The world has witnessed what British Prime Minister Theresa May is calling “a sick and depraved terrorist attack.” CNN reports this morning that authorities have now arrested seven people in connection with the deadliest terror attack in central London in twelve years.

Just before 2:45 PM GMT yesterday, while the House of Commons was debating a proposal regarding Scottish independence, a silver Hyundai 4×4 veered from the roadway of Westminster Bridge. The narrow sidewalk where the Thames flows under the “Big Ben” clock tower was crowded with tourists and office workers. The terrorist drove into the crowd; witnesses reported that the impact threw two bodies into the Thames.

The driver then smashed into the iron railings near the base of the clock tower and got out of the vehicle carrying a large knife. He repeatedly stabbed police officer Keith Palmer, killing him. An armed policeman then shot and killed the attacker.

A woman from Spain and a man in his mid-fifties were killed. Twenty-nine people were hospitalized; seven are in critical condition. Among the injured was a group of French schoolchildren.

The attack came on the one-year anniversary of the Brussels bombings that killed thirty-two people. Police say they know the assailant but have not released information about him as of this morning. They believe, however, that he was “inspired by international terrorism.”

We can now add London to the recent list of vehicular attacks, along with Nice, France; Berlin, Germany; Ohio State University; and Jerusalem. ISIS and al Qaeda have called on their followers to use trucks and weapons to “mow down the enemies of Allah.”

Why do jihadists see tourists on a London sidewalk as their enemies?
Continue reading Denison Forum – Seven arrested in London terrorist attack →

Today’s headlines are dominated by Judge Neil Gorsuch’s nomination hearings and the ongoing debate over health care. Meanwhile, an unusual high school wrestler interests me so much that I’d like to focus on his story this morning.

“He’s been very vocal about his goals: wrestling in a national championship, becoming an NCAA champ, not just a state champ.” That’s how Kobey Pritchard’s wrestling coach describes his protégé’s motivation in the Iowa state wrestling tournament. What makes Pritchard different from his competitors? He wrestles without a left leg.

Kobey was five years old when he was diagnosed with Ewing’s sarcoma in his left femur. Doctors removed the leg when he was six. Now he’s ranked number four in the state in his weight class. His drive and determination are inspiring his teammates and his fellow competitors.

In other news, Norway has taken over the top spot in the World Happiness Report. This despite the fact that oil, a key part of its economy, has plummeted. What accounts for Norway’s happiness? The report’s lead author explains: “It’s the human things that matter. If the riches make it harder to have frequent and trustworthy relationship between people, is it worth it? The material can stand in the way of the human.”

Martin E. P. Seligman is a psychology professor at the University of Pennsylvania and author of the bestseller, Authentic Happiness. Dr. Seligman describes three kinds of “work orientation”: a job, a career, and a calling.

A job earns you a paycheck and nothing more. A career entails a deeper personal investment in your work. But a calling is a passionate commitment to work for its own sake. According to Dr. Seligman, finding your “calling” is the key to authentic happiness.

Continue reading Denison Forum – One-legged wrestler seeks state title →

Judge Neil Gorsuch began his confirmation hearings yesterday as he and the Senate Judiciary Committee members made their opening statements. The committee will begin questioning the nominee today.

Whether Judge Gorsuch deserves to be confirmed is not the question for Republicans and many Democrats. As I noted when President Trump nominated him, he seems imminently qualified to sit on the Supreme Court. The larger question has little to do with the judge and everything to do with the state of our culture.

Many Democrats are still furious that Republicans refused to act on President Obama’s earlier nominee; in their view, this was a seat their party should have filled. Others are mindful that Judge Gorsuch would replace Antonin Scalia, preserving the present ideological balance of the Court. Since three of the current justices are in their eighties, Democrats may wait to contest future Trump nominations. And several Democratic senators serve states that voted for Mr. Trump in the election; their political futures may be in jeopardy if they oppose Judge Gorsuch.

