Virtue Signaling"We were priests and shamans"

submitted by JulienMayfair from self.LGBDropTheT

There was a total puff-piece on NPR's The Takeaway this afternoon, where the host let the trans guest say pretty much anything, and the only allowed response was applause.

The guest went into that whole song and dance about how transgender people were "priests and shamans" in all sorts of cultures all over the world before the boogeyman of Christianity arrived.

The thing is, I heard exactly the same routine about gay men and lesbians in the 1990s, particularly because I was around some professors who were working the angle of romanticizing "the primitive" as a career. The problem is the evidence -- or the general lack thereof. But that didn't stop them then, and it doesn't seem to stop them now. When you get into it, you soon realize that most of the "scholarship" on this thesis is the same few people quoting and referencing one another. In fact, there is some question as to whether or not the whole two-spirit concept was essentially made up by amateur gay anthropologists who went looking for something like it and, when they didn't find it, made it up anyway.

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[–][deleted] 19 insightful - 1 fun19 insightful - 0 fun20 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

People need to stop romanticizing the past. Most of the places where there was a 3rd special role for gender non-conforming men were places with extremely rigid gender roles where women were treated like property and any man that didn't fit the narrow definition of manliness(usually gay men) was forced into another role in society.

There is nothing good about this. Stop trying to emulate it.

[–]JulienMayfair[S] 7 insightful - 2 fun7 insightful - 1 fun8 insightful - 2 fun -  (1 child)

extremely rigid gender roles where women were treated like property

Yes, they usually conveniently forget that part . . .

[–][deleted] 9 insightful - 1 fun9 insightful - 0 fun10 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Not sure they forget that part. I'm more inclined to think they approve of that part.

[–]julesburm1891 17 insightful - 3 fun17 insightful - 2 fun18 insightful - 3 fun -  (0 children)

Honestly, I don’t really get the point of it. If every single one of the priests and shamans of ye olde times were trans or LGB, it wouldn’t change that there are two sexes. It wouldn’t change that most people are attracted to the opposite sex and a pretty consistent minority are either exclusively same-sex attracted or attracted to both sexes. It wouldn’t change that some people have form of body dysmorphia that makes them want to be the other sex even though there’s no way for them to ever change sex.

I’m also not really interested in a throwback to days when pure superstition reigned and you died of a scraped leg when you were 30. It’s not exactly a compliment.

[–]Horror-SwordfishI don't get how flairs work 18 insightful - 1 fun18 insightful - 0 fun19 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

From what I've read, it appears that some ancient cultures did do this, but it wasn't necessarily a good thing for the priest/shaman. For one, it was almost universally gay men that ended up in those positions, not trans people, and if said gay men could be considered trans it was because they were typically eunuchs.

The fact that they were castrated for being gay leads to them being in positions of "respect" because they aren't competition for whatever leader currently reigned.

Anyway, what Jules said is right: who fucking cares? Even if we assume that it worked like that, that "trans" was even a thing back in ancient times and that someone being trans made society basically worship them, what difference does that actually make today? Our society doesn't worship trans people (well, I guess that can be argued). Are they trying to say we should be revering them and putting them in positions of power? Get outta here with that nonsense.

[–]JulienMayfair[S] 10 insightful - 2 fun10 insightful - 1 fun11 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

I mean . . . just reading their subreddits and hearing their own accounts of their mental health issues does not exactly make me think that they have special spiritual insight into the great mysteries of the universe, and I don't think their problems are the result of their simply being unappreciated.

I tend to think the modern trans phenomenon is its own thing, and that direct connections to some kind of forgotten history are tenuous at best.

[–]IridescentAnacondastrictly dickly 10 insightful - 1 fun10 insightful - 0 fun11 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Are they trying to say we should be revering them and putting them in positions of power?

Yes, that's exactly what they are proposing.

[–]WanderingElephant 10 insightful - 5 fun10 insightful - 4 fun11 insightful - 5 fun -  (1 child)

I mean ..at one time baking your period blood into bread and then burning it to ash would reveal who God wanted you to shag ....so yeah......Failure to critically evaluate your ancestor's beliefs will lead to you desperately searching for sexy faces in bloody bread I guess.

[–]JulienMayfair[S] 9 insightful - 14 fun9 insightful - 13 fun10 insightful - 14 fun -  (0 children)

at one time baking your period blood into bread and then burning it to ash would reveal who God wanted you to shag

Has anyone compared that method statistically to online dating?

