Written by J. Warner Wallace |
Friday, November 25, 2022
All of us favor “our own”. There are “otherists” in every profession, organization and social group. Wherever there are people, you’ll find this kind of behavior, although our “otherism” will probably be expressed differently depending on the group, situation or historical context. Racism is perhaps the simplest form of “otherism” because it is based on the most obvious feature each of us possesses: our physical appearance. But make no mistake about it, the real problem, the root problem, is far more troubling. “Otherism” can employ nearly any distinctive feature we possess as the impetus for bias and favoritism. Knock down one reason to divide from one another and another can be easily be pressed into service. We do it all the time.

Several years ago at a memorial service held for the ambushed police officers in Dallas, Texas, the President said, “Faced with this violence, we wonder if the divides of race in America can ever be bridged. We wonder if an African-American community that feels unfairly targeted by police, and police departments that feel unfairly maligned for doing their jobs, can ever understand each other’s experience.” In the years that followed, the division only seems worse. Few would argue that we are increasingly divided as a nation, and many identify race as the basis of this division. But racism is simply the expeditious term we apply to a much more common and troubling experience: as humans, our problem isn’t simply racism, it’s what I call “otherism”.
I noticed it many years ago when my German in-laws expressed an interest in my profession as a police officer. One of them asked me what kind of pistol my agency issued. I told him we carried a Glock Model 21. He immediately winced and said, “Ugh, that’s an Austrian gun.” Mind you, this relative was born and raised in Southern Germany, less than one hundred miles from the Austrian border. When I visited the region, many years earlier, I couldn’t tell any difference between the southern Germans and the northern Austrians I met. From my perspective, these two groups looked the same, sounded the same, ate virtually the same food, and lived in the same region of Europe. For all intents and purposes, these two groups should find much around which they could identify and unify, but the line on the ground had become an excuse for division; a way for each group to identify (and separate from) the “other”.
Years later, while serving on our agency’s gang detail, I saw something similar occurring between “cliques” of gangsters in Los Angeles County. Young men of the same race, ethnicity, socio-economic status and region went out of their way to separate from one another, even though they had so much in common. They wore different colors to amplify their sense of “otherness”. They would even kill each other based on the colors they wore, even though without these clothing distinctions, they couldn’t tell each other apart.
Our innate “otherism” (our desire to separate from one another in any way possible) is so deeply rooted that even if every man on the planet was physically identical to every other man (and every woman identical to every other woman), we’d still find some way to separate from one another. Perhaps all the people who live at an even address would express a bias against those who live at an odd address. As crazy as that sounds, our “otherism” is that hardwired into our fallen human nature. In fact, there is a growing body of scientific research demonstrating this “otherist” predisposition.
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There is a new darkness, and that is the silencing of criticism when it comes to the future health of our children. Australia doesn’t have a voice in this debate — that has been silenced by the legislation of our premiers — so we must wait to see if legal action in other countries is able to give those harmed by gender-affirmation a voice.