Meanwhile, Senate Republicans need eight Democrats to side with their fifty-two-seat majority to reach the sixty-vote threshold required to confirm the nominee. If not enough Democrats support Judge Gorsuch, or if the Democrats threaten to filibuster the proceedings, the Republicans can waive the sixty-vote minimum and confirm the nominee by a simple majority. But this so-called “nuclear option” could damage any hopes of bipartisan cooperation on other issues.

In thinking about the partisan divisiveness on display this week, I was drawn to the prescient observations of John Adams, our second president. He wrote in 1789, “There is nothing which I dread so much as a division of the republic into two great parties, each arranged under its leader, and concerting measures in opposition to each other. This, in my humble apprehension, is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our Constitution.”

The fact that we have a “democracy” (“power of the people”) does not exempt us from political dysfunction. Mr. Adams: “It is vain to say that democracy is less vain, less proud, less selfish, less ambitious, or less avaricious than aristocracy or monarchy. . . . Those passions are the same in all men, under all forms of simple government, and when unchecked, produce the same effects of fraud, violence, and cruelty.”

What is the solution?

Continue reading Denison Forum – John Adams on Neil Gorsuch hearings →

A hamburger has sold for $10,000 in Dubai. According to CNN, “The giant burger contained seven beef patties—one for each of the emirates in the United Arab Emirates—aged cheddar cheese and veal bacon strips in a saffron brioche bun.” But its contents don’t explain its price. It was sold at an auction; its preparer explains that “all proceeds will go to breast cancer awareness and free detection at an earlier stage.”

When we know why people spend their money as they do, we learn something significant about their values and their culture.

Consider popular movies. I go to a lot of films because I believe that successful movies are a window into the soul of our society. We see movies because we want to. Going to the theater is not like going to work or even going to church, activities that are required or can become habitual. When we examine why a movie is popular, we learn something about our culture.

The last two movies I’ve seen are The Shack and Beauty and the Beast. Both have been enormously successful. According to a Forbes reviewer, The Shack “got off to a pretty terrific start” when it opened earlier in the month; so far, the movie has made more than $43 million worldwide. And Beauty and the Beast has passed Batman v Superman as the highest debut for a March movie in history.

Both have been in the news for nontheatrical reasons: The Shack because of its portrayal of God as a woman and other nontraditional theological elements, and Beauty and the Beast because it includes a gay character (actually two, if you count the dance scene at the end). My purpose this morning is not to review either film. Rather, it is to see what their popularity tells us about ourselves.

Continue reading Denison Forum – What a $10,000 hamburger and ‘The Shack’ tell us →

“Somewhere along the line, Disney went off course. No longer did it see itself as a defender of children’s innocence. Instead, it saw itself as a conduit to social change. Walt Disney became Harvey Milk.”

This is how a gay attorney views Disney’s decision to include a gay scene in Beauty and the Beast. In an Orlando Sentinel op-ed, Joseph R. Murray II calls himself “a proud member of the LGBT community.” But he disagrees with Disney’s decision to promote LGBT issues with children.

Murray’s assessment is insightful: “The vision for Walt’s world was clear: Entertain children. Disney characters were about hope, optimism, and above all else, making sure children were able to enjoy their innocence for as long as the outside world would permit.” Now Disney is promoting the “outside world” in unprecedented ways.

Why has the company departed from its founder’s vision? I would hazard two guesses. One: Some at Disney believe that LGBT youth need reaffirmation. But Murray responds: “I was gay and grew up without gay Disney and made it just fine.” Two: Disney executives view LGBT rights as civil rights and believe they should be taught to all of society, children included.

For those who liken LGBT rights to the civil rights movement of the 1960s, the logic is simple. When America legally abolished racial discrimination, we wanted to spread the message of racial inclusion across our culture, beginning with our children. Now LGBT advocates want to do the same, beginning with our children. And Disney is apparently a willing colleague in this strategy of normalizing homosexuality.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Gay lawyer criticizes Disney for gay scene →

“It’s time to build new religions around what we really believe in, technology.” So states the founder of the Hack Temple, a building that was a 104-year-old church in San Francisco.

