You're listening to Breakpoint This Week, where we're talking about the top stories of the week from a Christian worldview. Today, we're going to talk about Israel's strike against Iran. We're also going to talk about the riots in Los Angeles. and an online beef between Simone Biles and Riley Gaines. We have a lot to get to this week, but we're glad you're with us.
Please stick around. Welcome to Breakpoint This Week. From the Coulson Center for Christian Worldview, I'm Maria Baer, alongside John Stone Street. John, we're recording this week on Friday morning.
So, obviously, last night news broke that Israel had attacked Iran's military. Including some of its nuclear facilities and facilities where they've created missiles. Reports are that they've killed one of Iran's top military commanders. But I was listening to the New York Times this morning, and one of their analysts said this is the. Largest attack that Israel has launched on Iran in a very, very long time.
So. Part of me feels like hoorah, the other part is, you know, this is all. Adding to the feeling of instability right now in the Middle East and the world at large. How are you reacting to this? Yeah, I mean, there's a lot to be learned.
It does seem to be a historic kind of event. And, you know, Mark Twain is famous for saying that history doesn't repeat itself, but it does rhyme. And this is one of those, I think, rhyming things. I was thinking this morning about this and.
So much to be yet learned about the scale and the scope. Israel's tendency Is to strike when it thinks it needs to do that, despite people. You know, disagreeing. Certainly, almost everybody on the left in America disagrees. But in this case, it seems even the Trump administration had asked them not to do this.
They had gone forward. This is the posture that Israel has long taken. Have incredible intelligence. incredible strategy and then go when it needs to go. You might remember that there was a shelling from Iran on Israel.
That was impressive at first and then went, you know, basically largely countered by the. Iron Dome and shooting missiles down and missiles just landing in non-populated areas. And one wonders then: is this a kind of a sign that Iran's ability to counter-retaliate given what they? kind of wasted uh a few months ago is is One of the reasons for this intelligence. But that's all above my pay grade.
That's kind of in my area of interest, but that's all. But I do want to go back to the fact that it was not that long ago. That The world Was at peace, and it was impossible to think of the world going to war again, at least in the same way. as the early twentieth century. It was nineteen ninety.
five, that I was sitting in a history class. at at college listening to a lecturer. Talk about the Second World War and how it actually happened. And, you know, these are all really interesting matters of history. And thinking to myself, it's impossible to think that we would ever do this again.
We're not that foolish to do this again. But people were writing books predicting it. People were writing books talking about how things were realigning. Folks like Samuel Huntington, for example, in The Clash of Civilizations, one which I think was particularly prophetic, even though Many people don't like it. And there were things aligning, but that doesn't mean, as the pagans believe, that history is cyclical, right?
There is a necessity for Christians to put this within the larger story, like everything. Not in a trite way, not in a dismissive way, like God's in charge and That's it.
So our responsibility, our actions don't mean anything. But I just had this long, robust conversation this week on the way to basketball with my son. Ask me about 9-11 and ask me about What started World War I? I don't know where he gets these questions. They usually come out of nowhere.
There were no prompts. You know, I was thinking about hoops with him. And he suddenly goes, Hey, Dad, what started World War I? And that ended in this whole thing. And you just realize.
That I think Twain's vision of history is helpful, although incomplete, that history does rhyme. And That the biblical view of history extends. Explains human fallenness at a civilizational level, at a degree where this sort of stuff takes place. And it gives us some helpful framing. And also, it tells us that we are fundamentally religious creatures, as John Calvin said.
And one of the predictions after the end of the Cold War. was that it was all over. Because you The the things that would Beat. The catalyst for conflict. And of course, historically, that's been religion.
Certainly geopolitics as well, but Religious belief had been largely dismissed, you remember, by the 70s and 80s as a significant factor. The world had moved on. This was the prediction. of the secularist and Samuel Huntington predicted that the fault lines would continue to be the fault lines between countries that would be the hottest would continue to be religious, particularly when it comes to Islam. And we know that that's the story here, not only Islam.
In Iran, but Islam's hatred of Israel and the whole region's hatred of Israel. in Israel's Posture of survival that it has taken and been pretty successful with for a long time.
So that's the larger context, as far as I can tell. And there's a whole lot of details, and we'll see. Yeah, I don't know that that sense of peace or like we could never go back. Ever really existed in the modern state of Israel? I mean, even in that time you're referencing, the late 80s was the first intifada.
The second was really the early 2000s. Iran has been outspoken since the 40s that. They do not want Israel as a state to exist.
So, this feels to me, again, unstable, but it also feels like.
somewhat inevitable. And yeah, you know, I was reading the Psalm, I've been reading through the Psalms the past couple of weeks. And there's a lot of, obviously there are many psalms and verses that Jesus in particular referenced. And either said out loud or said specifically that he was fulfilling that psalm. And I've been rereading them, and it's strange because I wonder: were these psalms prophetic or were they about something specific?
And then Jesus was saying, this moment is also like that moment. And I think it's probably a little bit of both, but I think that that's what I'm thinking about today, just hearing this news about Iran, is that it feels obviously this is a new, developing, somewhat shocking story, but it also feels like a very, very old story. And particularly, we know what Jerusalem and Israel means to the Jewish people and Christian people. This is a part of the world that is not like any other part of the world. And that feels meaningful too in this moment.
The psalms are a good place to go at a time like this. That's what they're written for. I wouldn't call them prophetic, but I would call them eternally relevant as psalms of. at times asking really, really hard questions about like what's going on. In light of what one believes, that there's a God superintending all these things.
