Is morality upside-down?
By Paul Bawden
I take these words from a presentation by Victor Davis Hanson in the September 23, 2025, Daily Signal. He entitled his thoughts, “The disturbing epidemic of Upside-Down Morality.”
His interesting perspective was that “we find every possible way to contextualize or excuse evil and the victimizer, but we don’t show passion or compassion or anything for the victim.” He added when this happens, “you’re gonna get more.” Victor gave a few examples to illustrate his perspective.
“Let’s take the trans shooter, Audrey Hale, in Tennessee. She obviously acted out of hatred because she felt her gender dysphoria was oppressed by organized religion. She wrote a manifesto. We didn’t get the manifesto. In fact, we heard more about her trans problems than we did the actual reason why she went out to kill these people.
I don’t know if Robert/Robin Westman, another trans shooter in Minneapolis, felt that if he were to also kill young Christian children that maybe society would take a deferential view of him, as they had done with the manifesto of Ms. Hale, but he also acted out.”
Victor went onto say that he is giving these illustrations because the society itself began to rationalize it or explain the difficulties. “There was no referencing that a person taking various dangerous levels of hormonal drugs, testosterone, estrogen, if they’re engaged in very powerful antidepressant, which often accompanies that, if they’ve had very serious medical procedures, these things can promote, enhance, accelerate mental disturbance, and we have to be very careful about it.”
Victor commented, “And when people act out violence, then we have to condemn it. If we don’t condemn it, we can’t deter it. And it’s no excuse that a person is transgender. None at all.”
Then he mentioned a couple of examples regarding homelessness illustrating the same point. “As soon as Iryna Zarutska was killed, the mayor of Charlotte, Vi Lyles, the first thing she said was: We don’t want to demonize the homeless. That was Decarlos Brown Jr. who murdered her.
“And the same thing was true with Rashad Dabney. He murdered Julie Schnuelle, a retired Auburn professor of veterinary medicine. And he was homeless. They had another thing in common. Decarlos Brown had committed 14 felonies and he was out. Mr. Rashad Dabney should have been in jail for five to 10 years. He is charged with a felony and had recently been dropped, and he scot-free.”
In no way, as Victor mentions, is he demonizing trans people or the homeless. What he is calling for is to stop massaging these stories and, in some way, contextualize the violence. They don’t really talk about the victims who were butchered or killed, or the lives of their family and friends that are ruined.
So, Victor’s conclusion is that we need to restore sanity, and whether a person is homeless or transitioning from one sex to another, when they commit violence and destroy another person’s life, if found guilty, there will be swift punishment.
Morality is not just upside-down in such cases considered, sad to say, but we also see those in the USA thinking they are doing good by fighting against those who are keeping law and order, when in actuality they are doing evil.
Only a heart change through faith in Christ can turn a person around to carrying out His morality and goodness. For the true believer in Christ will display His respect, unconditional love, and forgiveness, with a commitment to live out His holiness as revealed in the Bible (Col. 3:12-17). I trust that you are among that number!
Paul Bawden is married and served in the pastoral ministry for 45 years, retiring in 2011. He graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a B.A. in Speech and attended Dallas Theological Seminary, receiving a Master of Theology. He has taken counseling courses at Trinity Evangelical Seminary in Deerfield, Illinois. Paul is a lifetime member of the Evangelical Free Church of America, as well as being a member of Interim Pastor Ministries (IPM), which serves churches during their time of transition in searching for a new pastor. He writes for Union Gospel Press, as well as being a volunteer writer for GotQuestions.org. Paul likes to write, read, bike, and work in the yard. The Bawdens have had the privilege to travel to Mexico and Romania on mission trips and visited various countries in Europe.
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