The World and Everything in It: April 21, 2023

PREROLL: The World and Everything in It is made possible by listeners like our parents. I’m Aaron Groen and this is my wife Alyssa Groen. We live in Sparks, Maryland. This month my dad is retiring after 50 years in farming, construction, and ministry. Many happy returns dad. And my parents are celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary this month. We hope you enjoy today’s program

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: Good morning!

Today on Culture Friday: Is the retired Olympic medalist formerly known as Bruce Jenner now a voice of reason in the transgender debate?

NICK EICHER, HOST: We’ll ask Katie McCoy. She’ll be along in a few minutes on Culture Friday.

Also today: Arts and Culture Editor Collin Garbarino reviews a film he admits isn’t easy to watch, but a powerful reenactment of a sad time in our country’s history.

And George Grant has Word Play for April.

BROWN: It’s Friday, April 21st. This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Myrna Brown.

EICHER: And I’m Nick Eicher. Good morning!

BROWN: Time now for the news with Paul Butler.

PAUL BUTLER, NEWS ANCHOR: NATO » NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg made a historic visit to Kyiv yesterday.

JENS STOLTENBERG: Let me be clear, Ukraine’s rightful place is in the Euro-Atlantic family. Ukraine’s rightful place is in NATO.

It was Stoltenberg’s first visit to Ukraine since Russia invaded.

He met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and discussed a multi-year support initiative for Ukraine. Several NATO members this week have committed to sending Kyiv more battle tanks and ammunition.

Ukraine first applied for NATO membership in 2008, but cannot join unless all existing member states agree.

DMITRY PESKOV [Speaking Russian]: It will be a serious, significant threat to our country.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov saying Ukrainian membership in NATO would pose a threat to Russian national security.

Russian leader Vladimir Putin has said he invaded Ukraine partly to prevent it from joining the military coalition.

Russian Spy Boats » Meanwhile Nordic broadcasters say Russian spy boats have been spotted in the waters around their countries. WORLD’s Josh Schumacher has more.

JOSH SCHUMACHER: A joint investigation by public broadcasters’ from several Nordic countries found at least 50 Russian spy ships combing the waters of the North Sea for ten years mapping communications cables and wind farms.

Intelligence officials say Russia is pinpointing targets to sabotage in the event of a conflict with the West.

An explosion damaged the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines in the Baltic sea last year. Many have pointed the finger at Russia for the sabotage, but the culprit has not been definitively identified.

For WORLD, I’m Josh Schumacher.

Weather » People from Texas to Wisconsin are recovering from tornado damage brought by spring storms.

At least three people died on Wednesday after eight tornadoes hit Oklahoma.

Oklahoma Baptist University in Shawnee, Oklahoma, sustained damage to some campus buildings. No one was hurt, but some students were displaced from their dorms.

University President Heath Thomas:

HEATH THOMAS: This is the most significant natural disaster in the history of OBU. That’s 113 years.

More storms are expected in the southeast this weekend.

Transgender bills » A bill to protect female athletes is on its way to the U.S. Senate after passing yesterday in the House. The legislation would prevent male student-athletes from playing on girls and women’s teams.

Cambry Ankenbauer is a multi-sport high school athlete from North Dakota.

CAMBRY ANKENBAUER: It wouldn’t be fair to females if we made them compete against males. We have men’s sports for men, and women’s sports for women.

The federal Title IX law bars discrimination based on sex in federally funded education settings. This bill would clarify that to comply with Title IX and receive federal funding… schools must base their definition of sex on biology when it comes to sports.

House Majority Leader Steve Scalise:

STEVE SCALISE: The whole intention of Title IX was to create more opportunities for women to compete in sports. And yet, it undermines the very fabric when you say a biological man can just play in a women’s sport if they choose to.

Meanwhile, North Dakota’s governor signed a law yesterday to protect minors from transgender treatment.

Wyoming abortion » The first facility to offer chemical and surgical abortion in Wyoming is now open. WORLD’s Anna Johansen Brown has more.