So I think that's the right place to go. And you're exactly right. Israel never had that sense that the world was at peace anymore. That was, of course, if you remember, that sense came out of the fact of the Cold War. Divided the world into three parts.
There was the United States and the West. There was the communist bloc, and then there were all the other countries where all the other wars were. Proxy wars were fought on our behalf. It was nice of us to export our people. They were serving their people.
Exactly. Yeah, it was so nice of us to do that to the rest of the world. But that's how the world was understood. It was across. Nation states, there were these kind of large worldview alliances, essentially, between the West and between communism.
And we didn't really think a lot about it. I mean, you can look at that period of time and say, well, the world's at peace. It wasn't. I mean, you know, there was still what was happening in Kosovo, and there was still the constant threat in the Middle East. And yeah, you had Rwanda around 1994.
And I think wasn't it 94? And so, yeah, it was. It was never at at peace. It was a false security. But that's why I think it's actually so helpful to think in those larger terms of what really does drive human behavior.
including on a national level, the psalmist. and and and putting it on in the context of God and the worship of God.
So, not a bad idea. And by the way, pray for Israel as always. and pray for peace because Mm-hmm. You know, these little events, when Hunter asked me this week what started World War I, he talked about assassin.
Well, it's the assassination officially of Archduke Ferdinand, right? And so you're just like... You know, why did that little thing spark this? you know, huge conflict. And then for somehow we got on The Second World War and then because he jumps around and then we talked about Pearl Harbor and where did how did that happen?
Where's Por yeah, these little events aren't little, certainly if you're on the ground there, but they do have the potential, especially in that part of the world. to bring in an awful lot of other people. And that's the issue here. Do you find with Hunter, as I find with my kids, that what they remember about these conversations are like little tiny details? Like my, I mean, this isn't a little detail to the person, but my grandfather landed on the beach in Normandy on the second day of the invasion, and he was shot in the mouth and lost all of his teeth.
And to my daughters, World War II is the war in which great-grandpa lost all of his teeth, which, sure, that's a terrifying story. Yeah, there's probably more to the story, but yeah, that's an important point detail. Yeah, it's funny.
So, one of the other news stories I wanted to hit with you today is the riots that have been happening in Los Angeles this week. And, of course, we know have spread to some other major U.S. cities. There have been some in New York, I think Chicago, Texas, certainly cities around Texas. This began as people protesting against Trump's immigration policies, the deportations of people who are not here legally.
But it has devolved, as so many of these tend to do, into rioting, looting, especially it sounds like at night, cars being set on fire. The National Guard has been deployed there. There have been a lot of news stories this week about sending U. S. Marines there, although it's somewhat unclear what their role is.
They don't have law enforcement capabilities in this instance. But Again, just adding to this sense of instability for sure, I'm sure, especially for people who live in these cities.
Well, look, there's a lot to be said here. First of all, it's really clear that. The left has a violence problem that protest that are supposed to be peaceful, turn violent. Not that the right doesn't, the right has its own issues as well. And there are a lot of details to emerge about the presidential aspirations of Gavin Newsom and the presidential administration now, Trump, and pulling in National Guard troops pretty early.
So cynical, but it's so believable.
Well, no, I mean, I don't think it's a question. I mean, how this impacts it, whether. He's going to try to use this as a catalyst for that, standing up to. I mean, this is all political talk, right?
So that's beyond our scope. Here's what I was thinking about. Because in the middle of this whole thing, there was another news story where Billboard Chris, who has been a courageous crusader. Against these evil transgender ideas and policies, particularly as it affects young girls. And Lois McClatchy Miller from ADF International.
were arrested this week. For standing and having you know these N not doing anything violent, basically just saying, um He says something like: Children can't consent. Children can't consent to puberty, and they were in Brussels. Yeah, they were arrested in Brussels. There we go.
Good. Thank you for that. And they were arrested. And they were arrested for offending the other people.
Now, here's why this matters: we all have to wrestle through with the limits of. speech. And the U. S. Constitution has the First Amendment.
Which Basically, says that our speech and our conscience rights, basically, says that our conscience rights are public. We don't have to keep them in the confines of our own head or our own hearts. And the limits, there are limits. The limits include violence and the riots that we have seen in LA, which started as protests, cross those lines. And then you have to actually step in and limit that freedom, right?
All freedoms. Have limits. Where those limits are says a lot about your country. And I was just like, you know, I'm. When you compare Europe Where an elderly woman, for example, in Britain, gets arrested on the sidewalk outside an abortion clinic for standing there.
You see the limits. The limits of of her conscience is that it can't be public at all. in in that show. And now we have what, four or five of those stories. And this story with Lois Miller and Billboard Chris, their conscience rights.
We're limited. Every country will say, oh, we have freedom. especially Western ones. but where you limit those and whether you think those things can be public or not. is is is the whole game and that was what we saw is that they were arrested for offending somebody else.
What happened in LA should never be. We should never tolerate, whether it's from the right or from the left, somebody being arrested just by offending somebody else. Right? The presence of a protester. Is not enough to limit those rights.
Violence is, that's a legitimate right. And you always have to adjudicate. what these rights are. And you have to protect the right to offend others. Otherwise, you get what's in Europe, which isn't freedom really at all.
It's private conscience. By the way, it's the same degree of freedom that they have in North Korea. Oh yeah, you can believe whatever you want. You just can't say it out loud.
