The real life case of Beauty and the Beast
This is a case of deception, love, and sex (not an unusual trio) that has caused a lot of startled and skeptical reactions. You may have to concentrate a bit to follow it at first:
A woman accused of pretending to be a man to lure a fellow student into bed has told a jury that her alleged victim was in on the deception and was a closeted lesbian.
Gayle Newland, 25, has admitted creating a fake Facebook profile in order to meet girls, using a photo of a good-looking Asian man she called Kye Fortune. But she denies misleading a woman who claims she was sexually assaulted by Newman wearing a prosthetic penis after they had intercourse, during which the woman wore a blindfold.
Newland denies five counts of sexual assault between February and June 2013. The woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, had earlier testified to having willingly worn the blindfold during numerous sexual encounters with someone she believed was Kye Fortune. She said Kye told her he was recovering from a brain tumour and did not want her to see his scars. Opening the case earlier this week, the prosecuting barrister, Matthew Corbett-Jones, told the jury the complainant was “by her nature a very gullible and naive person…
The court heard that the pair spent at least 100 hours together in person after striking up an intense online relationship over two years, and even became engaged. At each meeting, the complainant wore a blindfold, not just when they had sex but when they sunbathed or watched films together and even on one occasion when they went out in Kye’s car. The woman told the court she only uncovered the deception after ripping her blindfold off and seeing she had actually been having sex with Newland.”
The unnamed plaintiff was either gullible and naive, say some; or stupid or desperate, say others; or lying and in on it, say still others. I don’t profess to know the truth. But for me, the story conjured up another story, or set of stories, which are of great antiquity and power. One might call the original story and all its variations “the myth of the hidden lover.”
They are all stories in which the heroine is loved, and in some cases made love to, by a man who for some reason has to remain hidden, and asks her to trust him. Remember “Beauty and the Beast“? It’s not a traditional tale; it was written in 1756:
The Beast receives [Beauty] graciously and informs her that she is now mistress of the castle, and he is her servant. He gives her lavish clothing and food and carries on lengthy conversations with her. Every night, the Beast asks Beauty to marry him, only to be refused each time. After each refusal, Beauty dreams of a handsome prince who pleads with her to answer why she keeps refusing him, to which she replies that she cannot marry the Beast because she loves him only as a friend. Beauty does not make the connection between the handsome prince and the Beast and becomes convinced that the Beast is holding the prince captive somewhere in the castle. She searches and discovers multiple enchanted rooms, but never the prince from her dreams.
That story in turn echoes older stories from a folk and mythological tradition. The first is “East of the Sun West of the Moon” and its variants, which I delighted in as a child:
Well, after she had eaten, and it became evening, she felt sleepy from her journey, and thought she would like to go to bed, so she rang the bell. She had barely rung it before she found herself in a room, where there was a bed made as fair and white as anyone would wish to sleep in, with silken pillows and curtains, and gold fringe. All that was in the room was gold or silver. After she had gone to bed, and put out the light, a man came and laid himself alongside her. It was the white bear, who cast off his pelt at night; but she never saw him, for he always came after she had put out the light. Before the day dawned he was up and off again. Things went on happily for a while, but at last she became quiet and sad. She was alone all day long, and she became very homesick to see her father and mother and brothers and sisters. So one day, when the white bear asked what was wrong with her, she said it was so lonely there, and how she longed to go home to see her father and mother and brothers and sisters, and that was why she was so sad, because she couldn’t get to them.
“Well,” said the bear, “that can happen all right, but you must promise me, not to talk alone with your mother, but only when the others are around to hear. She will want to take you by the hand and lead you into a room to talk alone with her. But you must not do that, or else you’ll bring bad luck on both of us.”
But earlier still was one of my favorite ancient tales (from Apuleius, but I read it in a children’s book of myths), that of Cupid and Psyche:
The transported girl awakes to find herself at the edge of a cultivated grove (lucus). Exploring, she finds a marvelous house with golden columns, a carved ceiling of citrus wood and ivory, silver walls embossed with wild and domesticated animals, and jeweled mosaic floors. A disembodied voice tells her to make herself comfortable, and she is entertained at a feast that serves itself and by singing to an invisible lyre.
Although fearful and without sexual experience, she allows herself to be guided to a bedroom, where in the darkness a being she cannot see makes her his wife. She gradually learns to look forward to his visits, though he always departs before sunrise and forbids her to look upon him, and soon she becomes pregnant.
The stories have slight variants, but are remarkably similar. There is a young woman who gets lost or is taken away to a palatial place where unseen hands serve her. At night, a man (or beast?) enters her bedroom to lie with her, either chastely or sexually, and although she comes to love him, he says she cannot be allowed to look on him and she must trust him. At some point she is homesick and is allowed to visit her family, who plant seeds of doubt in her mind as to the man’s identity. Is he a man, a beast, a con artist, a monster? Finally, when she returns (the “Beauty and the Beast” story is a bit different on this point), she breaks the trust and one evening she takes a candle and tries to gaze on her lover’s sleeping face. When she does so, she is elated—he is a prince, or in the case of Psyche, he is Venus’ handsome son Cupid. But alas, she has broken the trust, and woe befalls them—at least for a while.
The plaintiff suing Newland was told that her lover felt self-conscious about looking like a beast of sorts (“was recovering from a brain tumour and did not want her to see his scars”). She was told to trust him, but ultimately she betrayed that trust, ripped off her blindfold and was confronted, not with a handsome prince or the god Cupid, but with Newland—a woman.
Life’s not a fairy tale. But the tales themselves have a power, and they often speak great truths about the human…Psyche.
Pretty sick stuff, all of it.
That which has been is what will be, That which is done is what will be done, And there is nothing new under the sun.
