Are Transgender Metaphors Worthwhile?
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 6 พ.ย. 2024
- Does everything have to be transgender?
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I think the point about men not being taught to see themselves in others is spot on! I'm a queer black woman and grew up identifying with characters who were white, or straight, or men, or all three and never thought anything of it because that's who the protagonists of my favorite media were, but a lot of people seem to have just never had to do that and don't think they can (and don't think they should have to).
I can vouch for that as a cishet guy who is close enough to pass for white. I've had to learn how to shut up my inner Karen and listen to the stories of people different from me. To step into somebody who has had experiences I can only understand through empathy and metaphor. And after walking the Witches' Roads of each new story, I come back to the real world a little different than I started.
@@philopharynx7910lol you sound like an idiot
I didn't have that issue but it's probably because as an autist I had to learn to do it explicitly irl.
Combined that with having issue with being understood and my favorite characters to id with have almost always been misunderstood characters who happened to not be cishet.
Ultimate Jessica Drew, Xavin, Evolution's Nightcrawler, Static, James (Pkm), etc... just to name the ones that come to mind atm.
@@philopharynx7910 you sound like you're talking about original sin or something 🤣
@@lordfreeza_ If you are going to sin, you should at least be original about it.
As someone who's been in fanfiction spaces for decades, it's always been interesting when people push back against certain fan theories and fan readings. That character feels trans to you? Awesome. The idea that it needs to be real or intended or that it's invalid because it's not official is dumb. People engage with their favorite pieces of media in a million different ways.
Add on to the top of that the fact that real representation can be PRETTY DAMN SLIM and I truly don't see the problem. I'm ace...if I didn't read aceness into characters, there wouldn't be any ace characters at all.
Thisssss
As a fanfic writer myself I for sure feel you
Tbh I feel like this is part of the crux of the issue. Some folks are so married to what is and isn’t canon that even exploring LGBTQ lenses in the fiction is somehow bad if it isn’t explicitly canon. It’s exhausting tbh.
@@Caterfree10 I completely agree
@@Caterfree10 I agree. I think it also points to a lack of...literary education? for those people--the idea that the author's intent is the only valid lens through which we should read something is very limiting.
This happens a lot between the sapphic and aroace communities. There's a woman who doesn't want to marry a man (Elsa, Merida, Moanna) and we fight over whether she's sapphic or aroace when they can easily be either.
Yeah that's so annoying too.
"Why not both?" A character is like a box you can't see inside, and we don't know what they'll be until it's seen on the page or screen or stage.
I think it's safe to say that Critical Drinker has never had an opinion that wasn't entirely worthless.
I wouldn't say that. If he dislikes something, it's a pretty good indication that that thing is awesome.
His issue with gay subtext and queer readings of fictional sidekicks sounds homophobic and defensive.
My fan cannon for Critical Drinker’s character is that he’s Mr. Plinkett’s son, and he knows but Plinkett doesn’t. Honestly? It makes both characters way better. I should probably just start sharing it as fact to see if it picks up steam and becomes cannon eventually. 😊 Consider: all of Critical Drinker’s nonsense would suddenly be depressing and cruel in totally different ways!
I feel a similar way about non-binary shape-shifters in fantasy and sci-fi media. While it could be read as representing deceitfulness and dishonesty, I personally find it empowering, because it's a fantasy where I get to choose exactly what my body looks like and how I express my gender on any given day. I like being able to mix and match without committing to one gender box as a whole.
Metaphors are powerful because they help us view the world from a POV without the biases that may come with specific labels.
I agree. My favorite character is Jordan Li from Gen V, whose shapeshifting is explicitly linked to their bi-gender identity. Thus they have a male form and a female form.
Me as a transfemme genderfluid non-binary person would likely have more than those two forms if I had Jordan‘s powers.
My response to you may be a simple case of "agree to disagree" like if you prefer coffee to tea, or something, but I will say it.
I think the issue with non-binary shapeshifters is that they can look how they want, which you pointed out. I think you should feel comfortable in your own body, and you don't have to pressure yourself into looking more 'stereotypically' masculine or feminine (or neither) if you don't want to.
I don't find the enby shapeshifter thing offensive or anything, but I don't think it's as representative or clever as it thinks that it is. It works for a fantasy, like you said, but I think that's about it.
@@Zelnyair that’s the thing though. I do want to most times.
And i definitely want to transition, at least via HRT. Not sure yet about surgery but I can still decide that after the HRT has had its effect.
I agree to a certain extent but as a gender-fluid person I somewhat dislike when the shapeshifter is the only non-binary character present. It moves not subscribing to the gender binary to the realm of being a fantasy or sci fi concept for me, like they’re only non-binary because their appearance is so fluid and implicitly, if they couldn’t shapeshift theyd identity with a binary gender. I may be overthinking it and I do respect the power fantasy, but I also really enjoy seeing normal human non-binary characters when we get them. Shout out to Adira
@@Cdr2002 i agree, there should’ve been a non-binary character who is not a Supe. It is states that it was the Compound V (which gives people superpowers) that is responsible for Jordan‘s ability to shapeshift, as in, they are bi-gender regardless. The Compound V just made that aspect of Jordan manifest in the ability to shift between forms.
This is such a tangent from the main point of the video, but the Data thing drives me nuts. It's like, throughout the entire show they were building up this idea that Data *does* experience emotions, in his own way. No one writes a poem about their cat out of pure pragmatic logic. That's love. He has friends. He values them. His desire to be human itself isn't logical, it's, well, human. And I feel like that's where the show was heading for seasons. Even after the emotion chip was introduced, the *way* it was introduced still felt that way to me. When it's used in the show, the emotions it gives him feel "wrong" to him. The fact that it bothers him is another sign he's having an emotional reaction of his own.
And then they just plug it in and turn it on in Generations. Boom. All that development out the window.
I think the little lifeforms song is funny, but it wasn't worth it.
When they kept repeating in the mirror “I am Billy Kaplan!” was definitely a trans metaphor, cause they were suppressing their true identity. That does not erase the fact that they’re overtly a gay male. “Por qué no podemos tener ambos?” Same thing with Spider-Gwen in Across the Spiderverse. She’s not canonically trans, but there are visuals/metaphors sprinkled throughout her story arc that validates a trans reading. To translate what I said earlier in Spanish, Why can’t we have both?!
Creo que usamos "conocer" en vez de "saber" para describir arte por esa razón.
"I believe this is why we [in Spanish] use (a verb for "to know" that leans on the personal perspective) to describe art instead of (a verb for "to know" that refers to universal facts)." I wish English did that.
While Billy isn’t outright trans, the metaphor does feel intentional and I’m not going to take that away; I was among those saying we shouldn’t take away the gay male rep BUT it’s not that I wasn’t saying the METAPHOR itself isn’t valid…
I mean, how many works can be said to have valid metaphors in this sense? More than one might think… I have suggested that the plot of “Shrek 2” plays as not only a queer, but downright transgender metaphor with its main couple and how they’re treated for “transgressing” against the social moors; Shrek even tries to pass as a human using a magic potion, because he wrongly assumes that Fiona would be happier as the human she was born as and thus he tries to “mask” as being OK also becoming human for her sake. But she rejects him losing his true self as she fell for the ogre she married, and she herself has been shown more at ease with her ogress form too… The villain of the movie rejects that ogres are allowed to have “happily ever after”, tries to both manipulate that Fiona becomes fully human (on terms that FGM wants) and that Shrek is punished for daring to break out (either becoming human for Fiona OR marrying her in any manner really…)
Don't use they. Billy uses "he/him." The trans metaphor is one thing but purposely using wrong pronouns is something no trans person ever wants done to them.
