In the latest example of the woke LGBTQ+ movement using historical revisionism to erase women, a scholar claims that Queen Elizabeth I of England was “non-binary.”
Along with Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre’s announcement that St Joan of Arc has been cast as a “gender-neutral” character in an upcoming play, Dr Kit Heyam penned a blog post for the theatre’s website earlier this month defending why “it was necessary” to use modern gender theory when looking at the past.
Dr Heyam, who describes himself as a “trans awareness trainer” with (they/them or he/him) pronouns, said St Joan was not the only historical example of LGBTQ+ figures, claiming that 10th-century ruler Æthelflæd, Lady of the Mercians, and Queen Elizabeth I of England were both transgender.
“Æthelflæd, who governed Mercia after the death of their [sic] husband, was later described as ‘conducting…Armies, as if she had changed her sex’: to take on a male-coded military role was, in some sense, for Æthelflæd to become male,” Heyam wrote.
“Elizabeth I, similarly, described themself [sic] regularly in speeches as ‘king’, ‘queen’ and ‘prince’, choosing strategically to emphasise their female identity or their male monarchical role at different points,” he added.
“Inhabiting that social role and dressing in the clothes associated with it, while living and working among men, may not just have felt like gendered defiance: it may have had a profound impact on their sense of self.”
Elizabeth I, who was born in 1533, was one of the longest-serving monarchs in British history, trailing only Queen Victoria and her namesake, Queen Elizabeth II, the current reigning monarch. She was famous for her military success, defeating the powerful Spanish Armada, as well as her devotion to England, allegedly remaining a virgin her entire life.
There have long been conspiracy theories about her gender, such as the one promoted by 19th-century Dracula author Bram Stoker, who claimed that Queen Elizabeth I cut such a masculine figure because she was a man and that the real Elizabeth died as a child and was replaced by a boy with similar features.
Feminist author Joan Smith commented: “Women and girls are entitled to reject stereotypes without losing our sex. We didn’t have enough female role models to start with, we have spent decades rediscovering women artists, authors, leaders. And now a regressive ideology is trying to take them away.”