Gendering in the Tarot

I'm not transfixed by the gender in Tarot. As some posters have previously mentioned here - I see things more as Archetypes or personality traits. And ascribe gender myself - as and when - despite what the card itself is depicting. So one day I might see a Knight as male, and the next day interpret the exact same card as female or as a feminine aspect of a man's character or the more feminine expressions of butch lesbian - depending on who I am doing the reading for etc.
(thinking of Nemia's comment here. I can think of all sorts of 'female' knights... Boudicca - though one might prefer to see her as a Queen of Swords, Joan of Arc as mentioned, Penthesilea - Amazon warrioress... even a number of modern day ladies - like female characters from movies or my favourite novels; or female sports celebrities that fit the bill for me. As well as some of my own female colleagues in my Kung Fu class, who are much advanced in their skills and have the temperament.).

I have a variety of friends - all standing at different sections of the "gender scale" - so gay, lesbian, transvestite, trans-sexual, gender queer or gender fluid etc. are realities that more immediately surround me - And I do my best to get into the shoes of each of these to get a better understanding of what it's like to be there.
Ofcourse - I can never fully understand, and I am limited by my singular experience of being heterosexual. So - I often will still automatically trip-up. But I'm aware of this inherent flaw in myself - and I do my best to circumvent it.

I am not offended by how gender is depicted in Tarot - I just read it as the interpretation of that particular producer - and not necessarily my interpretation, or an interpretation that must be set in stone.
As Happy Squirrel says - I feel Yin and Yang are a better lenze to look through.

And on the subject of gendering objects. Well - the same.
Humans apply what they understand to their outer world (@Nightmeru).
It doesn't mean it's true - and gender attributions are inherently different in different languages and culture (I'm thinking of how I sometimes struggled with remembering 'male' and 'female' objects when learning French for instance). That's just human nature.
The trick is to recognise where the "trap" might be in this kind of thinking - and work forward with this awareness.

delinfrey said:

Well here you are just referring to the tradition; for example with the strength card, we are talking about RWS clones. You could also use the Visconti-Sforza tradition, where there is a man depicted on the Strength card; Marseille's Strength is rather androgynous visually, but still clearly a female.

Most tarot decks abide by the tradition they follow (e.g RWS, Thoth, or some other), OR they conceive their own "tradition". It's not a question of gendering, it is just about tradition.

I'm not really following the sexuality bit on the Priestess and Empress, either. Empress is about creativity, motherhood, birth etc; Priestess about ancient wisdom, enlightenment, a different kind of creation - what exactly strikes you as sexual?

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Yes I refer to the tradition here, especially RWS, since it's the most commonly used and known.

To me, the gender topic is mostly rooted in views on and perceptions of sexuality. Therefore no archetype that is represented by a man or woman exists without a link to these perceptions. Otherwise they wouldn't be represented by human beings at all. That the High Priestess is a woman means that there are specific feminine connotations to the meaning of the card. Would she only symbolize enlightenment, the card would be called enlightenment.

If we take the GD tradition about the HP then this card is linked to the moon. The Moon's cycles are mirrored in woman's menstruation. But there are more links which are not limited to GD and their follow-ups. In general, the Priestess hides something, separating the seen and unseen world with a veil. Closed rooms, boxes, veils and such stuff can be related to the body of the woman and the hymen.

So if the Empress is the caring mother, the Priestess is the virgin she was before conception. The Empress is the woman as men wish to see her, the Priestess is the mysterious femme fatale whose intentions are not as easy to recognize. At least in European tradition there is a deep fear of female sexuality... see terms like the vulva dentata for example. Even today I read in the newspaper: male employees are somewhat afraid of female bosses. And the Priestess stands for exactly this type of woman, who draws authority from a world inaccessible to men.

So as you said the Priestess also has a different kind of creation as a topic, there you named it what strikes me as sexual symbolism.

That's also one of the reasons why male sexuality is only expressed in very suppressed ways in the Tarot: it's threatening potential is more commonly recognized than that of women's sexuality. The last one exists more on a psychological and symbolical stage.

The Happy Squirrel said:

This is probably why I see them as more like (perhaps not quite the same but close enough) as yin and yang. They are not masculine feminine, or active receptive, not exactly. I feel the construct of yin and yang is great because of all the points raised here. I haven't found anything else other than yin and yang to best understand them without going too close to the dichotomy of gender related ideas.

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Interesting discussion!

I agree with The Happy Squirrel here; viewing the cards this way, yin and
yang are meant to describe energies and qualities rather than gender differences.
Admittedly, I was taught that yin energies are classified as feminine, while
yang energies are classified as masculine. But the beauty of the yin/yang
symbol is in how it illustrates the fluidity between the two types of energy.
The opposites are in constant motion, moving into and becoming each other,
forming an androgyny of sorts. And, as others have posted, the tarot cards
can have this same fluidity depending on how you read them. IMHO, any gender
restrictions that exist are not in the cards, but in the bias of the person viewing
them.

Truthfully, it doesn't make me unhappy to see the The Star is "always" a
woman. It makes me MORE unhappy to see that a woman is "always" the
star of TV commercials for cleaning products, with a mop in her hand and a
smile on her face.