The cathedral, built in 1912, served as a place of worship for nearly eighty years. It then became an English school for Chinese-speaking children. Last November, Pavel Cherkashin, a former Adobe and Microsoft executive, spent $7 million to buy it. He is now renovating it into an event center for technology innovators.

Hack Temple hosted its first TEDx event last month. It held a dance party earlier this month. It provides communal workspaces for meetings with mentors or small groups. The organ now displays a neon sign that reads, “hello world.”

Cherkashin is right: technology qualifies as a religion for millions of people around the world. The Oxford English Dictionary includes in its definition of “religion” these descriptions:

•    “The condition of belonging to a religious order.”
•    “A particular religious order or denomination.”
•    “People devoted to a religious life.”
•    “A system defining a code of living, esp. as a means of achieving spiritual or material improvement.”

Substitute “technological” for “religious” in these phrases and you describe many of the people you know. They belong to a “technological order,” a subset of society that focuses especially on technology and innovation. They subscribe to a “particular technological order” such as Apple or Android devices and preferred social media platforms.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Church makes technology its religion →

It sounds like the start of a bad sitcom: a Democrat and a Republican rent a car and spend twenty-four hours driving through a snowstorm to Washington. Except it really happened.

Democrat Beto O’Rourke and Republican Will Hurd, both US congressmen from Texas, couldn’t fly back to the capital for today’s votes because the winter storm gripping the Northeast canceled their flights. So they decided yesterday morning to rent a car and spend the next day roadtripping to DC.

The two livestreamed what they called the “Bipartisan Roadtrip.” They took questions along the way. Their trip garnered national attention, not least because it’s the first time in recent memory that a Democrat and a Republican cooperated on anything.

The political divide in our country seems to be growing. Of America’s 3,113 counties (or county equivalents), only 303 were decided by single-digit percentage points in the last presidential election. By contrast, 1,096 counties were that close in the 1992 election. During the same period, the number of “landslide” counties (votes decided by margins exceeding 50 percentage points) exploded from 93 to 1,196.

Now there’s division even within the parties. According to The Hill, twelve House Republicans are opposed to the Republican plan to repeal and replace ObamaCare. Assuming all Democrats vote against the plan, if nine more Republicans reject the legislation it will not pass the House, much less the Senate.

We should not be surprised by such divisiveness. The Pew Research Center reports that in 1994, only 16 percent of Democrats and 17 percent of Republicans viewed the other party as a “threat to the nation’s well-being.” In the years since, this percentage has more than doubled for Democrats and nearly tripled for Republicans. Meanwhile, the number of Americans who express consistently conservative or liberal opinions has doubled over the past two decades.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Texas congressmen driving to DC go viral →

While the East Coast braces for what USA Today calls a “historic storm,” an op-ed in this morning’s New York Times warns that our nuclear weapons are vulnerable to cyberwarfare. Meanwhile, The Wall Street Journal reports that synagogues across America are ramping up security in the face of continued bomb threats.

Some sins are so public that they generate headlines. Others, less so.

I was walking in our neighborhood early yesterday morning and watched a driver pull up to a four-way stop sign, slow down slightly to see that there were no other cars or people in the way, then speed through the intersection. For the rest of my walk, I considered the theological implications of what I had just witnessed.

Here’s why: my neighbor’s decision represents precisely the kind of temptation that most plagues people who read an article such as this one.

We know that public sin dishonors God, ruins our witness, and harms everyone it affects. My neighbor would no doubt have come to a legal stop if there had been other drivers or people in the intersection.

But private sins known to no one but God, choices for which we cannot see significant negative consequences, are another matter. Judgmental thoughts not verbalized, greed or lust or jealousy or anger not acted upon—these are temptations we think we can indulge. Only God knows, and we can confess them to him and be forgiven without cost. Or so we think.

