Why a French philosopher claims Tintin is a girl

French philosopher, Vincent Cespedes, has caused a stir in the comic book world by announcing that reporter/detective Tintin is a girl and she is asexual. Cespedes says that he came to the realisation during his second reading of the series.

This time he was reading the comic to his children. Cespedes says Hergé and his friends were in on the joke.

The philosopher goes on to say that Tintin is "an androgynous redhead with blue eyes" and "presumably asexual". Cespedes claims to have found the clues in Tintin's physical appearance. Tintin's history in dealing with gender issues is among the reasons listed out by Cespedes for arriving at the conclusion.

Why would Tintin disguise him/herself?

Cespedes says Tintin would have done so to travel "without fear of the misogyny of other cultures, modesty, manners, or the stupidity of prejudices".

Does that change anything about the "Tintin experience" of childhood.

Tintin's contribution to the lives of ordinary Indians appears far too big to be stuck in gender binaries. For those born in the 1980s, Tintin opened the windows to a world that extended beyond what could be seen on Doordarshan. Through Tintin's travel's stories, Indians saw and experienced an unfamiliar world that was still out of bounds for middle-class masses.

Tintin made his (or her) way straight into Indians' hearts despite living thousands of miles away in Belgium. So popular was s/he in India that Tintin was translated into English, Hindi and Bengali.

Male or female, Tintin will forever rule the hearts, which have grown up with him. It doesn't matter if he was her.

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