The advocates of autonomy establish the moral righteousness of providing gender reassignment surgery or euthanasia to a minor who requests it on the argument that the child asked for it. This is an absolute abdication of adult responsibility for the sacred trust of children. It makes you wonder if those who advocate for a child-run world skipped the year in school when we all read Lord of the Flies.

The altar of self idolatry, at which our culture openly and completely worships, has implications for areas of public debate we may have never previously imagined, including the meaning of childhood and the age of consent. Those debates once centered upon the age of consent for sex or marriage. Today, the debates are about the age of consent for gender reassignment surgery and life itself.

Two international stories, one from Australia and one from Belgium are required reading:

First, in Australia, children are demanding–and receiving–sex transition treatment, including the surgical mutilation of otherwise healthy sexual organs. Child psychologist Michael Carr-Gregg told The Daily Telegraph that 250 children as young as three were being assisted by the gender dysphoria unit at Melbourne’s Royal Children’s Hospital.

Yes, you read that right: 250 children as young as three. One four year old is highlighted in the discussion about surgery. Again, yes, you read that right, four years old.  One gynecologist referenced in the piece, herself a transgender person, Dr. Rosemary Jones, believes that four is a “good age” and that “parents who have any sense can usually pick it.” That statement reveals the redefinition of “good,” and also the concept of “sense” and nonsense.

From Australia to Belgium we go from the question of good age related to gender reassignment surgery to the question of good death, euthanasia.

The BBC reports that last week a terminally ill minor requested and received a physician’s assistance in committing suicide. Belgium is currently the only country that permits euthanasia without age restrictions.

What’s going on in a world where, when children are married off as brides, conscripted as soldiers or forced to work in sweatshops, we rise in condemnation. Yet those who beat their breasts about such violations of human dignity advocate as rights unrestricted access to abortion, physician assisted suicide and gender-reassignment surgery? What’s going on? Confusion. We are reaping the harvest of a generation’s long societal worship of the idol of personal autonomy.

This confusion leads to catastrophic consequences for children. Because the child is considered autonomous, the age of consent is whatever the child determines.

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