Resistance Museum

  I recently revisited the Resistance Museum with a friend of mine and refreshed myself on the basic history of WWII. Though I had a time crunch, I got to see and read some of the things that I hadn't yet seen given that we also were on a tight schedule when we went together as a class. 

I had the opportunity to learn more about the important people in the history of France, such as Klaus Barbie and obviously the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin. 

Barbie, in charge of the Gestapo, sent Jews to concentration camps, tortured French Jews, and yet somehow was able to avoid conviction during the Nuremberg Trials. He is also known as the "Butcher of Lyon". As for Stalin, as we all know, helped defeat and conquer Nazi Germany in WWII.

There are so many notable things during the span of WWII in France. One that sticks out to me the most that I wanted to learn most about was Vichy, France. I did some further research and found an article with one of the subheadings asking if Vichy was in fact a fascist regime. I have had my share of being around someone who I would say is particularly fascist, so I thought I would state what was written in the article and give my thoughts.  “It doesn’t act like a fascist regime because traditionally elites have to give way, and in authoritarianism they retain power. But all the foreign Jews were put into camps, they cracked down on dissent, and it was in some ways increasingly a police state” -Smithsonian. With that said, they are not fascist because they do in fact give some leeway to others actions, thoughts, and ideas. 

There is so much to read in the museum, sure, but listening to the short videos of what people had to live through and their personal experiences makes me feel like we are destroying the barrier between the past and the present and coming to terms that these are real people that did in fact live through something that seems so very unfathomable. 

There was one particular clip where the woman, as a child, was told to never talk about Petain. Though he as a person was talked about a lot in her home, they never mentioned the name. It just became the 'he who shall not be named' before that term was a common term in today's society due to the Harry Potter series. She mentions that at one point during the school day, the teacher said that she needs to behave and that [the photo of] Philippe Petain was watching her. After being told this, she snapped back basically saying that the fact that Petain is watching means absolutely nothing to her. It's pretty easy to infer that she (a child) along with so many other children and their parents had never liked Petain.

If anyone were to remember absolutely nothing, one takeaway from WWII is to understand that Jews were treated tortured, sent to concentration camps and died whether or not they were in the camps. With that said, if Jewish individuals can't follow their religion and are murdered due to their personal beliefs, imagine what it would be like to outwardly say that you did not fit the norms of sexual orientation, gender identity, and sexuality.

La Chapelle Cafe

 While I know we all ventured here as a class, I couldn't help but want to return here to see about this bar. It had been called, by one of the bartenders, 'the gay bar in town', and with it's technicolor light display making it an eye-catching stop on a nighttime stroll along the Saône, it nearly begged for attention. I decided I would come back another night to sus it out. 

Upon entering, it's got a laid back vibe- even on a Friday night when more people are out to party, it seemed like most of the clientele inside the bar were just there for drinks, and not nearly as rowdy as some of the bars I've been to here. The music is a fun mix of cheery pop, ABBA and Britney Spears spliced with jazz. Given that it's a gay bar, it's not entirely surprising that most of the occupants are men in their late twenties to early thirties. The lighting is dim and cast in blues and purples. In one corner, there's a TV that (oddly) has some sort of fireside ambience video playing, sometimes switching to a relaxing beach. It's cozy and not threatening, but given it's location and the ambience of the place, it seems a bit like the tourist's version of a gay bar. However, the seating was easy enough to find, and the bartenders were blessedly patient with my poor hearing and poor French, helping me order my drink. It's not the sort of place where one really approaches strangers it seems, as most people were already with freind groups and rarely let their eyes wander away from their companions or their drinks. Inside, while the bartenders and the bar-goers may not be hiding anything about who they are, there's not anything inside the bar's decor that immediately proclaims itself to be a gay bar. It is sleek and comfortable, and while one could probably call it 'fruity', I'm not sure if I could call it queer. 

