Matt Sarme

I already shared before a trailer of it without any context. You might have heard more about it recently because it was one of the midnight screenings of the Cannes Festival.

"Jim Queen", of its full name "Jim Queen and the quest for the Chloroqueer", is a gay satire-comedy cartoon produced by Bobbypills (in fact they are proud to present it as their first movie). They are known for various works such as "Peepoodo" or "Vermin", though I don't know much about them... But I DO know about THE work that boosted their fame in the first place: "Les Kassos" (which I think got an English translation at one point, as "The Wakos"? or maybe "The Dorks"?). An irreverent, very dark, very goofy and funny adult cartoon about the famous characters of children's media and entertainment become "social cases" as they passed their prime, and turning into grotesque caricatures of themselves. Lot of sex, lot of swears and lot of blood occurs as they all come in the office of the same tired social agent. Think a bit of it as a French spiritual successor to "Meet the Feebles" (though the Wikipedia page rather invites people to compare it to "Robot Chicken").

But back to Jim Queen: it shall get official theater screenings around mid June. It had an online funding in association with to ACT (Against Conversion Therapy) - though I heard some people say the funding campaign actually couldn't be completed despite the movie going out, so either they found the money elsewhere either they completed the cartoon with lower quality than what they intended? But you're not here to hear about money problem - you're here to see HUGE SEXY GAY MEN.

The story follows two protagonists. Jim Perfect, the most famous gay influencer of all of Paris, and Lucien, his twink self-proclaimed "number one follower". The two of them are forced into a quest for the mysterious remedy known as the "chloroqueer" (yes it is a chloroquine joke) when a mysterious epidemy spreads around queer people - the Heterosis, which turns homosexuals into heteros. And Jim just learned he contracted it - meaning soon he shall lose his fashion sense, his perfect-body obsession and his enjoyment of prostate-orgasm, in short everything that makes his identity. [Some clickbaity article made the plot sound very VERY different by just summing it up as "A gay influencer faces a virus" and stopped there]. In fact this is how Lucien will go from his first to his very last follower as his heterosexuality makes him lose everything and only Lucien is willing to remain by his side, even if he becomes... *shivers* an heterosexual.

The movie presents itself as dedicated to the Parisian queer scene, and the adventures of the duo will take them through caricatural versions of some of the "most famous landmarks of the gay community" in Paris, according to what was promised on the funding page. One of the two main creators of the movie, Marco Nguyen, also proudly claims he is the co-creator of the "MercrediX" and "VendrediX", the "hottest gay afterworks of Paris" which... I'll have to trust his word onto, I haven't been in Paris in a WHILE. At least in this part of Paris. Last time I went there it was to go in a bookshop-spree and I almost got hit by bikes four times in a row - and only twice was I actually near a road. Parisian bike-riders are the most dangerous bike-riders of France, let me tell you that. Foutus vélos parisiens va... Enfin bref.

So this was their project: to create, in their own words, a "politically incorrect, irreverent comedy for all to gather around, heteros or LGBTQIA+" which shall reveal "all what the gay people live through and that nobody dares to tell". (Have I mentionned that one scene included some BDSM-elderly-Nazi-styled guy locking up someone in an Iron Maiden with dildos instead of spikes? And that the bears in this movie are ACTUAL humanoid bears?).

They also managed to bring on the cast Elisabeth Wiener, who is quite a famous voice actor in France for doing the roles of Cruella, Yzma or Winifred Sanderson. She plays Lucien's mother, an homophobic health minister who is the main reason Lucien stays in the closet and is basically an awkward "first-time gay"... (A thinly-veiled caricature of Christine Boutin). La Briochée is also part of the cast, this drag queen that you might know for being the French voice of Angel Dust. And there's also Philippe Katerine who you might (unfortunately) know from that one Olympic Games performance... (Before he was more better known for his song "Louxor j'adore") - he plays *puts on glasses*... Lucien's prostate. No that's not a type, Lucien actually has a scene during which his prostate appears to him in a divine vision. It is that type of movie.

Their funding page included quite interesting bonuses specifically for animation fans - as in, traditional animation fans, because while computers and tablets replaced a lot of the paper-work, they offered to recreate animatons cellulos based on the animation files so people could have them for supporting the movie, with a certificate of authenticity.

Of course I can't say any more given the movie is not yet released to the public and I was not at the Cannes festival... But as I said before, it has been announced as THE gay comedy of France this year, so we shall see!

