How Do You Know You’re Not a Man Trapped in a Woman’s Mind?

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How Do You Know You’re Not a Man Trapped in a Woman’s Mind?

February 20, 2023

Questions about whether there’s any issue with responding to “I’m a woman trapped in a man’s body” with “How do you know you’re not a man trapped in a woman’s mind” and how to respond to a meme that says God makes transsexuals so they can share in the act of creation.

* Is there any issue with responding to “I’m a woman trapped in a man’s body” with “How do you know you’re not a man trapped in a woman’s mind?”

* How should I respond to a meme that says, “God blessed me by making me transsexual for the same reason God made wheat but not bread and fruit but not wine—so that humanity might share in the act of creation.”

Transcript

[ Music ] [ Ding ] This is Amy Hall. I'm here with Greg Cokol, and you're listening to Stand to Reasons, #straskpodcast. >> Oh, Amy.

>> Hi, Greg. All right. This first question comes from Brian Kayko.

In reference to the October 27th show on pronouns, is there any issue with responding to, "I'm a woman trapped in a man's body," with, "How do you know you're not a man trapped in a woman's mind?" [ Laughter ] >> Oh, that's clever. And I have actually never thought of that before. I actually think it's really clever, because it just, you know, plays the same kind of confusion back on the person.

No, obviously, when I say confusion, there is deep and profound confusion here in its tragic. So I don't mean to be making light of it, but it's a fair rejoinder, it seems. And because, because it, there's a certain sense in which I agree with that point, the way we've been talking about it, no, I've got to let that whole line settle in, and think about it.

When a person says, "I'm a woman trapped in a man's body," that's a clear admission that something is wrong. Okay? So this is a broken situation. The question is, that's because the mind doesn't match the body.

The question is, "Which is amiss? Is the mind amiss, or is the body amiss?" When a person says, "I am a woman trapped in a man's body," it sounds like the body is attached to who they really are. So the problem is with the body. The mind isn't the problem.

Of course, this is the way the culture takes it now. It's not the mind that's the problem. The mind is all right, because truth now resides in the mind.

Now this is just an extension of relativism, and we've been talking about this obviously for years and years and years, where what one believes is the ground for truth. So a person's own belief is the truth maker of a statement. So if a woman says, I mean, if a man says, "I believe I am a woman," then I am a woman because the belief itself is the thing that makes this statement true.

Now, of course, pardon me, they could change their mind tomorrow, presumably, and then there would be a new truth that would be applied. The opposite truth. But in both cases, it is the mind that is the locus, the mind the feeling, the personal belief that's the locus of the truth.

It's what makes the statement true. That's classic relativism. True for me.

Not necessarily for you. This is my truth kind of thing. The physical world, in this case, the objective world is irrelevant to the truth.

So a man could say, or a woman could have a male body. No, I'm getting mixed up. You could have an individual with male genitalia say, "I'm a woman, my mind trapped in a male body." The body of the objective thing is not relevant to the assessment of their gender.

The truth of their gender is in their mind. Again, relativism. Now the rejoinder that was offered will maybe you're really a man trapped in a woman's mind.

Is that the way it went? Yes. Yeah. Okay.

So that acknowledges that the truth of the matter is not in the mind. The truth of the matter is in the objective world the way the world actually is. In this case, the physical body.

That would be objectivism. Okay. A person with male genitalia that have in principle the capability of participating with a woman that is one with female genitalia and sexual organs and apparatus that allows them together to make a child.

And that would be probably the simplest way to characterize the difference between a man and a woman. That's the way everybody's understood it forever. Which is why women who can't have children are so tragic to them because it's a challenge to their femininity in many ways.

Okay. And sometimes to some degree men who are not able to reproduce, I think it's harder for women. Perhaps then the locus of reality is in the objective world.

And that way of stating it, what we just heard, questions the mind. So remember there's a disjunct. The body says one thing.

The mind says another in this characterization. Which is accurate? The culture says the mind is accurate as long as it believes it for the moment. And then four years later when that individual changes that individual's mind, then whatever gender they change to is what they actually are at that time.

So that can go back and forth. That's gender fluidity. Okay.

Our point is reality is located and truth is located based in the objective world. And when your mind doesn't match the reality to the objective world, you're believing something false. Believing something false like that is called a delusion.

Now I don't know if you recall Amy, but it in older times when they would make movies. And I just saw one recently like this. And I can't remember what it is.

But I just saw one recently where this same little, in a sense meme, they didn't call memes then kind of appeared. Okay. Somebody's in an insane asylum.

And there's always somebody who doesn't believe he's himself, he's believes he's some other famous person. Tell me who that is. Napoleon Napoleon is one of them.