The rise of the so-called gender-affirmation industry and its relationship with children is one of the most important stories of our time.
Under the guise of science, we are being told that toddlers can know that they have been ‘born in the wrong bodies’.
Under the guise of healthcare, we are being told that it is harmful and cruel to do anything other than affirm a child’s belief that they are a different gender.
Under the guise of medicine, we are being told that it is perfectly fine to treat children with drugs that stunt their natural development.
And if you dare criticise any of this, you run the career-ending risk of being labelled transphobic and turned into a social pariah.
In reality, this remains both an open social and medical debate which is being pursued across the West.
Government Censorship
Not in Victoria, however, where the Victorian Education Department’s LBGTQ Support Policy, available on its website, encourages teachers to assist minors to transition genders without parental approval, or even their knowledge.
There is to be no debate after the Victorian government made it a criminal offence — under threat of fines and/or jail time — to attempt to counsel a child out of transitioning genders.
Other Australian states are considering similar legislation.
This runs contrary to decades of accepted best-practice which treated gender dysphoria primarily with therapy, as most children grow out of these feelings.
The previous federal Liberal government allowed bureaucrats to embed transgender ideology into our health services by mangling language against the wishes of — particularly — women. Even medicare forms referred to ‘birthing parents’ until an outcry led the incoming Labor government to correct it.
Lamestream Media
It is very much a one-sided conversation in which the media, particularly Australia’s national broadcaster, runs a steady stream of pro-transgender stories, while typically ignoring any negative news, such as the tragic stories of de-transitioners seeking to sue for their lifelong injuries.
The ABC was silent when the UK’s main gender clinic, Tavistock, was closed down, with 1,000 families threatening to sue the NHS for harm done to their children.
Meanwhile, you are more likely to find trans puff pieces about a teenage girl who had a double mastectomy.
Hollywood is increasingly pushing LGBTQ+ representation and the idea of gender fluidity onto children and young adults — from Buzz Lightyear’s gay kiss to a transgendered character in The Umbrella Academy.
Disney featured its first transgender character in July.
Labelled and Dismissed
Schools and local councils, particularly in America, continue to integrate Drag Queens into the lives of children despite public backlash against what are traditionally adult performers in sexualised attire performing for toddlers.
A doctor friend of mine who dared to suggest, in a very well-written and calm email, that his local council should not be promoting a highly sexualised all-ages drag show, received a curt response from his local member suggesting he was an ‘overly zealous’ religious ‘bigot’ whose ‘wrongheaded’ ideas were ‘harmful to society’.
Whack!
Consider the dilemma Victorian parents now face. If you complain that your children ought not be exposed to gender ideology, you will be labelled a bigot.
So you keep quiet.
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Moses and the Burning Bush (Ligonier Ministries, 2018), it of course deals with what we find in Exodus 3. And it appears to be a reworking of some of his earlier material, and those who are familiar with his work will find much recognisable material here. But still, for Sproul fans, it is worth adding this little book to your collection, even if it will take most folks an hour or less to read.

The noted American theologian and pastor R. C. Sproul passed away late in December 2017 (aged 78). I have often written about him and quoted from him. A quick search of my website reveals over 170 articles that mention him or discuss him.
I have reviewed some of his books on my site and quoted from plenty others. I even reviewed the 2021 biography of him by Stephen Nichols: https://billmuehlenberg.com/2021/03/30/a-review-of-r-c-sproul-a-life-by-stephen-nichols/
Here I want to look at one quite brief work of his that was published shortly after he passed away. It is: Moses and the Burning Bush (Ligonier Ministries, 2018). It of course deals with what we find in Exodus 3. And it appears to be a reworking of some of his earlier material, and those who are familiar with his work will find much recognisable material here.
But still, for Sproul fans, it is worth adding this little book to your collection, even if it will take most folks an hour or less to read. Since I like to make folks aware of good books by good authors, and good quotes from those books, that is what I am going to do here.
Four portions of the book stood out to me, so that is what I will highlight. Early on he sets the scene by reminding us of some basic Christian truths:
One of the church’s biggest problems is that we don’t understand who God is. But in that one revelation—the theophany in which God appeared to Moses—the transcendent majesty of God was partially unveiled. What had been invisible became visible through the theophany. Part of our problem is that when something is out of sight, it’s out of mind. But from time to time throughout biblical history, God manifests Himself to human eyes. God manifested Himself at the burning bush, and it was earth-shattering. p. 2
Other biblical characters of course experienced this incredible divine disclosure. The prophet Isaiah was one of these figures. Says Sproul:
Isaiah realized who he truly was as soon as he realized who God is. He realized he was unclean. Be we all, Isaiah realized, are filthy as well. And so to purify Isaiah for his mission, God dispatched a seraph to bring a burning coal from the altar and place it on Isaiah’s lips. It wasn’t for punishment; it was for purging. It was to make the unclean clean.
Just like Moses at the burning bush, Isaiah must have been terrified by his experience.
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