Continue reading Denison Forum – A ‘historic storm’ and the state of our souls →

Are you feeling less productive this morning? A little more stressed? You might blame March Madness, the annual college basketball tournament whose participants were announced yesterday. (Villanova, last year’s champion, is this year’s top seed.) Americans will waste at least 84.8 million hours of work fixating on the games, costing us $2.2 billion in lost productivity.

Or you could turn to a medical explanation. The hour’s sleep we lost Saturday night because of Daylight Savings Time has been linked to reduced worker productivity and an increase in heart attacks, strokes, and car accidents.

From the mundane to the esoteric: perhaps the problem is tiny visitors from outer space. Micrometeorites barely the width of a human hair rain down on our planet continuously, covering our planet with ten tons of cosmic dust every day. According to one scientist, “We inhale this stuff. We eat it every time we eat lettuce.” That’s a stressful thought.

Or maybe the problem is that aliens are bombarding us with fast radio bursts (FRBs). These strange radio waves have perplexed scientists since they were discovered ten years ago. Now a Harvard professor is suggesting that they might be leakage from planet-sized transmitters that are powering interstellar probes in distant galaxies. Whatever is generating the FRBs is powerful enough to push around something weighing a million tons, twenty times heavier than the biggest cruise ships ever built.

Continue reading Denison Forum – March Madness and the anxiety of our age →

This Time magazine headline caught my eye: “How Descendants of a Slave and a Supreme Court Justice Righted a 160-Year-Old Wrong.” Here’s the story.

Dred Scott was born into slavery in 1795. His owner, Peter Blow, took him to Alabama and then to St. Louis. After Blow’s death, Scott was sold to army surgeon John Emerson. Emerson took Scott to Illinois and later to the Wisconsin territory, both of which were “free” (regions that prohibited slavery). While in Wisconsin, Scott met and married another slave, Harriet Robinson. Emerson eventually moved to St. Louis, where Scott and his wife joined them. After Emerson died, his widow’s brother, John Sanford, claimed ownership of the Scotts.

Scott sued Sanford for his freedom, claiming that since he had been transported to a “free” state and territory, he should no longer be considered a slave. Thus originated the Dred Scott v. Sanford case that became one of the most infamous Supreme Court decisions of all time.

Roger B. Taney was the US Supreme Court chief justice who authored the Dred Scott decision. On March 6, 1857, he ruled that Congress could not regulate slavery and that blacks could not be considered US citizens. This ruling galvanized the abolition movement and spurred Abraham Lincoln to speak out against slavery. The eventual result was Lincoln’s election as president and the ensuing Civil War.

This week, a great-great-great nephew of Justice Taney met with the great-great granddaughter of Mr. Scott. Charles Taney III stood in front of a crowd outside the Maryland State House and apologized to Lynne Jackson. She leads the Dred Scott Heritage Foundation, a nonprofit that seeks to educate the public about the Supreme Court case.

Taney said, “Apologizing to the Scotts for the Dred Scott decision is like bringing a Band-Aid to an amputation. It’s right and necessary to apologize, but what’s important now is what actions we can all take.” He’s right. Racial discrimination is not just illegal, it’s sinful.

Continue reading Denison Forum – How 2 families righted a 160-year-old wrong →

Meet Vinny Ohh. This twenty-two-year-old California make-up artist believes that he is neither male nor female. He has had over 110 medical procedures to transition into a “genderless” extraterrestrial. Among them: twelve cheek fillers, two brow fillers, fifteen lip fillers, five Botox sessions, five nose procedures, and twenty cryo facial freezings.

He is set to appear on The Plastics of Hollywood, a television show that will house real-life plastic surgery addicts together. The show’s producer says, “In 15 years, hundreds of people will want to look like him. We’re in an era where there’s people who want to look like lizards, those who implant horns into their skulls and people with full-face tattoos . . . We want to be the first agency who will treat these human dolls, alien dolls and cartoons as a normal part of the society that we’re living in now.”

When there’s no such thing as “normal,” the term applies to everyone.

