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    Original post 
OP credits go to badtothebaritone. There was no mention of a specific thread reason for this trope so I just went with the default "needs help" option.
I was noticing a lot of examples of Gender Neutral Writing about nonbinary characters being referred to with neutral pronouns, which is basic courtesy and not a trope. So I decided to do a little digging and found the following:

Wick check: Gender Neutral Wick Check

  • 14/50 examples are the writing avoiding using gendered language to be more inclusive, or 28%
  • 9/50 examples are the writing hiding a character's gender until it's revealed later, or 18%
  • 15/50 examples are referring to characters with ambiguous or explicitly nonbinary genders, or 30%
  • 4/50 examples are aversions, or 8%
  • 7/50 examples are potholes, or 14%
  • 1/50 examples are ZC Es, or 2%

Taking a look at the 23 valid examples (the bottom 4 categories are all misuse and can go), 14/23, or 60.8%, are inclusive writing, and 9/23, or 39.2%, are concealing writing. This suggests that the trope is trying to be two ideas at once. To fix this, I present the following solution:

  • Split off the "gender concealed until reveal" examples into a new trope
  • Keep the "gender-inclusive writing" in this trope, prehaps with a new name (suck as Gender-Inclusive Writing)

Wick check:

     Gender-Inclusive Writing - 14/ 50 
  1. LEGO DC Super-Villains - Gender Neutral Writing: The Rookie is referred to using singular they/them pronouns by other characters as gender doesn't play a part whatsoever in the character creation, as well as possibly intentional to make the game more inclusive to players of any gender.
  2. Narm.Fire Emblem Three Houses - In general, the Gender Neutral Writing might sound a bit awkward in English, particularly everyone referring to Byleth as Jeralt's "child" rather than son or daughter. Even in Jeralt's final moments, he refers to Byleth as "kid"—if the Affectionate Nickname didn't strike any chords before, it's not going to there either. And even worse, in the journal you read right after this, he keeps referring to Byleth, his newborn baby, as "the child". It's especially odd when neither Robin or Corrin were written this way. It makes you wonder why they didn't just have the voice actors record those lines twice with "son" and "daughter" instead. After all, there are other scenes where the dialog is changed to accommodate Byleth's sex.
  3. BTS World - Gender Neutral Writing: The original Korean text and the (post-patch) English translation use this for the Player Character, with the members only referring to them as "manager" or your inserted name.
  4. Animal Crossing: New Leaf - LGBT Fanbase: The game is popular amongst trans people for allowing you to crossdress. The game also largely follows Gender Neutral Writing, and no villager comments on your attire specifically because it's of the opposite gender. The closest you get is Mabel commenting on the item your male character wants to buy that's designed for females in mind ("Oh, are you shopping for a present?"), but she doesn't hold it against you if you try something on ("Well, I guess it's okay to be a bit more adventurous sometimes.").
  5. Trivia.The Left Hand Of Darkness - Old Shame: Downplayed. While LeGuin was never ashamed of the book itself, she did come to regret using male pronouns for the genderless citizens of Gethen, and later stories set there would use Gender Neutral Writing to avoid such implications. She also regretted showing solely heterosexual couples, and introduced same-sex couples in the later stories for the same reasons.
  6. The Forever War - Gender Neutral Writing: When Mandella rejoins civilian life (the first time), he discovers people are now saying "tha" for he/she, "thim" for him/her, and "ther" for his/hers.
  7. Code 7 - Gender Neutral Writing: For most of the game, nobody uses third-person pronouns to refer to Alex, allowing you to decide their gender on your own. The few times such pronouns are used, they're either "they" or "it".
  8. LGBTFanbase.Video Games - Splatoon 3 gives the appearance of Super Jumping right out of the closet from the word "go" with its character select screen asking for a "style" rather than a gender, much like Animal Crossing: New Horizons before it. It also helps that the game’s primary ink colors of purple and yellow also heavily resemble the nonbinary flag, and the haircuts and legwear are now unisex. Lastly, Shiver, one of the main hosts, has a very androgynous appearance that doesn't make it obvious that she's a girl.
  9. Remnant's Reclaimer - Gender Neutral Writing: Instead of calling the heroes "Huntsmen" and "Huntresses" like canon RWBY does, this fanfic uses "Hunter" to refer to both sexes, like the official Japanese dub.
  10. Fanon.Video Games - The gender of Kyros, the world-conquering Evil Overlord in Tyranny, is pointedly left ambiguous, with different characters giving conflicting reports or making assumptions according to cultural norms of leadership. However, fans who don't go for Gender Neutral Writing when discussing them usually assume they're female rather than male. Especially given that the devs themselves typically prefer female pronouns.
  11. Early-Installment Weirdness.Pokemon - The first few post-Crystal games mostly used Gender Neutral Writing. Starting with the DS games, the series makes more of an effort to use gendered pronouns for the protagonist.
  12. Dragon Creek - Gender Neutral Writing: Dragons are only referred to as "they", and the player isn't referred to with any third-person pronouns at all.
  13. The Opposition with Jordan Klepper - "Well Done, Son" Guy: Another link between this show and The Colbert Report: like Colbert, Klepper has thinly veiled daddy issues. For example, when a line in "O Canada" was made gender neutral, with the phrase "all thy sons" changed to "all of us", his reaction was:
    Jordan Klepper: Refusing to praise sons? Since when did the Canadian national anthem become my dad?
  14. PhantasyStarOnline2.Tropes A To M - Gender Neutral Writing: Due to the fact that you can quite literally be anyone you design, the game tries to uphold this throughout all story context. However, this is simultaneously played straight and averted due to discrepancies between voiced dialogue and text dialogue; almost all characters refer to your character with gender-neutral pronouns when in voice, but the text version has some characters clearly referring to you as male.

