Editor’s Note: The following is an excerpt of an article originally published by the Observatory of University Ethics on December 18, 2024. It was translated into English by the Observatory before being edited to align with Minding the Campus’s style guidelines. It is crossposted here with permission.
What is the purpose of “gender studies”? Reading its followers, one might wonder. Their production oscillates between minority ego-trips—”initiatory quest of a dyke and a madwoman in heterosexual territory”—small manuals of grooming—”how to “queer” classrooms”—sometimes frankly crazy—”queer herbarium.”1
So what does the woke researcher do in his working hours? Research. But not the kind he is paid for. Especially not describing the complexity of things: his world is simple, fixed, reduced to an eternal political struggle between the eternal “dominants” and the eternal “dominated.” To question this reading grid—built with large stones according to Marx, Delphy, and Butler—is already “fascism.” No, he is looking for weapons to weigh in on this struggle, and without any scruples.
It is a real profession: it mainly consists of inventing historical falsifications—sometimes statistical. The impossible “masculinization of French” is thus used to justify the imposition of inclusive writing, the fantasized “Swiss colonial past” to develop a profitable cult of repentance in Switzerland. Crude tinkering? Yes, but effective, with complicit media taking charge of presenting them to the general public as truths. With the help of success, these myths will become so numerous that they will end up competing with each other: it will be the battle for the “Viking warriors.”
“Gender Archeology,” or the Quest at All Costs for “LGBT-Friendly Ancient Societies”
The wokes want to deconstruct traditional values of Western societies. To do this, the most effective way is to prove that they have nothing “traditional” or “natural:” the arguments of conservatives would then lose all their meaning. To demonstrate this, activists will therefore look for counter-examples of feminist and LGBT-friendly societies.
Alas for them, they do not exist. The vast majority of past and/or non-Western societies seem to have been solidly “patriarchal:” political inferiority of women, homosexuality sometimes timidly tolerated but generally taboo, “gender fluidity” most often limited to cross-dressing and linked to ceremonial practices. Theory has, therefore, lead in the wing.
Never mind: our activists are going to cheat. First, we will attribute the unpleasant aspects of non-Western societies to the bad influence of Whites: the rejection of homosexuality in Africa is thus systematically presented as a “consequence of colonialism” even though the most refractory are peoples who have never been colonized —Ethiopia, Liberia, etc. And where the facts are too big to be denied—Islamic world—we will simply pass them over in silence.
As for ancient cultures, by definition poorly understood, nothing is simpler than inventing the untruths necessary for current political action. Thus, a fictitious “equality of sexualities” in ancient China or ancient Rome is evoked to justify same-sex marriage. To support trans activism, all known ancient transvestite figures are anachronistically claimed as “trans” or “non-binary:” Native American berdaches, Suomi shamans, sacred hijra prostitutes, etc., even when their descendants protest. To win, they are allowed to do anything—even “cultural appropriation,” a crime when their opponents commit it.
Early on, these pious lies were supported by partisan academics: they then acquired the appearance of “science” useful for convincing the public. In the 1930s, the lesbian feminist anthropologist Margaret Mead caused a sensation by describing matriarchal, sexually free and happy Oceanic societies… which were in fact none of these things. But it was a useful pretext for demanding a radical change in American mores, judged in comparison as “neurotic.” Becoming bestsellers, her books contributed to the sexual revolution of the 60s. The deception would not be discovered until twenty years later.
In the 1970s and 80s, against a backdrop of the politicization of universities, these activist researchers gained influence and founded real departments, the famous “Studies”—Black Studies, Gender Studies, LGBT+ Studies, etc. After 2010, with the support of the media, they turned the creation of politically motivated myths into a real industry. A good example is that of the “queer Joan of Arc,” invented by the “gender historian” Clovis Maillet, herself gender-fluid. Which is based on nothing, but what does it matter? His “works” barely published, they benefit from overwhelming press coverage, inspire plays and militant manifestos, justify the wokeness of the 2024 Olympic Games. In short, a huge political gain for a tiny lie—with the advantage of hunting on the lands of conservatives and Catholics.
Around 1985, “Gender Archaeology” was born. An exact copy of “Gender Studies,” it reproduced its rhetoric word for word: “archaeology is political,” “objectivity is a myth,” so I have the right to pass off my activism as science.2 The first “gender archaeologists” were mainly intersectional feminists, quickly joined by LGBT+ activists: thus two currents were born, “feminist archaeology” and “transgender/queer archaeology”.
Highly radical, “queer archaeology” is nothing more scientific than its name. Its avowed goal is to “force [society] to recognize the fluidity and contextual nature of human identity.”3 They don’t mind the fact that there is no proof: our activists will resort to the usual woke techniques to bring the human sciences into line. On the one hand, they will silence colleagues who dare to recall the facts: in March 2020, a Canadian anthropologist will thus be dismissed for claiming that “there are only two genders.” On the other hand, they will invent “proofs” to the contrary, using ever more fanciful interpretations. The tomb of a 4th-century Athenian actor contains—unsurprisingly—a makeup box? This is the “sign of a certain gender fluidity” in Ancient Greece.4 An Ethiopian chronicle claims that a nun and a saint “loved each other?” This is evidence of Christian lesbianism in 17th-century East Africa.5
By co-opting themselves, the activists then managed to get this dubious work published in university journals: archaeologists were outraged by this from the end of the 90s, in vain.6 We will even see the publication, under the cover of scientific articles, of real little manuals of political action: such as this fascinating “Let’s Queer Serbian Archaeology,” call for support for the imposition of sex education in schools in the Balkans.
Publications and academic titles then allow them to be taken seriously by the media. These, whether accomplices or negligent, do not differentiate between proof and (far-fetched) interpretation. We see articles appearing like “Ancient Egypt was totally queer, ” and” This Roman Emperor Was a Trans Woman, “not based on anything serious but very useful in normalizing queerness/trans identity among the general public by claiming that it dates back to the most ancient times, with “scientific” support. The fabrication of these myths will take on such magnitude that “queer archaeologists” will end up entering into competition with their “feminist archaeologist” allies: this will be the Birka controversy.
See the full article here.
Image: “Kate Bornstein visits with Stephen Bloch Schulman’s women’s gender studies class” by Elon University on Flickr
The problem is that we are now entering the fourth generation of the War Against Boys. The only solution is to purge these people the way that the Eugenicists were purged 80 years ago.