Current Events > Trans themes in The Matrix

(+) Yeah! (+)

You're getting extremely upset just because some people said there may be some trans imagery in a movie created by two trans women.

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Tupacrulez posted...

If I'm looking for proof of God in the world, I'll find lots of things that I can say are "imagery of god"

Doesn't mean God exists.

The people combing through this stuff looking for any little thing ("oh my god the red pill is estrogen and the blue pill is to calm you!") are doing so with an agenda.
Amoxicillin comes in red pills too. Is that relevant?
The most prolific blue pill in the 90s (and indeed, likely ever) is taken to give you a fucking hard-on.

It's just people with a narrative.

there are a lot of right ways of looking at this. yours is not one of them.

if someone were collecting data for the purposes of, say, researching a link between eating [food X] and developing [illness Y], would you be upset if a table of the data showed a clear link between them? because that's much more directly analogous to what the twitter thread is doing

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it's also important to remember that one reading of a film does not negate other readings. it can (probably) be read as an allegory for certain trans issues. it can also be read many other ways. they're just different ways of looking at a work of fiction. the key is whether or not the reading is supported by the text. in this particular case, there is a hell of a lot of trans imagery in The Matrix, so there's probably a valid reading of it as such

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Tupacrulez posted...

If I'm looking for proof of God in the world, I'll find lots of things that I can say are "imagery of god"

lol

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shockthemonkey posted...

We get it, youre pointlessly upset about this. But youve said your piece and everyone can read it, why not let it go and let everyone who feels like discussing this do it in peace? What are you gaining from repeating this speech over and over?

What are all of you gaining by trying desperately to change my mind?

Like I said,one article from 1999 or so, and I'll say I was wrong.

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You care enough.
Nothing more than "bububut look at THIS!" Has been said.
And the. It's just people on a quest to stretch as far as they can to find a point.

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He's not trying to change your mind, he's telling you to shut the fuck up. He's been very clear about this.
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Oops


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Pepys Monster posted...

I think that this is a bit of a stretch. They wanted to make a sci-fi movie.

death of the author
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even though some religious people in this topic have said the wachowskis discouraged seeing transgender themes into the matrix, they've actually said this is a good idea.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wachowskis

After Lilly Wachowski came out as transgender, she encouraged looking back on her and Lana's works "through the lens of our transness", saying that the themes of identity, self-image and transformation are apparent in The Matrix, which is "about one person's struggle with and eventual acceptance of an identity that exists beyond the borders of a rigidly defined system".[37]

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The estrogen pills part of that is the only thing Id disagree with, but I do think on the whole, there are a lot of trans themes within the film, intentional or not.

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Tupacrulez posted...

What are all of you gaining by trying desperately to change my mind?

Like I said,one article from 1999 or so, and I'll say I was wrong.

an article from 1999 or so, using data collected in 2017? that sure seems like a reasonable request to me

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averagejoel posted...

an article from 1999 or so, using data collected in 2017? that sure seems like a reasonable request to me

An article from 99, using data found in 99, saying that those themes are present.

The stuff found now is "we're looking for X result, and can say that Y proves X!"

In a contemporary analysis, it'd be "X is present, therefore, Y"

I am not saying those themes aren't there.
I'm saying that the modern analysis is clearly bias towards proving those things are there. Cart, horse, etc.

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no worries guys matrix 4 will more than certainly hit the trans nail on the head.

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Tupacrulez posted...

An article from 99, using data found in 99, saying that those themes are present.

The stuff found now is "we're looking for X result, and can say that Y proves X!"

In a contemporary analysis, it'd be "X is present, therefore, Y"

I am not saying those themes aren't there.
I'm saying that the modern analysis is clearly bias towards proving those things are there. Cart, horse, etc.

what do you think that person would have done with the data if there was not very much of it?

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Tupacrulez posted...

An article from 99, using data found in 99, saying that those themes are present.

The stuff found now is "we're looking for X result, and can say that Y proves X!"

In a contemporary analysis, it'd be "X is present, therefore, Y"

I am not saying those themes aren't there.
I'm saying that the modern analysis is clearly bias towards proving those things are there. Cart, horse, etc.

So you're basically here to say "I am being incredibly pedantic about this because I can!"?

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four?

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Wewillrocku posted...

four?

Yes in 2021
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Lorenzo_2003 posted...

If that is true, then this whole thread has been much ado about nothing.

Most analysis by amateurs is.

I went and saw James Earl Jones do some spoken word and he presented his horrendously wrongheaded analysis of Othello. As much as I like him it was painful to sit through.

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what he say?

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God_Of_Entirety posted...

what he say?

That it was about racism... which is kind of absurd just within the text, but if he were to do a tiny bit of historical research or even compared it to other texts within Shakespeare's plays, he'd actually have evidence that it wasn't so.

It's ok to have a notion of what a work of fiction means to you, but the hot second you try to sell that as what it's actually about is the second people should stop taking your seriously. Fiction is about what the author intended it to be about. Everything else is masturbation.

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I mean, literally the second word that appears on the screen (excluding the title of the movie) is "trans"



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vigorm0rtis posted...

That it was about racism... which is kind of absurd just within the text, but if he were to do a tiny bit of historical research or even compared it to other texts within Shakespeare's plays, he'd actually have evidence that it wasn't so.

was it actually that it was "about racism" or are you ignoring nuance in what he was talking about?

shakespeare certainly intended for race to be an important part of the story, and it is indeed a significant part of what the play is about.

It's ok to have a notion of what a work of fiction means to you, but the hot second you try to sell that as what it's actually about is the second people should stop taking your seriously. Fiction is about what the author intended it to be about. Everything else is masturbation.

that is false.

fiction can be about many different things in different contexts

also, I take issue with you framing it as though people are trying to argue about what it "means" -- that doesn't really have anything to do with literary analysis

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some reasoning is too impeccable to be denied!

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This whole transgender shit is getting out of control, our ancestors must be rolling in their graves.

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shockthemonkey posted...

lolwut

Transphobes finna transphobe
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averagejoel posted...

was it actually that it was "about racism" or are you ignoring nuance in what he was talking about?

shakespeare certainly intended for race to be an important part of the story, and it is indeed a significant part of what the play is about.

that is false.

fiction can be about many different things in different contexts

also, I take issue with you framing it as though people are trying to argue about what it "means" -- that doesn't really have anything to do with literary analysis

Well, nice to see you double down on the utter stupidity

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