“Whenever, wherever, however it happens—your first shave is special.” This is the caption of a Facebook ad by Gillette. It features a young person shaving while a father offers encouragement.

What makes the ad unusual is that the person is transgender. The ad has received more than a million views as of this morning.

A strategy that changed America

As “Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Pride Month” begins later this week, we can expect many more messages like this in the media. They are part of a strategy that has been advancing in our culture for more than three decades.

In 1987, a neuropsychiatry researcher named Marshall Kirk and a social scientist named Hunter Madsen (using the pen name Erastes Pill) wrote an essay titled, “The Overhauling of Straight America.” Their strategy later became a book.

I encourage you to make time to read their article in its entirety. It is a fascinating and troubling window into the LGBTQ movement that has swept our country in the years since its writing.

Kirk and Madsen framed a six-part strategy:

1. “Talk about gays and gayness as loudly and as often as possible” to desensitize the public.
2. “Portray gays as victims, not as aggressive challengers,” leading society to assume the role of protector.
3. “Give protectors a just cause” such as anti-discrimination and civil rights.
4. “Make gays look good” by elevating prominent homosexuals and celebrities who endorse them.
5. “Make the victimizers look bad” by associating them with Nazis, KKK members, etc.
6. “Solicit funds” for a massive media campaign.

Their advice for countering conservative churches was especially prescient: “First, we can use talk to muddy the moral waters. This means publicizing support for gays by more moderate churches, raising theological objections of our own about conservative interpretations of biblical teachings, and exposing hatred and inconsistency.

“Second,…