Another man in a women's space, visible to ladies and young girls.
"As the home of the Judgement Free Zone, Planet Fitness is committed to creating an inclusive environment," a spokesperson for the gym said in a statement.
The linguistic duplicity of the Cultural Left is wondrous to behold. If you like to laugh, that is.
How can you make a commitment to be non-judgmental without making a judgement of some kind? Surely the Planet Fitness tagline was originally intended to make "unfit" people "fit" in their gyms, in every sense of the word.
"Out of shape? No problem — come on in — no judgement!"
That's one kind of transformation. Apparently there are others, too.
The entire transgender movement is based on leveraging a technique of unexamined oscillation between supposed ambiguity ("I want to be on the Supreme Court but I can't say if someone is a man or a woman") and absolute determinacy ("if we mutilate this melancholic teen by chopping off their personal bits, then we can actually make them into something else and give them deep happiness").
We see this oscillation in the basic claims of the ideology: Genitalia does not determine maleness or femaleness, but also, removing the offending parts (and/or creating new ones surgically) can actually make you another gender. 🥴
What can one say in the face of this linguistic labyrinth?
On the one hand, the ambiguity puts those of us questioning the movement on our rhetorical heels. How can you argue with someone who believes in neither definitions nor biological reality?
On the other hand, the ethical accusations are designed to be a knockout blow: We are bigots if we reject the felt needs and perceived reality of a man who claims he is most himself in a cocktail dress and some really cute stiletto heels.
Traditionalists (people who believe that reality is real) usually don't want to be mean. And certainly not "X"-phobic!
Well, as for me, a dude in a sundress and bouffant wig is not very high up on the list of things that strike fear into my little heart.
In fact, challenging the nonsensical verbal oscillation is central to dismantling this kind of foolishness. Fear has nothing to do with it.
Let me give you the example I teased at the beginning: A Planet Fitness gym allowed a man to shave in the women's locker room because he "identifies as" a woman and assigned a staff member to "assist" him while in there. Planet Fitness told its female customers that they could use a stall if they were uncomfortable with the man in their space.
He won't be competing with women for shaving space, that's for sure — it is a quintessential male activity. My guess is, very few women will be standing at that mirror lathering up with a razor in hand. So why does Planet Fitness supply him with an employee as he sojourns in the lady's space? Is it for his protection? Or to protect others? Or to monitor zir behavior?
Is this employee meant to be a shaving assistant, perhaps standing by with a hot towel? And is that employee male or female?
- If female, why?
- If male, why?
Planet Fitness made a judgement to assign a person to shadow the transitioner, but not the actual biological women who are offended. It made a judgement to protect the man's feelings over the women's. Suggesting that the person with the uterus (sorry, the birthing pyrsyn) can use a stall if they are uncomfortable is prioritizing one type of offense over another.
Judgement is always the making of a distinction, a division of some kind.
And division is not necessarily bad. In fact, life with judgement — good judgement, wise judgement, grounded in reality — is a necessary condition for life itself.
- I shouldn't try to pet the lion.
- I shouldn't eat the rotten meat.
- I shouldn't try surfing at Nazare on my first day in the water.
In similar fashion, the idea that being offended, feeling discomfort, is somehow the card that trumps all others, and that people should be protected from it, is a judgement — and it is absolute intellectual quackery.
Opposition, resistance, pushback, and hard learning curves produce strength. There is no other way to do so.
- If your coach is your buddy, your team loses.
- If your USMC Drill Instructor is soft on you, you will die in your first firefight.
- If your flight instructor takes it easy on you, you will crash the plane.
- In med school, Biochemistry and Gross Anatomy weed out the weaklings, and in research PhD programs, Qualifying Exams do the same.
Discomfort — also known as low-level pain — is the necessary pre-condition for growing, getting better, getting stronger. It is also part of living fallen in a fallen world, and thus cannot be avoided anyway — no matter what dreamy fantasies we may entertain about the world in which we live.
Ironically, going along with the mental and spiritual illness that is known as transgenderism actually further weakens those who have already been psychologically mutilated by this perverse ideological system.
To acquiesce is to be complicit. There is no neutral position. The ideological drivers of the trans movement do not intend for you to think there is.
Classical Liberalism (which is not at all what modern Leftism is) long posited the conception of "neutrality" as the arbiter in the marketplace of ideas. People with differing views would present their positions, each one having a place at the table of discourse.
In the post-Enlightenment era, open discourse would winnow truth from error, reality from falsity. Truth would win out, based on universal principles of logical reasoning, tolerance, and thinking the best of those whom you might oppose.
This works reasonably well until a rogue, illiberal ideological structure realizes it can use the tools of the system to overthrow the system — to pound it into submission with rhetorical battering (otherwise known as screaming), manipulative threats (we will kill ourselves due to your bigotry!), or even violence.
Instead of aiming for a studied neutrality (which I don't actually believe is possible), the Cultural Left pretends liberal "neutrality" in order to force its agenda on naïve Classical Liberals (not to mention normie traditionalists). They claim to be driven by a kind of charity (we must accept X, or we'll be haters!) but it is a fake charity.
And, if you fall for it, a cascading sequence follows.
- Acceptance must always replace initial tolerance, and then acceptance is supplanted by enforced celebration.
- Before long, otherwise sane people signal their coolness by taking their toddlers to drag shows to watch overweight men twerk in tights.
The Cultural Left is not neutral, they are not disengaged, they are not ideologically unbound; they are not just aiming for charitable inclusivity and all the rest of their proclaimed happy meal package of Utopian Goodies. Their "no judgement" judgement is always according to their predetermined ideology — as all judgements always are. They are ideologically pure soldiers aiming to conquer and enslave.
And, because their basic position almost always precludes the possibility of natural biological reproduction, they must recruit. Ever notice they never want to read to the lonely crowds in the Old Folk's Homes? It is always for the children. They are bringing back the draft.
There is no "Judgement-Free Zone." There never was.
And now Judgement is really coming to a head, isn't it? What a moment of clarity we have here.
Which is why it is an awesome time to be a Christian.
