The Gender Binary is Good: Is There Such a Thing as "Goodness"?

We have looked at "truth" of the gender binary (Scientific Data and Reason). Now it is time to ask whether it is good. In this post, I will give some introductory thoughts on the notion of goodness. Then, in the next posts, I will begin to demonstrate why the binary of the two sexes is good.

Is There Such a Thing as "Goodness"?

Goodness corresponds to what is right. “The good life is a flourishing life, a life rightly ordered with respect to self, others, and our end.”[1]  In a world created by the triune God, “goodness is achieved when personal creatures live and act according to their Creator’s character and purpose for them.”[2] 

Before looking at whether the gender binary is right and leads to a flourishing life, it is important to address whether there is such a thing as objective morality. The postmodern view that undergirds transgenderism claims that there is no such thing as objective righteousness. However, those who hold that view are quick to claim that transgenderism is right and leads to flourishing and that the gender binary view does the opposite. This proves that they actually do believe in objective goodness. As C.S. Lewis put it,

The moment you say that one set of moral ideas can be better than another, you are, in fact, measuring them both by a standard, saying that one of them conforms to that standard more nearly than the other. But the standard that measures the two things is something different from either. You are, in fact, comparing them both with some Real Morality, admitting that there is such a thing as real Right, independent of what people think, and that some people’s ideas get nearer to the real Right than others.[3]

So, no one, except for a nihilist, truly doubts that goodness exists objectively.[4] People often disagree over what constitutes "the good," but they believe it does exist. 

Now the question is whether the gender binary is the good and right way to relate to self, others, and one’s telos (i.e., the purpose for which God made us). We will take up that question in the next several posts. 

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[1] Gould, Cultural Apologetics, 148.

[2] Wainwright, 24.

[3] C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity, 25.

[4] A nihilist is someone who believes there is truly no such thing as right and wrong. Thus, a true nihilist (of which there are almost none) would believe that helping an old lady across the street is the same as shooting her. Neither act is better or worse. All acts are ultimately meaningless for the nihilist.