Assigned Genders and Corporate Foolishness

by Cowboy Bob Sorensen

A spell back, I wrote about an employee showing professionalism in a big box store. A customer was ranting about how he was supposedly insulted by another employee, and this one had to hear about it. After a few subsequent visits, I got to know the guy at the store and we had some discussions. One day over lunch, the employee that I will call Aaron gave me some surprising insights into that company and its policies. Those are quite a distance from the vision of the company founder!

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This company used to believe in people and listen to employees and customers alike, but I see quality sacrificed for profit. Aaron told me of a revolving door of employees that come in, work for a while, then quit or get fired. While they have some real gems that have worked in this company for many years, many of the younger workers just don't care. You can't find that plaid sheet set that the app says is on the shelf? Try looking behind the boxes of jigsaw puzzles, someone got tired of working that day. That sort of thing.

Aaron speared a bit of his lunch and lifted it toward his mouth. He paused, set it down, and said, "I reckon I can trust you."

"I'd like to think so. People who know me are aware that I keep confidences. Unless you're going to confess to a serious crime, then hold your horses."

"Naw, my horse is tied up and doesn't need holding," he said as he squinted out the window. "Oh, I get what you mean. I'm kinda distracted by this thing."

His storay was about a training module. It's a standard practice nowadays to have employees go through training modules, and I've done quite a few myself. Some need to be completed again periodically. Because of the political and cultural climate in the formerly United States, harassment is a big deal. Companies are in fear of having sexual harassment lawsuits and other legal action being taken. Sure, I'm not interested in hurting feelings or causing problems for people, even if someone has an alleged sex change. He or she is still an image-bearer of the Creator, and Jesus died on a cross and rose again for them as well as for me.

He told me that the corporation he works for had the usual sexual harassment things, and it branched out into homosexuality. What he feels about that doesn't matter, he has to be respectful to customers and co-workers — probably more than many of us, since retail workers are face-to-face with the general public. He said the training module included transsexuals. That is to be expected, but what he said about it irked me. He said the module talked about how some people are not happy with the gender they are "assigned at birth."

It was my turn to pause while holding my fork. I stared at him and used an expletive I shouldn't. "That's leftist politics! To say someone is 'assigned' a gender is idiotic!" I exclaimed. A couple of other patrons glanced at me. I continued in a lower voice, "That's unscientific. It's from science-deniers who want to score political points."

Aaron said "This multi-billion dollar corporation has lost its way. Something you said to me earlier fits, that nobody is too big to fail. They've lost their way and don't distinguish themselves other than being a big company. You don't get to be a huge success over the years by being political leftist science-deniers!"

Now he was getting louder. The waitress came over and asked if we needed anything else. Reading between the lines (so to speak), we took that as our cue to pack up. We were done with lunch anyway. I left a larger tip than usual.

Psalm 14:1 has frequently been cited in reference to professing atheists. Someone pointed out in a sermon (I regret not saving a reference for it) that it does not have to apply to only atheists. Big corporations and even Christians can be fools by acting like God is not there, that there is no accounting for violating his commands.

Genesis 1:27 tells us that God created humans male and female. That's it, and it agrees with scientific facts. Genders are not "assigned" and cannot be changed with surgeries, complaining about "misgendering," hormone treatments, or anything else. Denying the truth to make people feel better about their deviations is only harmful. It's time to cowboy up and get right with the Creator.

The video below is half an hour, but the segment relevant to this article is the first 4-1/2 minutes or so:

Image near the top is a derivative of 1909 Rider-Waite tarot card, further modified with deviant symbol at Pixabay by Gordon Johnson.