#gender identity definitions

[lesbianjackies]

hold my hand and say it with me: jackie taylor is not a femme

[baphometsss]

This is going to come off as very bitchy but I feel like the more beautiful and Instagram perfect someone's Lavellan is, the less I can buy into their Solavellan stuff. I'm really sick of writing about this tbh but the issue of women being valued solely or ultimately based on their attractiveness is such a pervasive problem that, not only does it show in fictional works a lot, but even a lot of fans do it with their own works.

I wanna be clear that I don't think there's anything wrong with having that kind of Lavellan (unless you're focusing on how they look at the expense of developing their character I guess), but there's a couple of reasons why it suggests that the people behind them are missing the point

I think, while Solas appreciates beauty, he understands that who a person is is much more defined by their spirit; this is why he repeatedly says that he loves Lavellan's spirit and only comments on their appearance once. On a deeper level, it kind of leads into why I think he reads as very queer to me. I think making him heterosexual was a mistake when he consistently talks about people not being defined by their bodies. I'm not bi or pan so maybe this isn't my lane, but I think they sacrificed something that made more sense for his character to avoid playing into negative tropes. I get why they did it (despite not showing the same concern for other morally ambiguous bi/pan characters), but I do think his character suffered for it.

So while Lavellan being extremely beautiful doesn't exactly negate this, I think overemphasising their beauty is sort of pointless at best. There's something very satisfying about having an enby/gnc Lavellan, or a Lavellan who isn't stunningly beautiful, with Solas. A love story about two people who do not feel defined by their bodies, or indeed feel trapped by them, is what has always compelled me about them. It's a tale of two souls falling in love, becoming entwined in a space only they understand, a space that is very much non-physical. They relish that, because it's where they can be their truest selves without having to worry about how they look in a world that is overly focused on appearances. It's only by doing this, ironically, that they figure out how to be more complete people. Solas helps Lavellan to remember who they are in the face of their deification, and Lavellan helps Solas remember who he is after ages of being broken and used.

[serpentface]

What's the Wardi cultural take on Akoshos sleeping with/partnering with/marrying other Akoshos?

It's not highly regulated to a degree that there are overwhelming cultural norms about it. There's a lot of societal focus on akoshos being theoretically suitable sexual partners for both men and women due to being dual-gendered, but not to an extent that relationships with One Another are stigmatized.

They also largely get to escape from the most severe concerns about penetrator/penetrated power dynamics because they're not regarded as Men (they're regarded as dual-gendered, and they're a female social class on every practical level), there's no status of manhood to Lose by receiving sexual penetration. The only real thing you see in that department is people assuming that one acts as 'the man' and one acts as 'the woman', but this is largely due to preoccupation with a notion of sex being Penetration With A Penis (and that Penetration With A Penis means that one person is in a Man's Role and one person is in a Woman's Role). But this will not be regarded as unnatural as in same-gender male relations, akoshos will Have to take up a position in this sexual dichotomy if they want to have Real Sex (Penetration With A Penis) with each other, and this is not unnatural and doesn't involve gaining or losing status since they are simultaneously male and female, not men.

So like you might see individual culture critics finding stuff to nitpick about it as their annoyance of the week or a singular Guy here or there who thinks it's weird, but this isn't a widespread norm. The vast majority of people don't give a shit about akoshos having sex with each other. The worst thing you're likely to experience Solely by virtue of being in an akoshos-akoshos relationship is someone asking you (probably with genuine curiosity) which one does the man stuff and which one does the woman stuff.

Akoshos also don't experience Hard expectations for marriage (though there are societal pressures that make marriage an attractive safety net all the same, ESPECIALLY marriage to a man) so unofficial life-partnerships between akoshos are pretty much the Only same gender partnerships between unwed people that are going to go unquestioned. ((Sworn brotherhood is technically a same gender life partnership for men that is Functionally similar to marriage (in that it's a kin-making practice between unrelated adults), but the tradition is Built upon the assumption that both parties will be married to women and that a primary goal of this kinship is to provide security for both parties' wives and children)). Marriage obligations in general are more lax in the economically secure but not Wealthy lower mercantile classes (as obligations to support and perpetuate one's family are universal, but these obligations can be filled simply by having at least One son who can get hitched, and marriages in the lower classes have no political functions and therefore there's less reason to ensure All your children are wed (there's still incentives like dowry, but this is not desperately needed when a family is economically secure)). So akoshos in this class group tend to have a Lot more freedom in terms of their life arrangements and chosen partners (though still experience the limiting frameworks of structural misogyny in other capacities).

