Aliens, Academics, and Gender

For the past few weeks I've been re-reading C.S. Lewis's Space Trilogy (Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, and That Hideous Strength) for the first time in quite a while. The last time I read these books I was eleven years old and on a plane from Dublin to Newark so I don't remember much. I got through the first two books double-quick but like many people I'm finding That Hideous Strength a bit of a slog. I LIKE it, but it's much slower reading.

One thing that I've been noting this time around is how these books deal with gender. I don't generally go to C.S. Lewis expecting great things with regards to gender issues or female characters, for three reasons: first, the whole Susan Pevensie debacle; second, how Dorothy L. Sayers once said that when the topic was sex and gender Lewis's mind just kind of went to static until somebody changed the subject; third, 'Ministering Angels' was truly awful. So when, late in Perelandra, Lewis suddenly started talking about gender and sexuality, and didn't stop in That Hideous Strength, I was kind of expecting to be angry at him.

And I am. But, weirdly, not as much as I thought I would be.

The bad things about the way the Space Trilogy handles gender are both really bad and obvious, so I'll list them first: gender is presented as real, the feminine gender is presented as 'lower' (though Lewis tries really hard to avoid equating this with 'worse', this was doomed to fail from the start and Lewis and all of his loved ones knew it) in some kind of spiritual hierarchy than the masculine, God is explicitly masculine, there is a character who is a gratuitously vicious butch lesbian stereotype, and the anti-contraception arguments in That Hideous Strength are completely insane and revolve around a deliberately absurd warning about eugenics and Merlin chopping people's heads off.

The good things are more subtle but also arguably more interesting, as the bad things are pretty much just what you'd expect of a conservative single male academic writing in the 1940s. In the realm of good things: gender and sex are different things and don't always go together in the allegedly 'normal' way (the main character, Elwin Ransom, is male in sex but actually feminine in gender as Lewis presents it), going 'against gender' isn't presented as sinful so much as something that just confuses the narrator and thus the author (the narration is first-person ancillary with Lewis appearing briefly in Perelandra), God isn't gendered in the same 'way' that humans and angels are (whatever that means), there are apparently five genders other than male and female that only exist in the Outer Planets, husbands who abuse their wives are roundly condemned, That Hideous Strength has a sympathetic coded-lesbian character in addition to its more explicitly lesbian evil character, and we're clearly not supposed to agree with everything Merlin says since he also recommends killing George VI for being a Saxon and insists on referring to Iraq as Babylon.

I think what this shows is that Lewis was interested in discussing gender within a small-l liberal Christian perspective but was hamstrung by his environment, which was filled with people who with the arguable exception of Williams were a lot more conservative than he was about these things, and by the fact that at the time that he wrote the Space Trilogy he had essentially no clue what a woman who wasn't Dorothy L. Sayers or G.E.M. Anscombe even looked like. Most of what he writes about sex is very questionable and I've spent a lot of That Hideous Strength with face firmly in palm.

It's interesting to think that with the exception of Til We Have Faces and maybe Surprised by Joy this is about as non-failing about gender as Lewis gets, and that most of my favourite authors tend either to have had 'of their time' views on gender (Lewis and all those premodern writers I love), to not really discuss it at all (Umberto Eco and his ilk), or to win at gender but fail in some other ways (Angela Carter, in my most humble opinion). I'm not sure if this means that I simply prefer older literature, that what I consider good portrayal of gender (as opposed to just awesome female characters, which is a broader category) simply isn't that common in general, that my interest in literature with religious themes or discussion ropes in questionable (though rarely if ever outright Godawful) dealings with gender as a sort of sacrificial lamb, or what.

DEAR FREAKING GOD

Do I really HAVE to explain to some yutz the many, many reasons why Simoun is a better representation of queer people (even in a fantasy context) and theories and experiences of queerness than Queer as Folk is? Really? REALLY?