Now their punishment might be harsher. In North Korea, but it's the same limit. I mean, the UK has gone even further, right? Because you can believe what you want and not say it out loud. But if we think you might be saying it in your head, you're going to get that.
Listen, indefensible. And when you think about the rich history of British freedoms and parliament and the Magna Carta and all these different ways of articulating things. It was never written down. That's the thing. The First Amendment is a remarkable achievement.
Because it reflects human nature and the sort of creatures we are. To be truly free means we have to be fundamentally free to our maker and to our conscience, and that has to be public. But there are rights because of the fallen nature of man. That's how these things have to be adjudicated. It's messy.
But man, it's a lot better in the US than it is in Europe right now. Let's just put it that way. Agreed. Let's take a quick break, John. We'll be right back with more Breakpoint this week.
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Give by June 30th at ColsonCenter.org slash June. Be part of Restoring What's Broken. We're back on Breakpoint this week. John, there's a couple more little news items I want to hit with you before moving on. First is Greta Thunberg this week and a group of activists were heading to supposedly Gaza with aid, which and were intercepted by the Israeli government because they were trying to go directly to Gaza without approval.
And deliver, I don't know, humanitarian aid. The Israeli government intercepted this ship and basically said there is less aid on this ship than would fill like a single truck. And the Israeli government accused Thunberg and her group of, I think they called it like an Instagram mission. This was all up, this was for the selfie kind of thing. And she was caught, all and her, you know, co-conspirators were intercepted.
By the Israeli military, and they were she's been sent back to Sweden by way of France, I think, at this point. This is the latest chapter. I mean, if you've been following Greta Thunberg's arc, she's still young. I don't know exactly how old she is now. She's from Sweden.
She grows to fame as a child activist against climate activism. But now I just want to share this phrase that Nellie Bowles wrote at the Free Press. I don't even think it was in reference to Greta Thunberg, but she said. This is the next chapter in the Forever Omnicause. Which just feels like it also references this poor girl, which is the way I view her.
But, you know, whatever the cause du jour is. That is a particularly left-leaning, she's going to be on board with, and it feels really, really sad. Yeah, I wanted to talk about this, not to pile on to Greta Thunberg. I feel so sorry for her. I think that she was not protected.
The. Omni cause is the right phrase for that, isn't it? Omni meaning all. Because you know, there was a a point at which she was Ask to articulate. her climate activism and she pointed to the patriarchy.
And you're like, well, what? What's the What's the connection there? And then here you have, of course. A mission that was designed to fail in terms of if the mission was ever about delivering aid, it was never about that. It was very clear what was going to happen.
She also went in. Clearly with no understanding of what was actually happening. on the ground and the logistics there. And She was. Arrested?
Then she was very quickly put on a plane. Bought tickets. To be flown back to a Western nation. You know, you talk about kind of first world problems. I don't want to.
I don't want to, you know, say that it wasn't probably an emotionally taxing. situation for her, but You know, it certainly wasn't. you know, arrested, put in prison, starved and deprived. She did talk about being mistreated and there's no evidence of it whatsoever. If for no other reason, then it would be foolish to do that with somebody like who's a celebrity like that, but she wasn't.
There there's she was not mistreated. But There's just such a... Dramatic difference. between educating a child and educating a child to be an activist. Thunberg is an ultimate example of this.
But there there are examples all across Western universities. You know, we've been talking about it now for about a decade: education has lost its way. education for wisdom is really and knowing how to live. In the world as it actually is, that's what education is.
Now, obviously, there's going to be different theories and different worldviews that are undermining that, or not undermining, but undergirding that process. Whether you believe in a Christian worldview or a Muslim worldview or whether you're coming from a secular worldview. There's still a difference between education within those systems designed to help a young person. mature and learn and grow. It comes from the meaning of the word education itself, educare, to educate out of or to lead out of.
You know, historically, that's been. Ignorance.
Now it's all about activism. It's basically a successful education then turns someone into an omni-activist. And that is just cruel to a kid. Because you don't actually give them. the tools that they need.
So so let's let's just say This all ends for her. And now she's got to go, and she's in her 20s or whatever.
Now she's got to go get a job. What job is she going to get? What contribution is she going to be able to make? She's been a a tool. And I think It's such an obvious thing.
That Kids. can be wonderful TRUTH TELLERS At critical moments. But that's not their job. And you can also see when it just becomes this intersectionality nonsense where you just layer these causes. I mean, I saw this story this week and I'm like.
What what is she going to Ga I mean, what's Gaza got to do with Climate Act? Activism. It's it's just it's just bizarre. And it's really, really sad. And somebody has let her down.
There are so many ways to objectify a kid. And this is a That's one. Yeah. Right. I mean, you can make your kid an accessory.
You can talk about children in the womb as barriers to your happiness. And then you can I don't know, force your kid to be an activist or be one of the many. people who are willing to prop up even from afar. a child who is saying the kind of things that you support. and you know champion them for your own cause.
And I'm sure the right is susceptible to this too. Um, but it's just it's so ugly. I mean, uh On top of, you know, adults don't handle notoriety well. Nobody does. Kids, I mean, what a cruel thing to impose on a kid.
You know, and I'm not just talking about parents or caregivers, but just everybody. Who's willing to go along with that kind of thing is because now, you know, not only has she, is she subject to all the like people. know her. I'm sure she gets all kinds of hate mail and threats and Admiration that's unhealthy, but she's also been implicitly taught that, like, her own passion and the way she views the world is correct and good and unique, and she is special in this way. Not taught as every kid and adult needs to be taught to not always trust your own instincts and that you're not the most important person in the world and you can't carry the world on your shoulders and.
