Exploring Gender in the Fate Series

sure the fête series is prone to capitalizing on fetishes and joking around with its characters but that doesn't mean hasn't done a fantastic job serving us a likeable assortment of characters who explore profound and diverse gender issues [Music] welcome back to otaku tycoon and I hear LGBT representation and media is often a heated topic has some absolutely demanded while others insist it should only be done if appropriate to the story or the creator's passions thankfully I can say that the fate series is genuine well the process of gender bending so many historical figures is clearly an attempt to produce more hit waifu the result questions gender roles based on the context of each character what does it mean for a woman to serve as a hero yet be remembered throughout history as a man what would it be like to come from another world and discover you of a male or female variant in this new history that in itself is fascinating but for this video I want to take a look at a handful of fate servants that I feel offer something unique for us to talk about as fans we'll begin with perhaps the most straightforward case enkidu as you may already know Enkidu is significant because they are genderless first created from mud given life through divine energy it was Enkidu's mission to restrain the rebellious nature of Gilgamesh in that regard and kid who was not seen as a human but as a tool or object they didn't even take human shape until after spending some quality time with the sacred prostitutes Chaumont in honor of Chaumont beauty Enkidu took her form for the most part while Chaumont was a visibly gorgeous well-endowed woman with long silky hair Enkidu's rendition of her wound up much more androgynous they lack a woman's chest but maintained the fair complexion and hairstyle this form isn't permanent either as Enkidu can change it when necessary while it's tempting to imagine what this implies in the bedroom we'd be doing Enkidu a disservice to try and understand them on our biological terms their relationship with Gilgamesh is a fair example all fates as Gill and Enkidu were close friends indogenes clearly show them is more physically intimate I feel it's safe to say their relationship is more profound than words can adequately describe just as Enkidu simply is Enkidu their bond with Gilgamesh needn't be confined to traditional dating logic just like the bond between Shinji and Kyoto from a van their relationship appears transcendent saying they're just friends or our boyfriend in clay just don't quite do the trick regardless Enkidu is a character who is very compatible with various gender identities women men gender fluid and non-binary fans can cosplay them and the character has been voiced by both men and women between the Japanese and English dubs because none of their features are too outstanding it's quite possible for males and females to effectively look like them to top it off there's no real community drama surrounding the character as far as I know which we certainly can't say for everyone in this video in contrast there's a stole foe who is fans utterly divided over whether he should be considered a trans woman or just a very pretty boy there's one specific reason people argue forrestal foe being trans and that's his character profile in fate Apocrypha essentially the throne of Heroes records both a hero's legend and their stats which masters can typically access as their bond deepens with their servants like the flirt that is a stole foe specifically scribbled out the data on his gender and wrote a secret beside it this ambiguity is also reflected in his fate Grand order profile well this certainly opens the possibility of a stall foe being trans gender fluid or non-binary it also doesn't eliminate identifying his male from the list of conclusions objectively speaking all this really says is that he's a tease and for some reason doesn't want the official answer out there for everyone to see now over the course of debates fans have compiled potential evidence of a stall foe being a guy his fate Apocrypha material details use masculine pronouns as does the exeed translation of fadec stella link in which he is referred to as he by his honorable King Charlemagne and apparently even says I'm my own man we've got to be careful about this however since XSEED likes to take creative liberties over their scripts not to inject politics but to make dialogue sound more exciting so I dug up these moments from FADEC Stella and listen to the Japanese voices one thing of note is how a Stoffel refers to himself by boku which is traditionally a masculine word however as we'll see later in this video we rely on that exclusively to determine gender for instance when Charlie says he's no scholar he says coid zu which is like saying that one over there the line itself doesn't indicate gender other times he just refers to his stall foe as Tammy which is kind of a condescending way of saying you then there's this quoted line I'm my own man if you listen to what he says in Japanese it's completely different he says boku wa Yeti thigh latosha I got an ayah which roughly translates to I only act how I want to if you're a fan of the anime denpa Kyoshi you may recognize this as being almost identical takaka me sensei's yd slogan Yeti taiko toshka de Kenai or I can't do anything but what I want to do not sure why exeed felt the need to change this as his next line is actually and what I want to do is help the master and my king so aside from using boku in the creator's using male pronouns a