One is a Nishimura Junji series (some of the only serious and portentous work the man's ever done, so you know that he felt that this was a story that really had to be told) with input from Mashimo Kouichi (he of the Girls-with-Guns Trilogy) and major Japanese feminists of to-day, inspired heavily by works by Doris Lessing and Ursula K. Le Guin. It explores the nature of gender through a fantasy society and also touches on themes of transcendence, eternity, faith, class, purity, and real and fake realities.

The other is a Russell T Davies show and exhibits the general lack of interest in the ordinary as a mirror for the extraordinary that characterises the man's oeuvre. It doesn't even use the extraordinary as a tedious mirror of the ordinary as his time on Doctor Who did. It is simply (in my opinion) plodding and thinks that it is funnier and more subversive than it is. There is nothing transcendent, eternal, or pure about it.

I don't think there's a contest between these two shows, really. One of them has extremely compelling characters, nearly all of whom are SOME kind of queer, sometimes more than one kind at once, and a beautiful and evocative setting and plot, used to the service of important, resonant themes that lend real power to the idea of a universe in which strong, beautiful, queer people can 'give testament in a ruined world'. And it's not the one that the yutz I was talking to thinks it is.

EVEN MUSIC-WISE. JESUS CHRIST.

DO I REALLY HAVE TO GET INTO THIS?

Which of these would you rather worship?

(Click images to embiggen.)

These are all images of the same person. Inari Okami, Japanse god/goddess/deity-thing of foxes, rice, agriculture, and wealth, and a chthonic and in some traditions afterlife deity. He/she/it can be a guy, a girl, an anthropomorphic fox (no word yet on George Clooney's involvement), a non-anthropomorphic fox, or, apparently, in the second image from the bottom, David Bowie from the film Labyrinth. Inari is associated with summer so I thought it'd be nice to post some of him/her/it for the beginning of the dog days.

Also, Google Image Search for "male inari" turns up mostly Inari-brand tennis shoes. THANKS A BUNCH, CAPITALISM.

Short Story: Alchemical Horror Stories Through the Ages

DISCLAIMER: THIS BLENDS FACT AND FICTION. DELIBERATELY. DO YOUR RESEARCH.

Alchemical Horror Stories through the Ages

And some that were modest successes

By Nathan Turowsky

The Vermont national character

I am from Vermont. Vermont is not a place that many people are from and most people have some pretty strange conceptions about what it is like. So in this essay I shall explain the national character of Vermont. I say ‘national’ because, while I am very proud of my state, like so much of New England, Vermont barely counts as America any more (I view this as a good thing in some ways).

            Most Vermonters are hippies. But we aren’t your typical hippies. No, we’re the sorts of hippies who climb mountains, stand on the summit in a snowstorm, and let out the great, half-deranged Vermont ‘YEEEEEAAAAARRRRRGH!!!!!’ as if to say ‘we’re here, we’re Vermonters, come and get us.’ This is why we were the first state to legalise civil unions for gays, why we fought just as hard against New York and New Hampshire as we did against Britain, and why we retained our independence until 1791 as the Vermont Republic. Our governor during this time was Thomas Chittenden, who only had one working eye because of an incident with a catamount.

            This seeming paradox is due to Vermont’s history. For most of our history we were peopled by proud and hardy mountaineers and farmers—first Algonquin and Abenaki Indians, then the French, then settlers from Connecticut. Then in the 1960s Vermont started to attract hippies because of the forests and mountains (the state’s name comes from the French for ‘green mountain’). In true New England fashion, instead of clashing, these groups merged. Hence proud and hardy hippies who don’t take shit from anybody.

Simoun drinking game

Take a shot:

• Every time specific reference to sex change is made.
• Every time you want to slap a religious official.
• Every time you want to slap a secular official (warning: in the later stages of the show, this may result in alcohol poisoning).
• Every time you find yourself getting emotionally invested in a character who hasn’t had much screen time until now.
• Every time an Argentine or Plumbish character speaks in their native language (Japanese played backwards).
• Every time a new dodgy translation of an honorific comes up.
• Every time Aaeru does something insensitive.
• Every time Simoun makes you cry or feel feelings associated with crying.
• Every time we see a Ri Maajon that hasn’t been seen before.
• Every time a straight couple appears onscreen, drink the whole bottle (don’t worry; this only happens once).