[–]MBMayfair 7 insightful - 4 fun7 insightful - 3 fun8 insightful - 4 fun -  (2 children)

This reminds me of people who believe in reincarnation, and oh look, when they were hypnotized it just so happens that they discovered they were Napoleon or Cleopatra or the like back when. Never some pissant farmer like everybody else. Same energy. Same ego.

[–]PriestTheyCalledHimBisexual 7 insightful - 1 fun7 insightful - 0 fun8 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Look up Jazz Jennings and his past life hypnosis it is super sad how a gay or bi kid like Jarod/Jazz was manipulated and forced into taking hormones and having multiple sex change operations all for his nutty parents and reality TV/fame of being a super young trans person.

[–]MBMayfair 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Yeah, I don't watch that show any more (is it still on?), but I saw a couple of episodes where he went to the hypnotist. I just felt so bad for that mixed up kid.

[–]PriestTheyCalledHimBisexual 8 insightful - 1 fun8 insightful - 0 fun9 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

LMAO yeah in the 1980s lesbian feminists/radfems tried to revise history and claim that all witches burned in Europe and in New England, and native Indian shamans were lesbian and this was found to be completely false.

[–]St_Origen 5 insightful - 6 fun5 insightful - 5 fun6 insightful - 6 fun -  (0 children)

Nah I was a Mage(Fire skill tree). Shamans and Priests are too squishy and have subpar dps.

[–]xanditAGAB (Assigned Gay at Birth) 7 insightful - 1 fun7 insightful - 0 fun8 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

i Heard harry hay made up two spirits but I don't know if that is fact or not

[–]JulienMayfair[S] 9 insightful - 2 fun9 insightful - 1 fun10 insightful - 2 fun -  (2 children)

I may be in rather unique position to comment on this question because I knew Harry Hay towards the end of his life. I had great respect for his ability to inspire people to action, but I can also see where he might have done something like that. If you've read any of his writings, he had a lot of fairly loopy theories about the development of human culture that were, shall we say, not firmly grounded in any kind of research.

Inventing two-spirit is something I wouldn't entirely put past him. He was definitely into the idea that gay people were some kind of third gender.

Edit: And then Will Roscoe got hold of the idea from Harry and expanded on it, giving it more apparent academic weight. From there, you can kind of play connect the dots to follow how the idea was disseminated to an audience that was looking for just that kind of thing.

[–]PriestTheyCalledHimBisexual 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Harry Hay also supported and defended paedophiles and NAMBLA. :-/

[–]JulienMayfair[S] 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Yes, I'm aware of that. It wasn't a major part of his beliefs, but the basis of his position was purely individual and anecdotal. I can't recall the details at the moment, but Harry was "initiated" into gay sex when he was young. He considered it a positive experience, and because of that, he extrapolated that it wasn't necessarily a bad thing. As I indicated above, Harry had problems thinking outside his own box, so he would theorize broadly about all sorts of things based purely on his own experience. He was a distinctly odd character, but then, I suppose it took being an odd character to start pushing homosexual political organization in the late 1940s. One could perhaps say that no entirely sane person would have done that.

It is also the case that it took until 1996 for gay pride parades finally to ban NAMBLA from marching, and their inclusion prior to that was certainly not solely Harry's doing. Someone involved with Gay Pride organizing in San Francisco told me that banning NAMBLA had been a very contentious issue even then. NAMBLA was part of ILGA until, I think, 1993. I think part of the change was an increasing cultural awareness of the long-term negative psychological effects of child sexual abuse arising from revelations of the actions of Catholic priests and other authority figures. Prior to that, it was something simply not spoken about. What man would want to admit that in an era when any admission that you had had sexual contact with another man was shameful?

[–]fuck_reddit 5 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 0 fun6 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

I had to read a piece for one class about “queer women” in the US borderlands. Many pages in, the author admits she has to “queer” these women (ie. make shit up) because she couldn’t find the evidence of actual lesbians that she wanted. Oh, and of course she define “queer” as “anyone perceived as a sexual deviant.”

[–]JulienMayfair[S] 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Let me guess: Gloria Anzaldúa?

That shit was all over grad school programs in the 1990s.

[–]fuck_reddit 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

No, Emma Perez.

[–]Q-Continuum-kin 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

There is likely a lot of truth in the idea that gay men were priests and shamen but the reason is that society was homophobic and the best way to hide your sexuality was through celibacy. It also led to deep psychological issues and centuries of abuse from priests in the church.

[–]ChunkeeguyTeam T*RF Fuck Yeah 2 insightful - 3 fun2 insightful - 2 fun3 insightful - 3 fun -  (0 children)

Perhaps they meant to say perverts and charlatans