ANNA JOHANSEN BROWN: Just under a year ago, an arson attack delayed the opening of the Wellspring center in the city of Casper. The fire caused nearly $300,000 dollars in damages.

Wyoming has several pro-life laws that have been temporarily blocked by a state judge.

Until Wellspring’s opening, only drug-induced abortions were available in Wyoming at one other facility.

Procedures are scheduled to begin at the new abortion center next week.

For WORLD, I’m Anna Johansen Brown.

Sudan U.S. troops » The United States is positioning its troops for a possible evacuation of its embassy in Sudan.

National Security Council Spokesman John Kirby:

JOHN KIRBY: The Pentagon did announce that they are moving forward to preposition some military forces and capabilities. Nearby, just for contingency purposes.

Two rival military groups have been fighting in Sudan for almost a week. The violence has wounded more than 300 people and injured thousands more, many of them civilians.

Leaders on both sides have refused to negotiate, and attempts at cease-fires have repeatedly failed.

Starship » SpaceX is investigating what caused one of its rockets to explode about ​​four minutes after liftoff.

Still, the company said it considered the test launch of its Starship rocket yesterday a success.

Timothee Pourpoint is an aeronautics professor at Purdue University.

TIMOTHEE POURPOINT: That’s what it takes. It takes a test, one test, to start and then a few more and eventually perfect the system.

Starship is the most powerful rocket ever built, and it is planned to be part of NASA’s Artemis moon landing mission in 2025. The nearly 400-foot craft was launched in South Texas, and flew about 24 miles before it exploded when the booster failed to completely separate from the rocket.

SpaceX says some of the craft’s engines failed during the test, which triggered the flight termination system.

5th arrested in Alabama shooting » Police in Alabama have arrested two more people in connection with a mass shooting at a 16-year-old’s birthday party. The shooting killed four people and wounded 32 more people.

Here’s what Alabama Law Enforcement Agency Sgt. Jeremy Burkett told reporters earlier this week:

JEREMY BURKETT: We're going to continue to do exactly what we've been doing. We're going to be very careful with everything that we say, with everything that we do, because we absolutely are going to stay focused on the families and the victims.

Three other suspects are already in custody.

I’m Paul Butler.

Straight ahead: Katie McCoy returns for this week’s Culture Friday conversation. And George Grant considers “over-thinking” on this month’s Word Play.

This is The World and Everything in It.

NICK EICHER, HOST: It’s the 21st day of April 2023.

Glad to have you along for today’s edition of The World and Everything in It. Good morning, I’m Nick Eicher.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: And I’m Myrna Brown. It’s Culture Friday.

Joining us now is Katie McCoy. She’s director of women’s ministry at Texas Baptists. Her PhD is in Systematic Theology. Always good to have you. Good morning!

KATIE McCOY, GUEST: Good morning to you both.

BROWN: Katie, I want to ask you about a recent comment from Caitlyn Jenner, arguably the first really famous transgender person.

Now, he did legally change his name from Bruce to Caitlyn, even though I can barely bring myself to say it. In any event, he wrote, I have never claimed to be a biological woman. That would be factually incorrect. I am trans and biologically male. He’s been making the argument against biological boys or men in women’s sports.

Are we to consider him the new voice of reason? How do you respond?

McCOY: Well, I hope not, because while he may represent a more reasonable take on some of these transgender debates happening in our culture. It still is based on this premise that your biology can be disconnected from your gender identity, that they are not created to be in harmony and that you can live in a way that is outside of God's design for your identity as a male or a female. And so, Caitlyn Jenner I appreciate that he has not said that he identifies as female because of course that is illogical, you cannot change you no matter what surgery or hormone treatment you do, whether you are male or female. And that might seem very simple. However, even that linguistic detail is being challenged in our society today. Things like the concept of sex being binary is considered an oppressive bigoted concept. However, from what I understand, Caitlyn Jenner still identifies himself as a woman, meaning that it is possible to be a woman and yet have no biology of female. Really what Caitlyn Jenner is, is what previous generations would call a transvestite, someone who cross-dresses, and he happens to live at a time where our technology and surgical options allow him to present himself in a more characteristically feminine way. So no, this is not the middle. This is not somehow a reasonable halfway point because the truth is, gender is either binary or it's not. Sex is either binary or it's not. Biology matters for our gender identity, or it doesn't. There really is no middle ground. There is more than enough room as there should be among the people of God for compassion for every person who struggles with a lack of wholeness and harmony in their spirit. And there is every compassion for people who have tried to fix that lack of wholeness by the world's means, but what we cannot give up ground on are the facts and the truth and the facts and the truth are, you cannot change your gender, you cannot change your sex.