Simoun character design grades

THESE ARE NOT GRADES FOR THE CHARACTERS, JUST THEIR APPEARANCE.

Sibylla Mamiina

In A World…where braids are a plot point, Mamiina’s character design, especially her hairstyle, stands out. This character is arguably the animation director, prominent design artist Nishida Asako’s, masterpiece. As Mamiina is introduced as a needlessly belligerent and selfish character, she scowls and postures and looks like every self-absorbed bitch we ever had to deal with in high school; yet as her character develops her design softens into something truly beautiful. It’s hard to make hair look either threatening or pathos-filled, but Mamiina’s manages to be both. A+

Sibylla Yun

Yun is introduced in the same episode as Mamiina and follows a similarly tragic and sacrificial character arc. Her blonde hair is of a complementary colour to Mamiina’s dark blue and as they are first seen together this serves to underline their superficially very different personalities. Also, she’s just plain pretty. A

Sibylla Aaeru

Nishida gave Aaeru an odango, a popular hairstyle in Japan that heightens her resemblance to early Mickey Mouse in both appearance and personality. There isn’t much to say about this design, honestly, but it works. A-

Her Eminence the Cardinal Priestess and Interior Minister

As the most prominent character who is never given a name, the day-to-day director of religious life in Simulacrum was an important design to get right. Her colour scheme is very dark, deep reds and blacks, but the lines of her face and clothing are smooth and clean, a perfect design for a morally ambiguous but ultimately justified character. A-

Captain Anubituf and Dux Guragief

I’m giving these two a joint grade because they are almost never seen apart for any length of time. Anubituf and Guragief are Simoun’s most prominent male characters. It was necessary to distinguish them from the girls but at the same time make them pretty enough that, when flashbacks of them as teenagers appear late in the show, they are recognisable. Anubituf’s fondness (as a girl and as a man) for elbow-length light blue capes, and Guragief’s frankly yuppie-ish hairstyle, make the characters ‘pop’ or stand out in any scene that they are in. Between them they have made many a straight male fan question his sexuality. They look good as hoboes, too. A-

Argentine Pilot

This guy only appears in one episode and spends most of his time coughing up blood, but his ghoulish appearance is truly chilling. A-

Vice-Chairman Halconf

Halconf’s scenes tend to be very well-drawn and well-animated, and his patrician features combined with a wonky fifties/sixties DA hairstyle reinforce his ambiguity. Is this wheelchair-bound leader an FDR or a Dr Strangelove? B+

Chairman-Pope Onashia

For a character who spends all but one of her scenes wrapped head to toe in a shroud with mummy-like facial markings, Onashia somehow manages to look her part as Simulacrum’s supreme leader. She has what I would term in polite company ‘effed-up eyes’—horribly jaundiced, bloodshot slits with olive-green pupils—which enhances her statuesque appearance. B+

Sibylla Alty and Sibylla Kaimu

These two sisters are also almost never apart (which, come to think of it, Kaimu probably doesn’t really like). Their designs are forgettable but in no way bad. Kaimu is the one with glasses. B

Sibylla Vyura

Vyura is awesome and her design makes her look like something out of a forties war film. In a good way. B

Sibylla Amuria

Amuria is essentially Vyura but a bit of a jackass and with different hair. B

Captain Wauf

Wauf is a perfect example of the ‘cool grandpa/uncle’ character type, even though he’s not actually related to any other character. He looks a little like my Uncle Joe twenty or so years ago. It’s still a bit odd to hear reminiscence about ‘when I was a little girl’ from the chubby, aging Wauf, though. Oh, the trials and tribulations of transgender-themed television. B

Sibylla Dominura

Dominura looks very imposing, and while this works for a while, her character design cannot mimeograph her character development in the same way that Mamiina’s can. This means that later in the show her appearance and behaviour form something of a jarring disconnect. Then again, this was likely intentional. B-

