Random Questions Thread

Say a person with a real-life intersex condition that gave them ambiguous genitals used some sort of Applied Phlebotinum to turn themself into an actual Hermaphrodite. Would this qualify as a Gender Bender?

Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.

The situation you're describing seems a little bit too niche to qualify for the intent of the trope, which is all the hilarity and awkwardness that ensues when a male turns into a female or vice versa.

I suppose the important question is whether this phlebotinum changes the character's outward appearance or just the way their junk works. A secondary question is whether the character undergoes a dramatic (or comedic) arc due to the transformation. If both are negative, then I can't see it qualifying.

As an aside, Gender Bender is sort of misnamed because "gender" refers to social, not biological traits. Oh, well, it's probably too embedded to change.

Edited by Fighteer on Jan 28th 2019 at 10:19:50 AM

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"

"Yes" to both questions (mostly the former; I don't really see how the latter is a necessary element). And "gender" is frequently used as a synonym for "sex", which is probably convenient for those who consider the latter too "vulgar" due to it being also used to mean "sexual intercourse" (unlike "gender"); I personally use "gender identity" when I wish to clarify that I mean the social definition of "gender".

Edited by MarqFJA on Jan 28th 2019 at 6:30:34 PM

Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.

Well, if a character changes sex and nobody notices or cares, including themselves, then there isn’t really any story impact, and thus no wacky hijinks to enjoy.

Edited to add: This is a bit complex for "random questions", but an intersex character who has both male and female primary sexual characteristics suddenly becoming able to self-fertilize doesn't seem to have any implications for their secondary sexual characteristics, but that's up to you and your story. Maybe it would affect their behavior and mood depending on things like hormone balance, but there would not necessarily be any outward visual indication of the change.

Edited by Fighteer on Jan 28th 2019 at 12:23:32 PM

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"

As for the "rich kids lost in the woods" story, it all sounds very plausible. How does the cultural background of the charcters fit into it?

Ah, that's what you meant. I thought you meant a whole arc dedicated to the sex-changing as its main plot.

... The transformation is significantly more complex than "suddenly becoming able to self-fertilize", to put it mildly. For one, there's no form of intersexuality IRL that allows for the intersex person in question to be fertile in both the male and female senses, nor possessing all sex organs from both sexes, specifically because of the way homology works in the reproductive system (e.g. scrotum and labia majora are mutually exclusive), and that it takes way so many specific mutations coinciding together to somehow duplicate the homologous organs without causing major problems (e.g. exactly how would the perineal muscles be structured?) that it's practically impossible for it to naturally occur in modern humans. This includes even intersexes of the "ovotesticular" kind.

The transformation that I'm talking about simply sidesteps the entire issue via Applied Phlebotinum to reach the end result, where the transformed person now has both a full set of male sex organs as well as a full set of female sex organs (i.e. they grew anything they were missing), blatantly disregarding the fact that certain organs in each set are homologous and thus it should be impossible for them to coexist (without extensive editing of the human genome, that is) because the Applied Phlebotinum doesn't respect biology's "silly" rules.

Well, I am basing them on Lara Croft, who is British and hails from an aristocratic family. Her classic incarnation had her break an Arranged Marriage and defy her parents in favor of thrill-seeking via archaeological adventuring, so they disowned her. Her Legend incarnation lost her parents at a young age and had to fight against the rest of her family for her inheritance, which she succeeds at but at the cost of burning all her proverbial bridges with said family.

I'm basically trying to figure out how likely such familial struggles would be in a different cultural setting. The first step to do that is determine whether there's a sufficient equivalent to modern British aristocracy in the prospective new cultures.

If you're wondering why I picked the Australia and the USA... the former because of the fact that it's a Commonwealth realm (thus it has a relatively close connection to the UK) as well as its infamously deadly ecosystem (makes for a good place to have some Training from Hell), and the latter because... well, it's the USA to make a long story short.

Edited by MarqFJA on Jan 30th 2019 at 8:23:24 PM

Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.

The firsts scenario makes no sense because, well, neither the UK nor the US have arranged marriages anymore. The second scenario sounds perfectly reasonable, but that could happen to any family whatsoever, not just a rich one.

I think it was less of a literal arranged marriage and more of an expectation that she'll marry a fellow aristocrat like every other girl of her station "typically" does, and the particular that she was formally betrothed to just happened to be the one that they approved of the most, and she at the time hadn't raised a fuss.

It's when she suffered a plane crash in the Himalayas that forced her to claw her way back to civilization that her personality underwent a drastic transformation that left her unable to tolerate the stifling life of an aristocrat anymore, prompting her to break the engagement and generally rebelling against her now outraged parents. She's just lucky that she personally owned her own mansion (and a huge one at that!) through inheritance from an aunt by the time her parents formally disowned her.

Yeah, but not every family can afford a giant estate with its own massive mansion, which appears to be either have been built in the Victorian era or deliberately designed to look as such.

And I did already point out the reason why I incorporate an upper-class background here.

Edited by MarqFJA on Jan 30th 2019 at 2:54:38 PM

Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.

Hey quick question, how long does it take to travel the whole America on foot, and is it viable to be a Knight Errant on foot?

I'm afraid to write, but I like to imagine.

