Mastodawn

fracpete Feb 25

'i am no man' Charlotte Eowyn!

It is 222 A.D. You are the transgender Empress Elagabalus, "call me not a man for I am a woman". Transitioning is new and experimental.

It is 1776. You are "Public Universal Friend", a transmasculine nonbinary Quaker. Transitioning is new and experimental.

It is 1906. You are Karl M. Baer, a trans man undergoing sex reassignment. Transitioning is new and experimental.

It is 1930. You are Lili Elbe. Transitioning is new and experimental. (to be fair you did get a uterus transplant.)

It is 1966. You are in Compton's Cafeteria with a bunch of other trans people when the owners call the cops to throw you all out. You riot. Transitioning is new and experimental.

It is 1969. You are Marsha "pay it no mind" Johnson. You are in a mob-run gay bar when the cops attack. You throw a brick. There is a bit of a scuffle. Transitioning is new and experimental.

It is 2026. You are a transgender adult or child listening to the NYT and British Guardian claim this is the first generation anyone has tried transitioning in. Transitioning is new and experimental.

Miriam's on Medical Leave Feb 25

@CharlotteEowyn i did a relatively thorough media search and purported surprise at the existence of trans people crops up every eighteen months (i think?) back to the invention of newspapers. anyway, its a constant staple of the news and always has been.

'i am no man' Charlotte Eowyn!Feb 25

@miriamrobern that's amazing

Jargoggles Feb 25

@miriamrobern @CharlotteEowyn
You can always rely on the news to tell us that nobody wants to work anymore, kids are more disrespectful than they used to be, and trans people are new and scary.

@jargoggles @miriamrobern @CharlotteEowyn

"Kids today: They got no respect, they dress like bums, and their music is just noise." -- Aristotle (attributed)

Brodeuse LucileDT Feb 28

@LevZadov @jargoggles @miriamrobern @CharlotteEowyn also E. Nasir

Evelyn Estelle Feb 25

@miriamrobern @CharlotteEowyn If you happen to already have this in a detailed article with citations, it would be nice to wave it around whenever the topic comes up.

Miriam's on Medical Leave Feb 25

@dragonfi @CharlotteEowyn sadly i just posted it to fedi. i didnt have the bandwidth to really do it up for proper publication.

Evelyn Estelle Feb 25

@miriamrobern @CharlotteEowyn Can you share the link? (I could probably go trough your timeline, but you probably know better where to look.)

Miriam's on Medical Leave Feb 25

@dragonfi @CharlotteEowyn i actually have no idea sorry :(

@miriamrobern @CharlotteEowyn that's a great demonstration of the epistemology of ignorance, whereby cis white people can have a personal revelation once or twice per generation, every generation forever without ever having to actually change anything.

snowyfox Feb 25

.

cassie, mothgirl object Feb 25

@CharlotteEowyn

It is 1865. You are Doctor James Barry, stealth transgender man and former Inspector General for the British army. You leave notice that upon your death your body must not be examined. This is not followed, and a media circus follows with a shocking gender reveal. Transitioning is new and experimental.

It is 1876. You are author Marc/Marie de Montifaud. You "crossdress" as a man when visiting the library for research, use the names Marc and Marie interchangably, and your pronouns are known by multiple people to be she/he. Transitioning is new and experimental.

It is 1880. You are known mononymously as the decadent author Rachilde. You delight in presenting publicly as sometimes a man, sometimes a woman, sometimes in between. You joyfully describe yourself as "androgynous". Transitioning is new and experimental.

Pinchy63 🇨🇦Feb 25

@Willowbriar @CharlotteEowyn
In the 1930/40s there was this man. https://www.cbc.ca/documentarychannel/docs/no-ordinary-man

No Ordinary Man

An in-depth look at the life of musician and trans culture icon Billy Tipton.

cassie, mothgirl object Feb 25

@CharlotteEowyn It is 7th century BCE. You are mythological third-gendered entity Asu-shu-namir, created by the god Enki to rescue Innana after the goddess descended into the underworld to steal her sister Ereshkigal's power. You are impossibly beautiful, neither man or woman, and your goal is to seduce the Queen of the Netherworld and steal the waters of life to revive Inanna. Upon completing your task you are caught, and while Inanna escapes, you do not. You and others like you are cursed by Ereshkigal to suffer economic hardship and social ostracization unto eternity. Transitioning is new(?) and experimental(?).

AlexanderVI Feb 25

@Willowbriar @CharlotteEowyn
It's 1779. You are the Chevalière d'Éon, spy, fencer, and veteran of the Seven Years War. King Louis XVI recognizes you as a woman. Transitioning is new and experimental.

Delta Sierra Feb 25

@Willowbriar @CharlotteEowyn I'd never heard of Rachilde before so I looked them up. Their Wikipedia article is fucking *wild* so far.

"She was unwanted by her parents and received less affection from them than did the family's pet monkey, who was even granted such social graces as a seat at the table."

That's the third paragraph!