I firmly believe Gwen is non-binary.
I remember Lindsay Ellis doing an interesting and what looks to be fun exercise wherein she explains and critiques films through the lens of different disciplines of film theory but only in the context of the Michael Bay Transformers movies. So for example she would critique Transformers through a queer reading or a feminist reading or a socialist reading. The point of the entire exercise was to prove how any film or piece of art can be seen in multiple ways and perspectives and that not has to oppose the other.
I love that series!
I need to see that video!!
@darlalathan6143 the playlist is called "the whole plate" or something like that. So good.
I've just finished reading Terry Pratchett's discworld novels, and there is an approach there that I think that it's similar to how I'm perceiving it on the MCU: Wizards are tied to academic, formal knowledge and hierarchical structure, Witches deal in the everyday magic, the informal passing of traditions, where one doesn't enter a university, but starts in the apprenticeship of a craft. There is both a woman wizard and a male witch explored in Terry's books and neither of these things are forbidden based on gender, but there is a societal expectation of maleness being tied to wizardry and feminity with witchcraft, and it is a palpable part of both these characters stories. There is also no rule that one has to be of a specific type of magic in the MCU, but one cannot deny the societal expectations that come with it, and the way that each societal role is read differently. When Wanda says: "You break the rules and become a hero. I do it, and I become the enemy. That doesn't seem fair." It would be a disservice to it to interpret it without seeing how it is also tied to gender. Something does not need to ONLY be ties to gender to be influenced by it. And, in choosing to follow his mother's footsteps, there's is a connection to feminity there, he's expanding what he can be to include that within him. The fact that society sees witches as less than, but he doesn't, and he wants to be one, it does read as trans experience to me.
wasnt there a character in discworld that was assigned at birth a gender, but magic disagreed or something?
@IsaacMyers1 If there was, I think it may have been one of those characters that is cited once or twice as to establish a precedent and not a character whose story we actually follow. I don't seem to remember such citation specifically, but I do find it likely to be the kind of thing that would've happened on the discworld. I know for sure there was a female wizard as she is cited as precedent of the reverse happening when Tiffany Aching takes in Geoffrey to be an apprentice witch. There is some revolt, both because of his gender and because she appoints him to the cottage of a recently deceased, very important witch, that the other witches were looking forward to be able to fill themselves. But it's ultimately accepted, as witches must keep evolving, and new understandings of magic are part of that.
I believe that Jessie (and Vera on CoG) have both reviewed that book as it’s one of the earliest Discworld books.
The "platonic male friendship" stuff irritates me to no end. My breaking point with this was when it started being applied to hazbin hotel of all shows, a show where you can pretty much count the non-queer characters on one hand. Two of the male characters in the main cast are confirmed to end up in a relationship, and loads of the fans whine about how "Why can't they just be good friends?" etc., it's ridiculous.
er you talking about vox and valentino I don't recall any other male characters in romantic relationships in the show
My far right, conservative sister loves the show which is so queer coded. The irony is honesty funny lmao
Thiiissss, I’m so sick of shipping being mischaracterized as an active attack on platonic friendships
@@lasseehrenreich5502 Valentino and Vox aren't dating, I'm talking about Husk and Angel, it's confirmed that they will end up together.
@@Cajuux it's not even queer coded, it's explicit representation
I hate the thing where people feel like they have to read the trans allegory as explicitly trans femme/masc. Billy literally found himself in a body with no memory and, thus, *no identity*. And he spent three years feeling as if something wasn't right, and he went on a journey to figure out of he "really is." There is a reason why so much weight is put on us finally getting to hear him declare that he is "Billy Maximoff."
The brainrot is unreal in transphobes.
I think that there is a lot of nb and trans masc erasure in favor of the transmisogyny and the fight against it. I don't think it's always malicious erasure, but I'm sure that doesn't make it feel much better
I'm sure there's lots of transphobia involved in the criticism Jessie faced, but even trans people fall into the trap of literalism when engaging with media ("x-charactet is actually secretly trans" vs "this character plays out a transgender metaphor").
@@cedaremberr I doubt the percentage is close to the number of people who think we're "trans-ing" all the characters based purely on any one of us going "I feel a connection to this journey of self-discovery that this character is going through."
We can *joke* about it and weirdos assume we're doing some cartoon villain shit.
Now, I get it! 😃😀
You managed to articulate some feelings I've had about the idea of the "competing" readings and representations, and I think it stings so much because there's so few canonically queer characters we can see ourselves in. Our only recourse is to use lenses, and we're very good at it, but we can be territorial about whats "ours" in those rare times we don't have to. As a trans man I often struggle with the feeling that when I explore readings of (or reactions to) my own identity, that I'm doing something terrible by "taking away" women's representation, because it's not progressive to be a man. Just like you got pushback for exploring the transfeminine reading in Billy, because you're "taking away" the gay representation, and it's not progressive to be straight. I don't know, it made something click for me that I should take a closer look at, at my knee-jerk desire to want to cling to one reading on Billy because he's gay like me, or at the shame I feel but shouldn't have to when I crave narratives of a character taking the same journey of choosing manhood that I did. We're both looking for affirmation there, we both see pieces of ourselves, we both want to be understood, and that shouldn't have to be at odds. It's definitely proof that you're right, in the way that our deep-set feelings are all so much more alike than we treat them as, they all touch on that same core of humanity that we want to be known and loved.
Please allow yourself to connect with female characters and to explore your bond. I (cis woman) sometimes also bond with a male character in that way and I will do so unapologetically and without it taking away anything from my womanhood. Good written characters and many experiences are universal and we can pick and choose however we want to with fictional characters ❤
@@marylincherie1806 I appreciate the spirit of participating, and I fully agree we should try and connect to characters outside of our own identity borders (stories are the best vessels for empathy, after all, and what is the true spirit of queerness if not a radical acceptance of all that is "other" makes us the same?). That said I think you may have misunderstood what I was sharing in my comment. I never said I don't or won't connect to female characters, my point was that I sometimes feel shame and pushback when I try to create transmasculine narratives or transmasculine readings, due to the fear of people thinking I'm "taking away" something from another marginalized group, and then relating it to what Jessie shared about pushback to her transfem metaphor Billy reading. My issue isn't "not allowing myself to connect with female characters", it's the heartbreaking dearth of transmasc narratives that exist in (mainstream) fiction, and accepting it's not wrong to read texts in more radical ways to help understand ourselves and others (and allowing other people to have those same kinds of readings without feeling knee-jerk threatened). And that a lot of other people can relate to this same type of experience, which when you realize that it makes us a little less alone and a little more aware. I'm not sure what you mean by "explore your bond" here.
