Last Friday, Iowa's Rep. Steve King (R) took to the floor of Congress to oppose the military paying for gender reassignment surgery for troops. He decided to use a very...odd analogy to prove his point - the Ottoman Empire.

I've pasted the transcript here, lightly edited at points, and linked the video where you can hear his words in all of their glory:

THE CIRCUMSTANCES IN A LITTLE BIT OLDER HISTORY BACK IN THE 16TH CENTURY AND 17TH CENTURY WHEN THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE WERE RL SWEEPING ACROSS THE COUNTRYSIDE, THEY PRESSED THEM INTO SLAVERY. THEY WANTED TO HAVE THEIR CRACK TROOPS AND OTHER TROOPS, TOO, AS WELL, BUT WHAT THEY DID IN ORDER TO KEEP THEM FROM REPRODUCING WAS THAT THEY DID REASSIGNMENT SURGERY ON THOSE SLAVES THAT THEY CAPTURED THAT THEY HAD PUT INTO THEIR TROOPS. AND THEIR REASSIGNMENT SURGERY, THEY TOOK THEM FROM BEING A VIRILE REPRODUCTIVE MALE AND INTO A EUNUCH. THEY WERE SUITABLE TO WORK IN THE HAREM, BUT THEY FOUND OUT WHEN THEY PUT THEM OUT IN THE FIELD TO DO BATTLE AGAINST THE ENEMY, THEY DIDN'T HAVE THE TEST TOSSER OWN TO TAKE ON THE FIGHT. AND THEY FIGURED OUT TO STOP TURNING THESE MEN INTO EUNUCHS. AND THE OLD HISTORY THROUGH THAT IS REPLETE WITH NARRATIVE AFTER NARRATIVE AND TAKING OUT THE KNIFE AND CUTTING THESE MEN AND SOME WOULD DIE AND SOME WOULD LIVE, BUT NONE OF THEM HAD THE WILL TO FIGHT. THEY DECIDED THEY WERE GOING TO KEEP COMPLETE MEN IN THEIR TROOPS WHERE THEY FOUGHT WELL. THAT'S A LESSON FROM THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE

R5: There's quite a bit to unpack here.

BACK IN THE 16TH CENTURY AND 17TH CENTURY WHEN THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE WERE RL SWEEPING ACROSS THE COUNTRYSIDE, THEY PRESSED THEM INTO SLAVERY. THEY WANTED TO HAVE THEIR CRACK TROOPS AND OTHER TROOPS, TOO, AS WELL

Rep. King is clearly speaking about the Devshirme system here. From the outset, King isn't exactly correct here, though it isn't his most egregious statement. While slaves certainly were taken during the Ottoman conquests of the Balkans, the vast majority were simply sold as normal slaves. The Devshirme levy occurred every few years during peacetime, and was more akin to lifetime conscription than Western chattal slavery: boys were selected for their strength and intelligence, trained over the course of a decade, and then entered into professional government service either as a bureaucrat or soldier. Induction into the Devshirme system was a fast track to power and privilege in the Ottoman Empire, to the point that the Ottoman government became completely dominated by this elite caste. Later in the system's history muslims actually fought and won the right to have their children subjected to the system.

But the characterization of Janissaries as slave soldiers is a common one, so this transgression can be forgiven.

BUT WHAT THEY DID IN ORDER TO KEEP THEM FROM REPRODUCING WAS THAT THEY DID REASSIGNMENT SURGERY ON THOSE SLAVES THAT THEY CAPTURED THAT THEY HAD PUT INTO THEIR TROOPS

Whoa whoa whoa. First of all, King seems to suggest that the Ottoman Empire was regularly conducting sex reassignment surgery on a mass scale in the 16th Century, when SRS is a complex series of surgical procedures, hormone treatments, and therapy that was not successfully undertaken until the 1930s (I believe). With the context of the rest of his remarks, he's very clearly conflating castration with SRS, which is also completely wrong.

A final note: while Janissaries were forbidden to marry for much of their history, this wasn't done to "keep them from reproducing", this was done so that the Janissaries would not have families and thus develop other loyalties besides the Sultan, State, and the Corps. The Janissaries later received the privilege to marry, though it was fairly rare even then.

AND THEIR REASSIGNMENT SURGERY, THEY TOOK THEM FROM BEING A VIRILE REPRODUCTIVE MALE AND INTO A EUNUCH. THEY WERE SUITABLE TO WORK IN THE HAREM

Again, castration is absolutely not sex reassignment surgery. But more importantly, to my knowledge the boys taken by the Devshirme system were rarely, if ever, castrated and sent to the Palace.

Instead, the Palace (not just the Harem) was operated by a system of eunuchs. White eunuchs, usually drawn from slaves from the Caucuses (again, not from the Devshirme), were initially a very powerful group as they worked closely with the Sultan himself, but as time passed and authority within the palace passed increasingly to the Harem and the women within, the black eunuchs (drawn primarily from African slaves and responsible for guarding and staffing the Harem) became the primary eunuch power group, to the point that the position of white eunuch became ceremonial.

So King is correct in that they could work in the Harem, but they were also important and powerful civil servants and administrators, with many eunuchs serving as provincial governors

BUT THEY FOUND OUT WHEN THEY PUT THEM OUT IN THE FIELD TO DO BATTLE AGAINST THE ENEMY, THEY DIDN'T HAVE THE TESTOSTERONE TO TAKE ON THE FIGHT. AND THEY FIGURED OUT TO STOP TURNING THESE MEN INTO EUNUCHS

What.

This is an impressively stupid statement. First of all, once again, the Janissaries were not eunuchs. Second of all, Eunuchs in the Ottoman Empire were not used as common combat soldiers (though they may have been used as commanders, especially as they frequently served as provincial governors and the head of a provincial government had a military role). Thirdly, testosterone levels do not make a soldier. Aside from the long history of women participating in combat, to this day, success of an army in battle relies on tactics, terrain, training, armament, discipline, morale, logistics, and a hundred other factors, none of which is testosterone levels. Fourth, the Ottoman Empire never really stopped "turning these men into eunuchs": we have pictures of eunuchs from the late 1800s, even though slavery had been abolished in the Empire and the eunuchs no longer had any formal court role.

Finally, the period of time when King seems to be referring to rampant castration in the Ottoman military ranks, with a corresponding lack of fighting spirit, was among the Empire's most militarily successful, bringing the Empire to the gates of Vienna.

THAT'S A LESSON FROM THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE

There are many lessons to be learned from the Ottoman Empire, but this is not one of them