Sibylla Rodoreamon

Rodoreamon is basically an unlucky person who fell through a wormhole from Upstairs, Downstairs into the wrong show (she’s been described as a ‘barrel-grown fish out of water’), and she looks the part. But she started the whole phenomenon of Plot-Relevant Haircuts and what she does with her hair in the last episode is a major part of Simoun’s emotional catharsis. B-

His Excellency the Defence Minister

The Defence Minister is a fat, ugly bastard and every scene with him makes me want to slap him silly. But, as he is unarguably the single most flat-out evil character in the whole show, this is as it should be. B-

Sibylla Morinas

Morinas is a bit alarming because she does not dress modestly or tastefully at all, but that’s perfectly consistent with her character and the extent to which her face conveys her personality is enough to make me give her a higher grade than I normally would. And she still looks good in the tan cloaks that the Sibyllae wear while discharging their religious duties. Also, if she had become male, what the Hell would her name have been? Morinasf? Morinaf? Bleh. B-

Sibylla Limone

Limone is a very cute girl to be sure, and as the youngest of the characters that seems right, but her design did not really move me. C+

Sibylla Paraietta

I don’t think you’re really supposed to like Paraietta, which is good, because I didn’t. Including her design. But it was technically proficient. C+

Sibylla Wapourif

Since Wapourif’s body is in the process of changing from female to male throughout the show, it seems unfair to judge his character design. I’ll give him a nondescript C

Corporal Mastif

Mastif was only in one episode and I hardly remember anything about him. C-

Sibylla Erii

Completely nondescript and served only to introduce a part of the setting. C-

Sibylla Aurea Neviril

Neviril’s character design is pretty, but it’s uninspired. I didn’t get sick of looking at her (which is good because she’s one of the main focus characters) but Nishida seems to have been phoning it in. C-

Plumbish Military Governor

You can tell that this guy is a military and political stuffed shirt with no concern for the matters at hand. And rather sadistic to boot, at least until Anubituf and Guragief do their little ‘let’s subvert the terms of the peace treaty!’ thing. D+

Sister Angulas

Angulas was probably intended to be a ‘sweet’/‘cute’ character. They went too far in that direction. That may have been the point, but it doesn’t really help. Random note: Angulas is the only foreign (non-Simulacran) character who has a name, although Aaeru’s name is supposed to be Plumbish as well. D

Sibylla Floe

Oh, God, Floe. So fucking annoying throughout. She serves a purpose and the show would be worse without her, but she still annoys the fuck out of me. And her character design is terrible; Nishida was obviously phoning it in at that point. Worst design of any named character. D-

Argentine Military Governor

Appears to have been cobbled together from bits of other anime characters and archive footage of Roald Amundsen. Truly awful. Thank Tempus Spatium he only had two scenes before getting fragged by Guragief. F

All right, insects of Bordentown; I've had enough of your bullshit.

To-day was the first evening for fireflies! I caught some but then the jar broke when I was jumping after more. I AM SO GRACEFUL. Also there's a narrow window of time when it's dark enough for them to be out but light enough for them to be visible and I pretty much totally missed it.

I did, however, get a BRILLIANT picture!

(The glare at the bottom is from lanterns.)

Also, my town has cicadas. I never noticed this in previous summers, but having got into Higurashi last winter it's making me rather paranoid this year. OH GOD PLEASE DON'T HURT ME, SWEET DAUGHTER OF THE GUY WHO RUNS THE DRUGSTORE.