This has long been a sort of dichotomy that I've found interesting. Over the past decade or so, with the normalization of homosexuality in the Western world, there's been a bit of a departure between gay men and the rest of the queer community. Whereas La Chapelle was a place for gay men, and both the clientele and the vibes inside reflected that, The L Bar (which operates as Lyon's only lesbian bar) still felt like a queer space. At the L bar, it seemed like people who look any way and of any proclivity were actively encouraged and welcomed. This is not to say those people were not welcomed at  La Chapelle, but at the end of the day it was a space creat
ed by and for gay men, and that is a very different thing than a queer space. It's hard to describe the difference, but the best way I know to put it into words is the difference between going to a club meeting that put out flyers saying 'open attendance', and going to a club meeting because a friend invited you there. In the latter example, while you have been invited, it is ultimately not a space created to be open, and upon entering you will be the outsider. I'm reminded a bit of the discussion we had at the LGBTQ+ center, where it was said that, while gay marriage had been legalized, there was still a lot of discrepancies in terms of the rights allotted to queer people as a whole. A similar thing happened in the U.S.- once gay men got the right to marry, it seemed like their fight was over, and a portion have begun to try and distance themselves from the community. 

You'll have to forgive me if I ramble about this subject. As a transgender man, I think a lot about the difference about being queer and being gay. There's some spaces that I simply feel I just don't belong in with cis gay men, where I feel as though there's been a line drawn in the sand. In queer spaces, however, I will know that it is a space where there is no question whether or not I am welcome. It's a hard thing to explain, and I promise I'm not using this as a cop out- but unless you're in the queer community, it's hard to see these partitions that have been put up between the 'G' and the rest of the acronym.

However, this is not to in any way be negative towards La Chapelle! The only real critique I had there were the drink prices. I'm gay, not rich. Otherwise it was a pleasant experience, but one that did make me think about how the queer community now addresses itself and those who align themselves with it and those who don't.

Le Petit Salon

 

I am not a big club person. I would much rather spend a Friday night drinking wine at home with my friends rather than going out. But one weekend, my friends finally convinced me that I just had to come to out with them, so I finally gave in. We made the trek over the bridge to the 7th district and stood in line for the club. I think it's kind of funny that this was the place my straight friends ended up taking me to, out of all the possible clubs in Lyon, we ended up at one with more queer men than straight men. Le Petit Salon is not generally marketed as a queer club, but I quickly discovered how queer-friendly it is once I was inside. There were a lot of 'older' young adults (mid 20s-30s) which made the club feel more sophisticated. Usually clubs are filled with 18 year-olds looking to party, so it was a nice change to have a more mature group of people. There was a main dance floor leading up to a DJ that was filled with people dancing, as well as multiple bars, an indoor smoking room, and another smaller dance floor. The music they played was not like other clubs; it was purely house music. I enjoyed it a lot more than other clubs I've been to because it felt like a very safe space for queer people. As a queer woman, I can typically quickly identify if the space I'm in will allow me to fully be myself. Sometimes there are situations where I know I wouldn't be able to hold my girlfriend's hand or show any affection towards her because of the place I'm in. It was pretty much the opposite case in Le Petit Salon. There were a lot of queer men dancing and having a good time. They were able to dress in more typically 'feminine' clothing without worrying what others would think, which is very different in comparison to where I'm from. In my hometown, we usually have to censor what we wear because it's a more conservative area. It was very refreshing to see queer people dancing and having a good time and being able to be themselves without worrying about what others would say or do. Additionally, I saw people using poppers for the first time in real life here. A lot of the guys were offering them to the people around them and trying to make it so everyone had an enjoyable time. I didn't personally partake, but it was interesting for me to observe this part of queer culture. The people at the club were friendly and were just looking to have fun, not start fights or bring any negative energy to the space. I've found that cis het men can sometimes bring a violent or entitled vibe to the club that nobody enjoys, so it was nice to be surrounded by guys who just wanted to dance. There were also a few quieter spaces to go to if you were tired of the music, like the indoor smoking room. I enjoyed this aspect of the club because it was less crowded and you could actually have a conversation with someone. I don't smoke cigarettes, but my friends do so we ended up in there a few times. We made a lot of friends that night. Although I did have a drink spilled on me on the dance floor, I still felt safer and more comfortable at this club than any others that I have been to. I would recommend Le Petit Salon to anyone looking for a queer-friendly place to dance and get drinks. The music was good and the vibes were great.

Baston? Révolution!

 I really enjoy drag culture. 