     Writing Deliberately Hides Gender - 9/ 50 
  1. Henry V - Gender Neutral Writing: The Chorus's gender is never specified, though in Elizabethan times women weren't allowed onstage.
  2. The Transit Card - Gender Neutral Writing: It's not revealed that Tolleson is a girl until her first on-screen appearance.
  3. Fate Apocrypha - Dub-Induced Plot Hole: After Astolfo's Gender Reveal to Sieg, Astolfo expresses surprise that Sieg assumed he was female, as the Japanese version avoided direct references to Astolfo's gender before that point. The English dub keeps gendered mentions of Astolfo to a minimum, but Sieg still calls him by female pronouns at least once when Astolfo could hear, and Astolfo's reaction is unchanged. Granted, Astolfo is not very smart, and could have easily forgotten or failed to notice (and should really expect people to assume he's female anyway).
  4. FireEmblemHeroes.Tropes F To L - Gender Neutral Writing: The notification for Flame Emperor's Grand Hero Battle, as well as the unit's entry in "Meet the Heroes", refers to Flame Emperor with "they", hiding their true identity.
  5. Anonymous Killer Narrator - In between the regular narration of the book that features the detective trying to figure out the case, there are sometimes chapters written from the perspective of the serial killer. These chapters usually are written anonymously and/or gender neutral so as to disguise which of the known characters in the book it is that is doing the killing.
  6. What Are the Contributors Real Names? - Tragic Backstory 42: Um...just call me Sam everyone does. Usually. Can't tell you anymore or else it'll defeat the mystery.
  7. WhamLine.Fan Works - The sequel / spin-off has a wham word. Wisp, a Changeling, has just had their actual form revealed, but the narration uses Gender Neutral Writing, until..
    Narration: She blinked.
  8. Instructions Not Included - Exact Words: Julie says that she wants Maggie to meet "someone". Maggie and Valentin are surprised to see that Julie's partner is a woman.
  9. 30 Rock S1 E3 "Blind Date" - Gender Neutral Writing: Jack refers to Gretchen Thomas as "Thomas" and, prior to the reveal, his dialogue about her is written to avoid pronouns.

     Ambiguous Gender / Non-binary Character Exists - 15/ 50 
  1. Battle Kitty - Ambiguous Gender: Kitty has a masculine-sounding voice but doesn't mind wearing feminine clothing (such as a bright pink bow as the page image clearly depicts) and the show itself never refers to Kitty by any specific pronoun. The most logical conclusion is that Kitty is non-binary, but this has yet to be confirmed or denied.
  2. Carmilla the Series - Gender Neutral Writing: LaFontaine is a non-binary character for whom them/they/their pronouns are used.
  3. Characters.Welcome To Demon School Iruma Kun Other Characters - Ambiguous Gender: The story is very adamant about Opera's gender being a complete mystery, deliberately confuscating whether they're male, female, both, or neither. Their character design is androgynous enough that they could be either Bishōnen or Bifauxnen, the voice acting of them in both English and Japanese dubs is right between Tomboyish Voice and Effeminate Voice, Gender Neutral Writing is so heavily used that English translations utilize "they" when using their name won't work, the Kalego Side Story prequel shows them wearing both the male and female uniforms simultaneously, and a flashback in the second season outright calls them androgynous.
  4. BetterThanItSounds.Webcomics - Wonderlab: Gender-ambiguous employees try to not get killed by fairytales during their day job. A webcomic spinoff of some video game.
  5. Word of Gay - Loki: Agent of Asgard writer Al Ewing stated what The Mighty Thor fans always suspected: Loki is bisexual and at least the young one is also genderqueer (this occasionally causes some pronoun confusion on this very wiki, as editors of Ewing's Loki series tend to refer to young Loki as they (Gender Neutral Writing purposes and also because that Loki tends to not be one of anything) while others go with previous Loki's he). A 2022 Marvel's Voices story reconfirms this and introduces several of Loki's male exes.
  6. Epic Tales - Gender Neutral Writing:
    1. At one point, Diana needs help from a friend to hack into CODIS. While talking about this friend both Diana and John keep referring to this friend with the word 'friend', rather then using 'he' or 'she'. It's so noticeable that it's obviously intentional.
    2. A slightly less obvious example is when it's mentioned that Diana is going out with someone named Alex. No gender is mentioned for Alex.
  7. The Owl House S2E5 "Through the Looking Glass Ruins" - Gender Neutral Writing: Edric has an upcoming date with an unseen someone, and Emira notably uses gender-neutral pronouns when referring to the date in question.
  8. InfinityTrainBoilingPoint.Tropes E To M - Gender Neutral Writing: Employed for the Land of the Lustrous characters (Phosphophyllite, Bort, Obsidian, and Sensei) and Chloe's principal.
  9. Undertale.Tropes G To N - Gender Neutral Writing: The main character, Napstablook, Monster Kid, and the Fallen Child are only ever referred to using gender-neutral pronouns.note 
  10. AmbiguousGender.Video Games - Valkyria Chronicles 4: Rosetta Valeriano has a feminine face framed by long blonde hair, a masculine physical build, a preference for women's clothing, a masculine-sounding birth name, a female VA in English, a male VA in Japanese, is officially listed as "genderless", and is subject to Gender Neutral Writing in English. Canonically, she identifies as female.
  11. Characters.Contest For Millions Of Thousands - No Biological Sex: Identifies as genderless and officially uses they/them pronouns (оно in Russian).
  12. A Taste of Gold and Iron - Gender Neutral Writing: Araşt has three gender-specific pronouns: he/him, she/her, and çe/çir. Multiple characters are of this third gender.
  13. Solar Wind - Gender Neutral Writing: Seeing as the series' main character is non-binary, there's a lot of this.
  14. Characters.Hades Cthonic Gods - Gender Neutral Writing: Chaos is referred to as "they," as Chaos is genderless and speaks with both a masculine and feminine voice.
  15. Characters.Bofuri I Dont Want To Get Hurt So Ill Max Out My Defense - All There in the Manual: The official anime website has him listed as a young boy, and a single offhand line during his light novel introduction refers to him as male. Not one other mention is made about his gender in any of the mediums, with heavy use of Gender Neutral Writing for unexplained reasons, especially the manga and anime that leave out the aforementioned novel line.

