Descartes, Trumpian Thomism, and ‘Pronouns’ by John M. Grondelski

Descartes, Trumpian Thomism, and ‘Pronouns’ John M. Grondelski Saturday, February 8, 2025 Listen to this article 6 min Listen to this article 6 min When I read that President Trump had banned government emails from including “pronouns,” I immediately thought of. . .Descartes. We don’t realize just how deeply René Descartes deformed modern Western thought. This year marks the 800th anniversary of the birth of St. Thomas Aquinas. Fifty years ago, American theologian Germain Grisez delivered a foundational paper at a Thomistic conference in which he argued that much of the dualism behind then-prevalent revisionist Catholic sexual ethics (Charles Curran, Richard McCormick, Anthony Kosnik, Phil Keane) owed much to Cartesian dualism. All wind up in the same place: the “person” is reduced to consciousness, while the body becomes sub-personal, a tool or appendage attached to the “person” (mind) to do with as he chooses. Starting from this dualism, the revisionists accused Catholic sexual ethics of “physicalism” when the revisionists, in fact, were the ones who depersonalized the significance of the personal, human body, leaving only the physical. If the “person” is essentially mind, then bodies can be “wrong.” They’re just tools, and sometimes you need a regular screwdriver, sometimes a Phillips. Just adjust to your “needs.” Descartes has had a good ride as the deep dualist foundation of modern sexual mores and bioethics. Thanks to his depreciation of the body and the senses, fertility ceases to be a human good to be loved and becomes merely a phenomenon: good, bad, or neutral depending on momentary utility. And when consciousness is impaired, well, keeping the sub-personal body alive becomes of no moral significance. The severely handicapped but not necessarily dying comatose patient becomes, by some perverse alchemy, a “vegetable.” You throw out old vegetables when they go bad. But in considering President Trump’s recent pronoun decree, I concluded that Descartes had gotten a second act. How so? Playing along with the fantasies of “transsexuality” always required some element of disbelief, most prominently of what one’s senses tell you. You looked at this shop teacher with size 38EEE breasts, a baritone voice, and a five-o’clock shadow and were told – under pain of social ostracism, employment “discrimination” investigation, and/or violence to call him “her.” Narcissus by Caravaggio, [Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Antica, c. 1597–1599 Rome] In a real sense, the roots of that suspension of disbelief lie in Cartesian systematic doubt. In the end, Descartes gives us not an objective world out there that we then perceive. He gives us a subjective world built in one’s mind and projected onto the world “out there.” Which comes first: the world or your mind? For René, it’s essentially the latter, which is why he put des cart before des horse. Descartes’ critics, of course, asked how it was that almost all people had the same perception of the world “out there,” if it is primarily built from inside individual minds. For that, Descartes posited some “deceiver” who coordinates the vast majority of perceptions. Józef Tischner observes that Descartes is utterly weak on ethics, and the question of the Cartesian “deceiver” is fundamentally an ethical one. Why would the “deceiver” go to all that trouble to construct in so many people over so long a time a common perception of the world? If it is a deception, why? Cui bono? What would be the motivation for such a global ruse? Descartes never gives us a satisfactory answer, and faith is not a reason for signing up to his philosophy of “knowledge.” If man’s basic approach to what his senses tell him is to consider them flawed, erroneous, and worthy of doubt, then reality – built in the mind – requires that mind to tell you what is real. If that is true, we have the perfect foundation for gender ideology. Don’t believe what you see: I am a woman because cogito ergo sum. In the same week that J.D. Vance introduced the concept of ordo amoris into a political debate, Donald Trump struck a blow for Thomistic realism. No, we will not play pretend; yes, we will react to what our senses and what our biology, our chromosomes, tell us. We will follow that science. And so, there are men and there are women, there is nothing else, and men can’t become women nor women men. Most Americans would not look to philosophy to explain what they’d call “common sense” – except that philosophy is inescapable and “common sense” is almost always Thomistic realism. In that sense, the heavy Catholic component of this administration will contribute something to the reconstruction of American culture. A parting thought. In Dickens’s “Christmas Carol,” the ghost of Jacob Marley confronts Ebenezer Scrooge, asking “you don’t believe in me, do you?” Scrooge says he doesn’t. Asked why he doubts his senses, he says they can trick him, only to be further queried, “what evidence would you have of me beyond your senses?” Scrooge there is stumped, with no answer, so he reverts to sloganeering, calling Marley “a blot of mustard” (which seems better than a “clump of tissue”). Seeing reason was getting nowhere, Marley captures his attention in a properly spectral manner: scaring the pants off Scrooge by clanking his chains. His interlocutor’s attention now properly focused on what is the object of his sensory perception, Marley can move on to the ethical question: Scrooge’s reclamation. Our world is anti-Marley because it is pro-Descartes. It denies what it sees before its eyes in the name of a mentally-constructed reality. As long as there is some measure of coherence between the two, things do not fall apart. Separate them enough, though, and “the center cannot hold.” In the sexual arena, that’s the ground for disaster. If sensory perception does not count, females cannot object to the “girl with a penis” in their locker room. Indecent exposure ceases to be in the eye of the beholder, but moves to the mind of the exhibitor. If the “trans” element of gender ideology seems to be collapsing (but, mind you, it will not go without a fight) it’s because its center cannot hold. The president has done us a favor by giving it a push. __________ You may also enjoy: Robert Royal The Angelic Doctor Today Randall Smith The Heavens Declare the Glory of God © 2025 The Catholic Thing. All rights reserved. For reprint rights, write to: info@frinstitute.org The Catholic Thing is a forum for intelligent Catholic commentary. Opinions expressed by writers are solely their own. About the Author Latest Articles John M. Grondelski John Grondelski (Ph.D., Fordham) is a former associate dean of the School of Theology, Seton Hall University, South Orange, New Jersey. All views herein are exclusively his.