On the slippery slope toward total cultural depravity, there looms another pagan practice that even the ancient pagan societies avoided. Using leftism logic, and the bastardization of the meaning of “consent” and “personal rights” the left continues to move the culture toward the acceptance of evil practices consistent with ancient pagan cultures.

In his newly released brilliant book, Pagan America, John Daniel Davidson exposes the motives of the left to move America toward paganism.  Mr. Davidson addresses how the left is vigorously  using the issues of transgenderism and pedophilia to transform the culture toward pagan practices. Specifically, in the definition of consent and personal rights. Consider a few excerpts from Pagan America. 

“The trans movement, in other words, is a cult that uses liberalism against the classical liberal order.  Employing the language of individual rights, trans advocates say the trans children have a “right” to avoid puberty; it is what they call the problem of “nonconsensual puberty”. In March 2021, Vox published an article about the effort of Republican-controlled state legislatures to restrict gender transition treatment for minors.  The author of the article, a transgender journalist named Katelyn Burns, stated bluntly that conservative legislators “appeal to the fallacy that natal puberty is natural and therefore necessary for all kids.” Burns goes on to describe regular human sexual development as something unnatural and dangerous:

      But this approach would force trans girls into male puberty and trans boys into female puberty without their consent, and brings along its own permanent changes, which could only partially be reversed through painful and expensive medical treatments in adulthood.  Trans women forced through male puberty would then have to undergo painful and expensive electrolysis to remove facial hair and may be left with a body frame (shoulders and hip width) that would be unchangeable by any surgeries.  Trans men would have to have surgery to remove their breast and, like their trans female counterparts, be forced to live in an unwanted body frame for their entire lives.”

Davidson continues, “If a person can withhold consent from a naturally occurring feature of human development, it follows that a person might also be able to give affirmative consent to something once thought to be unnatural or taboo.  Consent becomes its own authority. 

Chris Elston—a Canadian conservative activist who goes by the moniker “Billboard Chris”—often wears a sign that reads, “Children Cannot Consent to Puberty Blockers.”  Elston has said that people often respond to his sign by saying to him, “If children cannot consent to puberty blockers, how can they consent to puberty?”  This is yet another example of reason dying alongside Christianity.  Puberty is no more a choice than being born is a choice; one cannot consent to it or withhold consent.  But the question itself aptly illustrates how trans activists are degrading our sense of reality, our sense of morality, and our sense of reason.  They are also torturing the idea of consent in order to turn it into something else.

The immediate or near-term goal of this effort is to clear the way for aggressive medical interventions at increasingly younger ages.  But there is another, more profound effect of degrading the notion of consent by applying it to things for which no consent can be given, or expecting it from people (children) who cannot give it.  The effect is to turn consent on its head and use it as an instrument to normalize behavior and practices that society might once have outlawed as taboo or perverse, insisting that what is natural is in fact unnatural and what was once considered unnatural or perverse might, with consent, be considered natural and healthy. 

In the context of the trans debate, this misapplication of consent always occurs alongside an insistence on the “rights” and bodily autonomy of children.  Boys have a “right” to be girls, and vice versa.  Children have a “right” to opt out of puberty by taking powerful medications that inhibit their body’s natural development.  They also have a “right” to be exposed to sexually explicit material at school—to learn about homosexual and transgender sex, alternative pronouns, how kids can become transgenders and how doctors “assign” sex at birth.  Likewise, they have a “right” to be exposed to adults in sexually explicit contexts, whether at a drag queen story hour hosted by a local library, increasingly explicit gay pride parades and events now held every June in cities across the country, or a drag show featuring sexualized dance routine performed by adult men—meaningless designations of “all ages” notwithstanding.  Indeed, under the banner of “inclusion” and “tolerance”, sexually explicit drag performances, marketed to families with small children including toddlers and infants, have become increasingly common—and increasingly celebrated by the Left.

This deployment of “rights” rhetoric is meant to blur the line between adult and child, just as the insistence on consent where it does not apply blurs the line between those who have reached the age of consent and those who have not.  If children have a right to bodily autonomy, and even a right, somehow to opt out of puberty, what else might they have a right to? What else might they be able to consent to? And what sort of person—what sort of adult—might have a particular interest in securing these supposed rights for children?

In the fall of 2022, a government minister in Spain spoke with alarming frankness about the rights of children.  Irene Montero, an avowed communist and the Minister of Equality in Span’s left-wing government, said that children “have a right to know that they can love or have sexual relations with whomever they want. Based, yes, on consent.  Here, in a single sentence, Montero summarized the logical endpoint not just of the radical metaphysics of transgender ideology, but of the entire materialst-subjectivist philosophy of the post-Christian era.  By asserting that there is no truth except what an individual wills, we reach the inescapable conclusion that children have the right to have sexual relations with whomever they want—with another child, or perhaps even with an adult.  All that is needed is consent, and if a child can consent to something as profound and permanent as puberty-blockers and cross sex-hormones—that is, if they have a “right” to reject “non-consensual puberty’—then surely prepubescent children can also consent to sexual relations.” Davidson, pg 209-212

I wrote on the emergence of Minor Attracted People, MAP for short in May of 2023. In addition to the transgender debate, Davidson addresses the escalation of the MAP movement in Pagan America.

