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Pundits, policymakers, and even academics often treat the Middle East as \u201cexceptional\u201d\u2014a region of primordial violence and war, stuck in premodern social dynamics. But such conflict is not unique to the region\u2014the United States and Europe have, of course, fought in multiple wars, though often not on their own soil. It is because of these assumptions that news coverage of the war in Ukraine is viewed with justifiable shock, but the media often treats violence in Iraq or Syria\xa0 as relatively unremarkable\u2014the Middle East is supposed to be used to war.\xa0\nIn this episode of\xa0Order from Ashes, the scholars Karma R. Ch\xe1vez and Maya Mikdashi talk about moving beyond the common exceptionalizing frameworks that surround region, gender, and sexuality. They argue that, if straight and queer sexualities are analyzed together\u2014rather than treated as if the condition of LGBTQ minorities is solely its own separate issue\u2014observers can better understand how state and social power operate. Queer or marginalized genders and sexualities are policed or controlled, but so too are straight sexualities and all genders, in ways that are fundamental to how state power operates. The broader implication of their analysis: when we stop seeing the Middle East as exceptionally authoritarian, backward, and violent\u2014and stop seeing the United States and Europe as particularly democratic and civilized\u2014the transnational contours of war and power become clearer.\nThis podcast is part of \u201cTransnational Trends in Citizenship: Authoritarianism and the Emerging Global Culture of Resistance,\u201d a TCF project supported by the Carnegie Corporation of New York and the Open Society Foundations.\xa0\nParticipants:\nKarma R. Ch\xe1vez, chair and associate professor in the Department of Mexican American and Latina/o Studies, University of Texas, Austin\nMaya Mikdashi, assistant professor in the Department of Women\u2019s, Gender and Sexuality Studies and a lecturer in the program in Middle East Studies, Rutgers University\nNaira Antoun, fellow, Century International