What's the point of gender bender if it never matters?

[Partysan]

Considering that at times more than half of the top ten on this site have the gender bending tag, I think this might be the right place to ask: why do people write genderbent characters if they’re never going to address the issue? I’ve honestly been soured on this tag over time and it’s not because I’m somehow opposed to gender bending in principle (heck, I’m a long time reader of EGS), it’s just that most stories seem to use their gender bending for a few (usually very unfunny) „oh my peepee is gone!“ and „ooh boobies!“ jokes and then forget about it forever. The implications of being forced into a body of another sex are many and serious and while magic might be able to circumvent them, I’d expect the issue to be addressed somehow.

The height of my confusion came, when an author stated in his chapter commentary that they had elected to genderbend their main character, because they didn’t know how to write a believable female character and this way the character could be mentally male. This really boggles my mind. How can it be harder to write a believable female character (considering that individual differences between people of any gender are so much greater than differences between the genders as a whole and thus people of any gender can have pretty much any kind of personality) than a believable trans character (which is what you get if you force someone into a body that doesn’t correspond to their gender identity)? The only answer seems to be that nobody actually considers the mental implications of being genderbent.
And while I get why someone might not want to write about these themes:

If you’re not going to address all the things that would actually make the gender bending into a plot point or character trait, such as dysphoria, plain having to relearn all kinds of movement with different height, strength and centre of weight, confrontation with different role expectations (or in contrast a world where gender switching is common and the implications of that), what does the trope accomplish at all? If your character is magically turned to the opposite sex and the magic automatically rewrites their identity to accept it so it never comes up again, what difference does it make? Why put it into the story if it’s ultimately pointless? Just for a bad castration joke? I don't get it.

 

[Ace_Arriande]

I mean, it's pretty simple to a lot of people, especially in communities that tend to lean toward anime and manga. It's just another trope. Like action - how many action novels with protagonists who have to kill other people deal with all the mental ramifications from that? The PTSD? Most of the time it's just "oh, a bad guy, guess I gotta kill him." People get thrown into other worlds and suddenly become pros with weapons, are able to lead and inspire troops, build towns and kingdoms, etc.

Then you have the people who think that writing a cis-female character is somehow so different from writing a cis-male character that it's basically like writing a different, alien species. They don't realize you can pretty much just write a guy, swap out the "he"s for "she"s, and get away with it to the vast majority of readers. And because they want to write a female main character, without being able to imagine anything than a man's brain, they just go for genderswapping.

Then you have the people who are just straight up like "lol it'd be kinda hot though to be turned into a girl and have lots of lesbian sex, am i right?" They don't care about all the other parts. They probably don't even consider it transgender even if it technically is.

And then you have the people who treat it as pure wish fulfillment. Obviously this isn't representative of all trans people, and I'm not trans myself so feel free to take this with a grain of salt if you want, but I've known several transgender authors who treat genderbending as just... a simple fantasy. A wish come true. They don't want to deal with all the serious, realistic problems that might come with that because it takes away from the wish fulfillment fantasy of suddenly having the body that they've always wanted.

In general, though, it's just another trope often used for wish fulfillment or to take the easy way out of something. Like the vast majority of tropes. Don't overthink it too much.

Also,

How can it be harder to write a believable female character (considering that individual differences between people of any gender are so much greater than differences between the genders as a whole and thus people of any gender can have pretty much any kind of personality) than a believable trans character (which is what you get if you force someone into a body that doesn’t correspond to their gender identity)?

I mean, just check out something like /r/menwritingwomen. People already struggle trying to write believable female characters. Do you really think they're going to have an easier time writing a believable transgender character?

 

[GDLiZy]

The same reason authors use isekai (so much that it become a genre in this site, wtf where is my xianxia?) genre even though you can take it out and the story won't suffer anything. It's easy, it's popular, it's hot and trending. Most importantly, it masquerades as something special and exciting (wish-fulfilment). It also gives excuses for some questionable actions that an ordinary opposite sex person would not do.