Just, it just feels really hard for her. I don't, I don't see a healthy way forward, at least as she continues to be in the public eye. I mean, I think there's lots of other examples of this, right? I mean, there's child celebrities years ago. One of our writers on the Breakpoint team came up with one of the great titles ever, and it's.
And it's a a concept we've resurrected on a number of occasions, which is Mamas, don't let your babies grow up to be pop stars. That that being s famous is It is better than being good. You know, again, it's all in Neil Postman. We can talk about that again, but The child celebrity thing is particularly cruel because they can't actually opt in and opt out with, you know, full immune. You know, it's not unlike what the billboard, what the billboard on Billboard Chris said, children can't consent to puberty blockage.
Children can't consent. to that kind of a life. When you have seen, for example, you know, the stories of guys like Michael Jackson and Macaulay Calkin and Lindsay Lohan and it goes on and on. Yeah. And this is another way of being a celebrity now, right?
And I think we could say, mamas don't let your babies grow up to be activists.
Now, it doesn't mean that they won't. be involved in activism. You know, I think of, for example, Elila Rose. Who started young. I was just thinking about that.
And I felt uneasy when she started because of how young she was, but what a gift she has been. Oh, completely. But she wasn't as young as Thunberg for the record. And there was also a network of support around her. There was also the fact that Her cause was right.
And I think it's important to go back and say there are some causes that are right and there are some causes that are wrong. And she had been taught. and had wrestled with you know, the case for life. At a pretty thorough level and was able to think a thr think through it. That's different than You know, watching an Al Gore documentary and then connecting that to the patriarchy and then, you know, five years later to Gaza, there's not a kind of a line of thought there.
So I do think it's pretty radically. different But there's also the way in which this was done. you know, uh the or the way in which these you know Activist things were done. Very different, which I think matters as well.
So, yeah, it's sad. It was a sad. a sad story this week with her again. It just continues to be sad in my mind. Yeah, agreed.
Well, let's hit really quickly. There was a very public online beef this week between. Two very high-profile female athletes, Riley Gaines, a championship swimmer from. UNC and Simone Biles, the Olympic gymnast. Riley Gaines had posted yet again, or just commented on, an already public post from, I believe, a high school in Minnesota.
Where a girls' softball team had lost to a team whose pitcher was a boy. Saying that he was a girl and Simone Biles, Then posted a really ugly, to my view, very childish response to Riley Gaines. Calling her a bully. talking about her body, saying that, you know Ironically, Riley Gaines looks like a man. I mean, just.
Stuff that I mean the most cringy of the cringe. And Uh dressed personally as a female. Whenever women fight like this, I just want to crawl under a hole. I feel such secondhand embarrassment for Simone Biles after something like this. I mean, I feel like I'm watching reality TV against my will.
And then Riley, of course, responded, and I think very level-headedly compared to what was said. And then Simone Viles came back with a clearly kind of PR-mediated response, apologizing, which was unexpected, frankly. Yeah, it wasn't a great apology. There was a better apology on display this week for Michael Tate from the Newsboys. If you saw that whole story, that's a.
An awful story, but his uh his public repentance was in Like a textbook example of how it's supposed to be done, and Simone Balls was not one of those. And by the way, did you say Riley Gaines was from the UNC? Is that what you said? Is that the wrong one? It was North Kentucky.
University of Kentucky. No, she was at University of Canada. Oh, come on.
Sorry, Riley. You know, you watched this whole thing, and it was really odd. There's been no one. who has dominated her sport. Like Simone Biles has.
Obviously, she she had a The is the issue at the Olympics where she had to step down from getting what's called the yips and you know, basically the the danger of flying in the air like she does. And not having balance and not having perspective and, you know, and then to come back and then win a gold medal after that and help the team win a gold medal. I don't know a lot about gymnastics. And, you know, you have kind of great moments in history, like Kerry Strugg landing that vault at that right moment, which was just incredible. But you watch Simone Biles take off on a vault or on the floor exercise and You don't have to know anything about it and you're like Wow.
Like that is incredible. And she's also competed far longer into her career than most gymnasts. She's completely broken the rule that, you know, gymnasts are done by, you know, 21 or 22. And it's just astonishing. And yet.
If A man. were allowed to compete in that sport at the same time. She would not have won. If she had to compete. against someone who physically You take any men's gymnast.
from the uh the men's Olympic team. to do the same routines. And she would not have won.
Well, really quick. This is where it gets interesting because gymnastics is unique. I don't think a man could compete on the balance beam in the same way a woman could, but that's also due to physiological. They could be stronger, they could jump higher and go faster, but could they have the same balance or grace? Those are things you get judged on in gymnastics, but that just highlights the physiological differences.
John is shaking his head. He's like, I'm shaking my head. And that's not because, you know, to balance really well. Is uniquely a a woman's thing or a man's thing. It's easier to do four inches when you're smaller than when you're bigger.
I would say there is that basic Level of competence, and then what you do on top of that: flying around, arm strength, particularly upper body strength. And in fact, There was a a tweet that emerged from 2017 where Simone Baal seems to admit all but such. Uh during this whole thing. This is the reality of the difference between men and women.
Now, I'm sure there's more details, and there's gymnasts that, you know, that have been Colson Fellows that I'm sure will write in and correct us on anything that we. have gotten wrong on this. But there is just a dramatic difference there. Here's what was interesting, though. Not only that.