The only thing that is out of the picture is akoshos/akoshos marriage. Marriage in this society has a predominantly reproductive function, the concept of reproductively non-viable marriages is generally considered absurd. This is not JUST this culture's form of homophobia, as marriage is a very practical arrangement at its core - both in a reproductive capacity and as bedrock for the patriarchal blood-kinship family system that forms the core social unit. The idea of same gender marriage isn't just absurd because 'ewwww weird' it's like, that Cannot work within this system, it Cannot fill core functions of what a marriage intends to do here, the ways on which marriage and kinship are BUILT makes same gender marriage practically (rather than just socially) untenable.

The sole exception to the 'marriage = reproductively viable" rule is that akoshos can be married to men (which in practice is almost always as a remarriage after a man has secured At Least an heir). This has a Little bit of internal logic here in that they perform predominantly female social roles (thus are suited to being a wife, even if they can't bear children) (and also on practical levels of them having the same legal status as women) but it's really more of a 'this is just how it's always been' kind of thing. A lot of the older pre-Wardi identity dual-gender roles that got mashed together under the 'akoshos' name would have involved marriage to a man as a second wife/concubine, in addition to his primary wife who would bear his children. Men potentially having multiple spouses has not been retained as a cultural practice, but the notion that an akoshos Can be a wife to a man has survived into modern day legal and doctrinal practices around marriage.

So like this being said, marriage as it is legally defined is only between a man and a woman, a man and an akoshos, or a woman and an akoshos. In practice the latter two are comparatively VERY rare- a man/akoshos marriage cannot provide children (though an akoshos can practically fulfill all other obligations and duties of a wife), a woman/akoshos marriage Can provide children (and while akoshos cannot function as a male heir, these children Will take their akoshos-parent's family name (though the wife retains her father's family name)), but akoshos are legally grouped with women in terms of rights and privileges (including being permanently under legal domain of their father unless they have been legally handed off to a male husband) and Cannot provide hard power patriarchal support that this family system is built upon and therefore depends upon, which makes these marriages socio-economically insecure. They can obviously still be a good partner and parent, but this is not the same as having the Legal hard power of a patriarch.

Akoshos marrying each other would be reproductively and socially nonviable, and is treated as a similarly absurd concept to a man marrying a man or a woman marrying a woman. It's just not a part of the marriage and kinship framework, it's not a thing that you can Do.

[cynicalmusings]

[shoezuki]

i wanna depict sampo in my fics as being queer in some way but i wanna keep it undefined yknow. like i don't wanna write him jus saying 'i'm genderqueer' or smthin like that so i been tryin to sprinkle in some bits into some his dialogue of him refering to himself as other than a dude sometimes. idk if its working but i Did have one comment on the doctor fic bout it and i am still riding that high

[queeringclassiclit]

Éowyn

from The Lord of the Rings series by J. R. R. Tolkien (1954-1955)

submitted by anon

[weeb-polls-with-pip]

Anime Awakenings Round 1 Side B Poll 14

Propaganda:

Revy -

"made my buddy realize she liked girls. probably helps that she kills people by wearing very little clothing."

Medicine Seller -

"Well, I'm not actually a part of the LGBTQ+. I think. Uhhhhh

I’m not necessarily surrounded by homophobic people in my life, in fact as an art student I have a fair share of LGBTQ friends. I’ve always been that straight friend who everyone thinks is a lesbian or Najime (KCC) kind of gender, but I’ve never been attracted to girls and I’ve never felt like I was anything other than a girl. Well, we’ll get back to the latter soon.

I watched Mononoke; Karakasa.

I love Kon Kusuriuri. I want him. I want to BE him. I want both at the same time and it’s infuriating. I want his gender, the kind where he’s so proudly and unbudgingly feminine while still being so masculine too. His deeper voice fits surprisingly well with his character design. God I want to be an unabashedly shameless twink that busts ghosts while flirting with men and women in an eccentric manner.

Here’s the thing. He’s 185 cm. I’m 160. Okay, no biggie. But it gets a bit personal here with my own body image issues. I like being a girl, I like guys. But I’ve only ever liked guys for how they looked. I am so jealous. I want their stick legs, okay. The fact that they have no ass. Literally, I want that. I want to be a guy who chooses to be feminine, not a girl who is feminine because she has to be. It makes no sense. I’m confused. And my body type isn’t the masculine kind that’s for sure. I could never be Kon. It’s depressing. I’ll never be him, and I have to live with it.

Honestly, I have never actually thought of dating a guy, can’t even imagine it. Whenever I see a straight couple, I never see myself as the girlfriend who’s giggling away. I see the boyfriend, smiling and walking tall, and I think: I want a girlfriend, and I want to be this person for her.

