While Shang is angry with Mulan, he refuses to do so and explains that despite her fraud she saved the entire nation of China. When Mulan can no longer hide her gender, the General, Chi Fu, pressures Mulan’s superior officer, Shang, to execute Mulan immediately. What can be learned from Mulan? She ultimately becomes a celebrated war hero, but not until after she is outed as a female when she receives medical attention for a battle wound. While experts caution that the likelihood of an actual policy remains uncertain, transgender citizens should have equal opportunity to honorably serve their country. Some of these countries include Canada, Israel, Australia, France, and Germany. At present, at least eighteen countries allow transgender soldiers to serve openly. The estimated 134,000 transgender veterans face many barriers from obtaining updated service records that do not reveal them as transgender and from receiving medical veteran coverage necessary for medical procedures.Īmending the Pentagon regulations to allow for transgender troops to openly serve in the military or extending the “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” repeal to protect transgender troops is not a unique idea to the global community. However, active members are not the only transgender soldiers facing discrimination. Concealment of transgender soldiers is considered a necessity not only for the risk of dismissal for no just cause, but also for the realities which leave transgender soldiers vulnerable to harassment. Unfortunately for the estimated 15,000 active transgender service members, this mandate forces them to serve their country in secrecy, hiding their true reflections just as Mulan did. Current Pentagon regulations prohibit military service on the basis of “transsexualism, exhibitionism, transvestism, voyeurism, and other paraphilias.” This binding regulation restricts soldiers to openly serve as transgender, accompanied with the fear of bringing a premature end to the careers of qualified service members. However, “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell ” lives on for transgender soldiers.
In September of 2011, the “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell Law,” which had prohibited gay and lesbian people from openly serving in the military for seventeen years, was repealed by Congress and President Obama. While this film creates a positive image for the transgender community, it also extricates an underlying issue within the context of the law and the United States Military: the continued disparate treatment of transgender soldiers. While Mulan never associates herself as transgender, her story symbolizes the emotional journey many transgender people experience through their transition, as expressed by Mulan in the song Reflection, in which she wishes her reflection would show who she is inside. Mulan keeps her assigned gender a secret, knowing women are strictly forbidden from joining the Chinese army and for fear of being executed for the capital offense of impersonating a soldier. In this story, a Chinese maiden decides to disguise herself as a man to join the Chinese army to fight the invading Huns.
#REFLECTION MULAN IN CHINESE MOVIE#
While several Disney movies encompass transgender themes, (Ariel yearning to transform into something forbidden, Belle not fitting into her “small, provincial life”, Elsa’s liberation from solitude by no longer concealing her forbidden magic), there is no other Disney movie which illuminates this topic through musical storytelling quite like Mulan.
Must I pretend that I am someone else for all time? When will my reflection show who I am inside?
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