How to Internet: A Beginner's Guide

How to Internet

1. First and foremost: don’t ever antagonise any of the chans.
2. Don’t assume that people care about you. If they do, great, but you can’t take it as a given online.
3. Liking anything Japanese makes you a 'weeaboo'; disliking anything Japanese makes you a racist. That’s just the way it works.
4. Finland has a disproportionately large online presence. Be afraid. Be very afraid. Those guys beat off the Commies and the Nazis.
5. Video games are fucking controversial. Except for Jack Thompson; ever since the ‘flowers for Jack’ fiasco, everybody hates him.
6. Familiarise yourself with chatspeak. Even if you don’t use it, other people will.
7. Familiarise yourself with lolcats. Chances are after you get past the initial bemusement you’ll find them hilarious too.
8. If you happen to like both Philip K. Dick and Robert A. Heinlein, beware. This is the Internet equivalent of standing between the trenches during the shelling.
9. Yes, there are people who honestly like Draco Malfoy. No, I don’t know either.
10. Actually, you’re best avoiding most of the Harry Potter fans. Really.
11. My Immortal, however, unites the entire Internet. Against it.
12. Even outside the chans, DO NOT. PISS OFF. ANONYMOUS.
13. Do mention Twilight, Inheritance, and/or The Sword of Truth. Bring popcorn.
14. Depending upon what yuri board you’re on, bringing up Kannazuki no Miko may make the Internet reach through your screen and slap you. The same goes for Yami to Boushi to Hon no Tabibito.
15. Yoshinobu Nishizaki is always funny.
16. About Doctor Who fandom…avoid. Avoid. AVOID! But don’t avoid the show itself or there’ll be a lot of desultory references that you won’t get.
17. Mentioning Orson Scott Card can be good or bad, depending.
18. Do you like V for Vendetta? If not, I strongly suggest that you start to!

Disclaim for sarcasm

I note, with some consternation, that a recent online attempt of mine to explain—not even to argue for or against, simply to explain—St Anselm’s Ontological Argument was somehow disseminated to the point where it reached Richard Dawkins’s website, at which point it, along with other online assays of such kind, was mercilessly excoriated by Dawkins’s brood.

            Obviously being criticised by the followers of Professor Dawkins is a major setback for anybody interested in the philosophy of religion. As we all know, Professor Dawkins is a very well-regarded pillar of said branch of knowledge and to get on his bad side (or that of his fans) is to get on the bad side of the greatest philosopher of religion since, perhaps, Erasmus. In fact, to antagonise Professor Dawkins, wilfully or not, directly or not, is to be certain one of the greatest mistakes that a modern thinker of any sort can make.

            This has all been very trying for me. My beliefs have been shaken to their core. Due to the overwhelming insight engendered in Dawkins’s thought and that of his cohort, I am more than willing to re-examine and if need be abandon some of my most well-thought-out and clearly-articulated opinions. I am truly sorry for contributing to the vast religious conspiracy seeking to suppress Professor Dawkins and his thought, for as we all know he is as oppressed in the public at large as he is respected by serious philosophers.

            And it’s not just him! Poor Hitchens, poor Harris! For are not these pitiable Rudy Ruetiggers of modern thought the most oppressed of all? Surely they are as downtrodden as the great Christian and Jewish thinkers of former days! Surely no Buber, no St Cecilia or Tertullian, can match how they have suffered for their work, nor how great the work in question is. I wish them all speed in their work: may Hitchens succeed in his truly great endeavours! May Harris’s voice ring loud and clear in American life! May Dawkins’s next project truly do what it is meant to—for is not children’s ability to enjoy fantasy truly as pernicious and evil as paedophiliac rape? And may the great paladins, PZ Myers and Ian McEwan and Philip Pullman and their ilk, come to the constant aid and defence of these great, great, truly great and deep thinkers into the realities of the religious experience. May Myers’s reasonable approach, McEwan’s unique insights, and Pullman’s good grace triumph against the obscurantist drivel of the world’s Francis Collinses, Doris Lessings, and Leonard Cohens. May those who encourage unreason be mocked! May those who encourage fanaticism be killed!

May those who are against scientific supremacy be crushed beneath the wheels of the great Professor, who as we all know had so many better things to do over the past decade than teach his students about science. May he no more do useless things like studying his actual fields of expertise and expressing his outrage at various universities’ decisions to award honorary degrees to Ben Stein; of course these are less useful than promoting open contempt for one’s enemies in western Asia and trying to destroy the concept of fiction. May he entirely abandon his attempts at promoting evolution against intelligent design and focus entirely on religious philosophy, his true area of expertise!

            MEA CULPA.

            SALVA NOS, RICARDUS.