(Also, please forgive me if I've read the meaning of *your* comment wrong in turn. As I often say, "text-based communication is hard" or simply "text-based communication...")
@@bookshelfpassageway6232 Englisch is not my first language so the mistake is most likely mine. I just wanted to encourage everyone by saying, all our readings are valid and we should celebrate our shared love for a character instead of claiming them as only ours. I at least am happy to share. Only if enough people relate and enjoy the media similar ones will be made in the future.
@@bookshelfpassageway6232 thank you for taking the time to elaborate and answer.
I think some of this conflict comes from an obsession over what is official or "canon" to a work of art. It seems like a lot of modern media analysis focuses on an intended message, and clues and links to larger stories. Especially in stuff like the MCU where almost every work is also a scavenger hunt to see how it connects to something else.
It is interesting to look at a work of art and see what it says to us through our lens though. For example, I really like looking at the character of Big Boss from the Metal Gear Solid series as a transgender metaphor. It's obviously not the intended reading, and Big Boss is not literally a trans character, but it highlights some of the struggles that we all share as humans.
How did I know whose fanbase was harassing you on twitter without even having a twitter account lmao
This video honestly taught me a lot. I guess i always thought the point of media analysis was solely to try to figure out the interpretation that the creator intended and explore that. But what you describe makes so much sense-thank you ❤
6:14 I'm glad you said that, because often times I would hear people say that witches are for women or wizards for men, but depending on which cultures you're talking about, the word "witch" can be gender neutral. For example, some athabaskin tribes (like the navajo) in the American southwest, the word "witch" is a catch-all term for shaman or shawoman who turned evil and would use dark magic for ill-intent.
1:24 I'll just throw this one out there, knowing I'm not trans. A character being trans ~and~ queer takes away nothing from me. All of my trans friends are also bisexual or gay (and one is ace). I accidentally coded the colors of the trans flag into the protagonist of something I'm writing, and if people want to interpret him as trans masc, all power to them, tag me in the fanart, it is a DREAM to create something that people connect with.
I almost made a joke in the comments of your Agatha video about this. I pulled back in the end because I figured you'd get some push back, and I was worried you'd lump me in with that. Tone and intent is hard to get through with just text.
To say though, I've been seeing the most recent Exceptoinal X-Men run as having a solid trans lense, and I'm hella cishet, so it's not just you!
My English/Communication Studies degree sobs whenever people pretend like there is One Correct Reading of a text. The whole point of looking at it from multiple lenses is to deepen your understanding of the text by looking at it in many different perspectives. The author might not have consciously wrote it with a Marxist Lens, but looking at the class politics can give a better understanding of the text.
Speaking on the whole Kurt Cobain thing, the older trans woman who organizes my trans support group knew him. She partied with him. And according to her, he was definitely not cis. I agree that we can't claim him definitively as trans, but he was not cis either. It was a different time back then. We didn't have the labels or the acceptance we do today. If we did, I'd guess he would probably be genderfluid or genderqueer or nonbinary. But there were so many artists like that throughout the years that played with gender and nobody gave it a second thought. Now everyone is under magnifying glass. "WHAT IS YOUR GENDER IDENTITY!!?!" "WHAT IS YOUR SEXUAL IDENTITY!!?!" "WE MUST KNOW SO THAT WE CAN PUT YOU IN A BOX!!!" Back then, it was like if Kurt wants to get 🛤 in a sundress by girl with a 🍆, they just called that rock and roll. 🤘
Thank you for sharing this, I get so frustrated with people saying we can't claim Kurt Cobain. I think its unfair to say he was definitively a trans woman, but its painfully obvious Kurt was not cis. His journal has references to herself in the third person, mentions of experimenting with birth control pills. Kurt was very obviously exploring something gender related, and there is just so much there that is relatable to trans people. Every time I see people come out against the idea its always "men can wear dresses too" which is the type of thing that keeps trans women closeted. Yes men can wear dresses, but why are we talking about men and centering them so much? People reduce the claims that Kurt was not cis to superficial things like presentation, but there is so much more going on there. People just genuinely recoil at the idea of transition or the idea that we can spot our own.
I just clicked in and I'm going to put down my first thoughts. Transition, change, malleability is a human aspect that is unending. Death doesnt even stop it. Layer this on top of the base configuration of a people being so wildly variant and you get the magical kaleidescope that we are.
Now I'm gonna have Jessie drop some perspective on me. 🥳
Have you read The Witch Boy, by Molly Knox Ostertag? It's a middle reader graphic novel, so it's not like it's super robust or deep for an adult, but it's a trans allegory that serves as the kind of fable that I'm sure has already become a corner stone of a lot of kids' personal journeys. It's kind of become my bar for these sorts of things because of how wonderfully efficiently functional it is with what it has to say, because even though it never says "trans" it's 100% unmistakably about being trans. And that's the level of clarity I consider kind of the gold standard
Even more so in that Molly Ostertag, identifying as a lesbian, has been with Nate Stevenson since he was still presenting as a woman; she’d know a lot about different forms of queerness beyond her own and that could be read into it. And yeah, her husband-formerly-wife is a factor regardless of whenever she learned that her spouse wasn’t a cisgender woman.
omg i read that in primary school !!! Im trans now and i loved it. it was probably my first graphic novel, and it still lingers in my mind. Back then i didnt know what being trans was but i related so heavily to the main character, but i didnt know why- i just thought it was cuz i was a "tomboy" ... Its a great book i definetly recommend reading it if u havent already, ima probably re-read it myself lol.
So it’s not so much a “This is my feeling” “No this is my feeling”
It’s “Oh this is our feeling. You get what this feels like.”
Doctor Strange is a sorcerer, a "Warlock" is a term used for an **oath breaker**; someone whose broken sacred spiritual or religious vows.
Calling a user of magic(k) a "Warlock" is like calling a person a traitor
I figured they were evil witches/magic users in general.
I like your emphasis that multiple readings can be valid, that characters don't have to be put into only one box. Like, I'm cool with non-canon queer readings existing, I definitely ascribe to some of them (Dax is def trans!) and prefer to go with the literal textual interpretation in some cases. But I've had some weird encounters before where people would get oddly belligerent if you didn't ascribe to _their_ queer headcanon. Of course, it's fandom, and it's the internet, so people get oddly belligerent about a lot of things, lol.
I'm thinking for example of when Across the Spider-Verse came out, and I got a strong vibe online of "if you don't agree Gwen is trans, you're a transphobe". I personally do think the movie was hinting at her being trans or was at _least_ being very intentional with the allegory, but I was _super_ put off by people saying that sort of thing, even though most of the time it was tongue-in-cheek. Like, nowhere in the text (movie or comics) has anyone said if she's cis or trans, so I don't think it's wrong for someone to think she's cis unless/until confirmed otherwise, or for cis girls/women to identify with her as a cis girl.
I also ...unfortunately... had some encounters with people in real life who glared at you suspiciously if you thought Sam and Frodo were just friends, and who would seriously bristle if you disagreed with their non-canon ships. Like, chill, it's fine for you to prefer non-canon ships! But it's also fine if I have a different headcanon or actually like official canon! I know people are a bit excessive in their opinions online, but those IRL ones are the ones that unfortunately have me putting up my guard sometimes when someone starts to talk about different readings of media.
