical-Industrial Complex; Feeding the Medical-Industrial Complex; Thomas Szasz, Medical Freedom, and the Tyranny of Gender Ideology; Disordering Bodies for Disordered Minds). Yesterday, I listened to The Brendan O’Neill Show from March 7. He interviewed Abigail Shrier, former opinion columnist for the Wall Street Journal. In 2020, she published Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters. O’Neill and Shrier engaged in a conversation about her latest book, Bad Therapy: Why the Kids Aren’t Growing Up. They explore such topics as the prevalent over-diagnosis of mental-health conditions, the detrimental impact therapists can have on children and parental authority, and the innate resilience inherent in human beings. Here’s the conversation on Apple Podcasts.

Among the many forces at work, Shrier notes the emergence of Social and Emotional Learning (SEL), an educational framework ostensibly focused on nurturing students’ abilities to understand and manage their emotions, set and achieve positive life goals through responsible decision making, feel and show empathy for others, and establish and maintain positive relationships. SEL advocates claim the goal is to foster students’ social and emotional skills, which are essential for success in school and work, and life in general. However, by framing discussions around emotional well-being in educational contexts, teachers (perhaps for many inadvertently) often reinforce the belief that students have been traumatized or vulnerable.

At the top, I quoted what has come to be known as the Thomas theorem. But even when things are real, they can be made more traumatic by defining them as such. Many of us have had the experience of watching babies made to cry upon bumping their head solely on the reaction of those around them. Indeed, you can make babies believe they have bumped their heads even when they haven’t by acting as if they have.

Consider the Dartmouth Scar Experiment. Participants thought they were being interviewed for jobs with fake scars on their faces applied by a makeup artist. During final touch up, no longer being able to see themselves in a mirror, the scar was removed without their knowledge. Those participants who believed that they had a visible scar reported experiencing increased level of discrimination. They reported feelings of powerlessness and self-pity. They were also more like to blame others for their feelings.

Encouraging students to explore feelings and experiences in-depth, there’s a risk of inadvertently amplifying or even manufacturing perceptions of trauma. In other words, the process of introspection and discussion lead some students to interpret normal life challenges or experiences as traumatic events, potentially exaggerating their negative impact. Moreover, they learn that trauma is debilitating, thus steering the child into the sick or victim role. This creates a self-fulfilling prophecy, where students come to view themselves primarily through the lens of trauma, potentially limiting their perceptions of their own agency and resilience.

It should be obvious that excessive focus on exploring trauma and negative emotions in educational settings compromises important aspects of students’ development, such as fostering resilience, promoting positive coping strategies, and building strengths-based approaches to negotiating the life-course. Educators, while crucial in supporting students’ emotional and social development, usually don’t have the professional training or expertise to serve as therapists or counselors. Many only have a bachelor’s degree, and the quality of education programs is widely variable. Moreover, the vocation has become target and instrument of woke progressive programming.

Engaging in deep emotional exploration without proper training is associated with boundary issues. As I have noted, this can be a form of grooming. However, as Shrier points out, counselors and therapists are often as bad, and they are a conduit into the medical-industrial complex, thus representing another form of grooming. This is evidenced by the fact that all of the worsening mental health outcomes for kids widely reported by the media, and confirmed by research—as well as young people declining to engage in life and thrive at it (see tweet below)—have coincided with a generation of parents obsessed with the mental health and well-being of their children.

The young arent driving, fucking, and drinking because high energy activity is fundamentally incompatible with modern ethics. If you're always told to be harmless (but also guilty!) then your innate will to power withers. You vegetate. Man, the greatest animal, turned to plant pic.twitter.com/RrjQlFBdfY

— Jash Dholani (@oldbooksguy) March 25, 2024

This phenomenon has been well-explored in my field of sociology. In his various books (The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, Asylums: Essays on the Social Situation of mental Patients and Other Inmates, and Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity), for example, Erving Goffman directly or in effect elaborate the concept of the “sick role.” The sick role refers to a set of social behaviors and expectations associated with individuals who are perceived or depicted as disabled or ill. Goffman described the sick role as a socially sanctioned deviant status that individuals assume when they are treated as ill. This status comes with exemptions from normal responsibilities and obligations to seek help and cooperate with treatment. The later requires reifying the mental illness, which often involves securing an official diagnosis. In this view, illness is not necessarily am objective phenomenon, but a socially constructed experience shaped by cultural norms and expectations, and social interaction.

Update (April 7, 2024) at bottom.

Here’s the Democrat Party plan (establishment Republicans are complicit). Open borders accomplishes a number of things that enlarge and entrench the corporate state and weaken the working class economically and politically. First, illegal aliens displace native-born workers, thus providing corporations with a pliable and super exploitable labor source. Second, mass immigration drives down wages for the native born working class by increasing the labor supply. Third, open borders provides housekeepers and groundskeepers for the affluent classes, while perpetuating the ghettoization of black Americans, an arrangement that keeps that population at arms lengths. Fourth, by creating more government dependents, open borders enlarges those segments of the population that vote for a living. Fifth, it exacerbates the antagonistic contradictions that culturally, politically, and socially disorganize the working class.

