FURTHER evidence has emerged of the creep of ‘queer theory’ through our public institutions. ‘Queer Theory’ is not something I hoped in my life to become conversant with. But it seems we must familiarise ourselves with it if we want to save ourselves and our children from it.
So, a brief summary of this subversive and revolutionary theory that once would have been confined to the Leftist recesses of academia.
The general notion is based on the 1960s neo-Marxist idea that our ideas around sexual acts and sexual identities are ‘socially constructed’. None of our attributes, preferences, activities, is innate. They are social constructs – and up for challenge. This does not just refer to things many of us would agree are at least partly cultural. Even the binary nature of biological sex is apparently a social construct. If that is how far you are prepared to go in challenging norms and knowledge, pretty much everything is up for grabs.
The unique focus of ‘queer theory’ is the personal and the private. Anything which most people might deem ‘normal’ or perhaps ‘moral’ is challengeable as a regressive social construct. Anything which most people might deem ‘immoral’, perhaps just a ‘minority preference’, or perhaps even ‘your own business in your own bedroom’ must be brought out into the light of day. It is particularly important for ‘transgression’ to be placed in front of our noses. You get the drift.
The prevalence (and seeming acceptance by the establishment) of queer theory helps to explain why people push explicit sexual materials into schools. It explains why the BBC chooses to run an article cheerfully chatting about masturbation. All must be taken out of the private sphere and paraded publicly.
Queer theory explains why part of our NHS chooses to promote an article from the American online magazine Teen Vogue which is cavalier about sexual activity amongst teens, trivialises the ‘loss of virginity’, and normalises practices such as anal sex. What I am specifically referring to is something that can be found online called the ‘Open Clinic NHS’. This is the ‘Sexual Health Team’ that forms part of the ‘Midlands Partnership NHS Foundation Trust’. Last week it put out a tweet that referred to women as ‘people with vaginas’. Yes, Our NHS does not want to refer to ‘women’ because a tiny number of women and trans advocates reject the term. The NHS doesn’t want to offend that tiny number. But for some reason it is okay to insult the vast majority.
Even more concerning is the fact that this part of the NHS finds it appropriate to share material from Teen Vogue. This magazine is notoriously at the forefront of pushing transgressive materials at young people. The shared article is no exception. Cheerfully it talks about ‘popping the cherry’ – or losing one’s virginity. Teen Vogue tells us that ‘virginity is a social construct rather than a medical condition’.
What utter and dangerous stupidity. It is typical of queer theory that anything that cannot be precisely defined (which is just about everything) has instead to be torn apart, entirely rejected.
Teen Vogue tells teenagers: ‘It should also be said that having sex doesn’t change anything about you; it doesn’t add or take away value, just as not having sex doesn’t.’
I can only say again, what cavalier and damaging stupidity. What a degradation of the importance of an extraordinarily intimate act which touches our souls and goes to the heart of our human experience.
Someone called Eisler (a ‘health and sex educator’) tells teens: ‘I’m really clear with folks, that when we say sex, we mean oral, anal, or vaginal sex.’
What’s going on here is the normalisation and encouragement of anal sex amongst teenagers. Why? There seems to be a desire to degrade. How do young women feel when they have ‘trendily’ engaged in anal sex because apparently it is the new normal? I hate to think. Even the questionable TV drama Fleabag told us it was not good. Why are Teen Vogue – and Our NHS – so certain that teenagers will feel great and liberated? Many more, I suspect, will feel defiled.
We have to ask who benefits from this degradation? My feeling is that young women do want to take their virginity seriously and that their psychological wellbeing is at stake if they are encouraged not to do so. They do want to take their sexual relationships seriously and should be encouraged to be cautious. I suspect many will come to feel degraded if they have sex in too many different ways, with too many different partners. Even abused. Looking back, our young women will remember when and where and with whom they lost their virginity. They will not regard it as a ‘social construct’ and many may regard it with regret.
It is hard to understand why anyone would want to push transgression and degradation. James Lindsay tried to tackle the matter in this interesting Twitter thread.
It seems to be part of a movement to tear everything down, and to play an active part in that tearing down.
Promoters of queer theory feel important – they’re the visionaries building the bonfire and throwing all our vanities and our veils on to it. But younger people still finding their way in life, and under pressure from queer theory, need protection. They need to be encouraged to look more closely at the outcomes of this tearing down and tearing apart.
Oscar Wilde said: ‘We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.’ My feeling is that queer theory pulls us all towards the gutter. It is diminishing rather than dignifying. It tears away at those things we wrap around our naked humanity, the very things that enable us to see the stars.
