News and Views from around the World
Betraying parents of gender-confused kids
My patient "Cheryl" is an example of a traumatised parent. Her
18-year-old autistic daughter, her only child, identifies as a man
and has been on testosterone for six months. Cheryl is convinced
she and her husband were misled by a gender clinic and that
"Eva" did not have adequate evaluations and therapy. For the
first time in her life, Cheryl is taking psychiatric medication for
her constant crying, sleeplessness and anxiety.
Cheryl feels she's at odds with everyone: Eva, family
members, friends, schools, doctors, therapists, politicians, the
media and the culture. On how many fronts can one person fight?
I was not surprised when Cheryl told me, "Sometimes I wish my
daughter had cancer. The whole world would be there for me."
Doctors at Johns Hopkins tell Cheryl to embrace her child's
"evolving sense of self". But when she first heard the lowered
pitch of Eva's voice, Cheryl threw up. A double mastectomy
is planned; the thought of it floods her with panic and horror.
She fears for Eva's physical and emotional health, including her
sexual health.
Excerpt from Miriam Grossman, The Federalist (USA),
November 11, 2021.
Secret LGBT activists infiltrating conservative congregations
"I think you need to know what the next front in the culture
war is," a senior state leader of a conservative U.S. evangelical
denomination told me recently.
He said that pastors in five different churches in the southern
region of his state had reported the same phenomenon. They
have had strangers come and join their congregations, and six
months or so later, come out as transgender, and demand their
rights as official members of the congregation.
It has happened to so many of these churches, in the same
period of time, that they believe it is part of a concerted effort
to undermine those churches. There is serious concern among
the denomination's lawyers that these undercover trans activists
have found a legal way to force these congregations to capitulate
on trans issues, or face ruinous lawsuits.
"There are a lot of churches in our denomination that don't
have a lot of money," my friend said. "If they get sued, they
won't have enough resources to even defend themselves."
My friend said he just met with the pastors of this region,
who have all been poleaxed by this. Many of them are barely
able to understand gender fluidity as a concept, much less figure
out how to deal with it from a faithfully Christian point of view.
They are sitting ducks, according to my friend.
Excerpt from Rod Dreher, The American Conservative,
January 31, 2022.
NGOs vs. Hungary: actors of an asymmetrical warfare
Politics in the 21st century is not the game we have used to play
in the old times with established, clear-cut parties, honourable
and well-known career-politicians, and straightforward
manifestos battling each other on the podiums for all to see in an
accountable and civic manner.
Now, in the era of supranational organisations and global
NGO-networks, we are drifting further and further from the
world of transparent politics, and everything has seemingly
withdrawn behind the curtains of plausible deniability.
The double standards and unabashed bias of the Brussels elite
and international NGOs towards the conservative governments
of Central Europe have been obvious for the past decade.
They are part of a dangerous, asymmetrical political warfare:
unelected and therefore unaccountable bureaucrats funnelling
largely untraceable funds to undermine the legitimacy of
democratically elected governments just because they choose
not to adhere to the global, leftist mainstream.
Excerpt from Tamás Orbán, Hungarian Conservative,
February 21, 2022.
Don't let the 'woke' teach your children
"The values we teach our children" was the theme of a twoday
summit held in Budapest, Hungary, on February 16–17, and
hosted by the Mathias Corvinus Collegium.
Katy Faust, founder of the children's rights organisation
Them Before Us, emphasised that parents have the right to
educate their children — a right that is gradually being taken out
of their hands by educational institutions.
That is why parents should talk to their children about all
the "uncomfortable" topics, she argued. Parents also need to
compete for the education of their children with social media. If
parents don't want to talk to their kids, Netflix and TikTok will.
Excerpt from Dávid Nagy, The Hungarian Conservative,
February 22, 2022.
Men play large role in women's abortion decision, study finds
"The study confirms once again that, far from being solely a
'woman's issue', everyone has a role to play in building a culture
of life," Dr Ryan Anderson, president of the Ethics and Public
Policy Center, told The Daily Signal.
"Husbands and boyfriends are particularly important in the
advice and support they offer to pregnant women, as are churches
— and more needs to be done to encourage women to choose
life," said Anderson, co-author with Alexandra DeSanctis of
the forthcoming book Tearing Us Apart: How Abortion Harms
Everything and Solves Nothing (Washington, DC: Regnery, 2022).
Excerpt from Virginia Allen, The Daily Signal (Heritage
Foundation, Washington, DC), January 31, 2022.
A pregnant woman is viewed as an impediment, not an asset
Of all the bodies, the most unloved is, I would say, that of women.
A pregnant woman is just a chore. Nothing is more annoying for
our brains in Silicon Valley than a woman who must for nine
months carry her child, prepare her body to welcome an infant,
and maintain her body to house him or her.
They do not see a pregnant woman as the incarnation of
kindness, gentleness, and sacrifice. There is no symbolic or
figurative respect for her. They see her as a loss of productivity.
According to them, getting pregnant is costly for our dynamic
and flamboyant economy, where the homeless die in the dark
and where youth are suffocated with debt.
Excerpt from Zineb Riboua, Beyond the Ideological (USA),
February 4, 2022. 