Well it’s been awhile since I updated my blog, but I assure you, there’s a reason for that: I’ve been going through some pretty major changes this past month (retiring from my job and starting school in the fall), so my mood has been through the wringer. It’s also been hard to find inspiration for writing in the past two months as well. Thankfully, I have something I want to talk about: the new Big Hero 6 series on Disney+, and some reactions to it.
Released on June 29, Baymax! follows the adventures of the titular healthcare robot as he travels around San Fransokyo to help those in need of medical (and emotional) assistance. It was created and executive produced by Don Hall, who co-directed and conceptualized the original movie, and is the first Disney animated series to be made by Walt Disney Animation Studios, where all of the mainline canon films are created.
Reception to the show has been almost overwhelmingly positive, with people praising the show for teaching health and wellbeing in a wholesome and positive way. The episode that got the biggest response was the third one, where Baymax visits a middle school and meets Sofia, a girl who started her first period. Baymax is able to reassure Sofia that her period is nothing to be ashamed of, that it’s merely a biological function, and that she’s still a kid. There’s also a scene where Baymax buys her tampons and pads and a lot of people help him pick out products, including a single father buying some for his daughter and a trans man.
This scene meant a lot to many people, showing that (positive) representation, no matter how small, will always matter. That, coupled with a later episode featuring a gay man who asks another man out on a date, has made a lot of people feel genuinely seen.
Of course, a number of reactionaries were not too thrilled.
Without linking directly back to it (here’s a proxy) a conservative writer made a tweet on how Disney’s trying to “re-engineer the discourse on kids and sexuality”, making a stink how it showed kids as young as 2 years old that *gasp* men can have periods! There were a LOT of other people who were appalled at the discussion of periods altogether, ringing back to the days of Turning Red‘s release and how adults claimed that it was “inappropriate for children” because it dared to bring up how thirteen year old girls get their periods (spoiler alert: they do).
This made me realize a couple of things.
First, it made it clear to me that transphobes really and truly do not think that trans people are real. They see transgenderism as an ideological attack, a threat, a way to turn children into radicals and break up the nuclear family. No one is ACTUALLY assigned one sex at birth and changes or identifies as another one later in their eyes; it’s either a fetish, a way to infiltrate women’s spaces for some predatory reason, or a political movement (similar to the idea that being gay was a ‘choice’ back in the day).
Newsflash: trans people are absolutely real, and yes, trans men (people who were assigned female at birth but realize later that they’re men) who still menstruate do exist. The fact that some people were shocked that Baymax would not be a transphobe is kind of surprising to me. Baymax is designed to put people’s physical, emotional, and mental health first; he’s not going to judge or proselytize to people on how they’re not the gender they say the are, or a danger to themselves and others, or whatever nonsensical talking points transphobes like to make up about LGBT+ people. But it’s also really clear to me that people harping on the show probably didn’t even watch the first movie.
Big Hero 6 is a movie where 2/3rds of the main cast are people of color (Hiro is white/Japanese, Wasabi is black, Honey Lemon is Latina, and Gogo is Korean), features single women in traditionally male dominated fields (STEM and business), and is a movie that emphasizes the powers of science and how anyone can be a hero in a city with a large Japanese influence. It’s not exactly a movie that touts conservative values. It then went on to gross over $650 million worldwide.
At any point, the rage against a trans character appearing for two seconds to give a robot menstrual product recommendations really cements how bad transphobia has gotten. It would be one thing if the show had a whole episode dedicated to teaching kids how to transition, but that’s not the case. Transphobes aren’t just ‘concerned’ for children’s wellbeing, they don’t want trans people to exist. That’s why it’s important to deplatform transphobic and transmisogynist writers, speakers and bloggers; their words are dangerous and have gotten people killed.
On to my second point, which is the hubbub over talking about periods in Disney shows and movies. Honestly…for a bunch of people who scream about how LGBT+ and queer people are ‘grooming’ children for telling them that not everyone is cisgender and heterosexual, they sure are insistent that the topic of menstruation somehow sexualizes kids, or that it’s inherently inappropriate. It makes me wonder how involved these people are with their children’s (especially their daughter’s) lives.
I need to emphasize that it’s really important to start teaching kids about their periods as soon as possible, because a lot of them are starting menstruation at an early age (NHS, which has a good article on talking to kids about periods, has stated that children as young as 8 years old can start their cycle). A lot of people have talked about how their first periods were scary, humiliating, or even traumatizing, both from the lack of preparedness and from people’s reactions to it. I was eleven years old when I first got mine, but my mother talked to me about it in depth before it happened, so not only was I ready, it was almost a moment of pride.
Menstruation is a completely natural biological function that comes with the package of puberty. It has absolutely nothing to do with sex and doesn’t mean your kid is now an adult or automatically ready to start having kids of their own. The fact that menstruation is so stigmatized needs to be changed, and I thank the crew of Baymax! and Turning Red for fighting against the stigma in a positive way.
Baymax! is a wonderful, sweet show, offering a welcome return to the diverse world of San Fransokyo and demonstrating the beloved healthcare robot’s compassion and care for all people. Please check it (as well as the similarly excellent Turning Red) out on Disney+ to show Disney that we still care about Big Hero 6 and want more, and encourage more thoughtful discussions of health, wellbeing, and growing up.
The Flying Red Robot 
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