Does the genre have its place? Hell yeah, it has potential (just like everything), but most people aren't here for some deep stuff. They consume pretty much anything that feels good, so the gend-bend aspect is purely for fantasy (let's face it, it's a fetish at this point) for them. That's why most gend-bend didn't reflect the actual humane life but an idealised version.

If you want some mental aspect (sadly too deep for the average audience of SH), you probably have to go for transgender fictions (there is a tag for it). These are more grounded to reality and often depict the more refined and believable characteristic.

TLDR: WISH-FULFILMENT

 

[Partysan]

And then you have the people who treat it as pure wish fulfillment. Obviously this isn't representative of all trans people, and I'm not trans myself so feel free to take this with a grain of salt if you want, but I've known several transgender authors who treat genderbending as just... a simple fantasy. A wish come true. They don't want to deal with all the serious, realistic problems that might come with that because it takes away from the wish fulfillment fantasy of suddenly having the body that they've always wanted.

That I would understand if either the character had been trans before and the transformation is a positive for them or if the world is "gender casual" and lets you change sex easily. But I guess it just falling into your lap might be the easiest way to get the wish fulfillment without having to think about the hard parts? I'm not sure, I'm not trans either and I wouldn't want to take anything away from those who are and get something from these stories, I'm just trying to understand why they'd be written like that.

I mean, just check out something like /r/menwritingwomen. People already struggle trying to write believable female characters. Do you really think they're going to have an easier time writing a believable transgender character?

Obviously no, that's why I'm asking why in the world they would somehow believe that they would.

 

[Kldran]

The first story I posted here, used it primarily for the initial contrast between character expectations and what they were presented with when their wish was granted. It helps set up the immediate and quick "Oh god, this is terrible!" impression the main character gets at the start, which over the story is turned into: "Oh, this is actually awesome!"

The next genderbend story I wrote was one where the main character was reincarnated multiple times, and I felt it would make the most sense if they were not always the same sex when reborn. This did result in one chapter where they actually spend time figuring out what their gender is because they realize that ignoring the issue like they had been, wasn't a good long term plan.

The next one after that... well, it started as a one page prologue that used it as a joke. Maximizing the contrast between what they originally were, and what they turn into, helped make the joke work better (creating a strong case of "Why would I want to be that?!"). Eventually, it's revealed that they were trans all along and just didn't know it, but it's never made a big deal, and the majority of the early experience is "This is weird, but I like it". (note: The changes were significantly greater than just what sex they were)

Another gender bend story I started but haven't published here doesn't actually have any sort of sex change. Instead it's just a case of passing as the opposite sex by accident due to choice of clothing, hairstyle, and people making assumptions. I mostly use it as a way to add another layer of complication to interactions, as the character now has to decide if it's worth it to bother correcting people or not, and at the start, they don't always notice the issue. As the story continues (assuming I ever get around to writing more of it) I expect to have the main character eventually have to decide if they are okay with the constant mistakes, or if they want to do something about their appearance to make it more obvious what they are.

 

[Daitengu]

I feel ya mate. I've got an aunt who acts like a guy. Meat, booze, weight lifting. Totally the alpha take no shit type. I really don't see the reason for casual gender bending.

It really pisses me off. Mainly because I have gender dysphoria. So I'm pretty sure I have a good idea about how much being the wrong gender sucks.

 

[Deleted member 29316]

So it's like Chekhov's gun eh? If you put it there, you've got to use definitely use it in the story.

On a related note, most isekai stories nowadays have drifted from adventure to wish-fulfillment, battle of the sexes/genders type, that it has become bland. Those who try different gets shut down because it doesn't cater to the audience's desires.

 

[Sabruness]

as someone else said, it's like isekai: can, and does, be written excellently but a lot of it is just being used for wish fulfillment. I would never write gender bender unless i was absolutely 100% confident i could write it properly and relevantly.

the only gender bender i read are those that actually handle it really well and touch on both positives and negatives instead of just doing half-assed wish fulfillment.