I see Ponyo as a trans metaphor, but also about transitions as changes through life in general, not just gender. But as a trans person it really clicks with me from that perspective.
same, also saw spirited away as one too. the movie is alot about identity in general but i saw it as that for Kohaku/Haku + chihiro specifcally... Kohaku's identity/name been taken away and he is trapped... Also w chihiro, her name trying to be taken away and her being pushed into this job she doesnt want to be in, she just wants to find her parents and be free again... Also the whole "working hard to be free" seems like a transition metaphor imo. + the whole "trapped in the spirit realm" , also the whole working or you will disapear is my interpretation of dysphoria?
i know the movie is more about identity in general and how capitalism trys to supress it... + And that art is killed by capitalism. + How imporatant identity is... also about hard work... Idk i love the film, this is just one of my interpretations...
I dislike people staking claims on characters like one person owns their reading. When people tell me their reads, I am usually interested in another perspective
If they are too vague, they aren’t worth it.
Nobody makes vague references at least in the US about lesbian relationships anymore, but they still do it for everything else queer.
This. I love enjoying sapphic love in a story and I love seeing non-binary representation but the way lesbian couples and The One Enby™️ have kinda become the “softball” easily digestible versions of queerness in media is somewhat disconcerting
I do love how you are able to look at things beyond the obvious, the hidden messages in art, and also how art is very much interpreted by the beholder
As a gay trans man and practicing witch (also Wiccan was one of my favorites in the comics) I have a lot of thoughts. But for now specifically, I feel like a trans reading and a gay reading can happen simultaneously. If anything, good art can be/will be read differently by different angles and perspectives, it makes it worth talking about. I also think when trans people are brought up people assume trans women specifically, I don't see why a trans masc or non-binary reading couldn't also be explored.
There are parallels in queer experiences as a result of queer people, who may have wildly different identities, disrupting the cishetero-norm in very related/similar ways. So a story can be written with an explicitly queer narrative, with little ambiguities that can push it one way or the other. I think Nimona is a great example of queer storytelling; to say Nimona is a trans/non-binary allegory is entirely accurate, but it's so deeply rooted in the kind of queer experience of so many different people that it is that, but also more than that if you look at it that way.
I think as far as headcanons (which, from the sounds of it, you weren't even really headcanoning so much as pointing out how you related to the story), it's fine to do so laterally. I mean, it'd be kinda weird and I think merit further discussion if someone were headcanoning a canonically queer character as cis/het. I can understand both sides and don't think either is necessarily wrong, lots of people relate to things that don't directly apply to them.
I am reminded of my brief time spent in the Voltron fandom before that show ended (disastrously). One of the main characters who was the "nerdy guy" of the group, is revealed I think at the end of season one? To be a girl who was pretending to be her own brother in order to sneak into the private school they went to, and figure out how he disappeared. As a trans guy myself, I heavily related to this and headcannoned the character as a trans man. However, Voltron was absolutely infested by fandom drama, largely due to the younger demographic of fans. The general concensus was that it was sexist to say they're a trans man, because that would mean there's only one girl in the whole show rather than... two. The problem here isn't that this character could never be trans, or that me relating to them was problematic, ultimately, the problem is that this show sucked generally, and there was only two girls in it at all!!! Similarly with the example of Billy from Agatha All Along, the problem isn't having a trans woman relate to him, it's that there's so few good gay characters in ANY media, that it creates this desire to *protect* the ones we get.
I also think that there can be a small element of exclusion that I've seen cropping up more and more within queer circles lately. Wanting to draw neat little boxes between what is a trans woman, and what is a gay man. When in reality, those two groups have a lot of overlap in experiences, thoughts, feelings, and even people who do strongly identify as BOTH at the SAME TIME. It's complicated. It's *queer*.
Ah Voltron fandom. [drinks something strong]
Thankfully insofar as trans Pidge headcanons went, when her VA Bex started being louder about being nonbinary themselves, the pushback against trans headcanons seemed to ease. If only that were true for other parts of the discourse (I’m a Sheith fan, for reference 🫠).
I am going to finish your video but address a few points as I go which is why my comment might be a little weird.
I find people get too stuck on the differences sometimes. A lot of the similarities in the LGBTQ experience is important to help rely a kind of empathy and understanding to people who might be unable to get it just because they are a little different. It doesn't have to always be read as exactly the metaphor, reading something is based off YOUR experience and the more it relates the better. I tend to view things in a very odd way because I am non-binary.
Witches are an inherently feminine viewed role in magic systems now. This is in part because wizard and warlock (though Warlock has leaned back to its original meaning) have taken on the male systems. It's also important to note because a lot of that is important to the themes. The idea of this mystic, dark feminine. The use was deliberately leveraged by the showrunners (they have discussed this, there was an outroar about it that made me roll my eyes) and so for that reason it is missing the point to kind of ignore it. Yes Male witches exist. Female sorcerers exist too. It doesn't erase the inherit masculine vs feminine energies of the two magic systems. There was a reason Wanda and Strange were at odds in multiverse of madness.
I want to say as someone who was on Tumblr... Sam and Frodo being joked at as gay lasted a while. I find with the issue of seeing platonic friendships as gay, part of it is the danger of erasing male affection as being able to be platonic. The other part is simply heteronormative society whittles away at acceptable male platonic behavior and besides going "Yeah that is alright for straight men and it is also something that can be seen in gay men or something to strive for in a gay relationship." It instead becomes "I am not allowed to do this behavior because it will be perceived as gay, I must reject the very idea it can be gay."
Also side tangent... Sorcerers not Warlocks. It's just confusing to use the wrong word. I want to add to the discussion of the Sorceror/Witch distinction it can actually be comparable to the distinction between Primordials vs the Titans vs The Gods in Greek Mythology. The Sorcerers at the top are the ones in control. There's untrained sorcerors of similar power though it is primarily a more schooled education and then there's Witches which can be taught but are more wild magic. More interacting with nature and where things may or may not go wrong.
Also I want to add as a rule witches' magic systems and working within those type of "wild" rules is STRONGER than Sorcery which is kind of forcing things into your own rules. But this is also what I meant by having to find loopholes. It is also conversely more dangerous. And, hopefully this will be addressed more in Marvel particularly with how Loki actually does both Witchcraft and Sorcery, most magic users actually dabble in a bit of both.
My apologies for my long essay I love these type of videos and discussions and musings on things.
Funnily enough, a friend of mine just forced me to watch "The Vampire Diaries" with her. There are also male/male-read witches there.
short answer yes long answer it is far more complicated and depends on how the story is told
Lily Simpson did a A Great video about it too
I love those videos! Maybe she'll make one about Agatha All Along.
@@realMacMadame maybe she has said several times She is open to suggestions
After the "Is Samus Trans?" discourse in the early 2000s, I've been really gunshy about EVER trying to "interpret" a character in any identity-based way, unless I could throw to a professional interpreter's interpretation (like yours!)
