While I think it’s great seeing all the excitement and press coverage about India legalizing gay sex, I think it’s really important to remember that this is NOT India progressing due to Western influence. This is India decolonizing.
The homophobic statute that was overturned is a product of British colonialism in India. Prior to that, India had a rich and vibrant queer community that played important functions in society. There were queer Hindu gods and hijras serve as an example of how queerness in society was venerated. This is not something to patronize India over and congratulate ourselves in the West for. This is a victory for India reclaiming their culture.
Oh my god. If i see one more of these posts in my dash I will murder someone.
Okay, let’s see:
“The homophobic statute that was overturned is a product of British colonialism in India.”
True. Section 377 was implemented by British Raj in India, possibly as an effort to safeguard Victorian mores.
“Prior to that, India had a rich and vibrant queer community that played important functions in society.”
Say, what??????
Can you please tell me what the “important functions in society” were, my dear fella? Contrary to tumblr’s belief, homophobia was not a western (or christian) invention. We were plenty homophobic on our own, thanks. Literally, the only acceptable ‘queerness’ in society was a laundebaaz (aka, one who does it to men/boys) whereas the gandu (aka the one who takes it up the ass) was considered the lowest of low in society.Even now, gandu is a derogatory word similar to faggot. Does that sound like “venerating queerness” to you dear?
Also, lesbians? LOL. What lesbians?? Funnily enough, even in “a society venerating queerness" lesbianism is practically unheard of. Furthermore, the ‘celebration of queerness” in these cultures is mostly male receiving partners being pushed to the margins of society.
But hey, why consider boring things like reality… when you can have Cool-Tumblr-Version-of-Queer-Feminist-Utopia-Before-the-Whiteys-Fucked-Everything-Up™
brand of history?
“There were queer Hindu gods and hijras serve as an example of how queerness in society was venerated”
Firstly, there “were queer Gods”? What happened to them? Did they die when colonialism happened? Did they go, “Ah… those dastardly British have set foot on India and are imposing their Victorian mores, perhaps we should pack up our bags and leave”? I might be a tad bit uninformed in my “queer Gods”, considering the fact that I was born into and practicing Hinduism since my birth and so has all my forefathers, but according to my knowledge those “Queer Gods” still remained in society. Yet, homophobia persisted. Heck, Sabarimala is one of the most pilgrimage sites (that has the son of ‘Queer Gods’ as the deity), and even now “youthful females” (i.e., women of ages from their first menstruation till menopause) are NOT ALLOWED TO ENTER.
Despite being the son of queer gods, Ayyappa still seems to be misogynistic as fuck.
Secondly, you might wanna brush up on those queer gods and legendary figures… almost in all of them one of the couple gets magically changed to other sex and begets a biological child. Biological procreation and production of progeny – it seems as if even the Gods have to perform and conform to heteronormativity.
Now,
“hijras”
I wish I got dollars for every time a White Ally™ misused or misrepresented hijras. Contrary to popular belief, hijras are not transexuals (at least not all of them). There are different types of hijras – those who were born hermaphrodites, those who castrate themselves and proclaim to be neither man nor woman, those who are homosexual men who crossdress, and those who are men who do not perform masculinity to society’s standards. They are literally gender non-conforming men : either their homosexuality is a deviancy that needed to be corrected; or their lack of assertion of heterosexuality was a mistake to be corrected, or they just liked “girly things” too much.
So, these “venerated positions” that they supposedly held was quite literally the only option left to them – they were kicked out of society and jobs. I know a lot of people on tumblr would say “but they were in kings’ courts and all”. Guess why? They were either entertainers (a part of the dance troupe) because that ‘girly’ job was seen apt for them. Generally, dancers were not seen in positive light.
They were considered at best as courtesans and at worst as prostitutes.
Even now, “attakari” (dancer) is a term used to say a woman is a slut.
Second option for them was as guards or companions (sahelis). This was to ensure “the purity of noble woman”. After all, when the “purity of the womb” is of the utmost importance, a king/noble wouldn’t even trust male guards with their women. Heck, there are even legends of gnc men being coerced into castration so as to make guards for ladies. That is why they were the guards of many noble’s harems – not because they were valued for their capabilities, but because they couldn’t “damage the property” (i.e., have penetrative sex with the royal’s women).
Nowadays, most of them cannot get a decent jobs, and literally have to beg in trains and buses to get food on their tables. Oh, this is also a part of the “veneration” : they have no livelihood, so they go and threaten people with curses (their otherness makes them freaky, and according to superstition gives them supernatural powers), so that people will donate some money in fear.
This is not including the young boys and men that were pushed into sex mafia and trafficking.
