Talk:Sir Ewan Forbes, 11th Baronet/Archive 1

Comments

Interesting and curious. Was Sir Ewan intersex and assigned as a baby to the female gender only to discover that he felt male or was he a "true" woman, who simply decided to become a man? pmcray 12:07, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

I honestly don't know. My source was a Telegraph obituary, which was very discreet about such matters. Ewan's quote suggests intersex, though - his comments seem to imply that the doctors could have registered him male but decided on female. Shimgray | talk | 12:22, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

also this: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/12/01/nest01.xml&sSheet=/portal/2003/12/01/ixportal.html —Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.201.56.156 (talk) 04:11, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

I would be quite interested to find out his/her actual (physical) gender... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.76.209.49 (talk) 15:27, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure that this article belongs in the transsexual categories it has been attached to. I realize there are some theories that he was a transsexual who found a legal loophole in inheritance law, but following Shimgray's logic above (which I agree with), implies that Forbes is not a transsexual; rather he is an intersex person who was originally inappropriately assigned to the female gender when male turned out to be a better fit. 2003 Telegraph article while using 'sex-change' in the title states that "It is believed that the aristocrat had always displayed both male and female characteristics." Is the fact that he was believed by some to be transsexual reason enough to put this article in those categories? I can see his life as being interesting to people looking for information about transsexuals in history, but by that test Elizabeth Taylor and Judy Garland would belong in Gay Men Julib (talk) 09:22, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

Rated

I rated this article as a C. It would be B, if he was only famous for his gender, but he was also an aristzocrat, so would be notable for that anyway. Currently the article reduces him to only his gender. Sources shuold exist for all aristocratic debutants, so expanding other areas of his life should be easy. Similarly for the Barony. I'm sure there must be more to him than his gender. Yobmod (talk) 09:39, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Woah, that was a quick improvment! I've re-rated it to B, which it clearly is now. GA beckons, although a portrait would make that a much easier pass imo (maybe a scan of the biogrpahy cover would make fair-use?). Great job1 Yobmod (talk) 07:13, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! Like I said, your timing was perfect...

I've had real trouble tracking down a photograph. There's a small number (mostly low-quality) in the book - none on the cover - but the only copy of it I have access to is in the Bodleian, and there's no way I can practically make a copy of the images in it as a result. I've not found any contemporary newspaper photographs that I can easily get at, either, and there's nothing in the NPG.

As for online images to scavenge under fair-use, again, a blank. I've only turned up the one, and it's so grainy as to be of virtually no use. Still, plenty of time to keep looking... Shimgray | talk | 10:26, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Terminology

I've been mulling over these changes ("Pronoun issues resolved", 18 April) for a while, and on the whole I'm not comfortable with them.

The pronoun issue is one where stylistic preference varies, and I concur the MoS does suggest we should use masculine throughout, but the rest of it is less good. With these changes, we're consistently using "Ewan" rather than "Betty" to refer to the subject before 1945ish; I've never seen anything suggesting "Ewan" was used at all, by the subject or anyone else, before that date, and it seems a bit anachronistic to use it in the absence of any evidence suggesting that the subject wanted it that way.

(Forbes's biography is charmingly vague, omitting any details of personal identity in early life, even when you're looking for it. There really isn't much to draw on.)

I've removed the one part that actually changed the meaning of the text - the legal challenge to inheritance was not based on anatomy alone! - but I'll leave the other edits standing for the moment. Any thoughts? Shimgray | talk | 18:21, 21 May 2009 (UTC)