     Aversions - 4/ 50 
  1. Characters.Fate Extella The Umbral Star - Gender Neutral Writing: Averted, curiously enough. Though the game was written with the male Hakuno in mind, the female Hakuno's gender will be referenced fairly frequently in the narration, with correct pronouns and plenty of characters referring to her as "woman", "girl", etc, not to mention that all C Gs in which Hakuno appears have both a male and a female version. Only very few lines of dialogue erroneously refer to the female Hakuno as "him", and those are likely a result of the original Japanese using the (more common) gender-neutral pronouns to refer to them and the translators deciding to go with "him" instead of "they" for whatever reason.
  2. Funny.Dragon Ball Xenoverse - Likewise, the no Gender Neutral Writing is really funny, especially if you're playing the most feminine, revealing-looking and prettiest female character you can create.
  3. MassEffect.Tropes E To H - Gender Neutral Writing: Wholly averted, though not often; because most conversations are with Shepard, not about them, their gender isn't brought up much. But when the occasion arises the writers do not shy away from it. Most of the romances are gender-unique, and there are several other gender-unique scenes as well. For example, in the second game, there is a scene where a merc recruiter calls female Shepard a stripper. Bad idea.
  4. DummiedOut.Role Playing Game - Gates to Infinity removed the ability to choose your hero and partner's gender for the releases outside of Japan. This was presumably done because choices didn't actually affect the gameplay or dialogue in any way. (Annoyingly, though, the translations avoided the previous usage of Gender Neutral Writing, referring to both the hero and partner as "he" on multiple occasions). They did, however, alter Pikachu's appearance accordingly (female Pikachu have a heart-shaped tail tip), meaning players of the localized versions missed out in a small way.

     Potholes - 7/ 50 
  1. WMG.Pokemon Black 2 And White 2 - If you choose to play as Hilbert, then Hilda will appear as the hero who befriended Reshiram/Zekrom and defeated N some time prior to the new games' events. And vice-versa. That would explain why the opposite gender character was Schrödinger's Player Character in Black and White, breaking the tradition set up back in Ruby and Sapphire: they couldn't play an important role yet, they will be the hero of the sequel.
  2. Pantheon.Gaming - Portfolio: Adventurer Player Characters, From Being Just Another Guild To Legends In Their Base Cities, Hail From Post-Apocalyptic Settings That Used To Be Earth, Facing Cosmic Horrors Near The End of Their Journeys, Crazy-Prepared Out Of Necessity, Can Sense Impending Danger, Can Map Even While Talking or Fighting, Featureless Protagonists, Gender Neutral Writing, Going Up Yggdrasil (Lagaard and Arcania guilds only), Lazy Backup, Limit Break, Ambiguous Guild Leader, Collecting Organ Drops, Purely Aesthetic Genders, Saving the World (in varying degrees)
  3. Haiku.A Villain Named Zrg - Xzir name is Zorug.
  4. CommonKnowledge.Super Mario Bros - On November 17, 2014, GameSpot posted an article about an interview with Koichi Hayashida on Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker. He discusses the Toads' gender, where he claims that they never went out of their way to decide the sex on them. This led to the conclusion that the Toads are literally genderless. However, that's not the case. In an interview, Shigeru Miyamoto clarifies that when the Toads were first designed, they didn't focus on their genders, though their Japanese name Kinopio was chosen as a portmanteau of kinoko (mushroom) and Pinocchio, Pinocchio being a boy, of course. Once Toadette came into the picture, they clearly designed her to be female. Because she was the most feminine out of the others and because the character Toad was clearly referred to as he, it led the conclusion that the rest were male with the RPG games being exceptions. In other words, it's likely that Hayashida's comment was implying that the Toads just have Ambiguous Genders and not entirely genderless, a point that is further made with Super Smash Bros. Ultimate with the Move Lists for both Peach and Daisy. In Peach's, it clearly states that Toad is male, while Daisy's refers to the Blue Toad as an it as the other Toad colors aren't as significant.
  5. SoYouWantTo.Avoid Writing A Mary Sue - It's important to note that writing isn't a visual media, and that anything the reader pictures she has to make up on her own, no matter how much detail you have in the writing. Because of this, it's remarkably easy to get away with only a single short sentence of what the character looks like and still have the reader accept her presence without any raised eyebrows. Just don't get carried away with hiding things excessively, or using this as a way to Ass Pull something you didn't see fit to mention the first time around.
  6. Useful Notes.Indonesia - The Indonesian language has no past tense or third-person gender-specific pronouns (which results in the English translation for the sentence "he kicks the ball" and "she kicked the ball" being exactly the same: "dia menendang bola").note 
  7. Exotic Extended Marriage - Vonda N. McIntyre's Starfarer series has at least one married triad (Victoria Fraser MacKenzie, Stephen Thomas Gregory, and Satoshi Lono). There was originally a fourth spouse, but they died before the series kicks off.