stole fo himself doesn't actually use overtly gendered speech this is important because the defining factor is what a stole folk considers to be his identity not how others see him the last noteworthy part I want to look at is in the Apocrypha anime when Jean walks in on a stall pho and sees his man bits she freaks out assuming the stall pho had a female body up to this point this scene never happens in the light novel in the English dub SEIG says how to take her this long to realize you're a guy but if we listen in on the Japanese seagull he says I didn't expect her not to know this would have been a chance for a stall vote to deny seeing statement if he didn't feel comfortable being called the guy but again were left with English translations saying more than what was originally there that said I'm sure this was in good faith likely clarified by the creator's vision Apocrypha Zhou third clearly stated a stall pho as a boy but if so why would he intentionally mask his gender my answer is for the fun of it yes according to lore a stole pho was said to have lost his sanity on the moon this isn't a jab at trans people but rather a reason behind a stole foes free will and recklessness he's bubbly and impulsive a comic relief character in legend who spent time is a tree the inspiration behind his stall foes feminine behavior and attire comes from an excerpt in which he dressed as a woman in order to calm his fellow paladin Roland it's presumed that the greater Grail acknowledging this bit of legend is a stall pho at his peak likely carried this excerpt over in the form of feminine mannerisms in life he was also a ladies man not sure if during his days in France cute femme boys were a hit with the girls but in modern times I know a lot of guys and girls who go for that myself included personally I think that his stall pho being a feminine male is awesome it subverts the idea that men have to look and behave a certain way at a fear of being emasculated here is stall pho is wearing hotter swimwear than some of the LIFO in doing it is a man that said his playfulness also lends to the idea that he doesn't really care much about his gender he treats people like people without assumption if you treat him as a person instead of an object like his master cell Anik did he's sure to be friendly regardless of what gender you refer to him as proof of this comes when Sean asks him if he's in love with sieg and he legitimately thinks about it he's all I don't know what about you even as a ladies man he is still willing to consider his affection for sieg based on the content of his character if you want to call him gender fluid sure but he certainly seems to have no issue being addressed as a boy so yeah dressing in traditionally female attire doesn't mean someone's identifying as a girl this becomes relevant when talking about our next character Mordred she too is the subject of debate about whether or not she can be considered trans either way her particular behaviors in perspective raise important questions about gender before we dive into her I want to first detail our Toria as their situations are remarkably similar if anything our Toria is simply better at articulating her feelings rationally our Toria is biologically female identifies as such but doesn't think much of it in her time women weren't Kings so when she decided to pull Caliburn she cast away any hope of living as a traditional woman instead she dedicates herself wholly as a knight and king for her people those close enough to her to discover her gender understand this and as such never make a big deal out of it she is their King and they serve her accordingly in fact it only proves to be an issue when others use the fact that she's a woman against her to imply she's weak or shouldn't be on the battlefield when he scanned our first remarks he didn't expect the king of knights to be a little girl she confidently asks would you like a taste of this little girl's blade she encounters similar frustration with Shiro who insists that women should be protected it's kind of neat actually our Toria acknowledges Shiro chivalry and instead of trying to change his perspective she simply asks him not to think of her as a woman not because she isn't one but because it's preventing Shiro from seeing her as the king she sworn to be if Shiro is gonna get all hot and bothered seeing her in the bath she doesn't want that distracting him in the heat of battle it isn't until she begins to realize she's already done a great job as king and should instead look to the future that she begins to rekindle her desire to live and explore her femininity as a civilian Mordred however is less clear causing quite a bit of confusion let's go over the reasons why some fans feel Mordred is a trans male the most obvious is how she affords any discussion of her gender displaying clear killing intent to those who call her a woman she says with no uncertainty that the topic is never to be brought up before her one might interpret this is Mordred clearly not identifying his female which is of course her biological disposition and therefore trans by technicality I personally don't think it's quite this simple or rather calling it so quickly denies as a further look at her character in the story there are two times mortared is called a girl and gets aggressive about it in Apocrypha Mordred's master chi riche ago is surprised to find that his summons servant appears female he says you're a girl - which Mordred angrily orders him never to say that again when he asks for clarification she responds call me that