But I’m short, I’m admittedly pretty but not in the way that I want to be. I want to be androgynous, I want people to be confused on whether I’m a girl or a guy. I wanna be tall enough that I can be a guy, but short enough that I can still be a girl. Everything could be fixed, maybe, if my body was just different

When I draw Kon, outline his legs and his arms, I always feel like I’m just drawing who I want to be. I want him. I want his gender. I don’t know if I ever can have his gender.

I don’t know what I want anymore, I always thought I was sure (maybe) but now that Kon is here I’m just confused. Is it because I’m not as cis as I thought I was, or is it because of my body dysphoria? I’m too much of a coward to consult any irl lgbtq friends on this, so I’m resorting to a tumblr poll. lol

Am I in denial right now. Initially I was doing this form for fun but now I’m literally reeling from wtf I just wrote, because I’ve never put it into words before. Am I cooked gang?

Damn you, kusuriuri."

[focsle]

Do I still have to see people blanket defining bisexuality in a reductive and incorrect way in 2023? Do I?

[in-tua-deep]

Book recommendation for yall! Found this in the library and checked it out bc I was a curious. It’s a really interesting look at the lives of women in the UK and the lesbian community, and has lots of chunks of stories from the various folks who were interviewed

The stories are very honest and very interesting! It has a lot of different answers to questions such as “how do people conceptualize themselves when they don’t have the language to do so” and is super insightful, I think a lot of it is applicable to non-UK folk as well

If your local library has it, definitely give it a read!

[aroaessidhe]

2024 reads / storygraph

Pluralities

sci-fi novella

a burned out 20-something with premonitions has a gender-questioning journey, after quitting their job and becoming friends with benefits with a trans guy

with a parallel narrative about a runaway alien prince in a space empire and his complicated friendship with his sentient spaceship friend

audiobook arc from netgalley!

[mantisgodsdomain]

Now that we are being followed by people, we need to make some thoughts and opinions clear so that people are not later Shocked And Disgusted or whatever by thoughts we have held for many years. We think it's weird and also bad to treat queer people like they're a different species from cishet people, and we think that treating things like Having A Sexuality makes a character better than if they have a different sexuality is bad no matter what way you put it.

We also think that, if in your setting queer folks are widely accepted and straight isn't a "default", it may be worth noting that, say, a straight woman might need just as much self-discovery to work out she's straight that a lesbian does nowadays. In the same manner that, in Ace Attorney, Larry Butz needs to tell Phoenix that no matter how many photos of handsome men he shows him, he's tried, he's just not attracted to men,

[stevieharringtonwifeguy]

i love the rise of intersex male omegas for a/b/o aus now bc although i've always loved the genre i'll be honest the anal birth has squicked me out in the past

but i feel like this version of the au tends to gloss over Presentation as a thing or otherwise make it so that the pussy just like. Appears. which is fine. but i think kind of an untapped potential of a/b/o in general is in the gender fuckery of it, and like the fact that male omegas and female alphas have more or less the same deal down there

so i propose that until puberty, it could be that female alphas and male omegas are entirely the same- treated as their own neutral gender bc no one can tell if they'll end up alpha or omega until puberty hits and the hormones make the relevant changes

like you could do so much there?? like the usual 'well OBVIOUSLY im going to be an alpha wait what im an omega?' but also the potential 'people were so sure i was gonna be an alpha that they used feminine pronouns for me even before i presented and the change to masculine has me feeling Some Sort Of Way (positive or negative)' or 'people aren't treating me neutrally anymore and i don't care for it' or 'yeah im glad im an omega but i was hoping i'd get to be a woman' or 'i've hit puberty but people still can't tell if im an alpha or an omega. What Do'

like a/b/o has so much gender you could be doing with it (literally as a trans guy who wants to be pregnant some day i think it's genuinely helped me to come to terms with that) but i feel like people still end up with a dichotomy of gender when you could be doing So Much More

[serpentface]

Given what you've said about braids and their relation to traditional feminity in the Wardi Empire how does it impact Couya as an odonii priestess and as an upperclass women very involved in politics. How is Couya wearing a men's cloak viewed? What are gender expectations for odonii priestesses?

Partially elaborated in another post, but I can expand. It's complicated because Odonii experience reduced pressure to conform to expected women's roles, and a degree of 'masculinity' is accepted and normalized.

This is most prominent in that they do not marry and are expected to remain celibate (marriage and childbearing is otherwise basically a given for women, especially in the upper classes in which marriages are almost invariably arranged and a means of brokering alliances between families). This both frees them from very practical social restrictions and costs, but also of perceived spiritual pollution otherwise considered inevitable to women via pregnancy and as receiving sexual partners.