Some mobiles. would not want to play by the same rules she was trying to impose on Riley Gaines. But she called Riley Gaines fixated on it. And Riley Gaines, I thought, responded. Harshly.
but fairly. And maybe harsh is the wrong word. directly. It was tough. to point out that Riley I you know, essentially saying uh that she supported The exposure and going after the horrific Larry Nasser and all the terrible things he did.
and gymnastics. You know, another form of sexual abuse is men exposing themselves. in a small private confined space to women, which is what happened to Riley and everyone else, not to mention just losing the podium. And for Simone to just dismiss it all as being a poor loser, as she put it, is just missing the whole point. It was fair for Riley to bring that up, and she did it.
And she did it gracefully, I thought. and and and confidently Riley Gaines has become a very A thoughtful. and calm and confident in her position, She's able to say hard things. in clear ways. And I have a lot of respect for that.
What was interesting in all of it too, and I know we need to wrap this segment up. But four years ago one would think Simone Biles being kind of the untouchable athlete and the untouchable celebrity that she is. that everyone's going to take her side. And Riley Gaines, you know, kind of being categorized as right wing. No one's going to take her side.
In fact, I think Riley in an interview kind of said she kind of braced herself for The hate. And there was hate. But it was almost even, wasn't it? It was interesting to watch, and as kind of, I think this is one of those kind of you are here moments. uh culturally or an indicator maybe not a whole thing but but an indicator where basically A lot of people have dropped this issue.
They are not. On Simone Biles' side, on this, and they were articulate. Even this week, Stephen A. Smith, one of the great sports voices of our generation. brings Riley Gaines on his show.
gives her the platform to say everything. Stephen A. Smith will disagree with you in public if he thinks you're wrong. And he did not. I mean, and this is, you know, royalty in the sports world to other royalty.
saying the other royalty was wrong. And Riley Gaines, you know, this swimmer, you're right in this. I thought it was a moment, like it was another indication, like the closing of Tavistock, like the backing off of policy, like European nations and so on. I thought it changed I thought it was an indication that, again, We're in a different place than we were just three or four years ago. Which should give us all pause against this inevitability narrative that whenever we're told the science is settled and the right side of history is such.
It's just another indication that that's just not always true. And we should stand on. the side of what's right, not What seems to be inevitable. It is a horrible shame for all the women that have lost opportunities. while this has gone on.
But I do see like the writing on the wall. It hopefully will end sooner than later. But that will still remain a lasting shame just as much, if not more so, the women who've been exposed to men in locker rooms and Whatever else, but I am glad to see. Yeah, I agree with you. I think hopefully it's ending.
Most of the, like, if ever I listen to, Podcasts or interviews with left-leaning people, and this topic comes up, the general consensus now seems to be people being like, Well, we all like, no, this shouldn't happen, but it's not really happening that often, or it's just a small number of people, which, you know, they're good. Everybody has to save face at some point. People are going to have to rationalize what happened. It'll be fascinating for sociological reasons to see how they do that. But it is at least a positive development that they're not all out there saying this is great and it should continue.
Well, you know, another part of that is that. that the T in the acronym had dominated the Pride Month stuff. And There's just a growing, and we talked about kind of the growing conflict between the L's and the T's, but. I just think that there's this whole group that wants to maintain pride. quote unquote during the month of June.
But the T's have made it really, really hard for them to do so. And that in internal conflict. Is becoming huge. It's like the Matrix movies: like you set up this world with rules that you can't possibly follow and be consistent on. And by the third movie, it's terrible.
That's that's that's the pride movement right now. We're in we're in the third sequel, and people are like, something here is not working. Yeah, exactly. Aaron and I have been re-watching all the mission impossibles and Wow, I mean, each mission gets more impossible than the last.
Alright, John, let's take a quick break. We'll be right back with more Breakpoint this week. Hi, Breakpoint listeners. You've probably heard us talk about the Colson Fellows Program on Breakpoint. I'm excited to let you know that the Colson Fellows team hosts one-hour live informational webinars that allow you to hear an overview of the program and get your questions answered.
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You can find a full list of webinar dates and register today at colsonfellows.org slash webinar. That's colsonfellows.org slash webinar. Mm-hmm. We're back on Breakpoint this week. John, there's been a lot of research coming out of the Institute for Family Studies.
And you and I both have done some work with Brad Wilcox, who's such a Incredible researcher and sociologist. He's at the University of Virginia and also heads the National Marriage Project. There's some research that came out recently showing that particularly working-class men are not getting married at nearly the rates that they used to. This obviously has implications for all sorts of things that we talk about, including the birth rate, divorce rate. Just the formation of families generally, the health of young men and older men as they grow.
So here's a couple of stats from this latest research. In 2021, Only 36% of working class men were married with children. That's compared to 45% of men who are college educated. Wilcox and IFS says, you know, this is partly due to job stability, benefits, wages. Since 1979, wages for working class men have declined.
We also know that there is a divide here between men and women. Women are graduating and attending college at higher rates now than men used to. I heard Louise Perry recently talking about just the fact that we're in an information economy as opposed to a manufacturing economy just tends to lend itself more to. What might be understood as female skills or strengths more so than men's. And so, you know, and so sexist.
And thinking through all angles of an issue. I'm just talking about this personally as a person who has a home and. Tries to run this home with a man, you know, I sometimes think a little further ahead, or I notice the crumbs on the floor more than other people. Anyway, let's not get caught up in that. But this is all contributing to lower marriage rates because also, as we know, Women are less likely to men than men to be willing to marry below their socioeconomic class or their education levels.