That's not the one I'm thinking of. I don't know Teddy Roosevelt. Oh, okay.

There's a lot of this Teddy Roosevelt is, you know, you're going to find these guys. And what the person who believes he's Napoleon or Teddy Roosevelt, that's the more common one. And that's the one that just came up in whatever it is I saw recently.

They are in an asylum because their beliefs about themselves do not match reality. That's a tragic situation. But no, but how is that different than what we're talking about now? And in fact, I mean, but now of course the difference is everybody's, I mean, massive numbers of people apparently are Teddy Roosevelt or Napoleon.

And so, and we go along with that and just affirm it as the truth. When it turns out it's not just not the truth. It's destructive for the individual because the Teddy Roosevelt folks are not trying to kill themselves because people don't think they're Teddy or Napoleon.

But there are a lot of the suicide rates skyrockets for those who are genuinely gender dysphoric. And that's a serious problem. So I think, I thought that was very clever.

It took me a while to unwrap it, but it turns out that's I think the proper view. The body is the real thing. The trap is the mind that is thinking falsely about reality.

But of course, when your one's view of truth is relativistic, not objectivistic, and that is the kind of the disease of the age I called it in the past, the primal heresy because it goes all the way back to the garden where the devil says, do your thing, you be you, you know, live your truth, not gods. Okay. Now, I forgot where I was going with that sentence, but the point, the point is this is the world is consumed by this, the primal heresy.

All right. Everywhere, everywhere, and especially when it comes to sexual matters. And just as an aside, I do not think it's an accident that this kind of delusion is so prevalent in sexual things because the sexual things are foundational to the way God structured reality in the beginning for the purpose of human flourishing.

Male and female, he created them. Okay. People multiply subdue, okay, for this cause of man shall leave his mother and father and cleave to his wife and the two will become one flesh.

And so there you got marriage. And so there you've got this whole system, God made it in the beginning. And when it's done the way God wants, which by the way, woman was made for man, not man for woman.

That's repeated in the New Testament. It's, it's central to the, the, the element there. And there it's a husband and wife relationship.

I'm not just talking broadly about males and females. There, that, that the, there's a help mate relationship, particularly the woman is made as a help plate for the man in that husband and wife relationship. When those things operate the way God wants them to operate, there's health, there's flourishing.

But when those things are denied, when they're attacked, when they're ridiculed, then they're diminished and to the degree that they're diminished, there's suffering and anguish and hardship and lack of flourishing that comes on to humanity, the image bearers. So some of you might realize I'm working up to here. This is a scheme.

There's a spiritual alone to all of these things where the devil is undermining God's purposes in the world. So human beings who bear his image do not flourish. Well, Greg, my response to this, this, Brian's response here.

Do you want to read it again? Okay. People, it's a little bit of a tongue twister. So is there any issue? I don't mind a twister.

Is there any issue with responding to I'm a woman trapped in a man's body with how do you know you're not a man trapped in a woman's mind? So I'm a little bit torn, but I think I can offer a slight adjustment that would get rid of my concerns about this. First, I think what this does well is what you mentioned, Greg. It helps them to see the importance of the body because we completely dismiss that these days.

So I think in terms of that and helping them to see that they shouldn't assume that whatever they think is true, that the physical nature of their body should indicate to them what their gender really is. I think it's great for that. My only concern with responding this way is that it's if you say you're a man trapped in a woman's mind, you are saying that your mind is female and your body is male.

And that's a little bit different from what you were just describing, Greg. What we're describing is that you're mistaken about the fact that your mind is female. So you're communicating something there of a divided person by saying it this way.

And we affirming the distinction. Right. Yeah, that's good observation.

And we don't want to affirm that division. Our idea is that we are whole persons. We're not divided between body and mind so that we can be different genders in our bodies and our minds.

Now, how can you get that value of helping them see that they have put the emphasis on the wrong thing here? One thing you might say is if it were possible for us to be divided into two different things, then how would you know that you weren't a man trapped in a woman's mind? And that could open up the discussion a little bit. Now you're making the point about maybe I'm using the wrong thing to evaluate what I actually am, but you're still opening up the conversation for it. If it were possible for us to be two different things in the same human person.

So that way you can move into that discussion afterwards because I think that's one thing. This is a point that Nancy Piersi makes in Love Thy Body that Christianity presents this idea of a whole human person, not a divided person, that our culture wants to divide human beings all over the place in all sorts of ways right now. And we are arguing that we are whole human beings.

If you are a man, then you are a man. If your mind thinks you're a woman, that's not because your mind's a woman. It's because you're mistaken as you explained so well earlier, Greg.

