VICTOR JOECKS: Mario Lopez was right. 3-year-olds shouldn’t pick their gender

When my son was 3, he would bear crawl out of his room, proclaiming, “I’m a turtle. I’m a turtle.”

It was incredibly cute. It didn’t, however, make him a turtle. But if he had come out of his room and declared he was a girl, a vocal segment on the left believes that would have made him a girl.

Just look at what happened last week to “Access Hollywood” host and former “Saved by the Bell” star Mario Lopez. Lopez was asked about the trend of Hollywood celebrities, such as Charlize Theron, allowing children to pick their own gender.

“If you’re 3 years old and you’re saying you’re feeling a certain way or you think you’re a boy or a girl or whatever the case may be, I just think it’s dangerous as a parent to make this determination then, ‘Well, OK, then you’re going to a boy or a girl,’ ” Lopez said.

Lopez called it “sort of alarming and my gosh, I just think about the repercussions later on.” He added that kids “don’t know anything about sexuality yet. You’re just a kid.”

Reread these comments. There’s nothing that even slightly controversial for anyone who’s ever met a 3-year-old. They need constant care and supervision to stay alive. They think running to the couch and closing their eyes is a good hiding spot for hide-and-seek. They’d eat ice cream for breakfast, lunch and dinner if they could.

Yet the self-proclaimed advocates of diversity and tolerance couldn’t handle even the slightest dissent from current leftist orthodoxy.

“The real dangerous action is when someone with a public platform uses bad science to speak against a vulnerable group of children,” tweeted the radical group GLAAD.

You have to laugh at the irony of people citing science for the notion that 3-year-olds can pick their own gender.

“The opinions he expressed in this interview do not reflect those of ‘Extra’, ” a statement from the show he co-hosts read. As of this writing, it’s unclear if Lopez will keep his job. He wasn’t on the show’s set for at least two days last week.

As you would expect, the media coverage was slanted too. “Mario Lopez says it’s ‘dangerous’ for parents to support transgender kids,” a headline from NBC News read. Except he didn’t say that. No need to sweat the facts when there’s a heretic on the loose. Burn him!

Predictably, Lopez caved.

“The comments I made were ignorant and insensitive,” he said in a statement. Notably, he didn’t explain what new information caused his reversal.

That isn’t surprising because what changed Lopez’s opinion wasn’t logic, but pressure — including the possibility of losing his job.

It’s a modern version of happens to Winston Smith in the book “1984.” Winston rebels against Big Brother and is then tortured by a man named O’Brien. Winston’s crime is not believing the truth is what Big Brother says it is.

“How can I help seeing what is in front of my eyes?” Winston asks. “Two and two are four.”

“Sometimes, Winston,” O’Brien says. “Sometimes they are five. Sometimes they are three. Sometimes they are all of them at once. You must try harder. It is not easy to become sane.”

Sometimes a boy is a boy. Sometimes he’s a girl. Sometimes he’s a turtle. It is not easy to be politically correct in 2019.

Victor Joecks’ column appears in the Opinion section each Sunday, Wednesday and Friday. Listen to him discuss his columns each Monday at 10 a.m. with Kevin Wall on 790 Talk Now. Contact him at vjoecks@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-4698. Follow @victorjoecks on Twitter.