Outside of Iowa, few people had heard of purportedly Catholic Iowa State Senator Tony Bisignano until three months ago when he delivered a barnburner of a speech on the Iowa Senate floor in which he attacked Christians for living out their Christian faith. Like a virus, his speech spread across the country, especially in spaces where homosexuals and crossdressers live and move and have their being. What is insufficiently discussed is how un-American and anti-Christian his poisonous words were.
Bisignano’s ire was prompted by a proposed bill to remove “gender identity” from the state’s anti-discrimination bill. Bisignano characterized the removal as the “cutting edge of human rights violations” that puts the “lives” of cross-sex impersonators “at stake.” “Gender identity” was added to the law only 18 years ago. How did no Iowans notice the egregious humans rights violations taking place prior to 2007? Were the very lives of cross-dressers at stake in 2006?
To assess whether “gender identity” should ever have been added to anti-discrimination law necessitates understanding what “gender identity” is.
According to leftists, gender identity is a person’s subjective, internal feelings about their maleness, femaleness, both, or neither—feelings that can be fluid. As such, it has no place in anti-discrimination law. Historically, conditions included in anti-discrimination law were those constituted by objective, immutable characteristics that have no behavioral implications like race, sex, and nation of origin.
Historically, no conditions constituted by subjective, internal sexual feelings and volitional acts—which are legitimate objects of moral assessment—were included. Why should “gender identity” be the only condition constituted by subjective, internal feelings/desires and volitional acts included in anti-discrimination law? What about infantilism, zoophilia, sadism, and Minor Attraction?
While Besignano might not like it, a small business owner should have the right to refuse to hire a man who impersonates women by wearing makeup, falsies, dresses, and stilettos. Health clubs should have the right to prohibit biological men from sashaying through women’s locker rooms.
Bisignano mocked those who believe that sexual boundaries are critical to human flourishing. He mocked their boundaries as “cookie cutter.” To Bisignano, social taboos are anathema.
He scorned people who don’t want their children being exposed to men in drag, or don’t want to hire men in drag, saying “if they don’t fit your cookie cutter, you don’t want them living next to you. … or working next to you.”
Would Bisignano want his grandchildren living next door to an infantilist dressed in diapers and a onesie? Would he want to work next to a zoophile who had photos of the horse he loves on his desk? While “trans”-cultists object to such comparisons, their objections just prove they too have boundaries. They too make judgments. They too have limits to their “tolerance.”
Then Bisignano resorted to the tried and true “hate” epithet. Full of vitriol he spat, “you don’t even know them—but you hate them. … You have to hate them, because you could not do what you’re doing today if you didn’t. … [T]ell us why you hate these people.”
Oh, and while you’re at it, haters, tell us when you stopped beating your spouses.
Bisignano asserted with absolute certainty and no evidence that those who believe conditions constituted by subjective, internal feelings and volitional behaviors should not be included in anti-discrimination law are motivated by hatred and nothing else. In his wee little imagination, Bisignano can’t conceive of any motivation other than hatred. Confident in his erroneous assumption, he then demands to know why the hatred.
Maybe Bisignano hates everyone who holds different beliefs than he does about human flourishing, human rights, the necessity of sexual boundaries, and the reality and meaning of biological sex, but he ought not project onto others his narrow bigotry. Many people are fully capable of loving those who believe differently.
Then Bisignano, the avowed Catholic and card-carrying member of the no-judgment crowd, attempted to shame those who believe differently:
Shame on all of you Christians who want to keep talking about your faith.
This—this is what God talked about.
I don’t know where you go to church, and I don’t know what you read, but being a good Christian doesn’t take much:
- Do unto others.
- Take care of your neighbor.
- Keep your hands out of other people’s lives.
… Shame on you. Shame on you Christians.
I’ve grown accustomed to the sounds of Democrats caterwauling that the “separation of church and state” bars any commingling of biblically derived principles with politics, and yet Bisignano began thumping his Bible with the fervor of a revivalist. So, let’s take a moment to exegete his claims.
God did, indeed, have a word to say about sex and gender. About sex, God said he created humans male and female.
About “gender,” which to leftists are the social conventions, roles, behaviors, and expectations associated with each of the two sexes, God said, “A woman shall not wear a man’s garment, nor shall a man put on a woman’s cloak, for whoever does these things is an abomination to the Lord your God.”
I don’t know where Bisignano goes to church or what Bible he reads, because being a Christian takes a lot. It’s a hard path.
Jesus warned that the world will hate Christians because it first hated him. He said he came not to bring peace but a sword that will divide even families. God commanded his followers to “judge with righteous judgment” and “expose the unfruitful works of darkness.” He told us that lusting is tantamount to adultery. He said the greedy, drunkards, homosexuals, and those given to anger and envy will not inherit the kingdom of God. God prohibits “unwholesome talk.” God detests deceit, slander, and maliciousness. God hates “hands that shed innocent blood.”
Jesus told his disciples that “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.”
All that provides a glimpse into the demanding life of a Christ-follower.
It would serve Bisignano to finish the verses he partially cited. In Matthew 7:12, Jesus says, “So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.” Followers of Christ must wish that others do to them only what aligns with God’s Word and nothing else.
Taking care of one’s neighbor means feeding them if they are hungry and clothing them if they are naked. It means shoveling their driveway if they can’t and taking them to the hospital if they are injured. For Christians, taking care of their neighbors must never involve approving or facilitating sin.
I have no idea from what passage in Scripture Bisignano derives the idea that Christians are obliged to “keep” their “hands out of other people’s lives” or what he means by that coming right after his assertion that Christians must take care of their neighbors. And what does that mean with regard to whether subjective feelings and volitional behaviors should constitute a protected class in anti-discrimination law?
My humble suggestion is that before his next perfervid screed, Bisignano spend more time studying the Constitution, the law, and the Bible.