It just it just feels like a concoction that's Painful. It's going to hurt. For all these reasons. Do you think that I also saw a piece in the New York Times this week from a woman who had put out a prompt to readers, to Gen Z readers in particular, about what their goals were. And she wrote, she kind of synthesized a lot of their responses and she said, Almost all of them say that they desire to get married and have children, but.
You know, they're all scared to do it and they won't do it until they've reached some level of economic safety, or they're able to buy a house, or they're no longer afraid of homelessness, or they've been in their job for X amount of years.
So there's a. Big consensus, it seems, that the economics are what's driving this cultural shift. to less marriages. And you're shaking your head no, which I'm excited. Because I want to be awry.
Well, economics is the fruit, not the root. I mean, listen, it's interesting that there's still this aspiration to get married. And so on. But remember, this is also the generation that's not clear on what marriage is, that thinks that. The option of marrying someone of the same sex is just as valid as marrying someone of the opposite sex.
Oh, and that you still have a right to have children. The children you want, the biological children, and we have now technological workarounds and so on and so on. Listen, since the whole post-Roe v. Way Dobbs ballot initiatives. After which we were, you know, and I really was one of them who really believed that.
The the reports that the younger generation was more pro-life. than their parents were, which was true, but they were more personally pro-life. which meant they were subjectivist and relativist when it comes to morality. They were constructionist in the idea that they could construct their own understanding of life and morality. And that's now what we've seen with family formation.
You know, to say we believe in marriage, you have to say, well, what do you mean by marriage? Because we are now a world in which it is completely normal. to construct one's own way of life, one's own relational arrangement, and then want to call it marriage. I think that's undergirding all this. The other thing that's undergirding all this is there has been from the very beginning.
from a multitude of different directions of cultural catechism. Whether you're talking about pop culture in music and movies, whether you're talking about messages formally coming out of policy statements and elected officials, whether you're talking about what has taken place in classrooms. The conflict between men and women. that has been described goes back now decades.
So it is basically the water we live in, the air we breathe. To think. That there are irreconcilable differences between men and women, that men are bad because they're men. And that somehow, even though God said it's not good for man to be alone, and so he gave him woman, there's a narrative that it is good, it's better for women to be alone. That is is a almost dogma.
in Western in Western culture. both when it comes to being married and when it comes to being a parent. Right. I mean, we've talked about this. How many thought pieces, quote unquote, can we have?
They literally happen every week. Of some woman saying I think it's a very unencumbered myself from any responsibility, and now I'm truly happy.
Now IFS has also been on the forefront of telling us the reality on the ground is that they're not happy. The happiest people are those who are really, really, really encumbered. The happiest women are the most encumbered women. Right. Now, we're going to have a response from a listener, I think, in the last segment.
Now, I've committed ourselves to this particular question having to do with, well, there are bad cases where. Where there's abuse and there's danger and all that. And we'll come back to that. But the fact of the matter is this narrative That men and women have irreconcilable differences. It's just been built into the water.
It's just been put into it.
So there's something about, you know, kind of the way God made us to need one another and, to look at something. That is one of God's greatest gifts, marriage. And to want it. but then to actually have the wrong tools going into it. Right?
There's just this kind of taken for granted perspective that there's always going to be conflict.
So so so The best you do then is to explore alternatives like cohabitation or maybe same-sex marriage or some other things. Or that Okay, yeah, I want marriage, but I also want that get out of jail free card. You know, which is no fault divorce. when I want to go that way. The chapter of this long story have been fascinating to watch if they're if they weren't so consequential.
So you go back to the 50s and 60s, the shift from first to second and third wave feminism. And now you get to today when you see men and women go in different directions. You see men becoming more religious, women becoming less religious. Men becoming more politically and socially conservative, women becoming less politically and socially conservative on average. And these are fundamental beliefs about life and the world that are being reflected in these numbers.
So it's not a surprise. It's it's hard. And I'll ask the last question. Uh that I have on this, which is Who is prepared? To respond to this, in a reconcilable way.
Who has the message of reconciliation? It ain't critical theorist. Right? It ain't a culture that says forgiveness is really impossible. Christianity has a real role to play.
The churches have a real role to play. and to becoming the matchmakers of the f of the future. And I think we should embrace that as a cultural calling right now. It is fascinating that, because I think there is an attempt to respond from the progressive side. Because again, it's fascinating that so many people and young people say that they desire to get married.
Okay, so my husband is obsessed with these. Like, I feel like there's been a whole run of these new shows that have come out about like modern-day. Like family organized crime. Gang shows, okay? And I, every time he starts watching one now, I'm like, I already know, I can guarantee you, I know the story.
By the last episode, you will find that the matriarch is the one who's really pulling the strings. That's the whole story. You're going to think for the first five episodes that the dads and the sky. Yeah, but that's Shakespeare, right? I mean, Shakespeare did that first.
Well, yeah, maybe it's lazy storytelling. It's Macbeth, right? That is the. This is the whole. This is the whole story.
Okay, so. But what I'm hesitant about is I think you only talked about half the story, where this irreconcilable differences between men and women is the message. It's not just women being told or believing that they don't need men. There is also a very clear and has been probably around for longer than even that message. Message to men that women are a burden/slash ball in chain/slash like a necessary evil.
Don't let them get too educated. And like, I'm surprised by how it is. Yeah, yeah, that's the prerequisite idea. And it's given birth to this other idea. But yeah, go ahead.