     ZCE - 1/ 50 
  1. The Super Dictionary - Gender Neutral Writing: A rather awkward example.

Edited by GastonRabbit on Apr 21st 2023 at 4:18:59 AM

MacronNotes (she/her) (Captain) Relationship Status: Less than three
(she/her)
#1: Dec 8th 2022 at 7:09:47 PM

To-do list:

    Original post 
OP credits go to badtothebaritone. There was no mention of a specific thread reason for this trope so I just went with the default "needs help" option.
I was noticing a lot of examples of Gender Neutral Writing about nonbinary characters being referred to with neutral pronouns, which is basic courtesy and not a trope. So I decided to do a little digging and found the following:

Wick check: Gender Neutral Wick Check

  • 14/50 examples are the writing avoiding using gendered language to be more inclusive, or 28%
  • 9/50 examples are the writing hiding a character's gender until it's revealed later, or 18%
  • 15/50 examples are referring to characters with ambiguous or explicitly nonbinary genders, or 30%
  • 4/50 examples are aversions, or 8%
  • 7/50 examples are potholes, or 14%
  • 1/50 examples are ZC Es, or 2%

Taking a look at the 23 valid examples (the bottom 4 categories are all misuse and can go), 14/23, or 60.8%, are inclusive writing, and 9/23, or 39.2%, are concealing writing. This suggests that the trope is trying to be two ideas at once. To fix this, I present the following solution:

  • Split off the "gender concealed until reveal" examples into a new trope
  • Keep the "gender-inclusive writing" in this trope, prehaps with a new name (suck as Gender-Inclusive Writing)

Wick check:

     Gender-Inclusive Writing - 14/ 50 
  1. LEGO DC Super-Villains - Gender Neutral Writing: The Rookie is referred to using singular they/them pronouns by other characters as gender doesn't play a part whatsoever in the character creation, as well as possibly intentional to make the game more inclusive to players of any gender.
  2. Narm.Fire Emblem Three Houses - In general, the Gender Neutral Writing might sound a bit awkward in English, particularly everyone referring to Byleth as Jeralt's "child" rather than son or daughter. Even in Jeralt's final moments, he refers to Byleth as "kid"—if the Affectionate Nickname didn't strike any chords before, it's not going to there either. And even worse, in the journal you read right after this, he keeps referring to Byleth, his newborn baby, as "the child". It's especially odd when neither Robin or Corrin were written this way. It makes you wonder why they didn't just have the voice actors record those lines twice with "son" and "daughter" instead. After all, there are other scenes where the dialog is changed to accommodate Byleth's sex.
  3. BTS World - Gender Neutral Writing: The original Korean text and the (post-patch) English translation use this for the Player Character, with the members only referring to them as "manager" or your inserted name.
  4. Animal Crossing: New Leaf - LGBT Fanbase: The game is popular amongst trans people for allowing you to crossdress. The game also largely follows Gender Neutral Writing, and no villager comments on your attire specifically because it's of the opposite gender. The closest you get is Mabel commenting on the item your male character wants to buy that's designed for females in mind ("Oh, are you shopping for a present?"), but she doesn't hold it against you if you try something on ("Well, I guess it's okay to be a bit more adventurous sometimes.").
  5. Trivia.The Left Hand Of Darkness - Old Shame: Downplayed. While LeGuin was never ashamed of the book itself, she did come to regret using male pronouns for the genderless citizens of Gethen, and later stories set there would use Gender Neutral Writing to avoid such implications. She also regretted showing solely heterosexual couples, and introduced same-sex couples in the later stories for the same reasons.
  6. The Forever War - Gender Neutral Writing: When Mandella rejoins civilian life (the first time), he discovers people are now saying "tha" for he/she, "thim" for him/her, and "ther" for his/hers.
  7. Code 7 - Gender Neutral Writing: For most of the game, nobody uses third-person pronouns to refer to Alex, allowing you to decide their gender on your own. The few times such pronouns are used, they're either "they" or "it".
  8. LGBTFanbase.Video Games - Splatoon 3 gives the appearance of Super Jumping right out of the closet from the word "go" with its character select screen asking for a "style" rather than a gender, much like Animal Crossing: New Horizons before it. It also helps that the game’s primary ink colors of purple and yellow also heavily resemble the nonbinary flag, and the haircuts and legwear are now unisex. Lastly, Shiver, one of the main hosts, has a very androgynous appearance that doesn't make it obvious that she's a girl.
  9. Remnant's Reclaimer - Gender Neutral Writing: Instead of calling the heroes "Huntsmen" and "Huntresses" like canon RWBY does, this fanfic uses "Hunter" to refer to both sexes, like the official Japanese dub.
  10. Fanon.Video Games - The gender of Kyros, the world-conquering Evil Overlord in Tyranny, is pointedly left ambiguous, with different characters giving conflicting reports or making assumptions according to cultural norms of leadership. However, fans who don't go for Gender Neutral Writing when discussing them usually assume they're female rather than male. Especially given that the devs themselves typically prefer female pronouns.
  11. Early-Installment Weirdness.Pokemon - The first few post-Crystal games mostly used Gender Neutral Writing. Starting with the DS games, the series makes more of an effort to use gendered pronouns for the protagonist.
  12. Dragon Creek - Gender Neutral Writing: Dragons are only referred to as "they", and the player isn't referred to with any third-person pronouns at all.
  13. The Opposition with Jordan Klepper - "Well Done, Son" Guy: Another link between this show and The Colbert Report: like Colbert, Klepper has thinly veiled daddy issues. For example, when a line in "O Canada" was made gender neutral, with the phrase "all thy sons" changed to "all of us", his reaction was:
    Jordan Klepper: Refusing to praise sons? Since when did the Canadian national anthem become my dad?
  14. PhantasyStarOnline2.Tropes A To M - Gender Neutral Writing: Due to the fact that you can quite literally be anyone you design, the game tries to uphold this throughout all story context. However, this is simultaneously played straight and averted due to discrepancies between voiced dialogue and text dialogue; almost all characters refer to your character with gender-neutral pronouns when in voice, but the text version has some characters clearly referring to you as male.

