Texas legislator exposes UT Austin-promoted project that encourages trans individuals to 'play God'
Texas State Representative Brian Harris took to X to call out how a UT Austin is promoting on one of its websites a collage project that promotes resisting gender norms and encouraging trans individuals to “play God.”
The project includes imagery that represents scars from transgender surgeries, a testosterone bottle and syringe, and the “light” that surrounds trans individuals.
A Texas State legislator posted on X evidence that the University of Texas at Austin is promoting a student project called “Transsexual Beauty and Desirability” on its website.
Texas State Representative Brian Harris posted a direct quote from a project on UT Austin’s “Queer and Trans Voices” webpage; where a student project from August named “Adonis: Transsexual Beauty and Desirability” is being promoted.
In his post on X, Harris claimed that “@UTAustin is using tax dollars to promote transgenderism in “Transsexual Beauty and Desirability,” and posted the full description of the project which states that it intends to “[F]acilitate dialogue on the uniqueness of transitioning, whether it be to conform to traditional norms or to defy them.”
.@UTAustin is using tax dollars to promote transgenderism in “Transsexual Beauty and Desirability.”
This is on an official State of Texas website:
I created Adonis: Transsexual Beauty and Desirability as a commentary on transgender bodies and how outside factors and individuals… pic.twitter.com/J0U4oGMB2L— Brian Harrison (@brianeharrison) November 25, 2024
The project itself is a collage that displays a human male torso with angel wings surrounded by hands lifting it up, pointing at it, grabbing towards it, and holding a medical needle and vial.
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The project claims that the collage includes a syringe and “testosterone bottle” deliberately, meaning to depict the “[T]ools used by both outsiders and the trans person to change their appearance.”
The project was created by a current UT Austin student, Rowan Rosado Fuentes, and offers a description on how the collage is a “[C]ommentary on transgender bodies and how outside factors and individuals in society dictate how we change ourselves to conform to gender expectations.”
Fuentes says in the description that “While there are transgender individuals, including myself, who don’t conform to traditional gender roles, we are still expected to undergo medical and social transitions to be recognized as our true selves.”
The description goes on to state that the project’s focus is the collage’s lighting and hand placements, illustrating “[T]he unnatural trans body in relation to gender performativity and social constructions.”
The project’s description also states that hands across the chest of the figure are meant to display scars from transgender surgeries and “[T]he ability of the trans person to play God in deciding what changes they will make to their flesh.”
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Fuentes states in the description that “[T]he beauty of it is that it can be freeing to play God and defy these gender norms by subverting these expectations through our own unique transitions.
The project is meant to represent the “physical trans body” and offer commentary on Fuentes’ “[E]xperience as a transgender man.” Fuentes also states that the male body represents the Greek god Adonis to “[R]epresent the otherworldly allure of the trans body.”
The lighting of the project is also meant to display the “[D]ivineness of the trans figure,” and how clouds around the image “[S]ets the mood of the piece as heavenly due to this imagery being largely associated with the Christian ideas of heaven and God.”
The description further states that “The trans body is supernatural and transcends societal and cultural expectations of what it means to be a man or woman. The light is blinding to others, yet it is essentially that awakened and transparent soul of the trans person as they begin to realize that gender is constructed by their own actions and thoughts rather than the perception of outsiders.”