In his dissent after the Supreme Court legalized gay marriage, Chief Justice John Roberts noted: “It is striking how much of the majority’s reasoning would apply with equal force to the claim of a fundamental right to plural marriage.” In other words, the decision to redefine marriage need not end with same-sex marriage. Polygamists are already hard at work using the ruling to advance their agenda. Once the moral train leaves the station, it’s difficult to say where it will stop.

In We Cannot Be Silent, Albert Mohler asserts that “we are facing nothing less than a comprehensive redefinition of life, love, liberty, and the very meaning of right and wrong.” He cites British theologian Theo Hobson, who argues that the moral revolution of our day is unprecedented in Christian history. Hobson notes two factors behind the challenges we face.

First, the “new morality” is either-or. Either churches will affirm the legitimacy of same-sex marriage and other unbiblical behavior or they will not. There is no middle ground.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Meet a ‘genderless’ extraterrestrial →

According to this morning’s Washington Post, some women will refuse to smile today. Some schools will be closed in Washington, DC, and Alexandria, Virginia. Some restaurants are shrinking their menus as women go on strike. Rallies will be held around the country.

Today has been designated “A Day Without a Woman.” Organizers are encouraging women to take the day off work, shop exclusively at “small, women- and minority-owned businesses,” and wear red “in solidarity.” The emphasis is timed to coincide with International Women’s Day.

The day is meant to recognize “the enormous value that women of all backgrounds add to our socioeconomic system—while receiving lower wages and experiencing greater inequities, vulnerability to discrimination, sexual harassment and job insecurity.” It is organized by the same people who created the Women’s March on Washington last January in support of abortion and other women’s “rights.”

While I disagree with the organizers on a host of moral issues, I agree with them that the value of women in our culture cannot be overstated.

If women stopped working, 53 percent of the American workforce would disappear. More than three-quarters of our public school teachers would not be in the classroom. Eighty-five percent of our nation’s obstetricians, 75 percent of our pediatricians, 57 percent of our psychiatrists, and 58 percent of our family doctors would no longer see patients. Thirty-six million volunteers would no longer volunteer.

Continue reading Denison Forum – My response to ‘A Day Without a Woman’ →

“Obamacare has failed the American people. Over the past seven years, we’ve seen premiums skyrocket, choices dwindle, and government take more control over our health care. Left unchecked, the damage wrought by Obamacare would continue to spin out of control.”

With these words, House Speaker Paul Ryan has introduced the American Health Care Act, the long-awaited bill to repeal and replace Obamacare. According to the Speaker and other media sources, here is what the measure contains:

•  The bill maintains coverage for people with preexisting conditions.
  •    It allows children to stay on their parents’ insurance plans until the age of twenty-six. It also requires all insurers to offer ten essential benefits, including maternity care and preventive services. And it bars insurers from setting a limit on how much they must pay to cover a person.
  •    The “Patient and State Stability Fund” allows states to allocate resources in ways that will best care for their most vulnerable populations.
  •    The bill enhances Health Savings Accounts, creating choice and competition among insurers.
  •    The measure continues Medicaid expansion for low-income Americans until 2020, then provides an advanceable, refundable tax credit to create an open market for insurance coverage. The credit is capped to prevent wealthier Americans from claiming it.
  •    The bill repeals fines on people who don’t carry insurance. However, it levies a 30 percent penalty for lapses in coverage.
  •    A provision bars Planned Parenthood from receiving federal funds. President Trump reportedly offered to preserve Planned Parenthood’s funding if the organization would promise to stop providing abortions. The organization quickly rejected the president’s offer.
  •    Analysts have not yet had time to assess how the bill would affect federal spending or the number of people covered by insurance.