EICHER: Okay, I’m wading into largely unknown waters here. Mr. Beast, a huge YouTuber. I had no idea who he was until the story circulated that he’d donated money for cataract surgery and was criticized for it, and it was criticism so silly it’s not worth repeating. But now the big news about Mr. Beast is that one of his sidekicks who is a married father has decided to come out as transgender. So of course that wrecked the marriage, predictably. But will it also wreck the Mr. Beast show, which is, as I say, aimed at young children? The evidence so far is Mr. Beast is going along with it and keeping the guy on the show. So here’s another propaganda outlet potentially pushing trans ideology on kids. We’ve talked about this before with John Stonestreet and I wonder what your take is on this. John thinks people are going to come to their senses and reject this ideology. But it sure seems it’s on the march and it can’t be stopped. What’s your sense of it?

McCOY: It's a great question. Let me put a pin in that and come back to it, but first talk about something that is very sensitive. And especially for parents with young ears around you may want to keep this from them. There is a secret in trans culture that anytime you bring it up, it is met with more than a little pushback. The reality is that for biological females, oftentimes it is social contagion that will lead them to a trans identity. For biological males, however, you cannot talk about trans identity without talking about pornography. It is deeply linked to certain genres and sub genres of pornography, and this sidekick of this Mr. Beast internet personality, his name is Chris Tyson. And as you said, he came out as trans, wrecked his marriage. There's a whole subculture of women called trans widows, women who got married to men and they they are as though they are widowed because their husbands have essentially left them. They are no longer husbands and, and instead they demand women to be just fine with the fact that they're essentially going to live with and be married to another quote unquote woman. But Chris Tyson had his Twitter locked as I understand it, because he posted a tweet about being sexually aroused by Loli, L-o-l-i and Loli is a genre of sexual anime, a pornographic anime that features young girls and toddlers. But yes, this man Chris Tyson, frankly, he should probably be put on a predator list or a watch list of some sort. He's been posting this publicly. God knows what he says and does privately and he should have no access to children whatsoever. Again, what parents need to recognize, though, there are sub genres of pornography that are infecting the minds of young men, and it fetishizes sexual humiliation. And by doing that it is gaining inroads into the minds hearts and souls of men and convincing them that they too have sort of a fetishized feminization, there is something called Autogynophilia. That means love of oneself as a woman. And it can be an excitement of dressing as a woman or being aroused at the sight of oneself as a woman. If you remember that film, The Danish Girl, that that's what was depicted there, there's been some discussion as to whether Caitlyn Jenner belongs in that category. Certainly, Lea Thomas, when you do some digging, it's not this sudden trans identity, there's a link of Autogynophillia. And it is a very dark culture. And it involves also the humiliation or degradation of women as well. These things shouldn't surprise us. Because we live in a world where as we remember, the problem is not the internet. The problem is not laws. The problem is we wrestle against not flesh and blood but spiritual powers. And what does Satan hate, but God's image bearers? And so these things are matters for us to be aware of things for parents to ask their children about warn their children about. But let me come back to that question that you asked Nick.

EICHER: Right, right, and thank you for the warning there. I do want to go back to that question, and I’ll offer a counter-example where maybe the tide is turning. It seems that Democrats are all-in on culture issues, largely advocating for LGBTQ causes, and that many Republicans are running for the hills. They don’t want to talk about abortion, they don’t want to talk about trans-issues, with an exception. The governor of Florida, although not a candidate yet, seems like a candidate, but he’s very open on these issues. Calling Lia Thomas, whom you just mentioned, calling him a fraud. So to return to this, do you think the tide will turn, or is transgender ideology unstoppable?