“The slippery slope here is easy to see,  If Pedophilia is simply one of the myriad sexual orientations that fall under the LBGTQ+ umbrella, and it it really is unchangeable, innate, and important part of a person’s gender identity, not a mental illness that can be treated or ameliorated, then it follows that we should no—cannot—stigmatize or shame anyone for having such an orientation, not least because sexual orientation  is a protected class under federal and state laws.  And if we are going to admit that pedophilia is unchangeable and innate, resistant to all treatment because it is not really a mental illness, much less a disordered perversion, then how can we avoid the conclusion that it is natural?  And if it is natural, who is to say it is wrong? There is a reason that pedophilia, even if it is merely and unrequited desire, is stigmatized,  It’s stigmatized because it is unnatural and wicked and adults who harbor such desires (unrequited or not) are an inherent danger to society.  It takes a certain kind of naivete, as well as a stubborn ignorance of the history of the sexual revolution, to believe that lifting the taboo on pedophilia will have the effect it claims it will.”  pg 214

The DSM 3 removed homosexuality as a mental disorder in 1973  it wasn’t until 1987 that it fell out of the DSM completely.  Davidson continues;

“In the 5th addition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders DSM-5 for short, published in 2013, the American Psychiatric Association changed the categorization of pedophilia.  No longer would it be designated as a mental illness.  Instead, DSM-5 would make a distinction between those who act on their sexual attraction to children and those who do not.  Pedophiles the manual stated, have “a sexual orientation or profession of sexual preference devoid of consummation, whereas pedophilic disorder is defined as a compulsion and is used in reference to individuals who act on their sexuality.

After eight years of moving toward normalizing pedophilia, in 2020, the journal, Frontiers in Psychology published a paper arguing that the diagnosis of pedophilic disorder in DSM-5 is “problematic” because it is “primarily defined by behavior harmful to others” and depends” heavily on cultural and social norms.”  It therefore falls “outside the general disease concept and even outside the general concept of mental disorders. pg 216 footnote 41

The authors argue that the diagnosis for pedophilic disorder ‘should be reformulated in order to make it consistent with the general definition of mental disorder in DSM-5,” and that it “should only be applicable to individuals that are stressed or impaired by it, but not solely based on behavior harmful to others.”  In laymen’s terms, this means if a pedophile is not bothered by his sexual attraction to children, his condition should not be considered mental illness. 

The slippery slope here is easy to see.  If pedophilia is simply one of the myriad sexual orientations that fall under the LGBTQ+ umbrella, and if it really is an unchangeable, innate, and important part of a persons gender identity, not a mental illness that can be treated or ameliorated, the it follows that we should not—cannot, in fact—stigmatize or shame anyone for having such an orientation, not least because sexual orientation is a protected class under federal and state laws.  And if we are going to admit that pedophilia is unchangeable and innate, resistant to all treatment because it is not really a mental illness, much less a disordered perversion, then how can we avoid the conclusion that it is natural?  And if it is natural, who is to say it is wrong. p 215-216

The slippery slope is accelerating at ever increasing speed.  MAP blending into mainstream society and gains acceptance daily.  Persons who object to the progressive agenda are labeled intolerant, religious bigots, that hate men and women because they possess normal legitimate mental and physical differences.

As evil as it is to abuse children under the banner of consent and rights.  The slope could slide further.  Why not a category for Family Attracted Persons?  FAP for short. Following leftist logic, parents that are sexually attracted to their children should also receive approval.  If it is about natural desires of love, consent  and “rights”, why not approve of parents having sexual relations with their children?  Fathers and mothers with sons and daughters.  It is presently defined as incest.  But the left uses language to manipulate and alter reality.  The absolute horror of the thought and word incest is still considered by society as the line in the sand that cannot be crossed, ever.  But, just change the word incest to Family Attracted Persons and crossing the line is within reach.  

Fifty years ago, homosexuality was diagnosed as a mental disorder by the psychiatric community.  Twelve years ago pedophilia was eliminated from the DSM  as a mental disorder.  Homosexuality is now considered normal behavior and anyone who objects is bigoted, hateful, and woefully ignorant. Ten thousand years of history be damned.  In 1973 mankind became enlightened.  In 2013 mankind awoke to the news that child abusers are now normal because until now they have been misdiagnosed and mistreated.  We must accept their behavior, no questions asked.  How long before some fool somewhere declares that parents having sex with their children is just another step in man’s liberation.  

Evil is moving America toward paganism at breathtaking speed.  I highly recommend John Daniel Davidson’s book Pagan America for your reading. At the beginning of his book Davidson quotes G.K. Chesterton;

“Some say it is impossible to return to the past; but the truth is that there is now nothing before us but the choice between two paths which both return to the past.  We can return to some sort of Catholic fellowship, or we can return to some sort of pagan slavery.  There is no third road.”