So I think with that slight little adjustment, I think this could be helpful. So that's a fabulous insight. I want to work with that a little bit because it gave me more thoughts.

I do like because I actually didn't respond explicitly to the question as you did, like what about saying this? I like that it's a question, first of all, and that's therefore it tosses the ball in the other person's court. I think the distinction that you made there is really important for the Christian who engages these conversations to keep in mind. It strikes me though that this still could be a springboard.

And it depends on how it's delivered. And this is a concern that I immediately thought of maybe this will sound smart, allocate if you said that to someone in a circumstance like this. And if you were careful how you said it and you said, "I think I understand what you mean," or you could ask them, "Tell me what you mean." And then they give their description.

They say, "Help me understand this. Why isn't it the case? Maybe there's a reason why you're not a man trapped in a woman's mind." Now, I agree with you that when it's put that way, that does at least at the moment acknowledge these two differences, all right? And really, it's a man's body and a man's mind that's confused, all right? But I'm just wondering if there may be a couple steps you could get to that. So if you just simply offered the challenge that way, what that is meant to do, at least at that level, is to challenge the subjectivism.

Why is it that the truth is in your mind and not in your body? And I think that's a fair question, okay? And that might be an opportunity for further dialogue. And then maybe another step would be to take it to the refined point that you did. Like maybe you have a man's body and a man's mind that's confused.

You know, because I think that is the circumstance. And I think that this concern that you expressed is really important one. But I don't, I'm just wondering how that conversation would go and maybe it would be better to get to that point after you cross, you cover the relativism, objectivism ground, because that's what's going on here.

Even if you think you're a woman and you're, you think you're, why is it what you think you believe in your mind, the truth of the matter as opposed to what your physical body has to say. And, and, and of course, and I've written about this in, in fact, I just read it yesterday because I'll read through my galley proofs for street smarts. You know, when you say you're a woman, you're a man, a woman and a man's body.

What is a woman? What is a woman? Now Matt Walsh is the one who made this question famous and it's magnificent because there is no answer to that apart from some kind of characterization of an individual human being who has the capable of reproducing and having children bearing the children, you know, other than that. So when you say you're, it's, I feel like a woman and a man's body, I feel like someone who has a uterus and a vagina and ovaries and capability, but I, I don't have those body parts. Well, that's, that's really, I think the only answer that makes any sense, but now that sounds so much more like Teddy Roosevelt kind of stuff.

And then you realize how confusing it is. And so when Walsh has asked that question on camera, you know, talking with people who did agree with him, then he gets no answer. They just balk and, well, I can't explain it.

It's a feeling, you know, but, but if you can't explain what it is, then how, what meaning does your, your statement, I feel like a woman how. So there's a lot that's going on here. And I think this is a very difficult issue to deal with with people.

It's so emotionally charged. And nobody's going to be on your side of the culture except for people like us who believe that God made them male and female. And so it's really going to be a pushback.

But I think this gives an opportunity for the discussion of the kinds of things that are really important. The first one, the relative, or relativism versus objectivism concern and the second one, the one user wrote in on Amy. You know, you're a man's body and you're a man's soul, but you're just confused, you know, because we are whole unified beings.

All right. Let's go on to a question from Billy. I just want your comment on the following meme I came across.

And this is what the meme says, Greg. God blessed me by making me transsexual for the same reason God made wheat, but not bread and fruit, but not wine so that humanity might share in the act of creation. All right.

I actually read this yesterday. Amy gave me a warning so I could think about it a little bit. We also covered it a little bit before the show and it is still as mystifying to me.

It was the very first time I heard it. First of all, God blessed. How does it start? God blessed me by making me transsexual.

Really? God made you transsexual? I hear this kind of statement a lot. God made me homosexual. Why would he want me to then to live out my impulses if he made me that way? Well, that presumes.

This is a complex question, right? It presumes God made you that way. It's kind of like are you still beating your wife? That presumably were beating your wife. This one presumes God made me that way.

Why would anybody think God made them that way? There certainly is no biblical evidence for that. In fact, quite the contrary. Male and female, he created them.

It's in the very beginning. It's the first chapter. By the way, in Matthew 19, this person is referring to God.

We're going to take them at face value. This is a religious argument is what this is. Let's address the religious argument.

Jesus, Matthew 19, when Act of Up to Wars. He starts his response regarding divorce with this line. Have you not read that in the beginning God made them male and female? Now, why does he start his response to the question about divorce with an acknowledgement that gender is binary in God's world? It's because the male and female fit together in a particular way to become one that shouldn't be torn apart.