Shout-out to @TypeAxiom for their awesome top class work with gender bender in their story.

 

[Razzle-Dazzle]

Chekhov's gun

Had an interesting conversation with a friend about Chekhov's gun the other day. We wondered what kind of background or socio-economic influences would make Anton use something other than a gun....

"if in the first scene there is someone opening a bottle of wine... the second scene you gotta drink it!, If you are not going to drink it there is no point in introducing it! Drink it! Drink the wine!!"

 

[Moonpearl]

I do wish people made better use of GB. Even if you're not going to treat the transformation very seriously, there are things you can do that make the GB an interesting and relevant part of the plot.

I have to say, though, that the worst use of GB isn't by weirdos who think they need it to be able to write a female character - it's the nutters who think they need it to justify their character being a lesbian.

 

[gaylolis]

the issue about gender bender is because it's mostly a hundred percent switch, from totally male to totally female. so it's not really gender-bend, but gender switch / swap.

on the other hand, if you have something that's around 31% male, and 69% female, while still having the secondary characteristics of both genders (like the face has a distinct feature of man, and the remaining parts totally female), now that's the epitome of gender bender for me.

or was this called gender-blender?

all in all i don't really care though, as long it's fun.

 

[Deleted member 29081]

Because totally heterosexual dudes in the locker room who admire and touch each other's abs need entertainment as much as the rest of us.

 

[Discount_Blade]

There is no point to it. It still ends up being a woman who still acts like a man because barely anyone who isn't female themselves can write from a female perspective (on here and RR at least). I find the whole trope completely stupid and pointless. Just write a damned female character whose tomboyish and that would solve the whole problem....gender-bender is one of the biggest wastes of a trope. I'm genuinely confused about how it even became a thing.

 

[OvidLemma]

As somebody who writes primarily genderbender fiction (at least on this site), I may be able to offer some insight. I'm not going to go off and state that I'm doing it right or that I've not fallen prey to any of the criticisms levied here, but I also don't feel like I've used genderbending as a cheap gimmick any more than any other genre writer uses their conceit. After all, a mystery writer is going to have OMG Murder in pretty much every novel, and that's understood to be what their readers want to read going into the story. That said, I have a few comments on why I write in this genre:

1) It's what my readers want. When I started my Patreon, it was with a sort of generalized theme of transformations in mind. It turns out that readers, at least the ones that gravitated toward me, overwhelmingly wanted to read stories involving sex transformations. Insofar as possible, an author's got to write to their market.

2) Wish fulfillment. As somebody who's genderfluid, there's absolutely an aspect of wish fulfillment to the writing. But beyond that, it's more of a way to explore the idea space of sex and gender interacting with that fantasy.

3) It's got a decent built-in mechanic for self-discovery. In many of my stories, the genderbent characters *do* have a period of dysphoria or adjustment, but that isn't the focus of my writing. If people want to read more about dysphoria after a gender swap, then my stories aren't for them, because they'll get no more than a handful of chapters involving that. Maybe that's unrealistic, but since fantastical gender swaps don't happen in the real world, we're already conceding quite a bit of ground to speculation. Instead, I like to explore what's the same and what's different with the character's experiences.

So, yes, genderbender fiction is absolutely idiosyncratic - but so are many genres. If you've ever read or written a story with orcs, elves, dwarves, etc. that wasn't Tolkien, then you're reading something that's every bit as derivative and arbitrarily regimented within a genre (if not more so). But people like that stuff, and it can be well-written. Most of it isn't, but isn't that true of 95% of the free writing that's out there?

 

[PrincessFelicie]

Gonna mostly echo what others have already said. There's definitely a big chunk of GB that's just written to get to have their cishet character in a horny lesbian harem ecchi fantasy. That and it's a trope.

(As a sidenote EGS is great and I'll always thank it for Tedd kicking the door for my own gender exploration. Related to them eerily well for a while, from the "it's just a fetish/special interest with TG I just wanna insert everywhere" to "oh fuck I might be genderfluid", which, spoiler alert, ended up as just some sort of weird bargaining between my actual female gender and desperately trying to hold onto presenting as male irl because transition seemed scary.)

