BBC History magazine ...

[SerendipityJane]

Happily enjoying my monthly read, when I had to crash into a sentence about how the story of the bottomless chair and pope-vetting may have arisen ....

and they end with talking about checking the gender of the pope.

Not a great way to earn my respect if you want to cosplay as an academic.

So can a women identify into the job?

Didn't the last, and only one that did, get literally torn apart by the frothing at the mouth mob.

Yeah, I'm not contemplating a career change at this moment in time. 🙄

Well that would be how the article reads. Which means there was never any need for a special chair to inspect the dangly bits.

That film Conclave springs to mind.

pope joan

Too squeamish to say the S-word? Oh you BBC prudes. Just say it, you self-declared paragons of truth and accuracy: SEX.

The bottomless chair and Pope Joan is all a myth (mind, re-awoken in Conclave). The chairs in question are birthing chairs, medieval women sensibly choosing to keep the torso upright when pushing out a baby. The arrival of male midwives changed this to facilitate examination and also use of forceps.

The article may well have explained that.

However because author cannot tell their sex from their gender, it can't be trusted.

Who is the author?

Spoiler Alert 🚨

It's on page 42, and I could write the name here. However, in the spirit of #bekind, I'll remember that it is not impossible that someone anonymous tweaked the wording to reflect the BBC bubble.

True. Conclave is worth seeing. I note that I have seen no more suggestions it is pro-trans! Which it isn't. Haven't read the book, however.