On a sillier note, MY MAN-WITCH!!!!!!
Glad to see you're still making content about things you want to discuss. You have an audience who likes to hear what you have to say. I hope you're getting rest and feeling better. :) Honestly, whether or not entertainment is meant to be read as queer, the fact that some of these shows and movies allow a viewer to read that, to perceive that, and not immediately trample it, is important.
12:25 My apologies if I made it seem like our beliefs were antagonistic to each other. My intention with writing that comment was more so along the lines of how your take reminded me of how society (or at least the people I grew up with) acted as if our positions were antagonistic, and having to sit in the fact that they truly aren't. The parts of this video about society certainly help with me sitting in it.
I absolutely love this video (and all your videos. I'm tempted to start certain shows just to further understand your videos (Andor, Acolyte, Dr Who, the Rings of Power)) and love that I was able to be a part of you giving your take on this situation - through this video.
I appreciate all the Care that you and your audience have given to me and my comment.
Keep being your amazing self
💜💜💜
there was nothing wrong with your comment last time it just allowed us to have this wonderful discussion now. thank you for being so honest and open about your life. I hope you can enjoy Billy's story for a very long time.
I can see Billy being a bit of trans metaphor, but I don't think that's intentional. If anything it's coincidental, maybe even a bit subliminal, because gay and trans coming out stories, and self-acceptance and exploration are so similar that there's a lot of overlap. I think the major problem is that we need more trans representation in media. One of my favourite podcasts to listen to is Totally Trans, which often talks about popular media through a trans lens, much how you were saying. But is Billy literally trans? No. Not in my opinion.
I don't think they'll do this, but my worry is that they'll actually make Tommy trans. Like as a big surprise twist, Billy gets to the end of the road, and he's like "I want to see my brother", and we just see an image of this girl. And that's the end of this show/season. I fear what kind of story that would be because I only see that ending up being bad trans representation.
I'm sure there is a trans writer out there that could write Tommy as trans and have it make sense and be good representation. But knowing Disney as a company, they would never make a character explicitly trans because then they wouldn't be able to sell that show or movie in transphobic markets. Which is quite honestly disgusting that your are sacrificing stories and choosing to exclude certain marginalized identities in order to get bigots' money.
I very much appreciate when you make these videos in response to various critique youv'e recieved. It's so easy to take a critique or opposing argument as saying you're wrong and shouldn't even bring this topic up. But you always respond to it as a genuine question and a reason to both elaborate your point and explore the effects of the analysis in the first place. I really like when you get opposing responses to your takes, as long as they are done with good faith and with the intention to broaden the different perspectives instead of shuting someones experience down.
Billy's story is already a story about a journey of self discovery of a gay man, though. We even see a joke about getting out of the closet. I mean, sure, anyone can identify with his journey in some level or another... But this is a story about a gay guy, and for gay men his story is really relatable, his journey with his identity, self discovery, especially since the age it happens is around the age most gay guys would start understanding more about our sexuality.
a highlight of the first season of DS9 to me were a few scenes of Sisko talking to Dax and kind of momentarially forgetting about Jadzia, particularly in the episode where Jadzia is made to answer for the supposed crime of a previous life.
Jessie, that's an amazing discussion. It was a delight to listen to your arguments. And I'm 100% on board with your position that it's possible to read the same character, or scene, or whatever under many lenses, each one revealing a road that gets us to a different destination. And ultimately, most (if not all) people will read characters and situations in light of their own experiences, so it's totally valid that a transgender person would notice the codes of their transgender experiences in a story that's about a gay witch teen boy. At the end of the day, all of those "scripts" that people hold on to and say "this is a gay story", "this is a straight story", "this is a transgender story" are constructed boxes. In life, all of us have experiences that intermingle, that are familiar, that are recognizable or relatable, despite our different identities.
Thank you for taking the time to explain the concept of different readings and lenses. I feel like this used to be something very common in fandom but in recent years it seems like everything has become about 'proving' an interpretation is true or canon. Probably an artifact of the shift in representation recently. A lot of people in fandom are young enough not to remember when queer coding was the only queerness we could expect and having to do readings to get that feeling of representation.
I think there is value in switching between queer readings to highlight details of a character and there is so much common experience between fem gay men and trans fems. Billy is an excellent character for that kind of analysis. The way he feels disconnected from his body and his uncertainty about who he is really lends itself to a trans reading. Viewing him that way doesn't take away from his value as a canon gay character because both concepts of the character can exist at the same time.
1. Hearing you discuss Tehanu and its origins as a book (which I wasn't aware of previously) was genuinely fascinating.
2. I'm not trans, but I definitely get a lot out of trans readings of works that may or may not invite said readings. The most interesting ones I've come across are Lor Gislason's review of Possessor, Willow Maclay's review of Under The Skin, and Sasha Geffen's review of Titane. I'll echo your sentiments in saying that they have made me think more about what it means to be human.
3. Also, doing trans/queer readings of works not intended for such is also very fun, in my opinion. When I read them it usually comes as additional praise for the work, since it proves the work is dense and well-made enough to invite interpretation like that.
There's another fantastic gendered breakdown of magic in the Terry Pratchett Discworld series! Specifically the book Equal Rites.
It's crazy how much queer infighting could be solved by a simple _¿Porque no los dos?_
Like, I'm just happy we got Billy back. Maybe we can even get a Hulkling for the crazy gay space wedding, a boy can only dream.
But why would I have to take away your happiness to validate my own? I didn't see the trans metaphor, I let myself be distracted by the arms. But that doesn't mean it's not a feasible reading. It just means I'm not sensitive to trans metaphors.
We're supposed to be the LGBT+ _community,_ not the LGBT+ _fight club_
Pretty much anything that challenges hierarchal power structures can be a valid trans metaphor, because colonialism encompasses and is the origin of all forms of systemic discrimination, including transphobia. It's not the only thing included, but it's definitely part of the bigger picture. Or you can take the metaphors one by one:
* Any fictional race that experiences fantasy racism. There is going to be a lot of overlap with the way queer people are treated.
* Any monster fiction. Monsters are literary representations of the fears and anxieties of the society of the time, not just of the unknown, but also of the stranger, the foreigner, or the minority.
* Any superhero fiction, particularly where they have secret identities. This can more generally be a queer allegory for obvious reasons.
* Stories about death and rebirth. Basically shedding your old identity and taking on a new one, with a new start.
* Shapeshifters, including or especially stories where they're vilified by the narrative. That said, we do need more heroic or sympathetic shapeshifters for a change.
* Any other type of queer story. The trans experience has a lot in common with that of other queer identities, and most trans people have these other identities already.
I would utterly love more content on Ursula K. LeGuin.
I'm a cis gay man, and I've been around the block a few times. There's so many gay metaphors I've picked up on over the years (some intended, some not) that you reading Billy's journey as a trans metaphor, even though I did not pick up on those themes until they were pointed out, just makes sense.
We all have different experiences. Different queer folks reading different things from the same media shouldn't really be a shock, because we read into media differently than cishet folks already.
So I got to learn something new from your review since I did not have the experiences to pick up on how that episode could be a trans metaphor.