McCOY: I think the answer is yes, it is going to get better and it is going to get worse. And here's why. First, the UK, Sweden and Finland are all countries that have been very progressive, about transgender therapies for minors, they are reversing course. Fascinating, they are taking a look at the research and saying this is not working. This is not helping children's mental health. The U.S., however, is going full speed ahead. And I think there's a reason for that. In our own cultural psyche, we tend to believe that all changes progress and all progress is good. So as Americans, we tend to latch on to these new fads as thinking this is all a matter of good progress that we should be supporting. But there are other issues in play, I think people are going to wake up and I think it's going to happen with an army of parents who are informed. And if your readers are looking for something to do, I'll throw this out there they need to go look at WPATH, the World Professional Association for Transgender Health and the new standards of care and things that our own presidential administration is saying that they will sign on to the standards of care of WPATH. And frankly, I think speaking of politicians, this should be a litmus test for every politician: Where do they stand on WPATH guidelines? we've got plenty of other litmus tests for our elected officials. And last time I checked, Nick, we were still paying the bills. And so we should be able to ask our representatives where they stand on these issues.

The tide is beginning to turn. We saw that in Virginia with the gubernatorial election of Glenn Youngkin. But here's what's going against us. We have a culture, where combined social media, corporate activism, and public school policy, you combine all of those things, and right now it's a runaway train. And part of why it's a runaway train is people are still too afraid to speak up. You saw this last week with Bud Light giving a can with the face on it of this Dylan Mulvaney. But there was so much backlash that they ended up piecing together a quick ad about America and horses. And you just saw they couldn't backtrack fast enough, because they were trying to fix their bottom line. What happened there? The consumer spoke. And so until corporations feel it where they hurt, and that's their bottom line, they're going to keep pushing this and the more they push it, the more social media pushes it, and the more public schools include gender indoctrination in their elementary school curriculum, we're going to see this continue to spread. So what do we need to do? We need every parent to be informed and dedicated not just to these big elections happening nationally, but local elections, local civil government is vital. I think we need a renaissance of Christian influence in civil government and it might be this issue that is the tipping point.

EICHER: Katie McCoy is director of women’s ministry at Texas Baptists. She holds a PhD in Systematic Theology from Southwestern Seminary, and she’s author of a book due out in June: To Be a Woman: The Confusion Over Female Identity and How Christians Can Respond. Thank you, Katie.

McCOY: Thanks for having me.

NICK EICHER, HOST: May A woman in British Columbia Rosel

OK, got another bear story for you, and this one’s situated about 75 miles north of Vancouver, BC, in Canada. A small-businesswoman, food truck owner, had her Jeep loaded up with Orange Crush and diet soft drinks, and wasn’t worried about thieves, but should’ve been.

Her dog woke her up at 3am having detected the thief, a bear, climbing in and out of the Jeep with cans in his teeth. Audio here from the CBC, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.

SHARON ROSEL: He started with the orange crush and eventually the last thing he got was the diet pop.

Now you might expect Rosel to be frustrated. After all, we’re talking about 69 cans, not to mention damage to the Jeep. Not good.

But apparently she went into mama mode instead, listen to this.

ROSEL: He, he used his teeth every time, and I tried reasoning with him. I explained to him how important the car was and that I had to go to work the next morning. That didn't seem to affect him whatsoever.

Reasoning

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: It’s hard enough reasoning with my kids in mama mode, let alone a bear on a sugar high

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: Today is Friday, April 21st. Thank you for turning to WORLD Radio to help start your day.

Good morning. I’m Myrna Brown.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher.

Coming next on The World and Everything in It: A historical film about grief and justice is now available to stream. Arts and Culture editor Collin Garbarino is here now to talk about the tragic story of Emmett Till.

COLLIN GARBARINO: The historical drama Till was one of the best movies I saw last year, but the movie only made 11 million dollars worldwide, so I’m guessing most of our listeners haven’t seen it yet. But now’s your chance. This week the movie became available to rent on various streaming platforms. The film isn’t easy to watch, but it’s an excellent reenactment of one of America’s saddest moments.