So, miss me with that “veneration” bullshit.
“This is not something to patronize India over and congratulate ourselves
in the West for. This is a victory for India reclaiming their culture.”
Do you know what I find patronising? White allys
who has read Buzzfeed articles on ‘hijras’ or ‘queerness’ somehow pretending to speak for us. Lauding us for our extremely open/feminist/queer Culture™
that they know of through exoticized magazines and power yoga videos.
I once read an essay on how Indian patriarchial system countered westernization (in an effort to prevent women from going outside their homes) by claiming that
while British might be materialistically more advanced than Indians, ~spiritually Indians are better than British~.
The same exotic bullshit is repackaged here, using liberal buzzwords to please tumblr crowd.
Point taken. Anyone who reblogged this should read and understand this for a full picture of the issue (including me).
This is unrelated, but good job op on admitting your mistake and taking steps to correct it.
so on the subject of stolen property, i’ve seen various arguments on this point but it is in fact true that inheriting something from a relative, when you know full well that it was stolen, does not make it yours.
this clearly goes doubly so for powerful magical artifacts, and especially for artifacts which are strongly implied to contain part of their creator’s soul!
you can talk about consequences – maybe the artifact in question has benefits for you, maybe you’re not convinced its rightful owners would use it responsibly – but talking about the consequences doesn’t erase the fact that whatever benefits you think you’re getting are achieved through wrongful means.
which is why i, too, think Frodo should have given the One Ring back to Sauron. thief.
Hahahahaha here comes the law student nerd ready to complicate your wonderful post, op.
(Really this is just pretext for me to study for my property final in a week, so thanks yeah)
Because according to the principles of common property law, the matter of who actually owns title to the One Ring becomes really complicated really fast.
Buckle up babes for the pedantic law lecture no one asked for.
The best part of this is: trust me I guarantee Tolkien knew this much about the Common Law (English mediaevalists end up knowing ridiculous amounts about both Common Law and mediaeval Catholicism whether we want to or not), and indeed if you look at the text, this was relevant to the story.
It’s part of the reason that Sauron is as terrified of Aragorn’s potential claim on the Ring as he is of Gandalf’s or Saruman’s or Galadriel’s – if not more. Because in Middle Earth this shit matters. This is a world where a broken oath will literally bind your unhappy restless soul to the earth in spite of the dictates of the literal creator of the universe (who designated humans as Passing Beyond The World when they die). This is a world where a damn oath is responsible for Everything That’s Wrong With The First And Second Ages.
Oaths, ownership, duties, rights, things owed and owing: this shit matters.
And sure Aragorn is also direct line from Lúthien, but so is Elrond, and so are Elrohir and Elladan. So is Arwen. But what none of them have that Aragorn has? Is a rightful claim to ownership of the Ring.
So much of what Aragorn spends his time in the second and third volumes doing is Establishing Claim – establishing that everything that Isildur owned, he now owns. Why? Because it means he has power that is absolutely needed. “Isildur’s Heir” isn’t a woo-woo floofy-high-concept thing: it’s a literal matter of rights, duties and authority.
When he takes the Palantír from Gandalf and uses it, his companions are aghast, but he reminds them that he has both the right and the strength to use it – and the Right is actually important. Saruman was, face to face, stronger than Aragorn (never doubt that) and Sauron completely pwned him, but Saruman had no right to the Seeing Stone, no more right than Pippin.
But the Palantíri belonged to Aragorn: he’s not only Melian’s ever-so-great-grandchild, he’s also Fingolfin’s ever-so-great-grandchild, and since the Fëonori died out with the poor Ringmaker, the only competition Aragorn could have for ownership of the Stones are Galadriel and Elrond. (And that’s only if you are going right back to the maker-rights, and ignoring the establishment of the Stones as the property of Elros’ line rather later).
It matters. It changes how power works and doesn’t work. Aragorn’s status as the Heir is in fact grounded in these ideas, which play a hugely powerful part (in fact the fight over who rightfully owns the Silmaril Beren and Lúthien brought out of the dark is part of the bloodshed that makes it so that in the end the Silmarils themselves actively reject the last two living sons of Fëanor, negating their claim). Because Aragorn is the rightful inheritor of everything Isildur ever had, he can use the Palantír. Because he is the rightful inheritor of everything Isildur ever had, he can summon the Dead. And because he is the rightful inheritor of everything Isildur ever had, he stands equal to two of the Ainur, to the oldest member of the Trees-blessed Noldorin royal house, and to his own much more powerful (straight up) relatives as a potential claimant of the Ring.