     Writing Deliberately Hides Gender - 9/ 50 
  1. Henry V - Gender Neutral Writing: The Chorus's gender is never specified, though in Elizabethan times women weren't allowed onstage.
  2. The Transit Card - Gender Neutral Writing: It's not revealed that Tolleson is a girl until her first on-screen appearance.
  3. Fate Apocrypha - Dub-Induced Plot Hole: After Astolfo's Gender Reveal to Sieg, Astolfo expresses surprise that Sieg assumed he was female, as the Japanese version avoided direct references to Astolfo's gender before that point. The English dub keeps gendered mentions of Astolfo to a minimum, but Sieg still calls him by female pronouns at least once when Astolfo could hear, and Astolfo's reaction is unchanged. Granted, Astolfo is not very smart, and could have easily forgotten or failed to notice (and should really expect people to assume he's female anyway).
  4. FireEmblemHeroes.Tropes F To L - Gender Neutral Writing: The notification for Flame Emperor's Grand Hero Battle, as well as the unit's entry in "Meet the Heroes", refers to Flame Emperor with "they", hiding their true identity.
  5. Anonymous Killer Narrator - In between the regular narration of the book that features the detective trying to figure out the case, there are sometimes chapters written from the perspective of the serial killer. These chapters usually are written anonymously and/or gender neutral so as to disguise which of the known characters in the book it is that is doing the killing.
  6. What Are the Contributors Real Names? - Tragic Backstory 42: Um...just call me Sam everyone does. Usually. Can't tell you anymore or else it'll defeat the mystery.
  7. WhamLine.Fan Works - The sequel / spin-off has a wham word. Wisp, a Changeling, has just had their actual form revealed, but the narration uses Gender Neutral Writing, until..
    Narration: She blinked.
  8. Instructions Not Included - Exact Words: Julie says that she wants Maggie to meet "someone". Maggie and Valentin are surprised to see that Julie's partner is a woman.
  9. 30 Rock S1 E3 "Blind Date" - Gender Neutral Writing: Jack refers to Gretchen Thomas as "Thomas" and, prior to the reveal, his dialogue about her is written to avoid pronouns.

     Ambiguous Gender / Non-binary Character Exists - 15/ 50 
  1. Battle Kitty - Ambiguous Gender: Kitty has a masculine-sounding voice but doesn't mind wearing feminine clothing (such as a bright pink bow as the page image clearly depicts) and the show itself never refers to Kitty by any specific pronoun. The most logical conclusion is that Kitty is non-binary, but this has yet to be confirmed or denied.
  2. Carmilla the Series - Gender Neutral Writing: LaFontaine is a non-binary character for whom them/they/their pronouns are used.
  3. Characters.Welcome To Demon School Iruma Kun Other Characters - Ambiguous Gender: The story is very adamant about Opera's gender being a complete mystery, deliberately confuscating whether they're male, female, both, or neither. Their character design is androgynous enough that they could be either Bishōnen or Bifauxnen, the voice acting of them in both English and Japanese dubs is right between Tomboyish Voice and Effeminate Voice, Gender Neutral Writing is so heavily used that English translations utilize "they" when using their name won't work, the Kalego Side Story prequel shows them wearing both the male and female uniforms simultaneously, and a flashback in the second season outright calls them androgynous.
  4. BetterThanItSounds.Webcomics - Wonderlab: Gender-ambiguous employees try to not get killed by fairytales during their day job. A webcomic spinoff of some video game.
  5. Word of Gay - Loki: Agent of Asgard writer Al Ewing stated what The Mighty Thor fans always suspected: Loki is bisexual and at least the young one is also genderqueer (this occasionally causes some pronoun confusion on this very wiki, as editors of Ewing's Loki series tend to refer to young Loki as they (Gender Neutral Writing purposes and also because that Loki tends to not be one of anything) while others go with previous Loki's he). A 2022 Marvel's Voices story reconfirms this and introduces several of Loki's male exes.
  6. Epic Tales - Gender Neutral Writing:
    1. At one point, Diana needs help from a friend to hack into CODIS. While talking about this friend both Diana and John keep referring to this friend with the word 'friend', rather then using 'he' or 'she'. It's so noticeable that it's obviously intentional.
    2. A slightly less obvious example is when it's mentioned that Diana is going out with someone named Alex. No gender is mentioned for Alex.
  7. The Owl House S2E5 "Through the Looking Glass Ruins" - Gender Neutral Writing: Edric has an upcoming date with an unseen someone, and Emira notably uses gender-neutral pronouns when referring to the date in question.
  8. InfinityTrainBoilingPoint.Tropes E To M - Gender Neutral Writing: Employed for the Land of the Lustrous characters (Phosphophyllite, Bort, Obsidian, and Sensei) and Chloe's principal.
  9. Undertale.Tropes G To N - Gender Neutral Writing: The main character, Napstablook, Monster Kid, and the Fallen Child are only ever referred to using gender-neutral pronouns.note 
  10. AmbiguousGender.Video Games - Valkyria Chronicles 4: Rosetta Valeriano has a feminine face framed by long blonde hair, a masculine physical build, a preference for women's clothing, a masculine-sounding birth name, a female VA in English, a male VA in Japanese, is officially listed as "genderless", and is subject to Gender Neutral Writing in English. Canonically, she identifies as female.
  11. Characters.Contest For Millions Of Thousands - No Biological Sex: Identifies as genderless and officially uses they/them pronouns (оно in Russian).
  12. A Taste of Gold and Iron - Gender Neutral Writing: Araşt has three gender-specific pronouns: he/him, she/her, and çe/çir. Multiple characters are of this third gender.
  13. Solar Wind - Gender Neutral Writing: Seeing as the series' main character is non-binary, there's a lot of this.
  14. Characters.Hades Cthonic Gods - Gender Neutral Writing: Chaos is referred to as "they," as Chaos is genderless and speaks with both a masculine and feminine voice.
  15. Characters.Bofuri I Dont Want To Get Hurt So Ill Max Out My Defense - All There in the Manual: The official anime website has him listed as a young boy, and a single offhand line during his light novel introduction refers to him as male. Not one other mention is made about his gender in any of the mediums, with heavy use of Gender Neutral Writing for unexplained reasons, especially the manga and anime that leave out the aforementioned novel line.

