[ SECRET POST #5401 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #5401 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


01.



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03.
[Hannah Bayles (YouTube)]


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04.
[Squid Game]


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05.
[911]


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06.
[Holliday Grainger (The Borgias, CB Strike)]


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07.
[Ryan Bergara, Buzfeed Unsolved]







Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 19 secrets from Secret Submission Post #773.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[fscom]

01. https://i.imgur.com/ZkB4yj0.png

[(Anonymous)]

I think the simplest explanation (although of course not the only one) is that you like those characters in part because you want to bang them, and you don't want to bang the genderswapped version.

And that's OK imo.

[(Anonymous)]

Pretty sure if it was about attraction, OP would have mentioned it.

[(Anonymous)]

Tbh it's rare to find a well-written genderswap fic in the first place. It's always a complex issue and more work to make believable than casual fic writers want to put in.

In theory gender *should* not matter, but in practice it totally *does* matter due to how society perceives and acts about it. And characters' experiences are what make them well, themselves. So if you change those, you change the character. It's not their gender itself that forces the changes, it's the very different experiences that *being* that gender would have given them... that yes, lead them to basically be OCs.

It'd be the exact same for female->male genderswaps, too.

So I doubt it's your internalized misogyny, unless you for some reason adore when female characters are genderswapped to male and they *don't* feel like OCs and you like them better that way and see no issue with it and it's just the icky women you dislike.

If that's the case, yeah, start worrying.

[(Anonymous)]

I don't like genderswapped fics because nine times out of ten it's 1) done to turn a popular fanon queer pairing straight, or 2) a case of "this character now has boobs" and there's absolutely nothing different plot- or character-wise.

If you're going to genderswap a character, I want to read about how things would be different if that character were the opposite sex. I want to read about how the story would change, how their relationships would change, how their mindset would be different. If nothing changes at all, then what's the point?

For instance, in one of my fandoms, a large part of the plot has to do with a specific character being next in line for the throne. Genderswap that character into a woman and they wouldn't be next in line for the throne, which means an entire segment of the plot wouldn't happen the same way that it does in canon. That's interesting! I want to read stuff like that! But if it's just "[X] is female but nothing about the plot changes whatsoever," then who cares?

[(Anonymous)]

An anon from above, but yeah, I like when genderswap is treated the way it should be. As a total AU where a lot of events of the characters' lives change, not due to their gender but because of how the outside world reacts to them now that they are this gender. It *should* be a full AU!

[(Anonymous)]

+1, this is the kind of genderswap I like (and have written!) Your assigned gender does affect your life and how other people interact with you, even if you're the same person exactly on the inside. There's very few canons where it won't have an effect.

[(Anonymous)]

Same! I don't mind it in fanart (can be kinda cool!) but I don't want to read about it - maybe in a short crack fic where a magic spell goes wrong or the character ends up in another universe or something, but nothing serious. Especially not shipping fic.
(I'm ace so I don't want to bang them.)

[(Anonymous)]

I used to feel this way, and it really was sort of misogyny tbh. I just couldn't get comfortable with female characters because I scrutinized every single thing they did, said, how they looked and how they sounded. It was only when I started watching more and more female centric and female run shows (and read more female authors) that I began to accept vulnerability and imperfection in female characters. I still won't accept perfection though, because perfect characters are dumb and flat. Anyway, maybe you should just try finding more fem characters that you like. It doesn't mean casting off male characters you like, just adding more awesome characters overall.

[pantswarrior]

...I am going to agree with the person above who said that genderswap is a complicated thing, and even if it's well-written, the reader may or may not have the same feelings about gender as the writer, which may make it seem pointless, or may cause them to miss the point the writer was trying to make.

I mean I'm thinking here of when a friend wrote a genderswap drabble in one of our shared fandoms about 15 years ago. I was like "Hahah, this is great, I love how everything is exactly the same!" And they were like "...Actually the point was that everything was completely different." And this very gracious friend talked to me about it, and, well, tl;dr and tmi but I learned some things about gender identity that I had never even considered.

[(Anonymous)]

Honestly? A lot of genderswap reads like the author wanted to write a fanfic with the premise of "what if I were [swapped character]?" The most extreme example I've ever read was an Iron Man fic where Tony was secretly Toni, and secretly 19, and secretly all that booze was really just apple juice, but there are plenty of fics in plenty of fandoms that are just as self-indulgent (if less obviously written by a younger teenager). Personally, I'm fine with it a lot of the time because if the story is good enough I don't care if John Watson is suddenly Joan Watson with a bunch of oddly specific hang-ups and fetishes that probably line up pretty well with the author's. But, I absolutely get why someone else would read that fic and be annoyed.

