The Disney Connection -- Mulan, Transgenderism, and the Military

I'm always amazed at how many "things" Disney is/can be connected to. That is, how many people turn to Disney to understand things, or reference things. (I realize "things" is a very vague word, but forgive me: pregnancy brain.)

Case in point: this article from The Mary Sue:

The post itself is a great read, although the title isn't that great. When it initially popped up in my newsfeed, I rolled my eyes and internally screamed, "MULAN IS NOT TRANSGENDER!" This isn't the first time I've gone all Angry Capslock when it comes to this discussion -- there are a few, older scholarly articles about Mulan that seem to conflate "cross-dressing" and "transgender," almost equating the two. And while this makes for great class discussion, it still irritates me to hear Mulan described as transgender. After all, a transgender person is one who (not to oversimplify it) feels a disconnect between their biological sex and their gender identity. Mulan has no such disconnect: it's not like she was born a woman but wants to be a man; rather, she's criticizing the restrictions placed on her for simply being a woman in Chinese society. Big difference.

So I was glad to see that this Tweet was at the heart of the article:

👏MULAN👏WAS👏NOT👏TRANS👏GENDER👏SHE👏WAS👏A👏CROSS👏DRESSER👏PLEASE👏STOP👏 pic.twitter.com/UZDsJs40IK

— Vamp 🍬 (@vampkandy) August 6, 2017

And much like Jusino points out, I'd also agree that she's not even really a cross-dresser -- as in, she's not someone who, left alone, would don men's clothes/armor. When she goes back home at the end of the movie, it's significant that she's wearing female dress, not the male armor she wore while with the army. Even when she goes to the Imperial City, she's dressed like a woman -- a decision made, I think, to emphasize the female nature of her heroism.

The rest of the article is about educating yourself in our current climate, so that you're informed and knowledgeable when you say stuff online (I know, I know) but the Disney connection was intriguing to me -- especially since this is something we've often discussed in class when watching Mulan. And I always love it when things we discuss in class appears in a "popular" medium, since it shows that these topics, these discussions, these ideas aren't relegated just to the Ivory Tower of Academia.