Character Gender

Alright. I think I may do it then. Thanks, man.

No problem. I had a similar debate with myself when I wanted to make one of my characters ftm- I actually think he's one of my strongest characters, and I'm glad I made the decision that worked best for him.

My interest has been piqued. Do you post this character's story anywhere?

No, it's part of a novel I've been working on. He's actually a secondary character, but he has a pretty major role, and he's very fun to work with.

Welp, if you decide to publish it, I look forward to seeing it on the shelves one day.

Though I keep referring to this character of mine as the protagonist, he and his best friend are actually equally in focus.

edited 19th May '12 11:12:28 AM by MechaJesus

Thanks! Good luck with your story! It sounds interesting.

Thank you.

I don't particularly want to reopen a thread that's mostly finished, but let me put my objection to this way of thinking like this: does there have to be some "payoff" to having, as Morven says, a straight white male as the protagonist?

Perfectly put.

My thoughts exactly.

"I don't particularly want to reopen a thread that's mostly finished, but let me put my objection to this way of thinking like this: does there have to be some "payoff" to having, as Morven says, a straight white male as the protagonist?"

Is the character stated to be a straight white male in the story? Then yes, the fact that that's explicitly stated means that it would have to be relevant later on. Any explicitly stated character traits, qualities, and so forth need to have a reason for being so.

If there is no reason, then don't even mention it. Let the reader form their own mental image of what the character looks like.

edited 19th May '12 2:02:31 PM by KaiserMazoku

Oh, come on. In a non-visual medium you can get away with not giving the character much (if any) physical description, but you can't really just gloss over their gender. And if they display any sexual interest in any other character - doesn't even have to be a full romantic subplot - then you'll have at least some idea of their orientation.

What's more, while I personally do like to minimize the physical description I give to my characters, not describing anything about them except when it's relevant to the plot would likely produce a ridiculous and unrealistic character. Even for people who do approve of the Law of Conservation of Detail - a group I don't count myself among - that seems completely over-the-top.

Appearance can speak volumes about a character before a single line of dialogue is spoken or action carried out. It is what human beings see, first and foremost, about any person that they meet in real life, and how they form their view of that person. So I shouldn't mention a character's groomed appearance or preference for hair ribbons because it doesn't tie into the plot? I approve of not overdescribing a character, but character description should at least be used to give subtext to a character.

As for the original topic at hand, I'd say just go with your gut and do what feels best to you. It's your story, and supposedly trivial details can grant subtext. It's more just thinking about if you want this subtext, or if it detracts from other things.

I feel that it's just really important to know that most readers will not accept "oh by the way I'm transgender."

You can say "screw them" all you want, but I am going to say that it can end up being a really pointless red herring. You have to understand you're creating a world by hand, ideally to create a story. If you want your character to be male, why start them off as female if it's not going affect the plot? Especially if this is the main character, where the reader will be watching very closely. Is pointing out the character's complex sexual identity going to benefit the plot anymore than simplifying it?

Maybe this is just me not understanding the wide concept of transgender-ness, but isn't the point of switching genders in the first place to better identify with that gender? Isn't forcefully claiming "I'm female to male" or vice-versa kinda defeating the point? I dunno, I'm not very knowledgeable of the subject, so maybe I'm missing something, but in terms of writing a story, I would think that having the main character be transgender is an issue you can't just add for nothing more than... than color, you know? I guess if you're trying to be super-progressive writer, which I mean, we do need,'' but those stories don't tend to fly well with the general audience.

Actually, I do think that this shouldn't be a throwaway trait in the sense you're describing. My argument was half on more general principles and half against making it a theme.

Well, I now better understand the question. I would say that it would be kind of cool if you had a story where it was "yeah, I'm transgendered" and then basically wasn't an issue to the point where the audience just got used to it. I was thinking purely in terms of in-universe before. Of course, most audiences won't let that go, however, as has been pointed out.

I think your best move would be to simply try for the "transgendered, deal with it" idea and then make adjustments as necessary after you've drafted the story and gotten feedback from people.

edited 19th May '12 6:17:56 PM by DerelictVessel

Yeah, the way you described that is pretty much how it is. The character is actually introduced in the prologue as a male (since there really wasn't any place appropriate to say, "Oh, by the way, have I told you I'm transgendered today?), and it isn't until the first chapter that the reader actually finds out that, "Oh hey! There is no penis here."

@Heavy DDR, The fact that the character is transgendered isn't an issue though, and that's exactly the thing. There is no opportunity to really touch on it in regards to social matters due to the nature of the story, nor would I want to regardless. I consider the character on even terms with anyone who identifies as their biological gender, so though I will briefly touch on his initial issues in his back story, it's really not something that's going to come up as anything more than an acknowledgement in the future. I want readers to view him on even terms with the characters who are biologically male, too. As a person who actually is ftm, that's all I want for myself, so it would be unfair of me to treat my own character otherwise, especially when it really has no prevalence. All it would do is further instill the idea that "One of these kids is not like the others."

edited 19th May '12 7:05:25 PM by MechaJesus

I don't quite seem to understand the issue here. Can't a character be non-cis without it being turned into a huge thematic issue? I'm just going to insist again that if the story doesn't treat it as a huge deal, then most of the readers will probably get that it isn't that big of a deal and roll with it.

It can in-story, if the setting and environment around the main characters is properly set up. But I think most audiences within reality won't just go "huh, well, whatever," because sadly transgenderism is kind of this mysterious, taboo subject nobody in real life knows enough about, so they're going to stop and call BS because they want to know about it. It's unfortunate, but that's privilege for you.

Perhaps a few trans protagonists here and there would help to diminish the mystery and otherness a bit. Besides, if the story treats him as just another guy, then, well, what are they going to conclude from that? That transsexuals are just regular people. I see no downside here, frankly.

There's then the issue of wanting your audience to sympathize with the main character, and making them transgender would almost definitely severe that bond a bit, especially if it's just thrown in for no plot-important reason. You might be able to sympathize with the character, but will the audience be able to? Will this separate the reader from your perspective more than you want to, or will you be able to turn it around and have it increase our fondness of the protagonist?

Because if you're aiming for the latter, then just "throwing it in" is not going to help.

One last issue would be this being easy bait for people to claim as a "special snowflake trait." Take that as you will.

Now those people really are the kind I'd say "screw you" to.

The ones who are measurably alienated by this, that is, though I'm none too fond of the "omigod special snowflake MARY SUE KILL IT" people either.

edited 19th May '12 10:39:05 PM by nrjxll

If some of the readers can't identify with a transgender protagonist, I don't see why you'd want them as your readers in the first place.

You know, that's kind of another reason I wanted to make this character transgendered. The more you treat transgenderism as a special case, the more others will treat it as a special case, thus successfully segregating the transgender community from their cisgender counterparts in our minds. We are the ones who make them out to be "special snowflakes" because of this thinking. I want to stamp that out.

edited 20th May '12 5:33:20 AM by MechaJesus

Agreed, and I think post 45 said it better than I ever could.

I also think it's especially helpful to this development that transgender people like you write about transgender characters, since you can be pretty much guaranteed not to fetishise or appropriate transgender experience.

edited 20th May '12 5:02:56 AM by DoktorvonEurotrash