Nelson Lopez Feb 25

@CharlotteEowyn where's my wendy carlos :(

Ratsnake Games 🔞Feb 25

@nelson @CharlotteEowyn i don't think it was OP's intent to create a full list of every historical trans person

Nelson Lopez Feb 25

@ratsnakegames @CharlotteEowyn yeah but my wendy carlos

Keeper of the orb Feb 25

@nelson @ratsnakegames @CharlotteEowyn add her to the thread!! its kind of fun. being like HEY I TOO CAN THINK OF A FAV HISTORIC TRANS FIGURE PROVING THIS IS HARDLY NEW NOR EXPERIMENTAL ANYMORE

Chamomile 🐑Feb 25

@ratsnakegames @nelson @CharlotteEowyn Oh, you're a trans ally? Name every trans person

Nelson Lopez Feb 25

@chamomile @ratsnakegames @CharlotteEowyn

uhhh, luna, uhmm.... amber

that's gotta be like 32% of them

/j

youknowthatonepersonwithaface Feb 25

@nelson @CharlotteEowyn

Nelson Lopez Feb 25

@Thatonepersonwithaface @CharlotteEowyn yes exactly

australopithecus Feb 25

@CharlotteEowyn
It is ~2000BCE. You are a priest of Inanna . . .

🇨🇦 CleoQc 🍁🦜🧶🚐🌈Feb 25

@CharlotteEowyn
300 BC you reject gender norms to the point of castrating yourself with no anesthesia so you can become a galli and live like a woman. Transitioning is new and experimental

https://www.ancient-origins.net/history-ancient-traditions/galli-0017397

The Galli: The Cross-Dressing Cybele Cult Priests Who Castrated Themselves | Ancient Origins

Why would the galli, male devotees of a Greek and Roman goddess, choose to castrate themselves and dress as women?

Ancient Origins Reconstructing the story of humanity's past

'i am no man' Charlotte Eowyn!Feb 25

@CleoQc https://www.amazon.com/Wrath-Goddess-Sing-Maya-Deane/dp/0063161184

You'll love it.

Amazon.com: Wrath Goddess Sing: A Novel: 9780063161184: Deane, Maya: Books

Amazon.com: Wrath Goddess Sing: A Novel: 9780063161184: Deane, Maya: Books

École des Bro-Arts Feb 25

@CharlotteEowyn Great post, wholly agree, but just as a note--Marsha wasn't actually there. She said she was uptown at the time. :-)

Keeper of the orb Feb 25

@aphyr @CharlotteEowyn by all accounts of everyone who was there the brick just kind of mysteriously flew on its own and thats the story we stick to lmfao

École des Bro-Arts Feb 25

@hi_cial @CharlotteEowyn I don't think this is Johnson trying to shirk responsibility--she was fairly up-front about her activism and life in general. See 2:15 in her interview here:

https://makinggayhistory.org/podcast/episode-11-johnson-wicker/

Marsha P. Johnson & Randy Wicker | Making Gay History

Making Gay History

verified_transgender

@aphyr @CharlotteEowyn yep was gonna comment on that part too. had some people get really pissy about being corrected on that before though, because apparently the facts are less important than sticking to the established narrative. which I find kinda disrespectful to the people involved.

'i am no man' Charlotte Eowyn!Feb 25

@elexia @aphyr supposedly she herself told multiple different versions of the events, but whether she showed up early or halfway into it, she was there on the front lines, as witnessed by numerous people.

🏳️‍⚧️Feb 25

@CharlotteEowyn Such biggotry...

Artstories Feb 25

@CharlotteEowyn It is 3rd century AD, you are no defined gender and a deity who is worshipped.
"Laevius says: Worshiping, then, the nurturing god Venus, whether she is male or female, just as the Moon is a nurturing goddess. In his Atthis Philochorus, too, states that she is the Moon and that men sacrifice to her in women's dress, women in men's, because she is held to be both male and female." (Macrobius (c. 400s AD), Saturnalia 3.8.2)
Nothing is new. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aphroditus

@CharlotteEowyn makes you realize humans have been the same since the beginning

@southbob Modern humans (H. sapiens sapiens) emerged 250-300 kya, which is a very long time by human reckoning but practically 'yesterday' by evolutionary reckoning. Nevertheless, we have the same neurology as those very ancient people, and are not meaningfully different. Logically, there HAD to be gender variance way back then, too, as there has for all written history. How they dealt with it, we don't know, because humans have only been writing stuff down for a little over 5000 years.

LDA [doki doki waku waku

@CharlotteEowyn isnt the PUF just "the friend" (i.e, genderless), thus making them FT(NB) (?) rather than FTM?
doesn't change any of the point though, im just being slightly annoying on a detail

'i am no man' Charlotte Eowyn!Feb 25

@lda I usually assume transmasculine means 'towards masculinity' and not maleness, and transfemininity means 'towards femininity' and not femaleness. They can include those things, but are not necessarily those things.

