#historical trans person

[enbycrip]

ID: a black and white photo and caption from a newspaper showing a young white trans man with light hair wearing a tweed jacket and high collar smiling at a young white woman in a pale dress as he brushes her mid-length dark hair. She is smiling at him from the slightly complex angle as he brushes her hair. The photo is faded and not great quality but their faces are clear.

The headline over the photo is “Here’s How I Used To Do It!”

The caption below reads “An expert at women's coiffures although not a hairdresser, Zdenek Koubek proves himself as he combs the locks of Cinda Glenn, New York night club beauty. Koubek knows all about coiffures from experience, since they were of concern to him when he was the foremost girl athlete of Czechoslovakia, prior to a sex-change.”

Zdenek Koubek was born in Paskov, Czechoslovakia (at the time) in December 1913, one of eight siblings, and competed as an athlete. With minimal formal training, he began running at age 17, decided to pursue it formally aged 19, and broke two world records at the 1934 world olympics.

Because queer and gender-diverse history is complex, I’m genuinely unsure if Zdenek was intersex. He seems to have been pretty gender-nonconforming when read as a woman in his early life and seems to have retired from athletics because he was harassed by people wanting him to undergo invasive “gender checks” after his gold medals at the 1934 Olympics.

Apparently the current obsession with “defining gender in sport” has roots back to the 1930s. Athletes competing in female athletics have been forced to undergo a variety of examinations for the purpose of declaring them “female enough”. They seem to have never been pleasant, appropriate, or anything other than invasive and dehumanising, and they seem to have always focused on a) defining gender by physicality b) defined that physicality in fairly arbitrary ways that are actually incredibly difficult to relate to anything objective, despite a veneer of scientific objectivity.

I can entirely see why the threat of such harassment would have caused Zdenek to decide an athletic or adjacent career wasn’t worth undergoing it, whether he personally believed himself to be intersex or whether we would recognise him as such today. The term “intersex” has many definitions, and is often challenged by medical professionals if it could potentially cover too many people - e.g. medical professionals have repeatedly challenged the term when used by AFAB people with PCOS, which can cause fertility issues, hirstutism etc, purely on the grounds of “that would make around 10% of women intersex”. Zdenek simply publicly stated “I was wrongly assigned as female at birth” without giving any other details - as he had *every* right to. Some historians have characterised him as intersex based on this, and others simply as trans; he appears, very reasonably, to have preferred to preserve his privacy on the details.

Zdenek went on a lecture tour of the US talking about his life and transitioned in 1936. At the time of this photo, he was pursuing a career in cabaret in the US. He seems to have been reasonably successful but never settled there, returning home and marrying a cis woman with whom he lived happily for the rest of his life, dying in Prague aged 72 in 1986.

He joined a local rugby team along with his brother Jaroslov after WWII and seems to have been an enthusiastic amateur player. I hope he got a lot of joy out of it, which he does seem to have.

Like so many queer and trans histories, Zdenek’s is somewhat obscured because so much of what has been written about him is always skewed by the writer’s own perspectives about gender and transness. Including the drive to impose a false binary on trans experience - which I as a nonbinary person know is certainly not universally present.

There are, of course, *absolutely* trans people who always have a strong feeling of gender equating to “knowing they are a boy/girl from an early age”, and I in no way wish to erase them or their experiences, but it must also be noted and acknowledged there are plenty of us with different experiences. There are people like me who feel “wrong” in our assigned gender from pretty early in life, all the way down to having quite strong dysphoria in puberty and afterwards, but don’t strongly ID as the “opposite” binary gender either. There are people who rub along fine in their assigned gender, or who have many issues with it but don’t know what they equate to, until they have some experience presenting otherwise and suddenly experience strong gender euphoria for the first time in their lives. There are people who never feel anything much at all about gender and only ever do any identifying purely as a matter of convenience because a very binary society requires it.

Cis people seem to find the “always knew/born in the wrong body” narrative the easiest to relate to, and I can only assume that is because it is the narrative that allows them to challenge our society’s gender-essentialist, binarist worldview the *least*. It is considerably easier, and requires much less thought and critical attention, to say “I guess sometimes the occasional person is just mistakenly assigned to the wrong category” than to question those categories, why they exist, what they actually are, how they are imposed, and whether they actually mean anything at all in an objective sense.

I have no idea where Zdenek fell on any of this, or if his experience was very different in another way.