[(Anonymous)]

honestly it's not because of the genderswap part. Genderswap, like most AUs, turn out to just be self-inserts and insert-OCs cosplaying as canon characters. You may go into it wanting to read an interesting, well-thought-out execution of an interesting premise but dollars to doughnuts the author only got as far as the "what if...?" part of the premise and answered the question with "they are me and will do and say and act exactly like me or an idealized version of me." I'll give the benefit of the doubt that a lot of fanfic writers don't intend the self-insert from the start but they're writing idfic anyway so it just happens naturally vs actually stopping to think about which things would have been different at which points in the character's life, how to manipulate past events so that their personality winds up more or less the same as canon, and how to form a story that accepts all of this as given without it being some sort of social commentary.

Or maybe the subconscious drive to write yourself as Tanya Stark overrides any good sense and even if you didn't mean to, your subconscious totally meant to all along.

[(Anonymous)]

I tend not to read gender swapped FICA because they just...idk. I'd have to be in the mood for them and 9:10 times I just want some MC/OX shit. When I want F/F, I go looking for it, ya know?

The only time I really enjoyed gender swapped anything (in recent memory) was those girls who did a YouTube skit/episode as Dean and Sam because it was REALLY good! They kept them in character, I had honestly wished they kept doing more/made it a real thing. I was so down.

[(Anonymous)]

Link?

[(Anonymous)]

When I want F/F, I go looking for it, ya know?

I mean, yes, but, the amount of F/F is smaller, the number of ships is very small, and M/M ships often have better writers

There are times where genderswapped versions of M/M ships capture a dynamic that's extremely rare and uncommon in straight-up F/F

[meadowphoenix]

even apart from the sheer impossibility of an "accurate" "this is what it would be like if X was another sex and gender," (i really don't think most people realize both how much gender/sex affects things and also how little) the fact of the matter is that both writer and audience come into genderswap fics with their own specific understandings of gender, and we need to admit that while there are some commonalities, similar understandings of gender cannot actually be assumed.

it's hard to tell if this is the writing or you OP without knowing more, but it does seem like being male is important to your understanding of your fave characters. there's no shame or blame in thinking about why.

[(Anonymous)]

I feel this way about a LOT of them, but some (Captain America MCU ones especially) really explore the difference in how we're treated and socialized gender wise. The CA ones even dive into other stuff - a ciswoman Steve or AFAB Steve who becomes much more masculine or even gains a AMAB body because of the serum.

The Bleach and other anime ones tend to suck and are self inserty, though. Also, the self inserty or OC-but-technically-this-character can be weirdly sexist. Like, the CA ones discuss it, sure, but the anime ones take it at face value and just assume the sexist shit is true

[(Anonymous)]

I actually do think gender is essential to personality. Socialization related to gender and how the world treats you and how you see the world is a powerful thing. That's not the same as saying gender is some essential, unchanging thing, just that fic can't just swap out she for he and call it a day.

That said, I'm also self-aware and honest enough to admit that I read fic for pairings I find sexually attractive and want to imagine banging each other, and I am not going to give up valuable free time forcing myself to read gender-swapped fic of those characters just because avoiding them might make me sound transphobic to the fandom police or something.

[(Anonymous)]

Socialization related to gender and how the world treats you and how you see the world is a powerful thing.

That's something I've heard repeatedly from trans friends who have transitioned - that it's a real eye-opener when you pass well enough that strangers view you as your actual gender. One of my FTM friends tried to do some game streaming/v-tubing before he transitioned, dropped the idea for a while, and then picked it back up later after he'd transitioned and he said that the way people acted in his streams back then versus how they act now that he presents as male is like night and day.

[(Anonymous)]

Yeah, I enjoy genderswapped fanart well enough, but genderswapped fic has never really been my jam, because genderswapped characters tend to feel like OCs to me (regardless of which direction you swap the gender). I read a few genderswapped fics in the Sherlock fandom because some of them were just too freaking excellent not to read, but by and large I tend to give 98% of genderswap fics a pass.

[(Anonymous)]

I think it's a complex thing. Gender and how we view it shouldn't make this big of a role, but it does, we can't escape right now. I am interested in genderswap that say something, treats character differently, but you hardly can find fics like this. Without it fic just looks mmm boobies. Just no.
Also the thing is, I like different types of character depending on their gender. For example I like softer traits in male characters and I like angry short-tempered female characters. And it's not interesting for me if their gender is changed

[(Anonymous)]

Toni is a stupid name.

[(Anonymous)]

K

[(Anonymous)]

A lot of people are hammering on the socialization angle, and like... As someone trans...

Sometimes I want to just write queer as shit fic where I make the leads into lesbians because I'm a lesbian, and have gender not change things because I'm sick of living in a world where my life is defined by it so heavily.

[(Anonymous)]

No, you got it right the first time. Holly Potter and Antoinette Stark fics are OCs, dressed up in social justice to make sure the authors can fling that as a defense whenever their shitty OC is criticized.