Sorry. Because if feminism, you know, third wave, whatever wave we're in now, feminism tells women to be like men, one of the most quintessential ways women can be like men is by hating the opposite sex, to be honest with you. or by blaming their current social malaise on them. I'm still laughing about a comment that somebody sent me on a piece I wrote a while ago about this, the difference between marriage rates and men and women and educational attainment. And I had posted a clip from this panel that I had gone to at the University of Virginia with IFS.
And this man commented and said, One of the really interesting things I noticed about this panel is that, wow, those women really interrupted each other. And I can just tell you that men don't, we don't do that. We have better community. And he was for real. And I was like, friend, have you ever watched ESPN?
Because I've watched ESPN. That's not the way that show goes. I'm not sure you are familiar with what you're talking about. But sorry, I'm going to interrupt you with my example, which is because women get accused of being, I tell young men this all the time. It's like women are the emotional ones, men are the rational ones.
I was like, have you ever met a teenage boy whose heart was just broken? I mean, anger is an emotion, too. You know, I mean, in other words, we do not want to get political about this, but we're all falling. I literally saw somebody look at the interactions, the recent interactions between Trump and Musk, and someone, some commentator, was like, everyone just calm down. These are just men communicating how men do.
And I was like, really? Like, like little children in a sandbox? No, that's a great example, actually, that whole feud, which was embarrassing. Yeah. Anyway, which we avoided for all kinds of good reasons.
We digress. We do, but there is a backlash, even as men become more conservative and men become more religious. Of that extreme. Like I saw a tweet this week where, you know, somebody who's a voice in this kind of new. Chauvinism, you know, said women shouldn't drive.
I mean, it's just bizarre, dumb stuff. Or own property or vote or whatever. But culturally speaking, the dominant idea. That has divided the sexes is the promise to women of liberation. From men.
that has been put into policy and put into education and and I think is the the the Yeah. The world season things. There was a book that came out a few years ago from a somewhat influential, I think, Christian writer. Again, making the argument, and this is where I think we lose people and we unwittingly contribute to this divide. But making the argument that given the obvious physical differences between men and women, which of course at the time and even still people are refusing to acknowledge or pretending doesn't exist, but that points to the reality that men are really the ones who are supposed to be working.
Because work is I don't know, somewhat related to physicality. And I remember reading that at the time and thinking, this is so unaware of the times that we're in. Like, what percentage, again, this goes back to the knowledge economy conversation. What percentage of jobs, like bread-winning jobs now, rely on physical strength. It's definitely a minority.
And so to continue the argument that like maybe women, I think there is an argument that men and women's roles in a marriage and in parenting and in the early years of your kid's life, let's say, are dramatically different. And that is by design and inescapable, and it can be scary and good. But to suggest that The physical differences mean that women shouldn't contribute or work in the way that they do. I guess what I'm trying to say is that this, the irreconcilable differences. that the culture sends, these signals that they're sending to young men and women.
have gone both ways since Genesis 1. And maybe it goes back and forth. And for a while, it's men hating women, and then it's women hating men. But it's just Yeah, I I think, like you said, the church is probably o the only place you'll see that reconciled, but we haven't always done that well either.
Well, no, we haven't. And we we you know, you know there's a lot more to say. you know, I I wasn't planning on going into the work space, but I don't think the differences between men and women are just the difference between physical strength and, you know. being able to process information. Yeah, I think there's still a lot more to be adjudicated there.
But my point is. But this is, I think, a calling of the church. The church should be. able to do this. The official Message.
Men have screwed things up out of their own sin nature. The official message of our culture is a promise of liberation to women. And it's been embraced across the board if only they are unencumbered. It hasn't delivered. It hasn't delivered the happiness, and it certainly hasn't delivered cultural stability, and it hasn't delivered the best situation for children.
who whose concerns should be prioritized anyway.
So um yeah, a lot more to say.
Okay, John, well, let's get to some of our feedback and questions, like you mentioned from listeners. We have to start with the one we promised because I can't get to get to all of them now after we've rambled on on that one. Yes.
So, well, I never ramble, but never. I meant me, of course. Yeah, exactly. You had written a breakpoint commentary recently about, once again, another very popular cultural message, which is that the children of divorce will be okay. Like it's better to divorce than have an unhappy marriage, let's say.
And this is obviously a very personal topic for a lot of people. And we got our response from someone asking a question that I know you get frequently, which is: what about in cases of abuse? or danger. Couldn't you argue that it is actually better in the long run, especially for children, to leave or to sever marital ties when that situation is the reality? Yeah, actually, all three of the questions we kind of highlighted for today are exceptions questions.
In other words, what about this exception to this thing that you said? And the reason that there are exceptions is because there are rules. And that's what we're getting at, is that the rule now has changed.
So the rule now is the kids will be fine and people should be able to enter marriage and exit marriage. And the kids should be expected to adjust. And kids need happy parents, not married ones. And the commentary was: oh, hey, we've been now looking at this for 50 years, over 50 years. We have the data, and the data says nothing like that.
Now In cases of abuse. Those are the exceptions to this. Kids will not do better in a married home. if they are physically threatened. if they are even in kind of em you know, significant emotional abuse.
But that's not the same thing as having conflict.
So in other words, there is a line in which The conflict turns abusive. And, you know, I think we obviously any sort of physical harm threats to women and child, or by the way, to men and child, because men are actually victims of domestic abuse at times as well. Then, yes, that's where this is the exception to the rule. But the rule is. Kids do better with married parents that aren't happy.
than happy parents that aren't married. And it's with very few exceptions. This is one of the exceptions. And I should have put that exception. In this particular commentary, because it goes back as far as Judith Wallerstein's magisterial work on this, that she.