 

[Partysan]

As somebody who writes primarily genderbender fiction (at least on this site), I may be able to offer some insight.

You have and thank you. The financial aspect is actually something I overlooked completely.

Thing is, when you say

it's more of a way to explore the idea space of sex and gender interacting with that fantasy.

and

the genderbent characters *do* have a period of dysphoria or adjustment, but that isn't the focus of my writing. (...) Instead, I like to explore what's the same and what's different with the character's experiences.

you're already out of the main strike zone of my criticism, because you have contextualised the trope within your story and it's not pointless. In fact, I might check out your fictions, I've gotten a little curious now.

 

[UYScuti]

In most of the gender bender fictions I've read, it appears solely for world settings where women rarely fight or adventure. It's a way to explain or exaggerate how underestimated their character is. A typical scene is the young, impossibly beautiful mc walks into the adventurers guild and shocks everyone with her incredible strength, perhaps even putting a loudmouthed ruffian in place.

There's also the sexual tension between female characters and every male in the kingdom looking to sleep with her. This leads to additional confrontations to write about, which may lead to a royalty arc.

A prince sends his goons to kidnap her so he can make her his wife or concubine. She destroys the oppressive royal family and frees the beastman slaves. And a cute catgirl with fluffy ears feels indebted, so she joins her party.

I don't think I've ever read a gender bender where the female MC is considered ugly in the new world.

I'm not bashing it, though. A lot of people enjoy writing and reading the genre. I binge them at times as well.

 

[AryaX]

There is definitely some stigma to trans... And if one wants to change sex but feels compelled to deny/suppress such feelings for some social pressure reasons or such, having what you actually wanted "forced" on you, can help you get around any guilt/shame/etc quite nicely... and one can then go on to act like they always wanted, while pretending its only because its now expected of them...

 

[PrincessFelicie]

There is definitely some stigma to trans... And if one wants to change sex but feels compelled to deny/suppress such feelings for some social pressure reasons or such, having what you actually wanted "forced" on you, can help you get around any guilt/shame/etc quite nicely... and one can then go on to act like they always wanted, while pretending its only because its now expected of them...

That's a biiiiig thing, too, yeah. Lots of eggs (slang for trans person in denial) just writing wish fulfillment where they get to be their preferred gender but having it forced upon them so they don't actually have to feel responsible for what they want. "Oh I'd love to turn back into a dude, but sadly that's not possible/I don't have a choice/I'd lose my magic powers, woe is me [twirls in a skirt]" Just kind of trying to put a degree of separation between their desires and what they're writing because they're not ready to confront it awakening something in them yet. It's like if a gay dude in denial wrote a story about some rich dude having the hots for their male MC, "I'm (DEFINITELY) not gay (DON'T MAKE ME QUESTION MYSELF PLS) but a bajillion dollars is a bajillion dollars".

I have read my fair share of GB stories where midway through the author went "oh shit I'm just trans aren't I, fuck" and it's always a delight to see them scramble to look at what they wrote and see the goddamn telltale signs plastered throughout the story

 

[Chad_B]

I can't speak for everyone who writes or read GB, but I believe everyone (or at least more people than would let on) is curious about what things are like on the other side of the gender fence sometimes. As for me, personally, my girlfriend and co-writer is trans, and has been an avid consumer of 'Gender Bender' for years. Mostly because there aren't a ton of good alternatives.

As someone above mentioned, wish fulfillment is a part of it, having one's ideal body. Dealing with dysphoria can be a part of it as well. In the case of my girlfriend and I , we just noticed that there weren't many great stories out there with trans protagonists.

So we set out to write our own.

Journey to Amoraketh

Arcadia the Sorceress wants nothing to do with her birthrights; neither wealth nor politics, or the title of Prince and the gender it comes with. Rectifying all of these in a single night, she embarks on a journey with her trusted bodyguard Rekka, a journey to explore her freedom and...

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