     Aversions - 4/ 50 
  1. Characters.Fate Extella The Umbral Star - Gender Neutral Writing: Averted, curiously enough. Though the game was written with the male Hakuno in mind, the female Hakuno's gender will be referenced fairly frequently in the narration, with correct pronouns and plenty of characters referring to her as "woman", "girl", etc, not to mention that all C Gs in which Hakuno appears have both a male and a female version. Only very few lines of dialogue erroneously refer to the female Hakuno as "him", and those are likely a result of the original Japanese using the (more common) gender-neutral pronouns to refer to them and the translators deciding to go with "him" instead of "they" for whatever reason.
  2. Funny.Dragon Ball Xenoverse - Likewise, the no Gender Neutral Writing is really funny, especially if you're playing the most feminine, revealing-looking and prettiest female character you can create.
  3. MassEffect.Tropes E To H - Gender Neutral Writing: Wholly averted, though not often; because most conversations are with Shepard, not about them, their gender isn't brought up much. But when the occasion arises the writers do not shy away from it. Most of the romances are gender-unique, and there are several other gender-unique scenes as well. For example, in the second game, there is a scene where a merc recruiter calls female Shepard a stripper. Bad idea.
  4. DummiedOut.Role Playing Game - Gates to Infinity removed the ability to choose your hero and partner's gender for the releases outside of Japan. This was presumably done because choices didn't actually affect the gameplay or dialogue in any way. (Annoyingly, though, the translations avoided the previous usage of Gender Neutral Writing, referring to both the hero and partner as "he" on multiple occasions). They did, however, alter Pikachu's appearance accordingly (female Pikachu have a heart-shaped tail tip), meaning players of the localized versions missed out in a small way.

     Potholes - 7/ 50 
  1. WMG.Pokemon Black 2 And White 2 - If you choose to play as Hilbert, then Hilda will appear as the hero who befriended Reshiram/Zekrom and defeated N some time prior to the new games' events. And vice-versa. That would explain why the opposite gender character was Schrödinger's Player Character in Black and White, breaking the tradition set up back in Ruby and Sapphire: they couldn't play an important role yet, they will be the hero of the sequel.
  2. Pantheon.Gaming - Portfolio: Adventurer Player Characters, From Being Just Another Guild To Legends In Their Base Cities, Hail From Post-Apocalyptic Settings That Used To Be Earth, Facing Cosmic Horrors Near The End of Their Journeys, Crazy-Prepared Out Of Necessity, Can Sense Impending Danger, Can Map Even While Talking or Fighting, Featureless Protagonists, Gender Neutral Writing, Going Up Yggdrasil (Lagaard and Arcania guilds only), Lazy Backup, Limit Break, Ambiguous Guild Leader, Collecting Organ Drops, Purely Aesthetic Genders, Saving the World (in varying degrees)
  3. Haiku.A Villain Named Zrg - Xzir name is Zorug.
  4. CommonKnowledge.Super Mario Bros - On November 17, 2014, GameSpot posted an article about an interview with Koichi Hayashida on Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker. He discusses the Toads' gender, where he claims that they never went out of their way to decide the sex on them. This led to the conclusion that the Toads are literally genderless. However, that's not the case. In an interview, Shigeru Miyamoto clarifies that when the Toads were first designed, they didn't focus on their genders, though their Japanese name Kinopio was chosen as a portmanteau of kinoko (mushroom) and Pinocchio, Pinocchio being a boy, of course. Once Toadette came into the picture, they clearly designed her to be female. Because she was the most feminine out of the others and because the character Toad was clearly referred to as he, it led the conclusion that the rest were male with the RPG games being exceptions. In other words, it's likely that Hayashida's comment was implying that the Toads just have Ambiguous Genders and not entirely genderless, a point that is further made with Super Smash Bros. Ultimate with the Move Lists for both Peach and Daisy. In Peach's, it clearly states that Toad is male, while Daisy's refers to the Blue Toad as an it as the other Toad colors aren't as significant.
  5. SoYouWantTo.Avoid Writing A Mary Sue - It's important to note that writing isn't a visual media, and that anything the reader pictures she has to make up on her own, no matter how much detail you have in the writing. Because of this, it's remarkably easy to get away with only a single short sentence of what the character looks like and still have the reader accept her presence without any raised eyebrows. Just don't get carried away with hiding things excessively, or using this as a way to Ass Pull something you didn't see fit to mention the first time around.
  6. Useful Notes.Indonesia - The Indonesian language has no past tense or third-person gender-specific pronouns (which results in the English translation for the sentence "he kicks the ball" and "she kicked the ball" being exactly the same: "dia menendang bola").note 
  7. Exotic Extended Marriage - Vonda N. McIntyre's Starfarer series has at least one married triad (Victoria Fraser MacKenzie, Stephen Thomas Gregory, and Satoshi Lono). There was originally a fourth spouse, but they died before the series kicks off.