Tracked over the course of five decades, looking at the results of no-fault divorce, particularly the harm it does to children. And Wallerstein's conclusion was that no-fault divorce is abusive to children.
Okay?
So in other words, we're not comparing here. an abusive situation with a non abusive situation. Ending a marriage. Which is the vast majority of marriages end on the context of happiness.
Now, there are many exceptions to this where there is abuse and that there needs to be separation, and maybe also. You know, ending the marriage. Marriages do end and it's awful when it happens. Marriages end when one party doesn't want it to end, but another one does, you know, because you're talking about two individuals.
So all of that sort of stuff is in the context. And I did include that part of the context. But Wallerstein said that outside of those cases of abuse, in which it's better. That when it comes to two. No fault divorce.
The only comparable reality that she could point to. In terms of the trauma inflicted on children. were children who had survived the Holocaust. That was her comparison. In other words, that no-fault divorce is in and of itself abusive.
Listen, we're just so far down this rabbit hole where we prioritize adult happiness over children's rights, and we just got it exactly backwards. And no fault divorce is indefensible. It's indefensible. as a social policy.
Okay, and again, we're not talking about individual conditions, individual situations here or there. As a social policy, in which we have bought this narrative. that the kids will be fine and the kids need happy parents, not married parents. Flat out not true. That's all the evidence points to this and it's not even right.
And we're not just talking about how kids like subjective, how kids feel about it or even how they feel about it as adults. We're talking about measurable social outcomes. Yeah. It's just unavoidable. Right.
Yeah. Well, I think that's helpful context, John.
So another one of the questions we got was in response to a piece.
Well, you and I had also talked about Scott Klusendorf recently and his argument. He, of course, was at the Colson Center National Conference. Reiterating his really helpful and very calculated, like easy to follow kind of pro-life argument, that theoretical and principled kind of moral staking of the claim for the humanity of the unborn. And we got a response from someone who has, it sounds like, some personal experience with members of his family who have faced really dangerous physical pregnancies. And he felt that Klusendorf's argument might not have covered this specific situation when a pregnancy.
Endangers the life of the mother. I'll throw it to you. I think I agree, this is another exception. conversation, but I will say the only real condition I think we're talking about where the pregnancy itself really poses a dire risk in any like statistically measurable way would be something like preeclampsia or high blood pressure. Usually that starts to happen later in a pregnancy and The philosophically important thing to note here is that When we're talking about treating women for that, we could talk about delivering a baby early.
But it would never require going in and purposefully killing a child. For no other reason than to end a woman's pregnancy, you might need to treat a woman for cancer or deliver a baby early because a woman's health is at risk, but it is categorically different than killing the child. The situation often that's pointed to is eptopic pregnancies when the fertilized egg, the embryo, implants in the fallopian tubes as opposed to the uterus and that has life. Altering potential, and it's life-threatening for the woman. That is a A case where The treatment is not abortion.
The treatment is to preserve the life of the mother. Abortion is the taking. of a of a life. Treating an epitopic pregnancy is the saving of a life. And the loss of a life of the embryo.
Is the consequence of the life-saving treatment that's done for the sake of the mom? I just want to Say two things. The first thing he did was insinuate that Scott Glusendorf doesn't cover this in the book, The Case for Life. He covers it really thoroughly and is really clear. That if Two lives are at risk, it's always better to save one.
And the life that you can save is the life of the mother. And that's okay. that is actually what health care has to do. It's the same thing as triage on the battlefield. It's that you deal with the realities that you have on the ground and the capacities that you have.
And he's really, really clear about that. And as Scott often is, just always is, in my view, just walks through it in a very careful way.
So I just want to be clear, if you do want to see the answer to that, pick up the case for life because it it it I think covers all those basis. The second thing, though, is that this was a commentary specifically dealing with N.T. Wright. Who extended the exceptions beyond rape and incest and beyond the health concerns or the life-threatening health concerns of the mother? to mental health and to anything else.
And as we have seen and as we know, That is a loophole big enough to drive a dump truck through. I mean, everything gets smuggled in. to that category. And that's what we were responding to. And I oftentimes when I hear that kind of exceptions language used, well, what about rape and incest?
I will respond. And say Look, okay, let's make a deal. I'll give you all of those exceptions and let's make abortion illegal in every other circumstance. And the response is, no, no, no, no, we can't do that. Right.
In other words, that's a red herring. The exception thing is a red herring.
Now, I will say that I don't believe in the exceptions of rape and incest because. You don't fix one injustice by creating another injustice. You're not going to solve a crime by killing another innocent victim. And that is the abortion in the cases of rape and incest. That's where that ends.
So that's my. Uh take on that. But I also want to point out that that typically is used, culturally speaking, as a red herring. not as a real situation.
Well, thank you as always for sending in those comments and questions. Please do visit breakpoint.org and reach out to us on the contact us form and we'd love to hear from more of you. John, that is going to do it for the program today. I don't think we have time for recommendations, so maybe we'll save those for next week. I did.
The case for life. Buy it. Read it. There you go. That's my recommendation.
How about that? Love it. Love it. Okay.
Well, thank you for listening to Breakpoint this week from the Colson Center for Christian Worldview. I'm Maria Baer alongside John Stone Street and we'll see you all back here next week.