House committees plan to begin voting on the 123-page legislation this morning, launching “what could be the year’s defining battle in Congress,” according to the Associated Press. The bill’s passage in the House is not assured, and opposition is mounting in the Senate because of concerns that poor people could lose insurance.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Republicans release ‘American Health Care Act’ →

So headlines a New York Times column that has gone viral. Amy Krouse Rosenthal is dying of ovarian cancer. She has been married to “the most extraordinary man for 26 years” and planned on at least another twenty-six with him. Instead, she wrote a deeply moving essay about her husband in hopes that “the right person reads this, finds Jason, and another love story begins.”

Reading her tribute, I wanted to be as caring as Jason. If I were a wife, I would want to be as courageous as Amy.

We need more models of courageous caring today. What does it say about us that Logan, the bloody final installment in the “Wolverine” series, topped the weekend box office? Or that nudity at a Paris fashion show is making headlines? Or that Facebook is testing artificial intelligence tools as it tries to help curb the suicide epidemic?

In days like these, our culture can use the best models we can find. But the answer to our challenges isn’t so simple.

Stanford professor Albert Bandura is widely considered America’s greatest living psychologist. The recipient of sixteen honorary degrees, he is best known for pioneering “social cognitive theory.” In essence, Bandura believes that students learn by observing models and replicating their behavior. If imitation enables students to accomplish their goals, such success encourages them to perform similar behaviors. Over time, the successful student becomes a model for others and the process multiplies.

Prof. Bandura would agree that Amy Krouse Rosenthal’s article has been popular in large part because it inspires us to follow the example she and her husband have set. Imitating success is a popular self-improvement method in our secular culture. But I’m convinced that it’s not enough to take us where we need to go, for three reasons.

First, if we merely imitate our models without truly understanding their behavior, we will struggle to apply their example to different circumstances. What works in starting a church may not work in leading an established congregation. Unique challenges sometimes call for unique approaches. Continue reading Denison Forum – ‘You May Want to Marry My Husband’ →

Carryn Weigand Owens is being called America’s “moral compass.” Anyone who saw President Trump’s tribute Monday night to Ryan Owens, her fallen Navy SEAL husband, will never forget it. The president was right: her husband’s sacrifice is “etched into eternity.” And her courage in responding to his tragic death is an example for us all.

We should not be surprised.

Carryn Weigand was co-captain of the University of Virginia Cavaliers women’s soccer team and one of its best players. After earning a BA and Master’s degree, she chose to serve her country as an intelligence officer around the time of the 9/11 attacks. Then she met and married Ryan, a Navy SEAL Team 6 member. The couple had four children together. After twelve deployments, he was killed on January 28 during a mission in Yemen. Carryn buried him in Arlington National Cemetery just six days before the president’s speech to Congress.

This Sunday would have been Ryan’s thirty-seventh birthday. The next day would have been their thirteenth wedding anniversary. Carryn’s courage in the midst of her grief is an example for us all. And proof that character transcends politics.

Or at least it should.

A former Hillary Clinton campaign volunteer responded to Carryn’s appearance Monday night and the extended ovation she received by tweeting a horribly derogatory statement. The good news is that he was immediately fired by his employer after a firestorm of criticism. A Salon columnist later called the president’s recognition of Owens’s sacrifice a “disgrace”; a Washington Post writer called it “contemptibly cynical.”

Continue reading Denison Forum – Navy SEAL widow inspires the nation →

An interview with Oprah Winfrey aired yesterday in which she signaled she may be open to running for president. She now joins a list of celebrities such as Kanye West, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, and Tim McGraw who have speculated publicly about running for office. If they do, they can expect a level of public scrutiny they’ve never experienced before. The higher the mountain, the harder it is to climb.

The same principle holds for Christians. If you serve Jesus, you can expect opposition from everyone who is opposed to your Lord (John 15:18).

It’s no surprise that religious persecution in China is intensifying as the government seeks to curb the rapid growth of Christianity in the formally atheistic country. Catholic nuns in the Democratic Republic of Congo are coming under increasing attacks from vandals who are destroying convents and churches. As Christianity spreads rapidly across Africa, such oppression will likely intensify.

