Identity

 I'm reading a story about the debate among those providing care for teenagers who identify as transgender. The number of teens identifying with a gender different from their biological sex has increased dramatically. The debate comes as people attempt to explain the jump. Is it simply that the greater visibility of trans people in entertainment and celebrity culture has made it easier for individuals with some sort of gender incongruence to embrace it? Or is there a social influence factor that leads some kids to claim transgender status as a way of belonging to a popular trend? Arguments against social influence sound similar to the arguments that have been made for decades about same-sex attraction and sexual preference. Who would willingly choose to belong to one of the most maligned marginalized communities? People don't choose to be transgender any more than they choose to be gay. Still, I do wonder. 

I was having a conversation about this with my teenage son, trying to explain how the writer J.K. Rowling got into such hot water and was threatened with cancellation because of comments she's made that have been characterized as anti-trans. My understanding of those arguments is that they sound reminiscent of those made about issues of culture. To be physiologically female is a unique experience. While not absolute, it comes with the promise of bearing and feeding a human life; something that is bodily impossible for someone born biologically male. So then, Rowling's argument seems to proceed, there is something appropriative about the trans women. My question along these lines is this: what is the difference between a man who wants to identify as a woman, and a white person who seeks to identify with a culture not their own?

And since this isn't an essay that has to follow the rules of writing, here is a related thought to the number of young people who at the very least wish to identify as non-binary. Perhaps, what they are reacting to is the sometimes rigid roles that are still assigned to the biological binary of male/female. Is it really that they don't identify with their biological sex, or could it be possible that they reject the social constructs available to them as male or female? All of which leads me to a matter of faith. When Paul says that in Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male and female, could it be that to belong to Christ is to find our identity as beloved outside of whatever social construct would imprison us and keep us from living fully as human beings made in the image and likeness of God? Could it be that the most important thing about any of us is an identity that comes in the waters of baptism, an identity that supersedes all else?  I wonder.