So naturally, I wanted to seek out a place where I could immerse myself in the drag community of Lyon. When searching online I was honestly surprised to see how often drag events were hosted throughout the city with at least one event every month. In Reno we have one (maybe two if the queens are feeling benevolent) event every year, and even then they don’t tend to have high turnouts. I couldn’t find any events to attend that would fit my schedule but I found out that the bar, Baston, right across (literally) from my apartment was listed as a gay bar and was renowned throughout Lyon for hosting drag shows. I didn’t want to go alone, so I asked a couple of my friends if they wanted to come and off we went to Baston. 

When you walk in, you find yourself in a relatively small room with the bar on the left hand side. The bar itself has a bunch of plants falling down from the ceiling, which I thought was a nice touch. As for the rest of the bar, I don’t recall anything about the decor that rampantly screamed gay. Well, I digress. In the middle of the room is a couch, and on that couch is a plushed figurine of a cow on top of which sits Spongebob Squarepants.

 “Oh my…” I whispered to myself. “That’s rather suspect.” 

If you take a look around the walls you’ll quickly notice just how many trinkets and other assorted paraphernalia plastered on the walls. I found myself inspecting them in an effort to one up my spongebob observation. The more that I searched the more appeared before me. I noticed that there were a great amount of printed photographs, many of which showing what appears to be drag queens. They didn’t have any drag events going on that night, so I was left to assume that they were taken in the bar at some other point.

 At first I found the bar to be incredibly dead. It was me, my friends, another person, and the bartender all sitting in relative quietness. All of a sudden, a man named Sébastien manifested himself and approached my group. After talking to himfor a bit we suddenly heard roaring applause come from a crowd of people we couldn’t see. I jerked my head back to Spongebob and squinted. Still in the same position. 

“Where did that come from?” I asked Sébastien. 

“Oh, they’re doing improv in the back.” He responded. 

There’s a back? We asked ourselves. Collectively we decided to continue exploring the place. 

Once you make your way to the back, you find yourself in a small hallway plastered with drag paraphilia. Everything from drag to queens, they have it on those walls. I found myself appreciating this greatly because you could tell that this bar was a Bastion for the drag community. Hidden right next to the doorway, which I assume with the intent to scare people, is a gigantic mannequin with makeup drawn onto its face. Traversing further into the bar we found another lobby with a handful of people sitting down conversing. At the very end, we found ourselves in yet another room albeit much larger than the front lobby. There sat a group of may twenty people with actors running amuck. We sat ourselves down and began watching the show. 

I found the show to be hilarious, from what I understood. We began with talking about bananas, which evolved into casseroles, and ultimately about France’s social hierarchy and politics? Nothing LGBT related, unfortunately. 

I feel as though if I came on a different day or even at a different time the ambience would have been completely different. But either way, it’s a really interesting place and I’m happy to have made the adventure out there. The bar gave me the feeling of an English pub and I don't think that it began out as a gay bar, rather evolving into that. I find that to be a really nice thought, because as our society advances we’re finding ways to integrate more diverse identities into our collective communities. If any of you get the chance to check it out, I highly recommend it. 

Librairie à Soi(e)

Let me begin by saying that I am probably one of the biggest book nerds you will ever meet. I love everything from Austen to Fitzgerald, from Plath to Wilde, and don’t get me started on biographies of powerful women. As you can likely deduce, it was a no-brainer that I chose to visit Librairie à Soi(e) for this assignment. Bookstores have always been a safe space for me, tucked away from the hustle and bustle of society where I feel everyone can find their own form of peace. Librairie à Soi(e) felt like one of those places. Women owned and operated, this shop features the works of famous women spanning generations, books about gender and queerness, and even children’s books about discovering personal identity. Another bonus – it has an English section! So, for those of you looking for something feminist or queer parallel to read that isn’t in French, this is absolutely the place to look. 