Believers in America seldom face life-threatening persecution. However, we are watching the culture slide away from biblical morality with increasing speed. For instance, the latest version of Beauty and the Beast has a gay scene between LeFou and Gaston. Disney just aired its first-ever gay cartoon kiss. Creators of Moana say they wouldn’t rule out an LGBT Disney princess in the future.

Moral relativism has untethered our culture from objective truth and Judeo-Christian morality. As a result, we have witnessed seismic shifts on life’s most essential issues, from abortion to same-sex marriage to euthanasia. How should Christians respond?

One: Know why we believe what we believe.

Our faith is more than an opinion we hope others will tolerate. It is founded on empirical, historical facts: the Bible is truth and Jesus rose from the dead. Don’t believe the deception that your faith is just one “truth” among many. It is grounded in a reality that the entire universe will one day acknowledge (Philippians 2:9–11).

Two: Know why others believe what they believe. Continue reading Denison Forum – Will Oprah run for president? →

I thought Donald Trump’s address last night to a joint session of Congress was the most effective speech he’s ever given. His words and tone were presidential, and his passion for our country was obvious. Seventy percent of viewers said the speech made them more optimistic about the direction of the country. I heard one television commentator say afterwards, “He may have been inaugurated on January 20, but he became president tonight.”

However, the partisan divide that challenges our future is on clear display this morning.

The Huffington Post sarcastically headlines, “Speaker’s Pet,” with a picture of the president shaking hands with Speaker of the House Paul Ryan. The Los Angeles Times complains, “Trump speech: Promise the world, leave out the details.” The Washington Post is skeptical: “A tale of two speeches: The contradictions of Donald Trump’s Presidency.” On the other side of the aisle, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich was “Blown Away” by the president’s “Unifying” speech to Congress.

Why are our political divisions so entrenched? According to scientists, our brains are to blame.

University of Southern California cognitive neuroscientist Jonas Kaplan has been studying how our brains react when our political beliefs are challenged. Kaplan and his colleagues performed functional MRI scans on the brains of forty participants, all of whom held strong political views. They monitored brain activity as their team presented counterarguments and tried to sway the subjects’ political positions.

According to the MRI scans, the areas of the brain that were triggered control deep, emotional thoughts about the subjects’ personal identity. When these parts of the brain were stimulated, the subjects felt challenged and became defensive, shutting down any willingness to accept counterarguments.

Such divisiveness is truly dangerous, for it threatens our nation’s future. In a two-party system, compromise and consensus are essential to progress. When one-half of Congress stands to applaud the president while the other half sits in stony silence, the government gridlocks and America suffers.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Brain science and Trump’s speech to Congress →

Should transgender people be able to use the bathroom and shower facility that corresponds to their gender identity? This was the position of the Obama administration when it issued an edict last May requiring public schools to permit this choice. The administration threatened to withhold federal funding for schools that did not comply. A federal judge then put a hold on the president’s order.

To those who claim that this decision should be left to the states and to local school districts, supporters of the Obama mandate counter that civil rights take precedence over states’ rights. For instance, in Virginia v. Loving, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that Virginia’s statute forbidding interracial marriage was unconstitutional. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 likewise outlawed racial segregation in schools, even though such policies had been enacted by local school authorities.

If transgender rights are civil rights, the argument goes, they should be enforced even over the objections of states and school districts.

The Trump administration clearly disagrees. Last Wednesday, the president issued an order rescinding Mr. Obama’s directive. He stated that states and public schools should have the authority to make their own decisions without federal interference. As a result, states and school districts will now be able to decide for themselves whether federal sex discrimination law applies to gender identity.

The president’s order includes language stating that schools must protect transgender students from bullying. And it does not require individual schools to prevent transgender students from using the bathroom of their choice. It simply gives them the right to make this decision free from federal interference.

But what of the argument that civil rights supersede states’ rights? Here’s my response: unlike previous civil rights legislation, transgender civil rights significantly impact the civil rights of all people.

Continue reading Denison Forum – Are transgender rights civil rights? →