my good friends both online and in person were people i had met on the site and for the first time in my life i was not only learning a lot about queer history but i was also embroiled in conversations about representation and specifically what good representation looked like these were the types of discussions i never really had offline but the online community was so hyper focused on them and i felt welcome when i saw frozen i didn't think about any of that i was a huge fan of the princess and the frog and tangled so i didn't think of it as the start of a new era but just another great movie but then i went on tumblr and saw something very different i saw elsa being praised in various parts of the queer community who saw themselves in her storyline having special powers that isolate you from society having to go on a journey of self-discovery finding your place in the world it can all be mapped onto queer experience and specifically her lack of romantic interest in the film made her a quick icon in the queer community specifically in the ace and arrow communities for those who also felt pressured by society to fall in love have sex and have a partner elsa became an asexual aromantic icon but that wasn't the only way queer people saw elsa some people saw her magic powers as an allegory for being lesbian bisexual or queer so she was claimed by those parts of the community too and while i was obsessing over let it go like many others in the months after frozen was released i thought of it as a queer anthem don't let them in don't let them see be the good girl you always have to be conceal don't feel don't let them know well now they know at the time i was realizing that i am non-binary and i empathized i didn't want to be the good boy that i was raised to be in fact i never felt like a boy and i certainly didn't feel like a man in a way it reminded me of reflection from mulan you are so much more than what others expect you to be let it go let it go i can't hold it back anymore let it go let it go turn away and slam the door elsa's anthem is a powerful response to an unwelcoming society part of her breakthrough is being okay with walking away from where she was raised but the other part is her being okay with herself and when she has already spent her whole life being ashamed of her powers the second is more difficult so she lets it go and gets away from those holding her back and putting her life at risk but running away and building your own ice castle isn't the only way to stay safe and if you want to protect yourself online you should use atlas vpn the sponsor of today's video did you know that when you're online not only can your internet service providers see every website you visit but you're also one unlucky connection away from having your personal and financial data stolen by a hacker this can be avoided with a virtual private network commonly known as a vpn a vpn makes all of your internet traffic travel through an encrypted tunnel this way it protects you from spying public wi-fi dangers and hides your ip address and your
START_SPONSOR_TOKEN but running away and building your own ice castle isn't the only way to stay safe and if you want to protect yourself online you should use atlas vpn the sponsor of today's video did you know that when you're online not only can your internet service providers see every website you visit but you're also one unlucky connection away from having your personal and financial data stolen by a hacker this can be avoided with a virtual private network commonly known as a vpn a vpn makes all of your internet traffic travel through an encrypted tunnel this way it protects you from spying public wi-fi dangers and hides your ip address and your END_SPONSOR_TOKEN