This movie

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When asked about precisions and fact-checking:

The only logical explanation for this disgust reaction is that the taboo around such relationships is a form of bigotry, similar to homophobia, or transphobia. Consanguiphobia is real, it is pounded into us from such an early age that most of us have probably said consanguiphobic things throughout our lives. It is important that we fight against it, that anyone who has a disgust reaction begin questioning why immediately. Because the end result is that you are hurting real, live people. Consanguinamorous people are humans, just like you. They aren't dumb rednecks, like the stereotype. They are just normal people who happened to fall in love with family members.

deadly lips

The disgust at hesitation is common with any stigmatized feeling, but rushing rarely makes it better. You don't owe anyone an explanation for staying in the closet, taking small steps, or not being fully out on main.

How is this line of thinking any different from the TERFs who say that trans women just have AGP, or any of the number of people who spout race science, scientific misogyny, or eugenics, aside from which groups of people you're talking about? People alive today really do not appreciate enough that we have mostly lived in an era where people collectively "denied reality" by rejecting scientific evidence that was inconvenient to people fighting for feminism, racial equality, LGBT rights, civil rights, etc. You generally agree that "rejecting nature" is important in order to progress to a future that upholds social equality and bodily autonomy, but how is "reality" or "science" different from "nature?" Maybe these unfortunately realities that these reactionaries believe in are true; if that's the case, what's even the point of being a transfeminist or anything like that if science is only on your enemies' side and not yours?

The first and most obvious thing to note is that trans people are not in rejection of reality at all, but rather the arbitrary limitations on their autonomy with regard to their own bodies. Like, what do you even think the trans perspective is?

When we talk about "rejecting nature" we are talking about rejecting the idea of a "natural order" with authority over our lives. Nature lacks intelligence, intent, and morality. It is not an authority to worship to but rather a series of forces we can understand and operate in increasingly precise ways as that understanding grows.

For example, I would think it's foolish to "reject nature" in the sense of deciding arbitrarily that you're capable of ignoring gravity and flying as you wish. Obviously you can't do that.

But obviously that doesn't mean you can't gain enough of an understanding of physics to develop flight through technology anyway, right? And if someone came along telling you that airplanes are against the natural order or some shit that would be obviously false in the face of the fact that you actually can fly through the use of tools?

Similarly, you would just be crazy if you thought you could ward off disease with positive thinking alone (the pure idealist position), and you would also be crazy if you argued that vaccines and antibiotics subvert nature's design (the anti-transhumanist position). In this analogy, the closest thing to trans people would be using and advancing modern medicine.

Trans people see that their bodies do not match their preferences, so they physically modify their bodies, which in turn also often changes their social roles. They are well aware that HRT won't change your chromosomes, but why would that matter when these other changes are the ones that actually come up in your day to day life? It's kind of arbitrary to decide that gender should be based on chromosomes specifically when things like your hormone levels matter more for your body in practice and people you interact with cannot see your chromosomes.

The issues with things like the anti-trans movement are numerous. To begin with, the anti-trans side is notoriously unscientific to the point where in order to justify their policies they have to ignore the actual experiences of the people they're supposedly observing and push politically-biased reviews that selectively ignore inconvenient realities (wow it's almost like it's not trans people who are doing the thing you suggest).

But the other is a matter of values. You can do research to determine what is real and what isn't, but beyond that it is up to you to decide what is morally right and wrong. That's an adjacent thing (obviously it's very easy to commit atrocities accidentally if your information is false) but not strictly dependent. More of a matter of philosophy, really.

Personally, I think it is conductive to good outcomes to allow people personal freedom about their own bodies. This is not based on a whim but on the observed negative consequences of what can happen when you try to control that.

It's also worth noting that while the existing power structures have used the cover of science to further their hierarchies, it was also further scientific research that went on to debunk them, not retreating to comfortable ignorance.

Yeah, and maybe the world is made of pudding.

But to return to the point I made about how some of this stuff is a matter of philosophy rather than scientific knowledge, there's a lot of things that reactionaries claim that should not really change how you treat others even if they were true.

For example, let's say that misogynists are right and women are inherently worse than men at chess on average (for example). What does that actually change?

Obviously some women are still really good at chess and some men are bad at it, so it would make sense to judge people as individuals rather than generalizing their abilities from their gender anyway.