Gender Ideology in the News

The “Women’s” NBA seems to be twisting itself around rather than simply defining what a woman is, and as a result, gender ideology has made headlines once again.

There’s a linguistic issue at play here. When people say “gender,” they often mean “sex,” which leads to a lot of confusion. Jay Richards has pointed out that gender ideology posits that the traditional sex binary can’t fully capture human identity, suggesting that individuals can have a “gender identity” that doesn’t align with their biological sex.

This perspective sheds light on why discussions about basic biological differences can lead to intense backlash, including even death threats, particularly in the context of women’s sports and spaces that are separated by sex.

One explanation could be that the debate transcends biology. It also taps into a long-standing revolutionary tradition that views established institutions and categories as tools for oppression. This resonates with the saying: “The issue is never the issue. The issue is always the revolution.”

If we trace back to Marx and Engels, in “The Communist Manifesto,” they advocated for a radical break from conventional relations and ideas, taking aim at private property, religion, and the traditional family structure. Paul Kengor has noted that later leftist movements continued this critique of marriage and family norms.

However, the pathway from Marx to modern gender theory isn’t straightforward. Antonio Gramsci expanded upon Marxist ideas by emphasizing culture, institutions, and “hegemony” as fundamental sources of social influence. What many refer to as cultural Marxism arose from this shift in focus.

Herbert Marcuse similarly sought new groups, beyond the industrial working class, as catalysts for radical change. Rudi Dutschke introduced the “long march through the institutions” concept, and Mike Gonzalez has highlighted the Gramscian strategy of a prolonged “war of position” advocating for cultural change prior to achieving political success.

Critical theory took these discussions further. Thinkers from the Frankfurt School, such as Marcuse and Max Horkheimer, analyzed capitalism, authority, culture, and repression through a Marxist-Freudian lens. Others in that school of thought studied how social structures—including family and sexuality—could serve as mechanisms of oppression.

Meanwhile, postmodernists like Michel Foucault and Jacques Derrida, though from different intellectual backgrounds, merged with critical theory on one critical point: a skepticism towards claims of neutral, universal truths. Within this context, some theorists have dismissed the concept of truth itself as inextricably tied to power dynamics.

Bishop Robert Barron has remarked in a related discussion that “There is no final truth, no ultimate settling of a question. There is always something new.” When inherited categories are seen primarily as products of power, even seemingly fundamental questions, like “What is a woman?” can be subjected to endless reexamination.

Judith Butler’s influential 1990 work “Gender Trouble” brought these dialogues directly into gender theory, positing that gender is performative and challenging the stability of the distinctions between sex and gender as well as traditional gender roles.

This perspective doesn’t imply that every advocate for transgender rights subscribes to Marxist ideas, nor does it suggest that contemporary gender theory can be distilled to one ideological source. Yet, it does clarify why much of the associated rhetoric feels more revolutionary than simply therapeutic.

When instances of transgender discrimination are labeled as the “civil rights issue of our time,” it situates gender identity within a recognizable oppressor-oppressed narrative framework. Christopher Rufo has pointed out that some trans activists openly describe their movement as a continuation of Marxism, positioning transgender individuals as a new vanguard of revolution.

This connection seems more defensible. Gender ideology wasn’t merely spawned from “The Communist Manifesto.” It evolved amidst intellectual traditions that increasingly interpreted social categories through the lenses of power dynamics, oppression, emancipation, and the dismantling of traditional norms.

The politics surrounding gender further underscores this notion. Gender issues often appear among the platforms that contemporary leftist movements utilize in their broader critique of capitalism and Western civilization. Jonathan Butcher has observed how intersectionality explicitly links “identity movements based on gender and racial liberation” through a shared framework of social oppression.

From Black Lives Matter co-founder Patrisse Cullors identifying as a “trained Marxist” to the diverse coalition represented by groups like Queers for Palestine, the movements unite around causes that, while seemingly disparate, share a common political ethos centered on liberation and challenge to oppression.

Ultimately, the crux of the matter often seems to transcend the literal issues at stake. Increasingly, it’s about the revolution itself.