I was replenishing my G.K. Chesterton collection off project Gutenberg, as iBooks seems to forget previous volumes after a while or perhaps it was an incident peculiar to my device, but I came across another volume of his essays of which I was previously unaware, title in the title of this post. I'm only halfway through, but rather enjoying it, if mostly baffled and highly amused, as ever I am reading his works, but it really strikes me that he is both prophet and clown and his writing is strangely cognizant of an age he would never live to see, but then that is probably unsurprising as he writes about Man, the human condition and heart, even if clothing some of his suppositions in the color and fashion of his day, which is why his metaphors and analogies often elude me, a hundred years later and in a different empire entirely, if not the timeless meaning of his words. While the political, literary, and historical references he uses means little to me, his eternal truths echo down through the ages as clear as ever they have for they echo the words of the Word Himself. And no matter your time or place or culture, those are Truths and Realities with which we must wrestle, not against spirits or powers or principalities but rather against the human heart, wild, unfettered, untamed, like a wolf at the door, ready to rend at will rather than a trusty dog on the hearth rug, courageous, unflappable, and true.
It is interesting to note that in Chesterton's day they had all sorts of fads, fettishes, and fashions just as we have today, and apparently so has it been since civilization began and will be until something better comes along to replace it. I wish he were still around today to write a jolly retort to the untenable quirks of our day or perhaps Miss Austen might be inclined to write a novel thereupon? But perhaps it is better that they are not, for it seems we have forgotten, or are afraid, to laugh, most especially at our own foibles. There was a day when a man in woman's clothing was a joke, now this sort of person seriously demands a routine medical examination of anatomy they don't possess by a neutral-faced medical practitioner who daren't tell the emperor he's naked, and a man at that! I used to joke about being in such a predicament professionally, never imaging there would be a day when sane and licensed physicians would be ordered by ethics boards and lawyers to give prostate exams to those possessed of XX chromosomes but nary a hint of a prostate!
I thought the realm of animal medicine would be safe from such insanity, I used to think transgenderism would never gain a credible foothold in the public purview, oops!, and now I do not doubt the 'otherkin' will soon be equally legitimate, but where does that leave the medical community, human and not? Human physicians are not licensed or trained to treat animals; veterinarians are not licensed or trained to treat people. Human physicians have had to treat biological males as if they possessed XX chromosomes, do you really think there won't come a day when a man who thinks himself a dog will not demand to be treated by a vet or that the dog-man will sue a human physician for trying to treat him as if he were a human patient? I really want to submit this conundrum to the powers that be in the veterinary community, who are gladly embracing all the other tenets of wokism. What is my moral, ethical, medical, and professional responsibility here? They won't tell a man he isn't a woman, can I tell him he isn't a dog?
Will I lose my license for treating a biological human or will I get sued for not treating him? Our profession is based on the physical reality of the world around us but we want to be trendy and not hurt anybody's feelings but it only causes chaos! Cancer has no trouble interrupting someone's vapid reality and oncologists don't usually pretend it isn't there because obviously that would be everyone's preference; you can't pretend not to have cancer and make it a reality any more than a man can be a woman or a dog just because he thinks he should be and forcing physicians and everybody else to sing the same refrain doesn't make it any more of a reality: the emperor is still naked even if everybody but one little boy pretends otherwise. Do I vaccinate him for canine distemper and leave him vulnerable to measles and tetanus or am I allowed to say he should see a doctor who specializes in his biological species? Where do you draw the line? We jumped off that slippery slope and nobody seems to want to answer the tough questions that are cropping up because of it, we just pretend the cancer isn't there and villainize anybody who says differently while it wreaks havoc as we play pretend. O Chesterton where art thou?
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