Some of the sequences that really made an impression on my trans friends made an equally strong impression on my friend with D.I.D. The unease and anxiety of knowing that one SHOULD know their surroundings but not recognizing anything was very familiar to them.
Isn't that so cool?
just here to say that Tombs of Atuan was really important for me and i definitely have some trans metaphor interpretations in that. always love when you mention Le Guin! it was her birthday yesterday 💗 love your videos so much!
happy yesterday's birthday
Yes! Allegory and applicability are different things. Like Tolkien actually said, but no one ever acknowledges the context of. ;p
Something that can be easily overlooked when reading/interpretting a piece of art is that multiple different readings can be valid even if them might seem to be conflicting. This can be even more difficult when intepreting a character compared to something like a painting.
The modern labels we use are products of our particular time and place. There's a heavy emphasis on self-identification, specificity, and consistency, which doesn't necessarily have to be that way. Regarding Sam and Frodo, the intense feelings they feel for each other are clearly SOMETHING meaningful to them, but whether that falls on one side or the other of "homosexual" and "homosocial" is... unclear.
The same goes for feelings of gender incongruence. You mentioned Kurt Cobain in your video--a couple others that have started to pop up recently are Franz Kafka and H.P. Lovecraft. Both of them channeled their intense disgust and discomfort with their bodies into horror of different types. Was that disgust "gender dysphoria" as we'd call it today? We'll never know, because those two either didn't have a concept of gender as we have today, and/or they weren't ready to fully process that in their lifetimes.
And I guess to the point of your video--is there value in staking our flag on their experiences? I think in some sense it's valuable, because it helps people today feel like they're not alone. They know that the things they feel now are things people have felt since the dawn of time--from Inana and Elagabalus to Harry Allen and Doctor James Barry. But I understand the hesitation to put a label on somebody that they might not have or would not have used for themselves, even if they'd had it back then.
Something interesting about the topic of the relationship between Frodo and Sam is that I remember that in the mid-2000s both were read as gay characters in a pejorative sense by many fans, this in contrast to the "more masculine plot" of Aragorn and the others. Now, they are a symbol of a platonic friendship between men and reading their relationship as gay is taken as an insult by these fans.
If we count Billy, then he's both one of the closest things Marvel has a to a male witch, and one of the few explicitly gay characters. Add that to the fact that the contrast between him and Tommy makes it very clear that we are meant to associate him with his mother, him basically being the Wanda to Tommy's Pietro, and you could be forgiven for considering him a bit "girl-coded". It just kinda helps hammer the point home even more, at least for me.
I'm always impressed with your analysis skills and eloquence. Your perspective is really precious on various subjects!
With the Frodo and Bilbo, there was a time I was appealed by the gay reading of it. But in the end for me the friendship and what it does, the messages are stronger whithout it. Because when they are gay men who are venerable and open and soft with each other, fits the societal norms and expectations. But without that lens, it contradicts the societal norm and shows, Men can be vulnerable with each other, soft, kind. No need for the strong silent bottling up your emotions... stuff.
those aren't metaphors, those are **analogies** or **meta-contextual elements**,
a metaphor is phrase like saying "take with a grain of salt" as a phrase for "have healthy skepticism/doubt about the truth of something"
I think its the passion thats the priblem. Everybody is entitled to any understanding of media they want. Allegory should be kn the behest of the reader, should they choose to use it.
I see Billy as femboy which great since I don't think we have had any femboy like characters in mainstream media yet.
With somethng well written, you will usually identify with some of the characters and see yourself in them. This is indication of good writing.
Doesn't mean it was what the the writer intended or that any other reader\watcher will also see that connection. But as long as that connection is real for you, then the writer has done their job. THey have created something that you can identify with.
Hiya!
I haven't started Agatha All Along just yet. No particular reason. Though, your description makes it sound like something I've been looking for, for a LONG time! You mention a young boy who wants to be a witch. Witches are typically female-coded, even though there's no hard and solid reason why. This boy also looks up to Agatha as a guide or role model. That's something I've wanted to see normalized. I want to see a world where a boy can look up to a woman as a positive example and say, "Hey, I want to be just like HER, when I grow up!" I want to see a new generation super hero who looks up at a legacy hero and do their best to carry on that values. We've seen young women like Kate Bishop, X-23, and a whole bunch of bats and birds follow Bruce Wayne. I just can't think of any time I saw it the other way around.
I see your point. Also i can understand how the mirror exercise resonate for our trans adelphes. I think there is no point in negate that. I mean clearly this series will be probably the more queer we can get from Disney. I am just happy everyone can see and enjoy something specially in our queer community.
Is everything 'Trans'? What a silly question. Of course it is. Trans all the things.
I forgot who said it, I think some very famous musician, about interpreting a text by them in a certain way: "If you see it, it's there". Generally i'm a little astounded that we're still having that discussion. You can totally have different readings about the same character. Characters mean different things to different people.
My two cents: I was raised by well-meaning but negligent parents and missed out on a lot of 'basic' information in my formative days. For instance, I had no idea what religion or god was.
I also never had a concept of gender or sex as being divided into roles and presentations or anything like that. From my POV, people are who and what they are, and the whole battle over definitions falls firmly into MYODB (a Tim Walz reference) territory. I don't see why people have to define others like that. Which means that I have always been polyamorous and undefined, more or less, because shapes and chromosomes don't dictate lives.
Big picture, I agree so strongly that it is always correct to look at media through whatever lens you can apply thoughtfully and it's completely normal and good to read characters in contradictory ways depending on the lens being applied. I really want more people to get more comfortable with this.
I have some stray side thoughts too. They're kind of related actually, despite being about different things. First, I am interested in the way you're talking about witches not having to be women. To approach that maximally literally, I would say, well that depends doesn't it? Witches exist irl and in fiction, and in fiction there are different rules for whether being a witch is strictly gendered or not. And, we may not prefer fictional worlds to say "witch means woman period end," I'm inclined to say that if a text says that then it's true in that text.
BUT, that's really only the beginning of how I would think about the question. So like, I think about my beloved anime shows Madoka Magica and Revolutionary Girl Utena. In Madoka, witches are the enemies magical girls fight. They're not anthropomorphic, they're fantastic dreamy/nightmarish labyrinths. They are also all former Magical Girls. Madoka is DOING something with gender here, right? This is a story about girls, about the way the burdens of the world fall on girls and the way girls burn out. It's important that Magical Girls in this story are girls and that Witches are former girls.
In Utena the figure of the witch is an Extremely specific archetype that the show explains to the viewer in one of the last episodes. It's the girl who ruined everything, who took the light from the world. Utena is even more consciously and intentionally talking about girls here. It is talking about how and why girls are villainized and blamed in a specific misogynistic way. It's not by accident that The Witch in this show is a girl.
More broadly though, we have to acknowledged that being a witch is to be feminized in pretty much any piece of fiction, as well as in real life. So like, when a person irl calls themself a witch when they are not a girl, it would be willfully dense to not understand that as a performance of femininity. So like, ok sure men can wear dresses but typically they're doing that for very specific reasons, yes? Similarly, ok, men can be witches but the witch is still a very gendered archetype.
