#matrix trans allegory

[libraryleopard]

me going off to see i saw the tv glow: not sure what this is really going to be like but it looks interesting!

me walking out of i saw the tv glow: oh okay so it's the matrix for trans girls who really liked buffy the vampire slayer

[an-adhd-infested-nerd]

If there’s one thing I’m gonna do I’m gonna defend things that conservative straight males took over after completely missing the point

[flyin-shark]

Do it coward

[ankh-morporkianpostalworker]

As a society, we should've stopped making movies after The Matrix, cuz it's got everything.

Guns

Kung Fu

Keanu Reeves

Lawrence Fishburne

Mystical Chosen Ones

Leather everywhere

The Late 90s Corporate Hellscape

Cyberpunk Aspects

Trans Allegories

Hugo Weaving

Carrie-Anne Moss

Slow-motion Action Sequences

Anime Influences

Unsubtle but still cool names like Neo, Morpheus, Trinity and The Oracle

The Oracle

Philosophy

It was perfect.

[timuera]

[aemiron-main]

im not worried about the ga finding out about the gayness in st (ie byler endgame) at this point/them getting mad over it. what i AM worried (aka also excited about) is when the ga finds out about all of the trans/weird gender stuff in this show. esp with the matrix being confirmed inspo + the whole "henry creel isnt a chick" thing in tfs and patty vs patrick and the line "a boy like me" playing over a scene of karen wheeler putting on lipstick in s3 (lipstick that's the same colour as patty's lipstick in tfs that henry specifically points out). like im not saying patty karen etc are trans but i AM saying that theres some funky matrix-esque allegorical trans and twinner gender swap etc or smthn stuff going on here.

i can already see the headlines once people start to catch onto it- "WOKER THINGS?? MICHAELA WHEELER???? IS STRANGER THINGS MAKING YOUR KIDS TRANSGENDER? A Look Inside Netflix's Big Pharma Big Hit"

[rotzaprachim]

I think Ramiro 1899 being Jewish is something that I thought of as a joke before it swallowed me whole but Ramiro 1899 being trans is something that genuinely could have likely been canonical in later seasons

[furinafontaine]

I need to watch Lisa Frankenstein again. My t4t freaks.

[pyrobot1cs]

transfem sollux is fun because she’s the matrix troll (red and blue, programming) and we all know whatTHAT means

[james-wilsons-mommymilkers]

Did they call it Neo vagina after Neo from matrix

[horselessheadperson]

Thoughts on The Matrix (1999) after transitioning

As anyone who consciously lived through the nineties probably has, I must have seen The Matrix (1999) at least five times. I suddenly realized the other day that hey, in the few years since I last saw it I went through a medical and social transition, why not watch it again and see what all the "trans allegory" stuff is about?

First off, I personally don't really put that much stock in the coincidence that the most important plot device in the film is a red pill, while feminizing HRT in the nineties also came in the form of a red pill. Lilly Wachowski has also said in interviews that they didn't consciously have trans themes on their minds when they made the movie. Things that matter in stories just generally happen to be red. It's the natural color of plot devices. You don't see Adam and Eve being tempted by a golden delicious in religious imagery. See also: red herring. I digress.

Being out as trans myself now and having gone through something of a process of radicalization made me approach this picture completely differently. I've heard people interpret the central pill-related question Neo is posed with as a covert question of "do you transition or not?" - but to me, it feels more like: "do I assimilate or not?"

When a person grows up with a certain level of outward privilege in a society that caters to them, as many white people do, they tend to interpret the world we live in and the structures that govern it as generally friendly. This is obviously a bit of a generalization, but in that position of privilege doctors tend to believe and quickly help you, government officials don't generally doubt your version of reality, and so on - you get used to the trappings of the privileges you have. However, many late-realized queer people do go through life with a general feeling of unease at all of this, and a subconscious awareness that all may not be as it seems. Many trans people describe a feeling of noticing their otherness before they could name it (and often having others notice that as well, and a certain level of difficulty fitting in).

When your metaphorical egg starts to crack it often becomes exceedingly clear that you were right, your privilege - such as you had it - was conditional, and the world is a lot less friendly than previously thought. This isn't even necessarily a trans or even exclusively queer experience, we could also be talking about any other experience that might radicalize a person (for me it was going through medical gatekeeping and state-sanctioned poverty during my transition). Anyone going through a realization like this is going to be faced with a simple choice - do I pick the option of working as hard as I can to fit in, in other words: do I take personal responsibility for being an outlier, or do I fight back?

Not every marginalized person is an activist and they don't have any obligation to be, but in my personal experience a lot of day to day choices do revolve around this paradigm. As a queer disabled person, for instance, I'm faced with a lot of highly personal choices as I navigate the world around me: do I reclaim this slur for myself, do I bother asking for accommodations, how do I interact with our community and history, how do I approach intersectionality, who do I vote for if at all, how safe is it for me to come out here; I could go on. And I think in a lot of these decisions you kind of have to choose which pill you take, every day, for the rest of your life.

[aight-griffin]

Weird shit on Quora is always funny, but these incredibly misogynistic answers are especially hilarious when you know that the red pill they're referencing is estrogen.

[goober-37]

Just watched Matrix Reloaded and forgot how much I am OBSESSED with that fight scene on the freeway. First off, everyone’s outfits are so cunty I love it. Second, the techno music fucking slays like I can’t ✋. Third, it’s such an insane fight sequence I literally start foaming at the mouth y’all. Please if yall have never watched the original 3 movies, PLEASE tune in it’s absolutely worth the watch. The fight sequences are absurd but glorious, the outfits are serving, and in general it’s an excellent sci-fi franchise.

Matrix my beloved trilogy (we don’t talk about the 4th movie) that was completely misinterpreted by certain groups of people 🫶

[aubstacle-of-course]

“[Keanu] Reeves said a recent conversation about “The Matrix” with a 15-year-old put things into a terrifying perspective. The actor explained to the teenager that his character, Neo, is fighting for what’s real. The teenager scoffed and said, “Who cares if it’s real?”

Didn’t wanna take over the og post so I’m excerpting here, but this reminded me how as a child I went down a whole philosophical spiral about the nature of reality after watching the matrix at age 6, and what made “reality” more valid than the reality of the matrix.

Call me a metaphysical/subjective idealist, but I concluded that one was not necessarily more valid than the other and the issue with the matrix was the oppressive system of control; if the relationship between the humans and machines had been more egalitarian, symbiotic, and consensual there wouldn’t be any inherent moral flaw in the arrangement. If the “real” world is destroyed and horrific, why not live in the alter-world where the pleasures of life may still be enjoyed? (This age 6 insomnia-fueled spiral was also when I began to embrace hedonistic nihilism lol.)

“But your ‘real’ body is wasting away in a goo pit with your bio-energy being leeched” - so? And? I don’t see any moral failing in that sort of existence personally. Fuck that goo pit body tbh, it would be way fucking easier to trans your gender in the matrix.

[dragon-boy-gills]

[thefrostychemist]

Just finally saw The Matrix for the first time but I was high and busy cuddling wolfgirls the whole time and I think that's the real trans allegory.