Simply walking into this librairie made me feel happy. It is an open space with high ceilings and there is very little space that is not covered with books or gender paraphernalia. The front of the store has a recommendations section where you can find what the owners and employees love to read, which a feature that I love to find in a bookstore. The rest of the store is sectioned off by author and genre, and there’s an entire shelf dedicated to LGBTQ+ books! One of the best sections I saw, where I actually spent most of my time, was the children’s section in the back of the shop. This section has a plethora of books introducing children to the topics of gender, sex, identity, and feminism. When I was young, I never saw anything like this – and I spent a lot of my time in bookstores. I can’t imagine what a difference it would make in so many children’s lives to have access to literature like this, allowing them to discover things about themselves while learning to love reading. Finally, I’ll finish up the tour back at the front of the store near the check-out counter where you can find cards, jewelery, games and nick nacks all themes toward feminism and queerness. They even had ceramic earrings of different body parts! All in all, this bookstore is a safe and warm environment where I got lost wandering through the stacks, and I hope that if you end up visiting them you have the same experience.

 

This store is a wonderful resource for both the feminist and LGBTQIA+ community. It provides a space just for them where they can thrive around what they love – books – and feel comfortable doing it. No matter what gender or sex you identify with, I believe that you can find something that will make you happy in this store, which I think is very important for the French community especially because of their turmoil-like history with gay and women’s rights. I am sure many authors, such as Proust and Colette would be shocked (both in different ways of course) to see a store like this. And I know what some people may think – yes, this is a store dedicated to feminist and queer works, which means that not everyone is going to find what they are looking for or something that they can relate to here. Yet, hopefully others can realize that this space is open to everyone, and I encourage everyone to try and find something that piques their interests in the store. I myself have already made three purchases on the two different occasions that I have been in. 

I have yet to find any bookshops like this back at home in the US, though I sincerely hope some exist and I would love to discover them. I believe places like this can impact people in such a positive way. Reading is a wonderful hobby, form of escape, and way to relate to others, and I believe that feminist and queer bookstores will encourage connection and bonding within such communities. I believe that it’s interesting to take a moment to think about whether Colette would have come to a store like this if it existed in her time, or whether she would have sold her books here. I believe she definitely would have. On the other hand, what would Proust think? As a shameful homosexual, would he have been discouraged, or even disgusted, by an establishment like this? These are some interesting things I have thought about since my visits to the librairie. 

I hope I have persuaded all of you to visit Librairie à Soi(e), and I encourage you to form your own opinion of the space, whether it be similar or completely different from mine. 
Thanks for reading!

bark

The Trial of Klaus Barbie

I study the history of Nazi Germany and the Holocaust, so I decided to visit le Centre d'Histoire de la Resistance et de la Deportation, located in the political science university of Lyon. I was interested in Lyon’s relationship with gender roles during Nazi occupation of France. My dad and I decided to go to the museum and since I have been there once before I worked to think more critically about gendered propaganda as well as gendered treatment in Lyon as well as in the testimonies of those who witnessed the crimes of Klaus Barbie and what they mean for Lyon today.  

Nazi ideals maintained the importance of separate spheres in a most radical and inhumane way. The museum highlights how under the rule of Vichy, working was the most important thing for the people of France. Men worked hard outside of the home; many in war or doing other types of labor. Women were expected to stay at home and work on having a successful family to support Nazi ideals of the Aryan race. Women were valued solely for reproduction, as seen in this Nazi propaganda poster of Mothers Day in which we see a group of children hiding behind a door to a room containing a mother caring for an infant. Women were celebrated solely for their reproductive purposes.

Walking into the first exhibit you are shown a wall of movie posters, showing the mass number of media created surrounding World War II and the Holocaust. Many of these movies are well known and several come from countries outside of France. The vast number of posters gives museum visitors a perspective of how serious this event was. This is the same room containing a small movie theater where you can watch the Trial of Klaus Barbie.

 