I can’t wait for the movie. Come to think of it, I don’t have to.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYUfPTeE0DM
M. Butterfly, Bernard Boursicot and Shi Pei Pu.
Good one, Roy!
Roy and Lee have touched on something here: somehow the story strikes me as more believable if the relationship is between two young men, not two young women. Not terribly believable in any case.
My head hurts …
Gender profiles is partially inculcated by the conditioning of the patriarchy and society. The Left doesn’t negate this, they just use it, which is why people think women are acting like men, with no way to tell.
Watching films together…wearing a blindfold?
I’m AMAZED nobody here mentioned this film. The Youtube link above I just assumed was to this.
Boys Don’t Cry 1999 Rated R 118 mins
“Based on actual events, director Kimberly Peirce’s powerful, often harrowing drama stars Hilary Swank as Brandon Teena, a transgender person searching for love and acceptance in a small Midwestern town.”
By pretending to be a boy and screwing Chloe Sevigny with a strap-on. “Transgender” is inaccurate I think. She just wants to be what’s known as a stone butch.
Even a blindfolded person should be able to discern, during an intimate encounter, that her companion has certain anatomical characteristics of the female sex — unless the seducer was claiming to be hermaphroditic as well as scarred.
Trans men been doing it for ages…
its a minefield out there, better to play nintendo.
/sarcasm
AesopFan, not necessarily… there has been some historical precident before, including a famous musician.
see Billy Tipton: William Lee “Billy” Tipton (born Dorothy Lucille Tipton, December 29, 1914 — January 21, 1989) was an American jazz musician and bandleader. He is also notable for the postmortem discovery that although he lived his adult life as a man, he was assigned female at birth
Teena Brandon became the subject of the Academy award winning film, Boys Don’t Cry (not exactly a positive role model)
James Gray was born Hannah Snell in 1723 in Worcester, England. As a child she played soldiers, but was otherwise seen as a normal young girl. In 1744 she married James Summs, and two years later gave birth to a daughter. She was sent in to battle twice, during which time she was wounded 11 times in the legs and once in the groin. It is not known how she concealed her sex when her groin wound was treated. In 1750 her unit returned to England and she revealed her true sex to her shipmates. Her military service was officially recognized and she eventually opened a pub called the “The Female Warrior”.
Petter Hagberg (Brita Nilsdotter) was born in 1756 in Finneré¶dja, Sweden. At a loss without her husband, Brita dressed herself as a man and enlisted in the army to find him. During her time there her commanding officer called out the name “Hagberg” and both she and her husband stepped forward — she found him at last.
Albert Cashier was born Jennie Irene Hodgers in 1843. In 1862, Hodgers disguised herself as a man and enlisted in the 95th Illinois Infantry Regiment under the name Albert Cashier. After her mind began to deteriorate, attendants gave her a bath and discovered her true sex. She was forced to wear a dress from that time on. Cashier died in 1915 and was buried in her military garb. Her tombstone carried the words: “Albert D. J. Cashier, Co. G, 95 Ill. Inf.” — when she was finally traced back to Jennie Hodgers, a second tombstone was erected with both names on it.
Marinus was born Marina in the 6th century. Her father wanted to join a monastery (Monastery of Qannoubine, in the Holy Valley, Lebanon) so he took his daughter — disguised as a boy — with him. It was not until her death that her sex was finally revealed. Marinus is revered as a saint in the Roman Catholic, and Orthodox Churches. She is known as Saint Marina the Monk
Denis Smith (Born Dorothy Lawrence) was an English reporter who disguised herself as a man to go undercover during World War I. Dorothy, 19, was living in Paris and wanted to be a war reporter — something that was impossible due to her sex, and the difficulty that even males were having at the time getting to the front lines as journalists The military were concerned that if her story got out, other women would try to enter the army in disguise. Dorothy was compelled to sign an affidavit that she would not tell her story. When she returned to London she was unable to work due to the affidavit. When the war ended she wrote her story but the war office censored it and it would not come out until many years later. In 1925, Dorothy was institutionalized as insane and she died at Colney Hatch Lunatic Asylum in 1964
Malinda Blalock was a female soldier during the American Civil War who fought bravely on both sides. When the war started, rather than be separated from her husband Keith, she decided to disguise herself as a man and join the army too. She was officially registered on March 20, 1862, as “Samuel ‘Sammy’ Blalock” — claiming to be the older brother of her husband. Eventually the couple deserted from the army.
James Barry (born 1792-1795) was a military surgeon in the British Army, and by the end of his career was Inspector General in charge of military hospitals. He served in South Africa and India. Among his accomplishments was the first successful cesarean section in Africa by a British surgeon, in which both the mother and child survived the operation. James Barry was born Margaret Ann Bulkley and is, therefore, the first female Briton to become a qualified medical doctor. He died from dysentery July 25, 1865 and apparently the charwoman who took care of the body, Sophia Bishop, was the first to discover his female body, and revealed the truth after the funeral. Afterwards many people claimed to “have known it all along”. The British Army sealed his records for 100 years. James is pictured above on the left.
Charles-Genevié¨ve-Louis-Auguste-André-Timothée d’é‰on de Beaumont was born in 1728 in France. D’Eon was born a female but lived the first half of her life as a man. D’Eon’s autobiography states that she was raised as a boy because her father could only inherit money from his in-laws if he had a son. The next year she became a captain of dragoons under the Marshal de Broglie and fought in the later stages of the Seven Years’ War. She was wounded and received the Order of Saint-Louis. She was eventually granted a pension and lived in political exile in London. As part of her negotiation with the crown of King Louis XVI, she was told she could return to France but would have to live as a woman — an offer she accepted because the King offered to pay for her new clothes. She lived out the rest of her life as a woman
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