Their involvement in the military sphere (otherwise considered wholly the realm of men under normal circumstances) also by proxy frees them of certain dress standards. A lot of their base clothing would be considered 'masculine' in other contexts, being less physically restrictive and more practical for free movement. (This style of clothing would also be associated with poverty- ie women who have to perform hard labor, but this association is offset via expensive blue dyes and other visual signifiers).

They occupy a unique, somewhat nonbinary space in the cultural gender framework- they are considered women but without flaws and weaknesses considered otherwise innate or inevitable to women (and in a material sense they are afforded legal rights and privileges otherwise only accessible to men). So a degree of 'masculinity' can be not only accepted but deemed highly positive, reflective of their superior qualities. But this is only the types of 'masculinity' already implied by their roles and function (ie physical strength, practical dress, an assertive and commanding personality, etc).

This doesn't mean they are entirely freed of gender presentation norms. Couya wearing a men's style cloak is in the 'acceptable' range (would be clocked as pretty masc, but acceptably so for her station- masc dress=freedom of movement and a display of strength, appropriate for someone who serves as a physical embodiment of military might). Frequently wearing hair loose and unbraided is Not similarly appropriate. It's not just that she's diverging from an expected women's beauty standard, but that it also culturally indicates laziness, looseness, and inappropriate masculinity. It (combined with everything else) crosses the line from appropriately de-feminized to inappropriately masculinized, and will receive some scrutiny and judgment. But the very, very powerful social status of Odonii means that most of the consequences are immaterial.

So Couya more or less gets away with it, but this has contributed to her being generally unliked and a frequent subject of gossip and jokes (tends to be of the 'good thing no one has to marry THAT' and 'she swore virginhood because no one was gonna fuck her anyway' ilk, including from other priestesses). And more of this social scrutiny means her other unfavorable traits become more apparent (social awkwardness, inappropriate bluntness, etc).

Just in general she was not set up for success. She is technically an illegitimate child- her father had an affair after his wife's second son was born fatally premature. She was claimed and given the family name to avoid the associated shame on her father and legal mother above anything else.

From a young age she was considered slow, antisocial, strange, devastatingly unconcerned with presentation, and annoying (she's autistic and does not exist in a context where that is like, understood and going to be readily supported), which only further disincentivized her parents putting any real efforts into developing her into a suitable female heir. They were kind of just running through the bare minimum motions of raising her. She grew up with the (TREMENDOUS) benefits of a very wealthy family, but had no chance at receiving a good inheritance and would have been married off at the first profitable chance. She and Janeys both experienced some pretty horrific parental abuse after Faiza was selected as an Odonii (chosen by the Odomache herself, a Big Fucking Deal) and removed from the household, and this four year period kind of shaped everything she is now.

Faiza was the only member of Couya's immediate family who actually liked her, and was motivated enough to get her out of there to persuade a senior priestess to select Couya as an Odonii. Their parents readily encouraged this once the possibility became clear (becoming a high-status priestess would be of greater benefit to the family than anything Couya could have provided via marriage, and it was a little concerning that they were losing out on another chance of producing legitimate heirs, but it would be alright since they had a legitimate son who was Totally going to do that). Couya performed very well in this context and was inducted and sworn, which pretty much saved her from a life of privileged misery.

She takes her role very seriously, and on a more personal level her unconventional presentation is a matter of pride. She's kind of flaunting her status by consistently presenting this way and experiencing few consequences worse than mockery. She gets to behave and present in ways that she was punished for throughout her childhood, and there's nothing anyone can really do about it. There's definitely a "FUCK YOU MOM" undercurrent to it, but it also pleases her on its own terms. (On a less profound level, she just prefers this style of clothing, likes having a masculine presentation, and doesn't like how braided hair feels).

So like all that being said, her status as an Odonii is a powerful protection against things that would otherwise be RUINOUS for a woman of her stature, and she is Not a good case study for how her presentation would affect a woman of her political standing. She gets away with a lot and faces mainly petty social consequences.

[colorpicked-flags-from-one-guy]

The unlabeled flag picked from this one frame of Zuko!!

[retributory]

on another note though i really. gotta get off my ass and write about xie lian and his gender expression because TO ME. that is an extremely important part of how i interpret his character and i always see people express confusion or distaste at the idea that he could be viewed as genderqueer when TO ME. it is very clear

[fallershipping]

I love Looker and his gender-nonconforming wife

(I love Anabel and her gender-nonconforming husband)