I first read the news on PJ Media. Sam Brinton publicly announced he was accepting an offer from the Biden administration to become the "Deputy Assistant Secretary of Spent Fuel and Waste Disposition in the Office of Nuclear Energy for the Department of Energy."
My first reaction? If that isn't a perfect indication of how bloated and excessive the needless corpulence of American government has become, I don't know what would be. Map this out to fully appreciate it. You take the Department of Energy, and split it into various offices including one for nuclear energy. Then you divide that up into various categories including one for spent fuel and waste disposition. You have a secretary over that category. They get multiple assistants. Those assistants have their own deputies. It's insane.
But that point was largely lost given the personal eccentricities of the nominee for this relatively insignificant post. Sam Brinton is a non-binary activist who recently spoke to the left-wing politics and culture site "Now This" about the importance of pronouns. He can explain it better than I can:
Since the video was posted and Brinton's nomination was made public, several have posted the appointee's colorful history with the LGBT/gender identity movement. If that sounds like an improper invasion of privacy, I can appreciate that. Though I will always contend that a man's private moral character does have a profound impact on the kind of citizen and employee he is, I appreciate the merit system. If Brinton has earned the job in the sight of his superiors, I'm not interested in canceling him.
But as it turns out, very little digging is needed to uncover some untoward realities about Brinton's conduct. As with so many in our culture today, desperately struggling to draw attention to themselves in order to fill a restless internal void, Brinton has made his sexual preferences, practices, and proclivities a matter of public record.
Brinton identifies himself on his LinkedIn page as "Solving the World's #NuclearWaste Challenges and Protecting LGBTQ Youth from #ConversionTherapy." He combines these two concerns in his drag queen persona, "Sister Ray Dee O'Active," in which guise he says: "I am the slutty one. And the nerdy one. #sexynerd." He has also combined his life's preoccupations in previous government work, according to the bio he provided to the "LGBTQ Religious Archives Network": "Sam has worn his stilettos to Congress to advise legislators about nuclear policy and to the White House where he advised President Obama and Michelle Obama on LGBT issues."
And there's more. Brinton has made public declarations about his interest in "puppy play" – that is, putting on a dog mask and finding sexual pleasure in behaving like an animal. Briton brags about being a "handler" and defies those who would condemn it.
Brinton also defends the concept against those strait-laced normies who might object to the whole idea: "One of the hardest things about being a handler is that I've honestly had people ask, ‘Wait, you have sex with animals?' They believe it's abusive, that it's taking advantage of someone who may not be acting up to a level of human responsibility … The other misperception is that I have some really messed up background, like, did I have some horrible childhood trauma that made me like to have sex with animals."
That Brinton is one of many deceived people futilely looking for fulfillment and a sense of belonging in sexual idolatry is actually of less cultural consequence than the growing number of well-intentioned individuals who feel decency and love require defending depravity.
What is consistently lost in this debate over society's sexual mores is that we all draw a line somewhere. This isn't an issue of one group breaking free from another group's judgmentalism. For instance, look at those who have defended Brinton's self-professed love for "kink furry sex."
Notice how Lethias and Preston both are noting moral distinctions and drawing moral boundaries for what is to be considered appropriate sexual conduct. Both of them are saying that sex with humans pretending to be animals is morally permissible, but sex with actual animals is not. This would seem to invite a question: "who says?"
Who gets to draw these moral boundaries, and why? Perhaps these individuals are correct that Brinton doesn't really have sex with animals, but there are others who do. If Lethias, Preston, or anyone else declares that to be immoral, how are they not exercising the very same kind of discriminating bigotry that they accuse the "right-wing" of perpetrating when it comes to other forms of sexual expression?
We can ask the same thing about polygamists, polyamorists, necrophiliacs, coprophiliacs, or any other number of sexually depraved activities. If you're going to declare any of it wrong, what is your standard and why is that standard binding on everyone else?
These are questions that a thoughtful people would pause their hysterical tantrums over bigotry and judgmentalism to ask.