I also want to talk about the relationship between gay men and trans women. Increasingly, I believe that the problem with the modern strong bold line between "sexual orientation" and "gender" is that gender identity and performance is very fundamentally structured around heterosexuality. I'm inclined to resist as assimilationist the idea that gay men are just like straight men but with one small insignificant difference. Cis LGB people deeply challenge heterosexuality and the gender binary as systems. We are doing gender "wrong" in a way that is almost anathema to what the gender binary even is. So like, yeah actually it makes complete sense that there would be overlap in the characters that can legitimately be understood as transfeminine as as cis gay men. Transfeminine people and cis gay men both deeply challenge society by rejecting their privileged status and taking on stigmatized trappings of femininity. You challenge the system in a fundamentally similar way. Not to get too far out of my way, but it's not by accident bigots use the same slur for both.
Idk, everyone can do whatever they want forever, but I do think that lesbians and trans men and also that gay men and trans women need to be able to understand their respective historical community overlap and shared experiences. Of course we would imprint on similar characters? Idk, I know I'm potentially sliding into the ground of misgendering people and invalidating people's gender identities and I hope I'm not coming across that way. I just think that even though we end up in different places we should be able to see how much our stories tend to overlap and share struggles and characteristics.
having not watched the video, I can safely say: that as I am trans, everything is trans to me and therefore everything is trans. thank u
I've been thinking about how the 'magical species/creatures = marginalized minorities' often trips and falls either on its face or off a cliff depending on how badly it's used, and at this point, I'm so tired of it. Just give me magical species/creatures AND as many different kinds of people as possible. Also, friendship and romance aren't mutually exclusive, but a lot of people seem to think so.
[Tehanu is my favourite Earthsea book, by the way. I'm so glad that other people like it, too. Any chance of an in-depth Earthsea video or Ursula Le Guin video in the future?]
I often see myself in Batman! Even before my transition, I saw myself in Amazon characters such as Buffy or Xena! For some reason, I collected every news or magazine article about LGBT people!
Queer readings of all sorts of varieties are great. And like so many aspects of queerness, I think they exist along spectrums. From Vera Wylde's incredibly fun trans reading of Stephen Franklin on Babylon 5 which owes more to a tumbler meme than the content of the show, through to Spider-Gwen where it really feels like the movie writers dug deep into trans themes.
There's a validity to all these readings, regardless of intent in creation. Sometimes you have queer interpretations of characters like Mystique and Destiny, Juggernaut and Black Tom, Kitty Pryde and Rachel Summers where it was very much the intent of the authors but left vague or hidden on the page due to various editorial pressures. Sometimes you have characters like Samwise Gamgee and Frodo Baggins, written as the relationship between a batman and his officer, through the lens of WWI--a relationship which isn't necessarily queer, but in reality more than a few of these relationships were gay as well... and Tolkien knew some of these folks personally, he read and respected their poetry, and it's possible that there was romantic authorial intent as well. Sometimes interpretations are out of whole cloth, entirely what the reader brings to the text. It's great when folks can find joy and meaning in these readings as well.
Getting more specific, there are themes which lend themselves to particular readings. When you have characters who don't feel like themselves, who have to struggle to discover their identity, those themes often align with trans readings. But they're also not exclusively or necessarily trans. It's a Venn diagram with all sorts of overlap, but it's not just a circle--in either direction--neither fully contains the other, and that's beautiful. I think what I've chaffed against somewhat in the Agatha All Along reviews is the definitive oomph of statements like "The show is deliberately written as a trans metaphor," which doesn't really seem the same as "I really relate to this character's journey, and think his narrative lends itself to reading through a trans lens." There's a way it sounds like there's only correct one reading of the character, and a way which leaves more room for other readings.
The thing that really clicks with me about Billy Maximoff is that he's not a wizard or sorcerer, druid or magician--he's a witch. The traditionally feminine style of spellcaster, while himself a young man. As a guy who knits, and has spent a reasonable amount of time knitting in public, I can related to some of that, and I wouldn't describe my experience as a trans one. There's something in defiance of traditional gender norms to it, but again it's a Venn diagram not a circle, and the ways in which gender-norm-defiance and transness don't overlap are illustrative to each. If someone views their genderfuckery as transness, I'm greatly in favor. But when someone doesn't view their genderfuckery as being trans, we shouldn't gainsay them. At least not parasocially, where people don't actually know each other.
I'm aware that there's a shitty double standard here. Queer interpreters and interpretations are often asked to leave wiggle room, while cishet interpretation often loves to be absolute, present itself as the only valid way to read a text. Personally, I don't think anyone should be that definitive, but I'm also not leaving comments on the youtube reviews of anti-woke creators who are objectively worse and far more exclusionary to readings from other perspectives--not just to avoid providing engagement, but also because I just don't want to spend time in those spaces.
I think that's part of the context for so much around this. So much of the world is shit right now, for trans folks, queer folks, cishet folks. So many of us are worried it's all going to get much worse. I'm on edge all the time these days, facing nine kinds of pain and ten kinds of fear, and feeling like it's all beyond my capacity to control. But what can I do? I can argue about Billy Maximoff in a comments thread on a rather safe youtube channel.
Philosopher and Psychologist William James (at least I think it was William James) wrote something to this extent: no two people will argue so fervently as those who agree on nine out of ten points. I don't think that's actually correct, but sometimes it feels accurate (we've all witnessed shipper wars). I love and respect everyone here, even when I disagree about that 10th point.
Queer theory offers a framework for reading media texts that embraces the intersections of class, race, ethnicity, gender and sexuality. As readers of media texts our interpretation is influenced by the dominant ideologies within society.
I'm autistic and emotional, because I cried over a lost kitten, twice! I'm also transgender but due to my autism, didn't spot the transgender subtext in the Matrix until a TH-cam video pointed it out!
Laughs in episode 7s outfit
I've just realised I'm gender-fluid non-binary and come out to friends, I'm 41 and now understand if there was more representation and conversations with trans and queer I would probably have thought about and realised earlier in life. There is so much I'm now started to realise about gender and sexuality that is making the world become so much more clear and beautiful for me and I just hope the fact we have gay main characters and hopefully trans in the future we'll just keep adding more and just have them in the show without their trans or sexuality being a main plot in their story. But I guess it's always baby steps in our society.
But you should be able to see them as both or either gay or trans, I heard about the Gwen trans theory before I was even think about trans gender stuff and thought that was pretty cool and made sense with the colour scheme and plot with her father. Now I'm trans she's one of my idols and I love her so much because she represents what I am and she's awesome.
Sorry for the long rant ADHD right lol, great content Jessie.
14:55 My first read, as a young'n, was that they were intimate as friends can be. It wasn't romantic at all. It was just two very good friends going through trauma together.
Other interpretations aren't going to crush mine. They will add to it. More nuance, more analysis, more fun! Relating to fictional characters is empathy in action. We can all use the practice 😊.
"ST DS-9, because I'm a huge nerd..." LMAO. I love that show, but it's deeply problematic in so, so many ways. But you're absolutely right about Dax.
6:15 I’ve always heard witches are female coded (brides of Satan in some interpretations), with warlocks being the male coded versions of witches.
