👌 This Close To Losing My Damn Mind

But her family. Holy shit.

First off, it’s p much ALL women, and mostly UNMARRIED women, which at this time means of something happens to her dad then you’re financially responsible for like. Four grown ass adults, potentially forever

Because mom in law is DEFINITELY gonna need someone to take care of her when dad in law kicks it, and they have like. NO money. So already you’re accepting that if all goes well, you’re gonna be one random old bag’s retirement home. That’s expensive and exhausting, yeah? Imagine asking someone on a first date knowing that if they say yes and things go good her high-strung chihuahua mother is gonna move in with you. IMAGINE.

And girly’s other sisters. Well, one is a sweetheart, yeah, so she probably won’t be an issue, but that still leaves three more, and two of those ones are INSUFFERABLE. Never went to school, dumb as rocks, spend cash like it’s toilet paper

And while one of the two is young still and might grow out of it the OTHER one is actively torpedo’ing her entire family’s reputation by wandering off with random dudes and chasing ass. She’s never gonna work, she can’t build connections, she’s a fucking sinkhole, and she’s being led on by the same goddamn con man ass leeching tit who’s been bleeding you dry while telling anyone who’ll listen that your family is full of ratty thieving bastards.

And if he dumps her after a week- WHICH YOU KNOW HIS BITCH ASS IS GONNA- you’ve got a SECOND UNMARRIABLE GROWN ASS ADULT TO PROVIDE FOR. And you KNOW she’s gonna be a tantrum-throwing little shit about it, and it’s not like you can lock her in the basement or something, you’re gonna have to bring her fucking. Everywhere. And give her an allowance and shit while she contributes zero, because again, she NEVER GOT EDUCATED AND HAS NO MARKETABLE SKILLS. She’s not even good to TALK to. FUCK

And you’re looking at this girl’s father like “please for the love of fuck get your spawn under control, marry them off, get them working on their résumé, learning to sew or be nursemaids or manage staff or SOMETHING, yall got no money and one foot in the grave” and that old man just laughs like “haha yeah, what can you do. lol”

So you’re looking to the mom and finally it’s making sense how she got that twitch in her eye and as MUCH as she is you’re starting to realize she’s the SMART one, desperately throwing her armloads of girls at random men like they’re a bunch of fucking lifeboats bobbing around a sinking ship, like yes Jesus Christ sweetly that life boat IS old and ugly and kind of boring but for FUCKS SAKE PICK ONE

And you look back at this girl who is ALSO REFUSING THE LIFE BOATS BY THE WAY and god damn it she’s still the most radiant thing you’ve ever seen so fine, fuck it, Christ alive, you’ll do it. You’ll shoot your shot. She’s everything you’ve ever wanted in anybody abut it’s not even just about that anymore, it’s about being her best fucking shot at a future, and even if she doesn’t like you all that much she’s still gonna say yes and that might break your heart a bit knowing it’s about the money but who knows, maybe it will at least be civil, or companionable, and even if she doesn’t LOVE you at least you’ll know she’s well and cared for

And so you’ll do it. You’ll take on the neurotic stress mess mother in law, the absent father, the broke ass wingnut no brain no money no future airhead sisters, the bad mannered relatives and the embarrassing behaviour and the impending future of sharing your entire shit with a clown parade of freeloaders, you’ll risk it all and accept the absolute certainty of financial ruin and emotional exhaustion for the rest of your whole ass life and you’ll make your own family deal with it too, you’ll do it, you’ll fucking DO IT, you stupid lovesick motherfucker

And so you go to this chick like “look. Your whole family’s a shitshow. You’ve got fucking nothing and you’re gonna die on the street. But for some reason- and I don’t get it either- I’ve fallen in love with you, and I wish I didn’t, but I did, so I’m telling you that whether you like me or not, I’ll give you everything. I’ll give you everything even if it’s the dumbest shit I ever done. Fuck my stupid Baka ass, I’ll marry you.”

And she looks at you- having heard or considered absolutely none of your months-long internal debate and monologue- and goes “The fuck did you just say about my family, you son of a bitch?”

And the shock of that is enough to jolt you back into a reality where you are able to actually hear and process what just came out of your damn mouth And yeah

you've let in the vampire thank you. also most of this comes from leslie feinberg's transgender warriors which has a whole chapter on jeanne d'arc & which everyone should read imo!

so when i say "trans history" i do not mean that "trans" is a Real Thing that exists. we made up being "trans" and we cannot say that anyone in history is Objectively Trans, like its a fact we can prove. but we can say that people in history shared common experiences with trans and genderqueer people of today, and by linking them to our modern construct of transness we get a fuller picture of the human experience with gender diversity. also, and i cannot emphasize this enough: women afab can be trans. men amab can be trans.

but also, jeanne d'arc isn't just trans history because she crossdressed. the story often gets framed as her wearing men's clothes to fight in war, but its deeper than that! both from a secular trans sense and from a religious standpoint (which makes her an important figure for trans christians). & this gets compounded with the impetus in art to make sure jeanne d'arc looks appropriately feminine. which can be compared to the ways that, before fe/male impersonation had a queer connotation, male impersonators had to make sure that, even in drag, they always looked visibly cisfeminine.

on one level, regardless of gender, jeanne d'arc was oppressed by transphobia. she was the target of blatanly transphobic attacks for her gender expression. she was called a hommasse, a slur for masculine women, her crossdressing "contrary to Divine laws" and "abominable before God". while she was also a military threat, her trial was about her crossdressing- that was the crime that she was charged with after they failed to find evidence she was a pagan.

specifically, her claim that her wearing men's clothing and cutting her hair was a God-given command. and yes, part of that command was also going to war, but it does not seem like it was just "you have to wear men's clothing so you can fight." To Jeanne, crossdressing was its own command. She said she would rather die than stop, unless God told her to, and that "were [she] still so dressed and with the king and those of his party, it would be one of the greatest blessings for the kingdom of France."

Its claimed that she repented at first and was sentenced to life in prison as long as she started wearing women's clothing again, and that she later "relapsed" and started wearing men's clothing. some TERFs have argued that she had to wear men's clothing to avoid getting raped- but she was well known to be assigned female. The clothes she wore would not matter, given that she was famous enough that actual monarchs wanted her dead. And Jeanne said that she chose to start wearing men's clothing again which was compared to "a dog returning to its own vomit." And it was this that allowed them to burn her alive as punishment.

So on a second level, this is a lot more complicated than a normal cis woman wearing men's clothes to a specific end. Jeanne viewed her masculine gender expression as vital to her soul. It was used as the justification for killing her, so she quite literally chose to die rather than present as cisfeminine.

And on a third level, she didn't refuse to present cisfeminine to make a bold statement about the right of women to wear pants or go to war. She did it because it was God's command. And if Catholic canon matters to you at all, she is a canonized saint. The Church has given her a big ol blue checkmark in the sky. If Jeanne believed that crossdressing was its own command, and not just a means to an end, then she believed that genderqueerness is a holy command given by God. Which opens up a wonderful new trans-centric theology! It creates space within Catholicism (and anyone else who cares about Catholic saints) to view transness as a special role which comes from Divine blessing. And frankly, this cultural impact alone makes her part of trans history the same way plenty of cishet women are part of gay history because of their cultural impact on gay people.

On the other hand, they provide more immediate and possibly more tractable problems.