So like, when I identified as she/her I was transfeminine. I now use they/she and I'm still transfeminine. Someone whose's nonbinary would still fall under the umbrella of their community, I assume.

Like everyone is different, not everyone will define it that way, but I wanted to call out it wasn't just trans women.

@CharlotteEowyn

I can chime in! I'm agender but also refer to myself as transmasculine - to me it's a descriptor of the direction I'm going/the medical and social changes I have and am making - not necessarily an identity label, but a descriptor of a series of actions

Obviously different for everyone, and I know lots of NBs that don't like to refer to the "direction" they're transitioning,, but that's my 2 cents.

Eta- auto correct initially said "I'm a gender" when I, infact, meant the direct opposite

@lda

Superstars of the Apocalypse Feb 25

@CharlotteEowyn

When did Wendy Carlos (inventer of the Moog synthesizer and who experimented with computers playing music) transition publicly? I believe it was the 70s.

Also, a Bond girl was trans and Playboy, in the 70s, featured a pictorial by a trans woman.

One more thing: because the Stonewall was run by the mob, the cops used the RICO act as justification for the raid. I

Ratsnake Games 🔞Feb 25

@CosmickTrigger @CharlotteEowyn Caroline Cossey played an extra in "For Your Eyes Only", calling her a Bond Girl is a lot of a stretch

Superstars of the Apocalypse Feb 25

My mistake.

Ratsnake Games 🔞Feb 25

@CosmickTrigger No worries, you're not the first person to refer to her as a Bond Girl and it kinda always annoys me (partially because it gives the Bond producers way more credit for being ahead of their time than they actually deserve)

Superstars of the Apocalypse Feb 25

@ratsnakegames I'm right about Wendy Carlos fitting into OPs timeline tho, and the Playboy pictorial very openly let the reader know she was a trans woman.

Whatever his faults, Hugh Hefner was solidly leftwing on social issues.

@ratsnakegames Right. People get that idea because a tabloid used that language when it outed her. Typical horrible British tabs. (I won't say their name, but they're gone now, no loss.)

@CosmickTrigger Pretty sure Robert Moog is the inventor of the Moog synth. Wendy Carlos did offer many tips about it, which Moog gave her credit for.

By her own testimony, she began transitioning around 1966, but was not public about it until 1978.

Superstars of the Apocalypse Feb 28

@wesdym I thought she helped him design it. Or helped him design future ones

@CosmickTrigger She was one of several players who offered advice about it, though she was among the more significant of them. She suggested touch-sensitive keys, for example. (Keyboard control now seems obvious, but at the time it was not. Some early synth artists such as Brian Eno saw no need for them being integrated, though he often used them for input.)

Jezus Michał "Le Wzdych" (on)Feb 25

@CharlotteEowyn, the only thing really old and tested thoroughly is being ignorant.

@CharlotteEowyn
It's the 19th century America civil war, you're "Mrs. Nash" (sorry I can't find her first name), trans/intersex woman and friend to George Custer and his wife Libbie. You do not wish to be undressed after you pass when you fall badly ill...
Transitioning is new and experimental.

it's the 16th / 17th century, you're the gender nonconforming (it's hard to put any assignment to them as they dressed and acted masculine but how they identified is harder to say) Mary Frith / Mol Cutpurse / Tom Faconer. Gender non conformity (and transition) is new and experimental.

Jonathan Hartley Feb 25

@CharlotteEowyn this is amazing thank you so much for putting it together. Got me right in the feels, as they said last year.

Jonathan Hartley Feb 25

@CharlotteEowyn now you've got me thinking, and I'm wondering about producing my own version in places my in laws will see it. (a) Do you mind? I would always attribute with a link. But I would also be compelled to research and reword things as I went, it is my curse. (b) I realize the following contradicts the canonical form, but in this case I wonder if it would become more effective done in reverse chronological order? I shall experiment! 🤗

'i am no man' Charlotte Eowyn!Feb 25

@tartley I don't mind.

Hannah Clover Feb 25

@CharlotteEowyn https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kate_Bornstein is another person to add to the list

Kate Bornstein - Wikipedia

@CharlotteEowyn Generally speaking, human rights keep being new and experimental.

matiu bidule Feb 25

@CharlotteEowyn
this is perfect.
The only thing that could rival it in terms of novelty is the idea " that young people no longer want to work and do not respect their elders" 😅

@CharlotteEowyn You are a classical Greek, listening to the bard describe blind Tiresias, who lived seven generations, and seven years of it a woman, but this will be forgotten.

You are a gilded age English, reading of Orlando, who retired a lord and awoke a lady, but this will be forgotten.

You are an early Mesopotamian, listening to the priest of Inanna describing the power of the goddess in the story of Pilipili, who was transformed from girl to man, but this will be forgotten.

SolastalCycle Feb 25

@CharlotteEowyn It is 1777. You are the diplomat and knight d'Eon. The King of France, by decree, assigns you a female gender in order to put an end to the debate on this subject. Transitioning is new and experimental