I posted this to, as ever, note that we are not a new phenomenon. Trans people are part of human history. We have always existed. We have always contributed. The way the society we lived in perceived us *and* how the societies our stories have passed through perceived us affect how our stories are told today, and those things can make it complex to uncover the lived experience of the trans person behind all of that. Queer and trans history must always be about acknowledging those facts and uncertainties while doing our best to find out as much as possible about the actual lived experiences of our siblings in the past.

[destielmemenews]

"The North Hertfordshire museum will now refer to the emperor Elagabalus with female pronouns.

Museum policy states the pronouns used in the displays will be those ‘the individual in question might have used themselves’ or whatever pronoun ‘in retrospect, is appropriate’."

source 1

source 2

[porcelain-pines]

a terrible injustice

[starwikia]

suicide cw

look i have been in this area before mentally. it sucks and i wouldn’t wish this on anyone. but, and this is going to sound callous, but i don’t feel any sympathy for james somerton. even if i hope he’s like. not dead. But thats all the amount of goodwill im willing to give him. The more i think about this really, the more angry i am. 

ngl this entire situation is another example of how white people weaponize their mental illness to avoid consequences. Im seeing it in real time.

this man has a continuous habit of using self-harm as a get-out-of-jail-for-free card. in both of his apologies, he has worded his supposed attempts in ways that were clearly meant to guilt people who displayed his plagiarism and overall horrendous history of racism and misogyny. i say supposed because, while i’m not saying those are lies and this would he such a fucked up thing to lie about that i don’t want to think he has, unfortunately, it’s been proven again and again that his word can’t be trusted, as he’s known to lie to try get out of consequences. Hes a proven liar. him lying about this is actually the best case scenario, because no one should go through this entire situation, wouldnt wish this on anyone, but you can only do this so often before people stop sympathizing with you. is this callous? Yeah, but like. I’m actually fucking angry he cant straight up take no as an answer. that this is how he reacts realizing he cant be one of the Cool Kidz™️ on youtube anymore. he acts like he DESERVES a career, like its not a privilege hes lost due to his own actions.

He lied about apologizing and forgiving people, he lied about giving the money to hbomberguy to give to ppl he ripped off (yknow, instead of doing it himself), he lied about the jessie gender situation and rewrote the narrative to make it so he isnt the bad guy, and hes the victim all along actually!

you can’t tell me that supposed last message of his isn’t meant to be a 13 reasons why esq attempt to deflect the blame “look i’m going to kill myself and it’s all YOUR PEOPLES FAULT for not letting me achieve my DREAM of being filmmaker IN PEACE!!! I just wanted Nick’s (the guy who I have thrown under the bus again and again) portfolio up!! Im just being a good friend dont you all FEEL BAD” he refuses to take ANY ACCOUNTABILITY of any of his actions and he IS STILL trying to shove the blame over to other people again.

it’s also pretty ironic people are like “uhhh well hbomber’s fans harassed him!!!” like hbomber outright told people NOT to HARASS JAMES!!! ALSO acting as if james doesn’t have a very real documented history of STRAIGHT UP sending his fans to harass and threaten smaller creators, more notably women, trans, and bipoc creators. especially after he’s stolen typically very personal anecdotes so he could profit from them. so why can he do it but the second people are like “hey this guys an actual piece of shit.” and he can’t handle it suddenly people are trying to white knight his shit? like no he doesn’t get that. he doesn’t get that at all just because he couldn’t handle the consequences of his actions. 

what? were supposed to stay quiet about a man profiting off of other minorities because he wanted to be the spokesman for all gay people? people tried to solve this on a smaller, more private scales for YEARS and he kept doing it. it was clear that the giant public video was the ONLY way to get people to notice. HE WOULDVE GOTTEN AWAY WITH STEALING 87 FUCKING THOUSANDS WORTH OF DOLLARS. HE CANT HANDLE THE FACT HE CANT GET AWAY WITH IT. 

am i supposed to feel bad for the guy who basically threatened a trans woman with the police? i don’t care what anyone says, it’s so fucking obvious that he threatened jessie by implying he was getting the police involved in their conflict. what am i supposed to act like that didn’t happen? are we supposed to pretend like he didn’t glorify nazi’s and outright said that gay people made up a good chunk of the nazis? That he didnt say america joined ww2 bc they were jealous of the NAZIS. WHAT WOULD POSSESS YOU TO FUCKING SAY THAT. but then? He gives women (not even women most of the time, he misgenders nonbinary ppl constantly) shit for writing mlm. are we supposed to act like he doesn’t straight-up sees himself superior and better than people of color and steals their works to put himself on a pedestal? Are we supposed to act like he didnt spit on our elders by saying “only the boring gays survived aids” like man! Fuck you! He BLANTANTLY MAKES UP HISTORY TO PUT HIMSELF ON A PEDESTAL!! HE ACTIVELY TRIED TO REWRITE LGBT HISTORY TO SUIT HIS FUCKED UP NARRATIVES!

yes this sucks ! no one deserves this but no one should be making him a martyr. Thats what he fucking WANTS! He wants to be immortalized as a victim!! (again, supposedly, it was reported hes alive but its not confirmed).