I recommend going to this museum so you can watch the 45-minute Trial of Klaus Barbie. Watch this film before going through the rest of the museum, because as you walk through the museum, you will find more information about several French people, Jewish or in the resistance, who faced Barbie. It is difficult to watch; old men and women who can barely walk at the point of the 1987 trial recall the horrors they faced and break down crying after explained horrendous crimes against humanity just for Barbie to defend himself by claiming that they were at war so everything he did was necessary. Hearing Barbie defend himself for the murder of school children, for the assault of women and mothers, and the immense physical and mental abuse that affected survivors 40 years later. Listening to testimonies made the Holocaust seem much more recent, more real, and even more of a nightmare. I suggest that after completing this film, you take some time to think about the treatment of the resistance and to reflect on the possible reasons why the museum decided to show the trial. This film is graphic, and definitely not for all audiences, so why show it in the first place? This was not an easy film to watch. It goes into detail about Barbie’s crimes, including physical and psychological torture, sexual assault, and more. But these are the reasons why it is important for us to watch this film; to face the past so we can remind ourselves of the Holocaust. These are real actions that real people experienced, and avoiding brutality encourages this behavior. The main point I took out of this film was how these stories need to be shared. We owe everything to the victims, who fought against all odds and all of the trauma to get their stories out, so the least we can do put in the effort and use critical thinking to understand the stages which led us to these events. In this age of Holocaust Denial and the revision and censorship of history, it is vital that we educate ourselves and others about what so many people were confronted with because of Nazism. Below is a museum exhibit explaining the trial.

Although the trial itself does not handle the subject of queerness, it is important to note that Barbie’s trial took place in the Palais de Justice in Lyon, which holds the statue of The Weight of Oneself. This sculpture is of a man holding another man, which happens to be himself. When you reflect upon the symbolism of the statue as it sits outside the courthouse and create connections with the importance of Barbie’s trial and our responsibility to humanity for holding accountability not only for Barbie but also for ourselves to maintain an education on these events. I find the placement of this statue to be very unique, and completely on purpose. It is no mere coincidence that this statue was placed in the same vicinity of Barbie's trial. The statue forces you to reflect on your own complicity. It reminds you that you must take action if you do not want the continuation of Nazism in France; we cannot have a repeat of a dictatorship which worked to destroy cultures.

Going to the resistance museum for the first time helped me think critically about how Nazism had an affect on France. Going the second time and watching Barbie's trial reminded me of just how inhumane and real Nazi occupation was.

Tara Gibbs

Welcome Spring 2023 USAC Students!

 Welcome to the blog for class!

Chapelle de la Trinité

  

For my second visit, I thought it would be without justice if I didn’t visit any of the churches here in Lyon, questioning those spaces for their queerness. Thus, I decided to visit the Chapelle de la Trinité. I had been here once before with my architecture course from last month, and was so taken aback by the space. Chapelle de la Trinité is apart of a school building in Lyon around the Hôtel de Ville area. It is not that easy to get into, and luckily the people from my last visit recognized me and allowed me back into the space. The “church” has been hollowed out and is now used for musician events. The ceiling and much of the original Baroque decoration remain, including the front stone altarpieces and golden sun near the entrance. The space, with the marble flooring and ornate décor is just gorgeous (one might even call it a little gay in there).

I wanted to negotiate this space for its queerness specifically because of its modern identity. That is, the space has been transformed from its original purpose as a holy space to a musical venue. The comparison alone is really interesting: a church has such specific energy governing where and how someone enters within it. When entering one of these churches, it would be for a number of reasons, but it would all center on someone seeking communities, or salvation, or even penance. The space called on you to stand in awe or fear of it. The visiting of a church is one of rigid standing and hushed tones. While a musical venue could best be described as its antithesis. You are encouraged to roam there; music and laughter fill more space than the air itself. The body is free to move explosively and passionately. Turning this space of confining worship and religious community into a space of boundless bodily expression and a new, modern community is somewhat ironic. This transformation is seen further, and more meaningfully, by this space also being used to exhibit art. In particular, this art is rendered in a religious Medieval Christian-esque style with the subjects being those you would not have found during the Dark Ages: Refugees. Rendered here in this style, these portraits decenter the harmful ideas that surround someone who is a refugee. Even more, these are now holy characters, symbols of family, faith, and community. They are divine, like they always have been but now validated and forced to been seen with the reverence and compassion they deserve.

When I was walking the now massive nave, avoid of its pews and bibles, I couldn’t help but imagine how many other queer people, both modern and Medieval peoples, had entered this space. My research asks this very question applying it to current churches. Spaces like this reveal the very essence of what I hope to unravel and demonstrate: That queerness and religiosity are not two-ends of a spectrum, but rather as interwoven as all others aspects of identity and self. I could rest easy in the fact that I know that I was not the first queer person in this space. I might have been one of the few and first opening queer persons, which is sad in a way, but to know that regardless of whatever law or hateful people would revel to see me and people like me extinguished, we persist.