Editor’s Note

DISCOVER OJAI MONTHLY

Bret Bradigan

GREAT GENDER BENDERS

"The search for truth is more precious than its possession.” — Gotthold Lessing

A few of my friends are dealing with their children questioning and exploring gender identities and while they are being supportive, this fluidity is a new thing for them to absorb. It wasn’t like this when we were growing up, even when my kids were growing up. It’s a Generation Z innovation for it to be so open and accepted. It’s taking me some time to understand it, and yet I am getting there. Living in Ojai will do that for you. You question your assumptions and are the better for it.

It’s taken me decades to realize that there’s great power in gender fluidity. Growing up on a farm with Great Depression-era parents and a World War II hero dad, there was a bright clear line between men and women. It had served us well with a clear division of labor and the partnerships it takes to thrive in the harsh farming life.

But I’m coming to understand that if you want to be a whole, fully realized human being you must seek that balance of masculine and feminine energies in yourself. Carl Jung called those forces ‘‘anima’’ and ‘‘animus.’’

History is replete with examples: Alexander the Great’s feminine traits were part of his mastery over his men; he was clean shaven when other Macedonian men were bearded, his adoption of Persian clothes and customs gave him an epicene look that added to his air of mystery.

A more recent example is Frederick the Great of Prussia. Born far down the order of succession, his older brothers died in infancy. His militaristic father loathed Frederick for his effeminate mannerisms and for the time he spent dancing, at theater, writing books of philosophy and composing music, some of which is still performed. He was a virtuoso flute player. Born today, he’d probably become a rainbow flag warrior with a love of gender-bending costumes and dramas.

Tensions between father and son got so bad at one point, that Frederick, having formed a close attachment to another Prussian officer, tried to escape. His father threatened to have his son executed, then tried to have him removed from the succession in favor of a younger brother. The king had Frederick’s friend and likely lover, Hans Herman von Katte, publicly beheaded, and forced Frederick to watch.

It didn’t stop with the death of his tyrant father. His younger brothers, who rode at the head of the armies that Frederick controlled, also loathed him. One brother, Prince Heinrich, moaned, “If only it had pleased God to give our dead mother a miscarriage on January 24, 1712.”

And yet his subjects came to love him. Mostly for his astonishing military victories, but also because of his exuberance for the arts and architecture, building the Berlin State Opera and State Library, which still stand today. He earned his title ‘‘The Great’’ honestly.

I’m not sure why Frederick the Great isn’t more remembered today. It could be that he’s been shadowbanned by history because Hitler, among others, extolled him for his military victories, or that he’s been simply been obscured by the mists of time. But I propose him as a role model for young people coming to grips with their gender dynamics, or those like myself who seek to understand.

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