MUSIC: [Opening Music]

This movie’s a tragedy, but it starts out on a hopeful note. It’s 1955, and 14-year-old Emmett Till is a joyful child taking his first steps into manhood.

Emmett—his family calls him Bo—lives in Chicago with his mother Mamie. Bo is excited at the prospect of visiting cousins in Mississippi. Mamie has misgivings.

ALMA: Not a bad thing for him to know where he come from.

MAMIE: Chicago is all he needs to know. I don’t want him seeing himself the way those people are seen down there.

She worries he won’t understand the different social expectations for blacks living in the Deep South. Her worries prove well-founded.

TV ANCHOR: This is a breaking news bulletin. We interrupt this broadcast to report a breaking news story. The body of Emmitt Louis Till has been found dead in the Tallahatchie River near Money, Mississippi.

After the young boy’s brief encounter with a white woman named Carolyn Bryant, her husband Roy Byrant and J.W. Milam abduct Emmett and kill him.

Mamie’s grief hardens into resolve to see justice done. But justice for blacks in Mississippi proves hard to come by.

Director Chinonye Chukwu has created a beautiful, heart-rending tragedy. High-quality production values provide a rich background for a film that ultimately relies on powerful emotional storytelling.

Jalyn Hall portrays Emmett Till as a fun-loving boy who believes himself to be on the cusp of manhood. Watching men drag him to his death is truly horrifying. Danielle Deadwyler is astonishingly good as Emmett’s mother Mamie. In one scene, she becomes a vessel for raw grief.

MAMIE: [crying] Oh, my Lord! Get him out of the box. Get him out of the box! Get him out of the box. He can’t breathe.

Her performance also holds depths of nuance. She moves from sorrow to self-recrimination to outrage to resolve, sometimes in the same moment. I, along with many other critics, registered shock and dismay when Deadwyler was snubbed for a best actress nomination at this year’s Academy Awards. She gives a magnificent performance.

MAMIE: When it came time to place him down, so he could make his own way around, I touched every inch of him, every bend. My hand knew him with my eyes closed.

The cavalier attitude many whites in Mississippi held toward Emmett’s lynching is shocking, and Till shows with scenes both explicit and subtle the impossibility of ­finding justice in that context.

DR. HOWARD: But I do not believe that justice will be rendered by twelve jurors who look exactly like the two so-called men who are on trial.

Till’s murderers get little screen time. They seem to fade into the background of this story about the futile struggle for justice.

The movie reserves its harshest criticism for Carolyn Bryant, Emmett’s accuser. Now in her late 80s, she’s the only person involved in the case still alive. And just last year she once again escaped indictment for Emmett’s death. She’s presented as a malicious liar who wanted Emmett dead, but her real-life role in his lynching isn’t quite so clear.

The movie also introduces many of the civil rights heroes who fought alongside Mamie.

MAMIE: Thank you for driving us, Mr. Evers.

MEDGAR: Please, ma’am. Call me Medgar.

Till contains disturbing scenes and racial slurs. But it’s a harder film to watch than its PG-13 rating would suggest. Movies don’t usually subject audiences to such brutality involving children. We’re not used to seeing a child’s savaged and bloated corpse lying beneath a mother’s weeping gaze. I wept more than once when I saw it the first time. The fact that it’s a true story makes it even more difficult.

RAYFIELD: Her story has changed the world, because she had the courage to make it not just her own, but all of ours.

There’s no happy ending, but Till does end with a sense of hope. The murder of Emmett Till changed the way many Americans looked at race. At one point, Mamie asks God why this happened. In the end, the movie hints that through one boy’s death others might live.

Till is a tough movie about a tough time in America’s history. But this pivotal moment deserves this powerful retelling. It forces us to look at humanity’s sin and brutality. And it asks each of us to reflect on our own commitment to justice.

During the open-casket funeral, Emmett’s aunt tells Mamie, “I can’t look.” Mamie responds, “We have to.”

She’s not just talking to the aunt. She’s talking to us too.