The shit he got isnt near the amount of fucking callous behavior hes done again and again. Again, to drill this point, EVEN IF HE DIDNT CALL THE POLICE HE THREATENED A TRANS WOMAN INTO THINKING HE DID!!! The fact he tried to use a head injury to justify years of the outright ghoulish shit fucking astounds me. Why the fuck did anyone in his life thought it was a good idea to let him TRY to come back. in the end, he had options. he didn’t need to try to make a comeback. HE DIDNT NEED TO FUCKING LIE OR IGNORE THE SHIT HE WAS CALLED OUT ON the reality is, he wanted to come back thinking he could shove it under the rug, was told that no dude, you’re not allowed to be a youtuber anymore. you’re done. you need to move on and went full nuclear. it’s not on anyone’s hands but his own. HES BEEN DOING THIS TO HIMSELF!! But nah man we cant call his shit out bc hell may or may not kill himself. Fuck the other minorities who have the same issues but worse and sometimes BECAUSE of him. This is going to SUCKKKK so bad when other ppl, specifically white gays, are going to weaponize this shit to get away with their stuff.

[uncanny-tranny]

For TST

I just finished listening to Elliot Page's book and I have to say it was an interesting piece of literature. I highly highly recommend it.

I have never read a book that is so closely aligned with myself as a trans man and my upbringing. I never thought I would read book that defines what it means to be a trans man in the public eye. I do not want to be as famous as him but I would like to make a change to the world as he has.

I am comfortable in who I am and who I love and how I choose to express my gender. Things really can and often do get better with time. And I hope that any person that sees this knows that they are not trapped in the shoes that society has put them in and they can actively choose a different pair.

I would love to read Pageboy soon; these memoirs and other art and literature are our history, part of our lifeblood as a community, and it's vital that we read each other's lives and understand that we truly are here in this world💛

It's great to read such a glowing review from you, and I'm so happy that his words lit your soul like it has

[hussyknee]

The very specific paralyzing fear as a person of colour with OCD, that you might be acting like a white person to other marginalized people.

[menlove]

not to be like. Annoying about it. but what really gets me abt beatles fans of like. really Any demographic who complain that it's disrespectful to assume john & paul were anything but straight boy besties bc "men can show affection for their friends" or whatever is just like.... once again it always comes back to: if this were a man and a woman, would anyone be out here crying about their friendship or would it just be an uncontested fact about rock history? like. when you look at everything they've ever said about each other, what their friends and partners have said, the songs they've written about each other, etc it's like. pretty blatant. the only reason it's Not a "fact" is because it's two men. like whether you want to think they had a physical relationship or not (which is smth we can never know bc that's no one's business) it's just so weird to insist it's disrespectful to point this stuff out. like. again. do you guys say any of this stuff when people talk about straight relationships in history? or is this hesitance and distaste Solely reserved for gay people?

(none of this means anything to my followers who don't care abt the beatles scroll on ur fine I'm talking abt ppl deep into this but w a side of homophobia they can't shake)

[this-should-do]

me when i meet with my colleges first out trans teacher who is like a celebrity with me after one of my teachers puts me in contact with her again (i had interviewed said trans teacher 4 years prior and hadnt met with her since) and she tells me tjat my teacher had so many positive things to say about me, about how i was one of her brightest most well spoken students and that she (within like 5 minutes of having been talking) immediately sees exactly what my professor had been talking about and so many super implied positives about me that i would never had known about and i dod everything in my power to avoid prying for more details but even what i heard was soso nicies

[novelcain]

I meant like, the whole homophobia/transphobia thing, unless China was very accepting of enbys. Idk I don't really do history.

OOOOOOHHHH!!! Sorry I have a big dumb Skittle brain and am incapable of reading between the lines when it comes to nonverbal communication. 😅 Ok ok I did some research on this just now so I could give an accurate (as much as I can but I'm no expert for sure) answer.

And that answer is... it depends.

