Edit: not having thumbnails for videos was fucking with me. It looked like I just asked the post title as an open question. I ended up taking a screenshot of the thumbnail, uploading it in the body, and adding the link separately.
Edit edit edit edit: looks like my issue with the video thumbnail not showing is specifically on mobile and it’s a known issue
I’ve been thinking about the central question here for a while. And it really does seem like the category of “trans” is a cultural Other constructed relative to western patriarchy. There seem to be myriad examples of people from other cultures and time periods who we would undoubtably identify as trans by our modern culture’s standards, but would not categorize themselves the same way relative to their own. It’s also become increasingly clear to me that there are also people in modern western society who identify as cis but would be less gender-conforming if not for the societal repression of non-patriarchal gender roles.
As far as I know, there isn’t good terminology to differentiate all of these categories, so talking about genders across cultures becomes messy quickly. As noted in the video, many trans icons even just several decades ago did not call themselves “transgender” but are still identified as such today.
I really digged the Rabbi quote. Fun fact that isn't the whole depressing prayer, you can find it here. https://opensiddur.org/prayers/civic-calendar/international-civil-calendar/transgender-day-of-visibility/prayer-of-kalonymus-from-sefer-even-bohan-1322/
I wanna go back in time 700 years and explain to her that smashing your nuts and drinking tea concentrate will grow you tits (or really anything that helps with menopause, theyve done that for a long time)
So ancient women would drink certain things for menopause, yeah? Turns out theyre high in phytoestrogens and usually were consumed in concentrated batches to fix hot flashes. Low tech way of transition is to castrate yourself by thoroughly smashing your nuts (which will be reabsorbed in the body) and drinking that remedy, though the modern ways are better.
Also more on that Rabbi, its interesting that she brings up Dinah, didn't realize that could be taken as a trans allegory.
Thanks, this channel is a great resource. I’m cis, and lately, gender has been the object of my ponderings. To be honest I’ve always had a lazy, uncritical sort of acceptance for trans people, and I’m trying to develop my thoughts a bit more. Perhaps it is my bias but I think Marx applies extremely well to the subject. Seems that the trans community maybe agrees since Lily does briefly mention Marx in this video. Anyway, I’m going to sleep now but I’m halfway through her other video about TERFs, good stuff.