     ZCE - 1/ 50 
  1. The Super Dictionary - Gender Neutral Writing: A rather awkward example.

Edited by GastonRabbit on Apr 21st 2023 at 4:18:59 AM

Macron's notes
MacronNotes (she/her) (Captain) Relationship Status: Less than three
(she/her)
Berrenta How sweet it is from Texas Since: Apr, 2015 Relationship Status: Can't buy me love
How sweet it is
#3: Dec 8th 2022 at 9:44:35 PM

Those two ideas sound good. [tup]

she/her | TRS needs your help! | Contributor of Trope Report
Noaqiyeum Trans Siberian Anarchestra (it/they) from the gentle and welcoming dark (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: Arm chopping is not a love language!
Trans Siberian Anarchestra (it/they)
#4: Dec 8th 2022 at 10:06:24 PM

The problem with trying to split them is that, prior to such a time as a character is revealed to have a gender, the two are indistinguishable from each other.

I'd compare it to The All-Concealing "I" and Narrator All Along, where what we've done is to trope the way a speaker's identity is left open and the fact that it was revealed, rather than separating ambiguous narrators who are eventually identified from narrators who aren't. (Some of these examples, where neutral second person is used to allow a broad audience to project whatever traits they want onto a Featureless Protagonist, could go into a sibling trope like The All Inviting You. Both would be subtropes of "writing around the use of gendered terms".)

...I guess I'm also not sure I agree with the premise that being basic courtesy means something isn't a trope. Encountering gender-neutral writing is one way people discover they are non-binary, and in return the wider acceptance of what is courteous feeds back into how gender-neutral writing is perceived. (For example, Toby Fox had to clarify by Word of God whether Frisk or Chara are gender-neutral or non-binary, because you can't tell just by playing Undertale.)

Edited by Noaqiyeum on Dec 8th 2022 at 6:11:45 PM

The Revolution Will Not Be Tropeable
Amonimus the Retromancer from <<|Wiki Talk|>> (Sergeant) Relationship Status: In another castle
the Retromancer
#5: Dec 8th 2022 at 11:26:39 PM

Surprized Gender Reveal is an index despite the wick count, maybe because of the name. If it wasn't, I'd snowclone its name.

Favoring the... Gender-Concealing Writing and Gender Non Specific Writing per OP (Can't think of other names).

TroperWall / WikiMagic Cleanup
wootzits Since: Apr, 2010
#6: Dec 8th 2022 at 11:28:44 PM

Doesn't Gender Misdirection already cover the "gender concealed until reveal" variation?

Amonimus the Retromancer from <<|Wiki Talk|>> (Sergeant) Relationship Status: In another castle
the Retromancer
#7: Dec 8th 2022 at 11:40:46 PM

It's for previously unseen characters, but I can see a compelling reason to expand it.

Edited by Amonimus on Dec 8th 2022 at 10:40:53 PM

TroperWall / WikiMagic Cleanup
selkies Professional Wick Checker Since: Jan, 2021 Relationship Status: Star-crossed
Professional Wick Checker
GastonRabbit Sounds good on paper (he/him) from Robinson, Illinois, USA (General of TV Troops) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
themayorofsimpleton Now a lurker. Thanks for everything. | he/him from Elsewhere (Experienced, Not Yet Jaded) Relationship Status: Abstaining
GastonRabbit MOD Sounds good on paper (he/him) from Robinson, Illinois, USA (General of TV Troops) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
#11: Dec 11th 2022 at 5:03:09 AM

I hooked a crowner. As I said, the two redefinition options are not mutually exclusive, and if both have consensus, the trope will be split.

Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
wingedcatgirl I'm helping! from lurking (Holding A Herring) Relationship Status: Oh my word! I'm gay!
I'm helping!
#12: Dec 11th 2022 at 7:25:20 AM

posting to make public that we're in favor of a split and accordingly voted both options

Trouble Cube continues to be a general-purpose forum for those who desire such a thing.
GastonRabbit MOD Sounds good on paper (he/him) from Robinson, Illinois, USA (General of TV Troops) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
#13: Dec 14th 2022 at 3:03:41 AM

Calling in favor of the following:

  • Rewrite to focus on the "gender-inclusive writing" aspect this trope instead of gender-neutral writing in general, perhaps with a new name. If both this and retooling into a trope for gender-concealing writing have consensus, the trope will be split.
  • Retool into a trope for "gender concealed until reveal" examples, and possibly rename. If both this and retooling into a trope for gender-inclusive writing have consensus, the trope will be split.