The corporate state and its media mouthpieces report that GDP is growing. This is expected. Immigration increases the size of the labor force. More workers mean more production output, which contributes to GDP growth. Like everybody else, immigrants are consumers; they contribute to demand for goods and services, thereby stimulating economic activity and GDP growth. Increased consumer spending may also lead to higher production levels. In countries with aging populations or low birth rates, immigration replenishes the workforce, supporting economic growth. Immigrants tend to be younger on average than native populations, which mitigates the economic burden associated with an aging workforce (such as increased dependency ratios).

All that may sound good, but increasing the labor supply puts downward pressure on the price of labor (wages and salaries), which increases the rate of surplus value, realized in the market by the production of private and government debt. Government debt in turn increases inflation. Inflation is a tax on working people. Wage gains are eroded by higher living costs; the slight increases in wage growth of late are offset by persistently high inflation (greater than 3 percent annually), resulting in a decline in real wage growth. Low wages are weak incentive to pull native born labor from the industrial reserve. Unemployment rates are made to appear low because workers aren’t job seeking. Meanwhile, because of the excess hundreds of billions of dollars transferred from the working class to the corporate class, the top 1% increased their wealth from $30 trillion to $45 trillion under Biden. Mass immigration is a big swindle.

* * *

Update (April 7, 2024)! Today I listen to Bari Weiss’ podcast from this past Tuesday and felt the need to share this will readers of Freedom and Reason.

“When your base is the college-educated elites and the dependent poor—neither of whom are competing with working-class people or with illegal aliens for jobs—you then create policy that caters to their economic needs. That’s what the Democrats have effectively done by shifting from an agenda based on labor to an agenda based around the things college-educated people care about, which, by and large, are things like climate change.” —Batya Ungar-Sargon

Over the past eight years, Newsweek opinion editor Batya Ungar-Sargon embarked on a quest to unravel the enigma of Trump’s 2016 victory and elite misapprehensions regarding the American working class. Her journey led her to this realization: the most significant division in American society isn’t merely political but more economic—the gaping chasm between the college-educated and the working class. Traditionally, Democrats have been champions of the working class. At least that’s the standard narrative. However, in recent years, support for Democrats in the working class has eroded. Despite predictions of a diverse, working-class coalition shaping the future of the Party, this prophecy failed to materialize. Instead, Democrats have become the party of the affluent credentialed classes and strata, those who enjoy actual privileges.

In the 2016 election, Trump captured significant portions of the working class vote, including 54 percent of those with family incomes of $30,000 to $50,000, 44 percent of those with incomes under $50,000, and nearly 40 percent of union workers—the highest for a Republican since Reagan in 1984. By 2022, Democrats faced a 15-point deficit among working-class voters but enjoyed a 14-point advantage among college-educated voters.

Ungar-Sargon’s new book, Second Class: How the Elites Betrayed America’s Working Men and Women, conveys the pervasive sense of disillusionment among many working-class individuals, who feel that the American dream had become an unattainable fantasy. The discussion I am sharing below covers the matter in depth. Not unexpectedly, mass immigration and offshoring lie at the core of the economic woes of those Hillary Clinton referred to during the 2016 campaign as a “Basket of deplorables.” These are the dynamics that find popular support for a second Trump term growing.

As reported in the New York Post, Seattle Public Schools is dismantling its gifted and talented program because it is “oversaturated” with white and Asian students. They will replace it with a more “inclusive, equitable and culturally sensitive program.” A little DEI will fix it!

This is what the New Racism looks like. Governments are in explicit fashion discriminating against white and Asian students. This isn’t de facto or indirect racism. This is de jure and institutional racism. This is systemic racism. This is what lies at the heart of DEI: anti-white and anti-Asian prejudice. Why do I say that? Because they’re making educational choices on the basis of race and it’s hurting white and Asian children.

Nearly 70 percent of the students in the gifted program are white. That’s the problem. The majority takes a majority of the seats. “Numbers would suggest that within our city…predominantly white children are more gifted than other cultures and races, and we know that is absolutely not true,” Kari Hanson, the district’s director of student support services, says. How does Hanson know this is not true? Because 3.7 percent of Hispanic and just 1.6 percent black. Washington’s population is 72 percent white. Let that sink in.

This is the Democrat agenda. The Democratic Party, the party of the Slavocracy, the party of Jim Crow, is now the party of New Racism. These policies not only discriminate against whites and Asians but against any black kid who might qualify for gifted and talented programming. They’re literally holding everybody back because white and Asian kids do better academically. The white and Asian kids shouldn’t work so hard. Hard work is a white supremacist value.

This is Kurt Vonnegut’s “Harrison Bergeron” in living color. Literally. Washington’s children are living in a dystopian nightmare world. They’re not the only ones. This is coming to a city near you. Vote accordingly.

“The force said complaints had been received but no action would be taken,” reports the BBC, referring to a statement released by Scotland Police letting the public know that JK Rowling tweets describing several transgender women as men were not criminal.

The Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act makes it an offense to stir up hatred with absusive or threatening behavior on the basis of characteristics including religion, sexual orientation and transgender identity. The maximum sentence is seven years in prison. (Racial hatred was banned under a 1986 law. A law against misogyny is forthcoming.)

“I hope every woman in Scotland who wishes to speak up for the reality and importance of biological sex will be reassured by this announcement, and I trust that all women—irrespective of profile or financial means—will be treated equally under the law,” Rowling tweeted, adding, “If they go after any woman for simply calling a man a man, I’ll repeat that woman’s words and they can charge us both at once.”

I hope every woman in Scotland who wishes to speak up for the reality and importance of biological sex will be reassured by this announcement, and I trust that all women – irrespective of profile or financial means – will be treated equally under the law.https://t.co/CsgehF2a5d

— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) April 2, 2024

Why is JK Rowling’s defiance of Scottish law so important? Because there is nothing more fundamental to freedom than the rights to speak the truth and not have to tell lies. The United Declaration of Universal Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil And Political Rights affirm the right to conscience and speech. It’s affront to human dignity that the Scottish law exists, even if the police have declined to arrest charge Rowling with a hate crime.

But the influence of the queer lobby has proved itself powerful. The gender ideologue hates correct gendering because it represents active resistance to the demand that others participate in deception or affirm delusion. Since a man knows, or at least suspects, that he is not nor can ever be a woman, he depends on others to suspend their disbelief for his sake—whatever his motive (gain access to women’s spaces, sexual gratification, etc.). He demands others live in his world by his rules. If he cannot count on the emotional blackmail of dysphoria or suicide, he attempts to arrange for the state to punish dissenters.

This is why Rowling’s defiance is so moving and powerful—and necessary. Just as we must openly defy demands that we accept the doctrines of Christianity and Islam, we must openly defy the demand that we accept the doctrine of the queer religion. Rowling is a role model.

Perhaps the gender ideologue might consider respecting the right of others to speak freely and be free from compelled speech. After all, freedom of speech and conscience are fundamental human rights. But the gender ideologue cannot respect the rights to speech and conscience because, like Islam, the techno-religious cult of gender ideology is a fundamentally authoritarian.

And like Islam, gender ideology is nonsense through and through. There is no gender identity apart from gender itself (which is the same thing as sex)—or at least the believer must be forced to admit that there is no evidence for such a thing beyond his subjective feeling. How could a man know how it feels to be a woman? The brain of a man is a man’s brain—just as are his hands and every other part of him. Gender is binary and immutable.

* * *

The White House was in for some criticism on March 31 for proclaiming on Easter Day “Trans Day of Visibility.” Biden later denied he did that. But he did. In his defense, we are told, the trans holiday was established in 2009. You’d think, though, that one would check to see, since it is a floating holiday, whether Easter would fall on the last day of March. Or maybe that was known and intended. Whatever. I am not one to get too worked up over religious days of remembrance.

More interesting is the fact that there are nearly thirty days devoted to sexual minorities in the United States. Indeed, there are entire months devoted to LGBTQ causes or commemorations: Pride Month in June, LGBTQ History Month in October, and Transgender Awareness Month in November. The queer agenda is pursued in public institutions across the nation, its flags flown over government buildings. Streets are painted in queer colors. DEI training at universities and in corporate offices conditions students, employees, administrators and managers in the doctrine and encourages—sometimes demands—they rehearse the slogans and perform the conventions. The queer agenda is pushed out by the culture industry and embraced by the health care industry.

America’s culture and institutions have been commandeered by the queer movement. Either that or elites have coopted the queer movement to disorganize society and disorder the public mind—albeit these are not mutually exclusive developments. Either way, society is being disorganized and the public mind disordered. If the former, then the motive is not hard to discern—it’s a desire to depathologize what has heretofore been regarded as sexual deviancy, enlarge the congregation of the queer church, and use the institutional apparatus to force everybody to obey the dictates of the new (state sanctioned) religion. If it is the latter, then the motive becomes perhaps a little harder to infer, or at least explain, as it goes to the elite imperative to remake the world in the image of the queer agenda. Why would they want to do that?

* * *

NOW responded to the news that several former and current college athletes are suing the NCAA for violating their Title IX rights. The law suit concerns the NCAA’s decision to let Lia Thomas compete in the 2022 national championships. 

“Repeat after us: Weaponizing womenhood against other women is white supremacist patriarchy at work,” the post from NOW said. “Making people believe there isn’t enough space for trans women in sports is white supremacist patriarchy at work.”

Factcheck: Trans women are men. There is no room in women’s sports for men. The National Organization of Women is part of the establishment disorganizing Western civilization.

* * *

And there is this:

BREAKING: I just vetoed Republicans’ anti-LGBTQ bill to ban trans and gender nonconforming kids from participating in school sports teams that align with their gender identity.

LGBTQ kids deserve our love and respect and support just like any other kid. pic.twitter.com/h4BT2uhj3K

— Governor Tony Evers (@GovEvers) April 2, 2024