This is how he reasons. But he starts there with binary gender. There is no reason any of us have to believe that God made people transgender.

That's the first problem. Then there's the rationale. Here's why God made us transgender so that we could turn our wheat into bread or we can take our grapes and make wine out of it.

Just participate, what's the last line? So, that humanity might share in the act of creation. I'm trying to find a way to say this. That's as kind as possible.

This is bizarre. When you think about it, it sounds like, "Oh, wow. How do I answer that?" This is really a strange thing to say.

Think of all the bizarre things that could be justified by such logic. God made me a double amputee. Wait, you have two arms.

I know, but he didn't make me that way. He made me double amputee so that I could have my arms cut off and participate in the creative process to be who he really wanted me to be in the first place. He expected me to do that.

Now, that seems like, "Oh, that's really bizarre." It is bizarre. And it's precisely consistent with the logic here. The problem is, as I've said many times in the past, you can't parody these things because when you offer them as a parody to show how bizarre it is, the parody becomes true.

People start doing it. And in fact, there are people who believe that they're amputees even though they have arms. There's a whole group of them.

There's websites for them. And they want doctors to cut their arms off because it will fit their internal image. The only thing that I haven't yet heard is that God, this kind of divine sanitizing of the desire, belief, or impulse that God made me an amputee.

You know, I can cooperate in fulfilling His creative purposes by having my arms cut off. By the way, this isn't such a far-fetched example because women who believe they're men, transsexual that direction, have breasts removed. Men who believe they're women have penises removed.

They have body parts removed to participate in the creative process. Again, this is one of those things that I think, why does this need to be answered? It is so bizarre on the face. But the reason it needs to be answered is that there are some people, the person who's saying this, who did the meme, takes us seriously.

So the first problem, of course, is the assumption that God made me this way. And the second problem is the assumption that somehow by carving up my body to be different from the way God made me, that I am participating in a creative process that God not just approves of, but God has purposed. This is what God wanted for me, but He's letting me do this.

Okay? It's interesting the illustration about bread and grapes or wine because in Psalm 104 verse 3 or 4, it says that one of the things that God did, it's somewhere in 104, is He gave us wine so that we'd be happy? Well, there, well, He didn't give us wine, He gave us grapes. We make the wine, then we'll be happy. So there is a place for creative work with things that God gave us, but that's things that kind of follow the niche.

There's a natural process, you cook food, you make bread, you make wine, but that's not the same as dismembering parts of your body that God gave you to be something entirely different. Okay? I have an alternative here. Okay? Yes, God wanted us to be part of the creative process.

Okay? God made women so they could be mothers and produce life, a child. God made fathers, and men with the sexual apparatus to participate and be a father and create a life. That's God's plan.

God's plan isn't self-mutilation that is somehow in a very strange way sanitized by this kind of reasoning. And just to add to that great foundation you just laid there, Greg, I think what this comes down to is a misunderstanding of what human beings are. God created human beings.

We are created male and female, as you explained, and that's something different than a kind of raw material. We're not a raw material. We are a particular kind of being.

And our goal is to become more the way that we were meant to be, not to make ourselves into something completely new. That's different than it would be for a raw material such as wheat or fruit. So we're less like wheat, like a simple substance that's meant to be used as an ingredient in other purposes, such as for bread.

And we're more like a watch. And the watch has the purpose of being able to tell time. And so the more it's like a watch, the more it's fulfilling what it was meant to be.

And if you take it apart and you use the parts for other purposes, it becomes less of what it was supposed to be, not more. So these are just two different types of things. The goal with the watch is to keep it running according to its intended purpose.

The goal of the grain is to use it as an ingredient for other purposes. It's not an end in itself, but human beings are ends in themselves. God created us whole beings and He has a purpose for us.

And we have a way that we flourish and we have a way that we're meant to be. That's great. I just thought of taking my, you know, my Rolex, which I don't own and tying it on my fishing line and putting a hook on and using it as a weight to take the bait to the bottom of the lake, I would do that really well.

I'll take it right down to the bottom. Yeah, destroys the Rolex, which I don't own. I mean, there's the point that would be a creative use of your Rolex.

So creative, you know, yes, Rolex designed this watch so that I could be involved in a creative process of using it as a sinker. So hopefully that helps people see the difference between being creative with our bodies and being creative with something that's a raw material that we're meant to be creative with. Well, Greg, we're way over time, but we didn't go quite as long as I was going to.

So thank you, Brian and Billy. We appreciate hearing from you. If you have a question, send it on Twitter with the hashtag #STRask or you can go through our website at str.org. This is Amy Hall and Greg Coco for Stand to Reason.

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