"the whole america" is a bit of a trick question there, mate. it's so spread out that it'll depend on what you mean.

only going with the continental states here, it looks a little like this;

NORTH TO SOUTH:

from blaine, washington, to san diego, california, it'll take you about 453 hours- or roughly 18 days

from portal, north dakota, to brownsville, texas, it's an estimated 592 hours- or 25 days

from caribou, maine, to key west, florida, it's a 684 hour trip, or 28 days.

EAST TO WEST

philadelphia, pennsylvania, to seattle, washington is a 916 hour trip, about 38 days

san fransisco, california to richmond, virginia is a 930 hour trip, about the same

san diego, california, to orlando, florida, is a 798 hour trip, about 34 days

ROUND TRIP:

starting with the central zoo in manhattan, down to atlanta, over to dallas, through albuquerque (no, don't take a left), over to los angeles, up to portland, back west to minneapolis, down to indianapolis, and then back to manhattan is a trip that is an estimated 2,337 hours, or, rounded up, 100 days walking time, covering a distance of 7,083 miles, and going through all sorts of climates imaginable.

---

and, a knight errant is an idea rooted in the chivalry, and moral codes of the knights, not whether or not he rides a horse. your knight may not have one for whatever reason (killed in battle, say) or may never have had one in the first place (there's really not going to be a lot of horses, per person, in some areas of the states, especially after any sort of apocalyptic-level events). what exactly your knight errant looks like is up to you, as long as they fit the archetype.

[forum cryptid: it/it's]

I asked is it "viable" to be a Knight Errant on foot, and by that I meant is it viable to travel long distant on foot to save a lot of people all over the world.

I'm afraid to write, but I like to imagine.

short answer: shrug

long answer: yes, if your world and scale allow it, and no, if your world and scale don't allow it.

if he can reach people all around the world, the answer is yes

if he can't reach people all around the world, the answer is no

i can't answer that for you since i don't know what your setting is

[forum cryptid: it/it's]

The more important consideration is the density of people in need of saving at any one point in time. If the population density is such that he can reasonably expect to encounter someone once a day, then the only other parameter is the percentage of people needing saving, which gives you the encounter probability.

The only other parameter is how often he needs to encounter people needing saving in order to qualify as a knight errant. Is once a week enough?

Somebody give me a germanic-esque (sur)name that sounds somewhat/vaguely like "Zemo" (the character that needs the name was born in 1890's)

Edited by Nukeli on Feb 12th 2019 at 8:11:29 PM

~ * Bleh * ~ (Looking for a russian-speaker to consult about names and words for a thing)

Choices include: Zeno, Zino, Zero, and Zorro.

I have some questions about how autistic people react to animals, interacting through text, and a few other things like that. Is anyone here knowledgeable enough to help, or have another forum I could ask on?

There used to be so many good Ask an Autistic blogs, but they've all gone defunct in the past few years.

Right now, Candidly Autistic over on tumblr is the blog that updates most frequently and takes questions.

But maybe checking out pro-autistic (also on tumblr) will give you some insight into textual communication. This is a blog compiling posts from the autistic community on tumblr.

Edited by Strontiumsun on Feb 14th 2019 at 9:05:50 PM

Creator of Heroes of Thantopolis: http://heroesofthantopolis.com/

I am autistic, and i react to those things like most 'normal' people i've seen in real life and tv. But, just like non-autistic people, their behavior greatly depends on the situation and an invidual, like how i'm stoic and silent and one guy i knew who ran around doing crazy/nonsensical stuff even during school lessons.

Edited by Nukeli on Feb 14th 2019 at 9:28:09 PM

~ * Bleh * ~ (Looking for a russian-speaker to consult about names and words for a thing)

I'd like some pointers on how folks on the spectrum interact with animals, too, since my story is mainly set in a nomadic society.

Echoing hymn of my fellow passerine | Art blog (under construction)

I'm autistic. I'm not that into animals, personally, but in the "I don't know how to communicate with you" sense more than anything. I have the same problem with babies and toddlers. I do most of my interaction through text, but that's mostly out of convenience I think. Usually I find it easier to explain my thoughts verbally or in person.

Award-winning screenwriter. Directed some movies. Trying to earn a Creator page. I do feedback here.

I need suggestions about the mask of a Red Skull expy i'm designing. What should it look like? It's hard for me to come up with scary enough things

Edited by Nukeli on Feb 15th 2019 at 1:04:03 PM

~ * Bleh * ~ (Looking for a russian-speaker to consult about names and words for a thing)

We actually have an autism thread. You can try asking over there.

If you had to pick a picture, song, film to represent humanity to an alien race, what would it be? For a picture I think I'd go for 'The Starry Night by Vincent van Gogh or 'Relativity' by M.C. Escher. For a song I'm thinking 'Land of confusion' by Genesis or 'Bohemian rhapsody' by queen.

These, to me, say that humans can produce beautiful things, despite our problem or we are kind of mad (maybe both)

My latest Trope page: Shapeshifting Failure

That, unfortunately, would only be helpful if the aliens had the same standards of beauty that we have (or, you know, any standards of beauty at all). I think we could hardly do any better than The Vitruvian Man by Leonardo Da Vinci.

A motto for a HYDRA expy? ('Hydra' as in Marvel comics' Hydra. I call the expy 'Lerna' and use a five-headed snake silhoulette as the symbol)

~ * Bleh * ~ (Looking for a russian-speaker to consult about names and words for a thing)