I’m Collin Garbarino

NICK EICHER, HOST: Today is Friday, April 21st. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Nick Eicher.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: And I’m Myrna Brown. You know that feeling of mental exhaustion from going over something in your mind over and over again? We’re not the first ones to suffer from overthinking. Well it’s time now for Word Play with George Grant.

GEORGE GRANT, COMMENTATOR: Google it and you’ll quickly discover that overthinking has become a commonplace label for what was once called worry or anxiousness. It is described as obsessive ruminating, worst-case-scenarioizing, or pathological catastrophizing.

The Cleveland Clinic calls overthinking “an unhealthy habit that typically causes more stress by focusing on the negative, dwelling on the past, and worrying about the future. It’s almost like a broken record of negativity that replays repeatedly in your head. For example, you may start worrying about a specific situation at work, which leads to worrying about money, which leads to worrying about losing your job. Overthinking can be” debilitating, “a symptom of stress, anxiety or depression.”

Not surprisingly, there is plentiful advice online offering “five science-backed ways to arrest overthinking,” “six therapy skills to alleviate overthinking, “seven strategies to stop overthinking,” or “eight methodologies for overcoming overthinking.”

Overthinking is a common bugaboo for sportsmen: baseball, basketball, or football players fearing the loss of intuitive spontaneity. Artists, musicians, writers, entrepreneurs, politicians, and pundits are often encouraged to follow their gut instincts rather than allowing their decision-making to be stymied by overthinking.

Overthinking is actually an old Anglo-Saxon term. It was used as early as the 9th century by Werferth, the Bishop of Worcester, and the memorably named scholar-monk, Werwulf. King Alfred had asked the two men to translate the Dialogues of Gregory the Great. In the same way we might use oversight to mean “looking things over,” they used overthinking to mean “thinking things over.”

Overthinking only came to mean “thinking too much about things” in the 17th century. George Wither used it in a poem in 1628, “So long the solitary nights did last / That I had leisure my accounts to cast / And think upon, and overthink those things / Which darknesse, lonelinesse, and sorrow brings.” I know, I know. There’s a reason you’ve never heard this verse before. It’s not exactly well-crafted poetry.

During the English Civil War, Wither an ardent Cromwellian and a horse guard captain for the parliamentary forces was captured by the king’s army. Sir John Denham, a royalist Anglo-Irish poet, pled with Charles I to spare Wither’s life, despite his high crimes and misdemeanors. His reasoning was self-serving. He reasoned that, “Whilest Wither lived” Denham “should not be the worst poet in England.” Apparently, it was a petition that required no overthinking. Laughing, the king granted the prisoner the clemency to continue writing bad verse.

I’m George Grant.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Well, it’s time to say thanks to the team members who helped put the program together this week:

Mary Reichard, David Bahnsen, (Addie Offereins), Jill Nelson, Leah Savas, Whitney Williams, Jenny Lind Schmitt, Travis Kirchner, Janie B. Cheaney, Lindsay Mast, Steve West, Onize Ohikere, Ryan Bomberger, Lauren Dunn, Cal Thomas, John Stonestreet, Collin Garbarino, and Amy Lewis.

Thanks also to our breaking news team: Lynde Langdon, Steve Kloosterman, Mary Muncy, and Josh Schumacher.

And thanks also to the guys who stay up late to get the program to you early … Johnny Franklin and Carl Peetz.

Our producer is Harrison Watters with production assistance from Lillian Hamman, Benj Eicher, Emily Whitten, and Bekah McCallum.

MYRNA BROWN: The World and Everything in It comes to you from WORLD Radio.

WORLD’s mission is biblically objective journalism that informs, educates, and inspires.

The Psalmist writes: "As for man, his days are like grass; he flourishes like a flower of the field; for the wind passes over it, and it is gone, and its place knows it no more. But the steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear him, and his righteousness to children's children, to those who keep his covenant and remember to do his commandments.” Psalm 103, verses 15 through 18.

Remember to worship the Lord this weekend with your brothers and sisters in Christ! Lord willing, we’ll meet you right back here on Monday.

Go now in grace and peace.

WORLD Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of WORLD Radio programming is the audio record.