China has a very long history regarding sexually and its views of sex have shifted a LOT from one era to another. But for this post, we'll focus on the Tang Dynasty because that is the time period JTTW is set in (tho which time period of the Tang Dynasty is unclear)

So I'll start by saying that the Tang Dynasty was notoriously open about sex and sexual desires and homosexually was accepted in ancient but only in certain situations. Usually homosexuality or simply non-straight behavior was only accepted and allowed within the upper class. For example most if not all (I'm not too sure) Chinese emperors had several male lovers and they didn't hide it as it was often revered with great admiration.

NOW as far as gender orientation goes. This would HIGHLY depend on the person and their beliefs as during this period China was dominated by 2 religions Taoism and Buddhism.

Taoism was the official religion of the Tang Dynasty and states that nature is perfect as is and by proxy some believe that would mean they view transgenderism as a flaw of nature while most Taoists themselves do not view transgenderism negatively as the Tao is pretty unconcerned with identity and focuses on virtue and coming to accept things as they were born in nature. Therefore I think the only thing that would even remotely be said against transgenderism from a Taoist standpoint is that you shouldn't feel the need to change your body to reflect your mind. Conclusion: ancient Taoism would likely accept transgenderism so long as you don't pursue gender affirming surgery.

Now while the official religion of China at the time was Taoism, many emperors highly favored Buddhism and that can even be believed of the emperor described in JTTW.

That being said. Buddhism believes that the body is a cage that traps the spirit in suffering and should therefore be distanced from as much as possible. HOWEVER! The Buddha himself said that while you should try to separate yourself from the Earthly Realm one's body should be used as a tool of awakening, and given that awakening in to find Nirvana, one could argue that pursuing your gender identity is simply using your body to reflect your soul and therefore is good. But honestly Buddhists are pretty chill and as long as you ain't hurting anyone or anything I HIGHLY doubt a true Buddhist would care what you do so long as you live amicably. Conclusion: transgenderism would likely be cool with about 99% of Buddhists even in ancient China.

Overall conclusion: MOST people probably wouldn't care, though these are ancient times, so I'd really read the room before offering any info about being gender nonconforming or nonbinary. Having said that, the worst thing you'd have to do is pretend to be whatever gender you most closely resemble. But honestly I think a lot about how it'd be best to pretend to be a man when traveling as they are much less likely to be attacked, assaulted, or hate crimed.

So again, in situations like these you need to be flexible and willing to present as something you aren't. And while that can be hard, I feel like dying via whatever brutal death an extreme transphobe can think of is a lot harder. So if you play your cards right the most a nonbinary reader would get is probably some nasty comments and a few even nastier looks. Tho both could easily be corrected by Tripitaka explaining they shouldn't do that and that isn't what Buddhism believes if the person is a Buddhist and if that doesn't work or they aren't Buddhist then a few sharp glares from the Great Sage Equal to Heaven should be more than enough to get them to knock it the fuck off. Tho if you're good at talking people over to your side then they probably wouldn't even need to step in.

As for how the group would take it, I think they'd all accept it rather quickly after you explain what being enby is with maybe the exception of Bajie who just truly doesn't understand so you'd just have to explain the concept of other genders to him a few times.

I hope this answers your question at least somewhat 😊

[canisonicscrewyou]

Hey. Hey. I don't know what you're staring at. This is serious work. I am TRYING to work. Clearly. We are scraping paint off the floor. Now can you please fucking focus.

💥 DNI w/ this if you’re under 18. Silly. 💥

[diapause]

if you see a post that contains some historical writing or art by or related to trans women and your first instinct is to comment or share it and make it about gerard way, maybe consider not doing that

[a-dotrivenitupontop]

it’s so funny when terfs are like ‘um actually that trans historical figure was really just a woman dressing up to escape the patriarchy!!1!’ because like.. you mean to tell me a person dressing as a man despite ‘not actually being one’ was a) believed because people knew someone’s gender was none of their fucking business and b) an important contributor to whatever they contributed to + didn’t just dress up to look at coochie in public bathrooms

[vvitchgender]

Thinking about the time my TERF mother encouraged me to look into Claude Cahun's work as part of her "convince my trans son he's actually a cis lesbian" project, so I said okay sure and when I looked them up low and behold turns out they were gnc as fuck and a lot of their work was about their very not-cis relationship with gender.

[uncanny-tranny]

Regardless of your thoughts on trans people's right to reproduction, it is a human rights violation to force sterilize trans people. It is vital that we maintain trans people's inalienable right to their bodies in every conceivable way.

[freckliedan]

such a hard handshake emoji on the dans curves deeply impacting my gender front. you always just get it

anon this js us right now

[galesburgdogs]

it rlly sucks to see professional sources have little/lacking nuance abt queer history especially people who could be considered more trans-y