again and I will be unable to restrain myself Kyrie apologizes and Mordred lets it slide the anime adaptation is a bit more exaggerated with Mordred holding Clarence to kairi's next time you call me a woman I'll be using your throat as a sheath either way the message is clear Mordred is defensive about being referred to as a woman in the London singularity of fate grand order dr. Jekyll is confused as to how everyone seems to understand Fran's adorable grunts he suggests perhaps it's because Fran mortared in ma shoe are all the same gender again Mordred threatens to kill Jekyll if he says that again in fact he immediately retract his statement implying he done goofed before sure enough in both cases it's never brought up again interestingly however is that the light novel continues to use feminine pronouns to describe Mordred is the author disrespecting her trans identity or are they providing legit insight into how she feels in contrast the English version of fake Rand Order used he/him pronouns in Mordred's bio that if since been patched out it also says things like don't treat Mordred like a woman but don't be too obvious about treating Mordred is a man then her summer versions bio uses she/her pronouns throughout shit's confusing I don't think we can use the English localization for a definitive answer it switches back and forth a lot and let's not forget this is the same team that continues to use Altria instead of our Toria online discussion is cited that in Japanese Mordred uses the word or a to refer to herself instead of the more traditionally feminine Lata she surely this indicates she uses more masculine language but I don't think that inherently pins her as male the thing is or des is not just masculine it's informal while in real life women have absolutely no reason to use the term not even men will use it when trying to be polite therefore a trans male wouldn't necessarily be more inclined to use it more historically women referring to themselves as boku or or a or tropes created by characters in anime and manga these fictional characters boku KO and ona ko you said terms not to signify their gender but to be more youthful and rebellious it's a very tomboyish wild way for a woman to speak which is pretty much ideal for Mordred as she's written in Japanese to play devil's advocate though we can't forget that Mordred was essentially raised as male her identifying as such isn't a stretch she was born to sabotage King Arthur's reign it was trained as a knight in order to infiltrate the round tail problem is in her time women couldn't be Knights or kings this is likely why she first thought our Toria was male and continues to refer to her as father even when confronted by the truth in Mordred's cognition female is synonymous with an in eligibility to fulfill her ambitions thus the likely root of her hatred for being called female is that she interprets it as an attack on her worthiness this is further supported by how Mordred doesn't appear to have any bodily dysphoria she has no fear of dressing and revealing outfits that she'll off her body sure she doesn't wear hyper-feminine dresses and looks quite dapper in a suit but her short shorts and tube tops aren't exactly masculine either do the creators get the final say in an interview Natsu states that Mordred is a girl definitely a man with that sort of outward appearances well I guess a certain kind of person would consider it a prize anyway to add Higashi day the author of Apocrypha detailed Sabre was originally going to be male like the legend but it was thought that having two male characters look feminine the other being writer of black was too much well this sounds definitive we can't be too hasty on this conclusion either I suspect that these guys are referring to Mordred's biological sex and not necessarily her gender identity Mordred is undeniably female in terms of her body and she appears to have no shame in that technically that isn't an essential factor in her being trans there were physical and mental reasons for one's identity both of which can be legitimate sadly listing all of the objective truths about her doesn't give us a definitive answer to how does Mordred identify she was raised male but her hatred for being treated as a woman seems exclusively rooted in her desire to be worthy of the sort of selection as someone on reddit pointed out if our Toria would just sit down with Mordred and tell her women can be kings I'm sure her hatred would subside and of course that would require our Tory to actually acknowledge her I think at the end of the day Mordred just doesn't want to deal with her gender she wants you to accept her as is and not place any gender biases upon her a good friend of mine came to the conclusion that Mordred probably hasn't fully settled on a specific which is pretty understandable I definitely don't think you're wrong for using either set of pronouns so long as you don't make a big deal out of it which sadly it seems the fans myself included have just done I think it's important though both Mordred and our Toria in their own ways teach us that it's sexist to put someone's gender before their roles and abilities seeing someone as a man or woman is cool and all but it shouldn't be used as a basis for discrimination or stereotype maybe mortared could be thought of as gender fluid though I think it's more accurate to say she just doesn't give a damn the sentiment is more sincere with our next character civilian Dan was thought to be born male yet presented publicly as female as a child as an adult they dressed in acted