Wizards would be more akin to the female version of witches, interesting how one is more demonized than the other
Warlock just means oathbreaker
If you go to the Old English, the root word for Witch has masculine and feminine forms (wicca {M} and wicce {F}, with various text accents that I can't really reproduce) which would probably both translate to "witch" today, and the old meaning simply referred to magic, soothsaying, divination. More closely analogous to sorcerer or wizard, whose word origins have more to do with the act of working magic.
The root of Warlock is deceiver, liar, traitor, oathbreaker. In context, one who betrayed Christianity for the Devil. In Medieval Europe, that overlapped, so Warlock and Witch became equivalents, but linguistically the origins are very different.
However, there's also some overlap with a trend in the words a lot like various professions where there are masculine and feminine versions, and the male version is typically presumed to be more professional, more skilled. A Doctor and a midwife. A Chef and a cook. A Fashion Designer and a seamstress. A Wizard and a witch. One is more powerful, more knowledgeable, more of an authority.
Transformation is one of the most important parts of both magic and storytelling. If you walk the Witches' Road, the one who arrives is not the same person as the one who leaves. This show is all about this. William to the Teen to Billy is a transformation, and witchcraft does have strong femme energy. If the trans reading is strong enough for a clueless cishet guy to get it, then it's definitely a strong way to see this. I think that the MCU is better with a little queer in it. This isn't enough, but considering that they are fighting Disney here, it's a good start.
So, that's why I often played female fighter/magic users in Dungeons & Dragons in college!
Good screen adaptation of Earthsea WHEN? That would make my life complete.
My understanding is that asking "What if William Kaplan/Billy Maximoff is a trans metaphor?" is worth asking even if he isn't.
23:00 The differences and similarities between male and female magic is discussed as early as the introductory pages of A Wizard of Earthsea.
I read that as feminist critique on first reading, because it seemed quite blatant that the only real difference was societal expectations of what men and women had to do and be.
Women firmly relegated to the domestic, while men are doing the big, important outside stuff.
That did not read like coincidence or oversight, but as very deliberately placed sexism. Maybe she regretted not punching the reader in the face any harder with it, but it was baked into the world building from the start that this is completely arbitrary, and to me personally it felt like obvious setup for the feminist arc about demanding equal rites (Pratchett reference! Woop!).
I choose to be optimistic about the prospect of cis people being willing to empathize with characters and situations with clear parallels to trans experiences (and/or with the experiences of trans characters). It's not quite the same as "your experience is different from mine in a way I can't quite understand, but I can respect it," but when it comes without the denial of the parallel to trans experiences (and that'll vary among cis viewers/readers) it seems to suggest an increasing possibility for trans inclusion to be more the norm.
Like with Agatha All Along -- I don't think they intended Billy Kaplan to be trans, but I would not at all be surprised to hear that they intended his experiences to resonate with trans folks' experiences in an empathetic way, and I think it's a worthwhile reading whether intended or not.
Everything is about anything if you think about it enough and believe enough
I was wondering if the different readings only work in an ambiguous situation where one defaults to their personal "normal" may it be heteronormativity, romantic relationships, bi erasure, cis-ness etc. The more explicit media becomes the more readings will be eliminated, won't they? Nobody is taking about the great friendship Willow and Tara had as since they became girlfriends this reading is no longer existent, right? I would assume that with much more representation multiple readings will be less often. I also don't think they are inherently wrong. (I'm not native in English.)
I got sent this after I talked about how Unbreakable works very well as a trans allegory.
Dr. Strange is a sorcerer, not a warlock.
If you give him sour cream and guac, he becomes the Sorcerer Supreme.
Oops this Transgender Demigirl here to see, and lots of love to all.
The only time I saw a trans meta is The Doctor (Doctor Who) ever since 12 (male), going to be turned into 13 (woman) and back as a male when she turned into 14
Because as we all know, there can only be one thing which is true at any given time. /s
18:28 The trans experience is a human experience. We can all relate at least a little. Its bullshit to say you cant relate to a well developed character.
Off the top of my head, I've had to supress part of my identity for the first part of my career. Being an ally would have slapped me with the woke label and I would have not received the training I needed. However, I was able to be true around a small selection of people and those relationships kept me going. Now, as a full Journeyman, I have protections that apprentices don't. I'm out as an ally, as an atheist, as a supporter of equal rights and bodily autonomy.
How many queer experiences relate to "it isnt safe to be myself"? And why the hell shouldn't I see myself in those stories? You dont have to be a carbon copy of a person to have empathy. ❤
I love your videos!
But every time you list important Star Trek characters, I am forced to wonder, have you even *seen* Voyager?!
Jordan Li from Gen V!
Wiccan was always queer coded (beyond being gay) and is dating a shapeshifter.
The skrulls of both the Young Avengers and the Run Aways imply very heavily that skrulls experience gender in a very different way. In both cases, it's heavily implied that their gender identity is built around their most important relationships.
Hulking becomes more masc as the series goes on while Xavin commits heresy by refusing to perform anything other than fem female (Xavin started as a masc super-soldier-trainee).
While irl they are religions where men can be witches, they are also branch of wiccan where a witch is a womenly art and in Norse mythos they are male and female magical arts.
Wiccan is coded as a witch in Marvel (which is usually based on the "must be a chick" branch of wicca) and Norse coded. His first name was "Asgardian" and his magic absolutely falls under the "women's magic" category by Norse standards.
Trans issues have always been very close to that generation of heroes. The show indirectly commenting on transidentity/drag is expected.
I'm still a bit mad they used Spider-Gwen for the transmetaphore in Spider-Verse. I love Ultimate's Jessica Drew. The og marvel trans character. The og Spider trans character. A trans Parker. Overlooking her for Gwen is basically a confirmation that the character I loved is being left in the past. But oh well. The queen is dead. Long live the queen.
This situation is (partially) eye opening to me because in my head im like "why are people mad about this? a trans METAPHOR doesnt mean the character is trans, it just means its an experience of not belonging in a place or way of living in which all people but especialy trans people can relate to and thats all", but we all think differently after all. Im a gay man that grew up surrounded by women and I relate to billy and his life experience, and Jessies reading doesnt take that away from me or from anyone. Moreover, this is marvel, who in their sane mind think theyre ever gonna make Billy trans anyway? That's ridiculous, its never gonna happen even if we wanted to. A gay character can mean other things to other queers and thats beautiful, why do we have to pretend as if we own a character and no one else can take anything away from them? I swear, being queer is less exhausting than dealing with queer infighting and discourse online. We all need to take a sip and breathe for once.
I love hearing reads of art that are different from my own. It's the (only) reason I watch some of the more right-leaning essayists like the Critical Drinker. I guarantee that I won't see the show/movie like he did. I also don't think there's an objectively "wrong" read on a work of art unless the read uses evidence that ISN'T in the work or, like, directly lies about what's on screen. Anyway, I hope to hear more trans reads of stuff because I may not be able to see it that way myself due to my own ignorance or whatnot.
i always wanted to ask this what are your thoughts on the movie dark city versus the matrix.
Take a shot every time they say 'lenses' and 'intended'.