We'll need to select names, so get a list ready. Reusing Gender Neutral Writing for one of them is an option, but simply calling the first Gender-Inclusive Writing and the second Gender-Concealing Writing was previously suggested (and both of them sound good).

Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
Berrenta How sweet it is from Texas Since: Apr, 2015 Relationship Status: Can't buy me love
How sweet it is
#14: Dec 14th 2022 at 7:42:24 AM

Gender-Concealing Writing works for the "concealed until The Reveal" part.

I'm good with either Gender-Inclusive Writing or Gender Neutral Writing for the other.

she/her | TRS needs your help! | Contributor of Trope Report
wingedcatgirl I'm helping! from lurking (Holding A Herring) Relationship Status: Oh my word! I'm gay!
I'm helping!
#15: Dec 14th 2022 at 8:20:52 AM

This seems like a case where we'd want the original name to become a disambig, so yeah Gender-Concealing Writing and Gender-Inclusive Writing

Trouble Cube continues to be a general-purpose forum for those who desire such a thing.
Vilui Since: May, 2009
#16: Dec 15th 2022 at 11:34:43 PM

Gender-Concealing Writing and Gender-Inclusive Writing, both with hyphens.

GastonRabbit Sounds good on paper (he/him) from Robinson, Illinois, USA (General of TV Troops) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
#17: Dec 16th 2022 at 7:57:09 AM

[up]We'd use custom titles to add the hyphens.

Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
eroock Since: Sep, 2012
#18: Dec 16th 2022 at 11:42:52 AM

What would be the defining line between a new Gender-Concealing Writing trope and the existing Gender Misdirection?

Amonimus the Retromancer from <<|Wiki Talk|>> (Sergeant) Relationship Status: In another castle
the Retromancer
#19: Dec 16th 2022 at 11:53:18 AM

  • Gender Misdirection: An unseen character is given traits/pronouns/titles of one/neutral gender, and it turns out to be the other.

I can't really come up with a suggestion how to separate Gender-Concealing Writing from it except strictly not alluding to any gender and still wonder if Gender Misdirection is enough.

TroperWall / WikiMagic Cleanup
badtothebaritone (Life not ruined yet) Relationship Status: Snooping as usual
#20: Dec 16th 2022 at 12:02:15 PM

I think we can just expand Gender Misdirection to include that stuff.

GastonRabbit MOD Sounds good on paper (he/him) from Robinson, Illinois, USA (General of TV Troops) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
#21: Dec 16th 2022 at 8:57:21 PM

Let's see if we're doing that, since I never got any feedback on what to call the gender-inclusive writing trope, so we can hash this one out in the meantime. I'll tag the page for Gender Misdirection.

Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
JustNormalMusicLover As long as everything goes well, it'll be fine! Since: Jun, 2022 Relationship Status: Abstaining
As long as everything goes well, it'll be fine!
#22: Dec 16th 2022 at 10:10:11 PM

I perhaps think there is a difference between "We won't use "he/him" or "she/her" for that person's pronoun", and "This person is a "he/him" or "she/her" even if we know it will probably be a plot twist to be wrong and be the opposite".

That being said, I think I'll go with a Gender-Inclusive Writing definition of a trope, but I won't have problem with Gender-Concealing Writing. There's enough difference between the neutral gender being either used just for convenience on a character, and then another one used as a Plot Twist.

I'm also questioning how are Gender-Blending Tropes not referenced as "See also" in Gender Reveal, or the other way, though they share a supertrope category in Gender and Sexuality Tropes.

How many games got ported into Nintendo Switch? A lot of them.
GastonRabbit Sounds good on paper (he/him) from Robinson, Illinois, USA (General of TV Troops) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
#23: Dec 16th 2022 at 11:44:59 PM

[up]We'd be expanding Gender Misdirection's definition a bit if this crowner has consensus, so whatever would go under Gender-Concealing Writing would go under the former in addition to what's already there.

Edit: Gender Misdirection already allows gender-neutral nouns other than pronouns (like titles and honorifics), so I don't think expanding it to include gender-neutral pronouns would be a major change. Personally, I think the fact that Gender Misdirection allows pretty much every kind of gender-neutral writing other than pronouns is an unnecessary restriction, and one that strikes me as arbitrary.

Edited by GastonRabbit on Dec 16th 2022 at 1:52:08 PM

Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
Twiddler (On A Trope Odyssey)
#24: Dec 17th 2022 at 2:29:20 AM

My problem is the name. "Misdirection" is more specific than "concealing". Out of the nine "Writing Deliberately Hides Gender" examples on the wick check, it seems like only two of them (the Fate/Apocrypha and 30 Rock examples) have context for "misdirection".

GastonRabbit Sounds good on paper (he/him) from Robinson, Illinois, USA (General of TV Troops) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
#25: Dec 17th 2022 at 3:48:53 AM

I checked and Gender Misdirection doesn't have too many wicks, so I added a rename option since moving the existing wicks wouldn't take long. (To be honest, even Gender Neutral Writing doesn't have as many wicks as I expected; I expected the wick count to be in the upper three-digit range at least instead of just above 400.)

Edited by GastonRabbit on Dec 17th 2022 at 5:54:00 AM

Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.

21st Dec '22 11:48:16 PM

Crown Description:

Consensus was to split Gender Neutral Writing into a trope for gender-inclusive writing and a trope for gender-concealing writing. What should the name for gender-concealing writing be? Using the current name is an option.

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