And that is why Sauron is willing to take the chance to catch Aragorn, and (he thinks) ensure his capture, rather than attacking him earlier on when there’s a chance that (even if Aragorn can’t possibly WIN) he could still escape and then bide his time before the next Ring-War and learn to use the damn thing.
But. It’s also important when it comes to Frodo.
Frodo uses the Ring twice, and lays open claim once. Both of the times he uses it are on Sméagol, both times overwheming him and in the second case cursing him (“if you ever touch me again you will be thrown into the fire”). We get both moments from Sam’s POV, where the physical reality of Frodo is replaced by an image of him as a much larger figure, alight from the inside, robed in light, and with a “wheel of fire” at his breastbone.
Frodo does not have any genetics (so to speak) more special than any other hobbit. It’s not like Aragorn vs most humans, where there’s actually a legit difference because most humans were not, at that point, descended from a Maia. Frodo’s just this guy.
The only thing that’s really special about Frodo in terms of the Ring is that, like Aragorn, he’s the other person who has a viable claim. It would, as it were, have to go to the judges to figure out whose claim is better.
And this is why in the moment that he claims the Ring, in the Mountain, Sauron is fucking terrified. It’s why he drops everything else, even the issue of trying to keep his mindless drone-fighters going, even the maintenance of his actual control of weather, of light, of whatever fight he and Gandalf have going, to get his best servants back to the Mountain now now now now.
Because Frodo having an actual rightful claim on the Ring means he can, in fact, use it. Not well, which is why Sauron can paralyse him for that moment it takes for Sméagol to strike (and carry out both Frodo’s demanded oath – “save the Precious from Him” – and his Curse – “if you touch me you will be thrown in the fire” – at once), but he could. This tiny little person is a threat to Sauron, in the heart of his own home, because he has the right to have and use this Ring.
The tricky thing about Tolkien is that whatever his flaws (and he has many), the one thing he’s never unclear of is that the concept of right and might are actually separate. Just because you are strong enough to do or take a thing doesn’t mean you have any right to do it; and just because you aren’t strong enough to enforce your right, doesn’t mean it goes away.
…/UTTER NERD
I had a nerdgasm just reading this.
This is good and you should all feel good for writing it.
(As a former lawyer there is NOTHING better for studying than arguing fake cases in your favorite fictions. Things you thought you were tired of reading about suddenly become interesting when you are trying to prove some fucker wrong on the internet about like, whether or not testimony counts as hearsay if you can prove that the speaker was under the effects of a magical truth-enforcing curse.)
The story of Superman and Moses are actually very similar. Both were sent away in a capsule, as their family was about to be killed, and were adopted into another family. After reaching adulthood, they used their special powers to benefit those around them
It’s almost as if the story of Moses was important to the creators of Superman in some way
Hey guys please I’m begging you to stop romanticising toreros, they’re murderers and torturers, they’re not cute and we’re trying to get rid of this unsubtle form of torture they call “art”. Be aware of that, please and thank you.
What my friend up there just said. It’s a profession based in an awful tradition of torturing a poor animal before killing it. It does not deserve praise.
I love this. Its in all the toilets at the local birth centre and basically if your in a domestic violence relationship and cant speak out about it you take one of the stickers and place it on the urine pot and the midwife will speak to you after about it and get you the help needed to flee the violence. So upsetting how many stickers have already gone tho 😦
If it makes you feel better, those might not have been taken by actual folks who needed it – we were taught at the clinic I worked at to never leave a full sheet of anything, because the sorts of folks who need these stickers might also be the kind of folks who, psychologically, have a hard time taking a first step or ‘breaking’ something brand new – like being the first person to take a sticker off a sheet or tear a phone number off a flyer. They called it ‘easing the path’ and all us admin staff were careful to never fill up brochure things all the way, to take the first tag off a flyer we hung up, leave the toys for the kids in uneven piles and leave a couple of books leaning or sideways or lying flat on the shelf.
Reblog for the second set of comments. Folks in abusive relationships have a constant mental commentary about how you aren’t worth it, you’re a bother, you’re inconvenient, you cause trouble, it’s all your fault. That “easing the way” is solid psychology. Feeling like you’re not alone, you’re not the only one who has this problem, can let you shift from feeling helpless and hopeless to being willing to reach out for help.
i used to think it was fun and interesting to get into debates about feminism or racism, or in general challenge people’s bigotry and prejudice and call them out. but recently it’s become a burden. it’s a chore now. i no longer want to debate about whether or not i should have basic human rights, this shouldn’t even be a fucking issue anymore. i no longer go into these discussions with an open mind and a light-hearted demeanor, now i’m fucking furious. i should not have to defend my humanity at every single step, repeatedly and constantly. i’m done.
backup blog in case tumblr explodes 