formally as a man serving Marie Antoinette as Knight of the white lily however Dan was considered so beautiful that they were able to present his female during reconnaissance missions they owned a lovely dress gifted to them by Marie Antoinette herself historical accounts claim down spent the latter part of their life identifying as female but fates rendition appears to be both male and female interchangeably they are gender fluid and are referred to in game by they/them pronouns what I find fascinating about Dan is that they have a societal view of masculine and feminine gender roles but goes out of their way to fulfill both so far none of these characters have been straight-up trans male or female but don't worry fates got us covered with Leonardo da Vinci Leonardo was in life a brilliant man also considered quite handsome and pretty her gender wasn't particularly relevant but she pursued an ideal beauty found in the form of her painting the Mona Lisa thus when she was summoned by called aya she appeared in a form very similar to the Mona Lisa and was quite pleased with the result to remain in called aya she constructed a duplicate body a complex doll in child form to anchor her as a master would at Chaldea she appears wholly comfortable being acknowledged as a woman and the fact that this body was her ideal form I feel it's safe to declare her undoubtedly a trans woman her circumstances are quite unique though it's not every day you can just imagine the perfect body and BAM suddenly having it her ability to just build another body well Olli or otherwise far surpasses what current medical tech is capable of in reality in that regard she's every trans woman's dream and that said she doesn't appear to have any massive dysphoria for her former self her name or the fact that history regards her as a male she embraces it all simply admitting she prefers being female does that mean she always identified his female not necessarily she's interesting to me because I would probably feel the same in her shoes as it stands now I identify as male I don't have any kind of dysphoria I'm comfortable being male because that's how I've always been my biology is quite masculine I'm not gifted with smooth hairless skin and androgynous features I know looking like a woman isn't necessarily a prerequisite to identifying as one but I wouldn't say it's irrelevant either traditional views of femininity both culturally and biologically or what informs certain people of their identity I don't think any amount of transitioning medical or surgical would bring me any closer to feeling like a woman at least not with the options available to me and yet if I were to create my own dream body it'd be female without a doubt and I would identify as such in that body I'm not sure how to categorize that would that make me conditionally trans like my personal identity is male or female is dependent upon the physical conditions of my body it's a feeling I have that defines me but the rules I use to determine my identity don't mean jack to anyone other than myself it's fascinating and I think how fake characters each have their own approach to gender what masculine and feminine means to them has really helped me understand myself and others around me that's why I dig into their lore because in order to determine their gender we have to better understand them as people which is where the real insight occurs but I don't know I suppose I'm just a cyst white male feel free to call me out if I'm full of crap anyway I thought this would be a fun way to discuss some of our beloved fate characters and I'd love to hear your thoughts on them below if the gender struggles of these characters resonated with you have they been something you find bothersome and difficult to tolerate as I see it these characters weren't made to fill quota and as such feel completely genuine and well-developed deepening faith floor without virtue signaling or forcing politics down anyone's throat it's good stuff yeah thanks for watching if you enjoy this channel help me beat the algorithm by liking commenting and sharing the video subscribing to otaku tycoon and most of all smashing that notification bell as if it were your waifu that way you'll never miss out on all of my anime content lore videos live streams and holy waifu wars polls my vids are struggling to get featured so that mel is absolutely critical if you want to support me directly check out my patreon or consider donating via super chat and as always celebrate your fandom [Music] I [Music]

Channel: OtakuDaiKun

Views: 49,523

Rating: 4.8352256 out of 5

Keywords: astolfo, trap, trans, is astolfo a guy, mordred, transgender, non binary, gender fluid, gender, is mordred trans, enkidu, genderless, agender, artoria, altria, da vinci, chevalier d'eon, d'eon, chevalier deon, fate, fate lore, fate/grand order, fate grand order, grand order, fgo, fgo na, fate/apocrypha, apocrypha, type moon, anime gender, genderbend, anime, nasu, pedantic romantic, babylonia, babylonia anime, heaven's feel movie, spring song, lost butterfly, presage flower, otakudaikun, vtuber

Id: V9qZPF0RPM4

Length: 21min 50sec (1310 seconds)

Published: Fri Feb 07 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/TheTenk]

I'm not going to watch this video but since it's a youtube video about fate I am going to presume it is wrong or oversimplified.

[u/[deleted]]

Can someone pls tell him that gender dysphoria is not a requirement to be trans?

[u/notasinglenamegiven]

>21 minute video about anime/videogame genders

Wew...

[u/Mrlewl]

21 min...BOIs