[ SECRET POST #5789 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #5789 ⌋

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


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[Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart]


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10. [SPOILERS for She-Hulk]




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11. [WARNING for discussion of suicide]

[Extraordinary Attorney Woo]


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12. [WARNING for discussion of rape]

































Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 00 pages, 00 secrets from Secret Submission Post #828.
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

[feotakahari]

Yeah. I wasn’t against trans Bridget in and of herself, because apparently this was a long time coming, but I didn’t like the vibe in the fandom that turning a crossdresser trans equals “fixing” them. And I get annoyed when Chihiro from Danganronpa gets “fixed” by turning him from a crossdresser to trans.

(That said, I do reserve the right to complain about the thing in Japanese media where a woman who wears men’s clothing learns the Valuable Lesson that she’ll never be a man and she should start acting feminine. Naoto from Persona 4 is the highest-profile example of this, but I’ve also seen it in Dark Rose Valkyrie, and Psychedelica of the Ashen Hawk seemed like it was heading this way before I quit playing.)

[(Anonymous)]

That said, I do reserve the right to complain about the thing in Japanese media where a woman who wears men’s clothing learns the Valuable Lesson that she’ll never be a man and she should start acting feminine.

That's... not what happened with Naoto, though. Like, that's completely missing the entire point of her story. The only reason she was trying to pretend to be a man was that she was afraid that she wouldn't be taken seriously in her chosen field as a woman, it didn't have anything to do with how she personally wanted to present herself. The entire point was that it was fucked up that she felt she had to pretend to be a man if she wanted to be a detective and her choosing to be more feminine was her finally embracing who she was, which was a detective AND a woman.

[(Anonymous)]

Ok, but why is it that it always turns out that the way the girl wants to present herself is actually feminine? There's nothing wrong with being feminine, but when every story about a girl who dresses/acts non-feminine (whether it's flat out pretending to be a boy or just dressing/acting more butch than "normal") ends with her changing to embrace femininity, it stops looking like a "Be true to yourself" moral and more like a "Girls should be feminine" one, and fanservice for the male audience these stories are often for.

[(Anonymous)]

... I mean, if the girl actually wanted to present as masculine then there wouldn't be a story? She would be being true to herself and would be comfortable with herself the way she was. The whole point of that kind of story is that the main character is being compelled to do something they don't really want to do and can't be themselves. If they wanted to do it in the first place, then the story would fall apart.

[(Anonymous)]

Do they, though?

For instance, Naoto keeps wearing the same clothes.
Haruhi starts dressing up girly-ish due to peer pressure.
Sometimes, oftentimes, they "want to present as feminine" for fanservice reasons. Other times, more rarely but unfortunately it does have corrective "it's just what she truly wanted!!" vibes.
But about the same amount of times they just... keep presenting as tomboyish really. Maybe we are not thinking of the same characters but I am thinking of Rin Hoshizora, Samus Aran (a case of "will wear whatever the job requires" which got fanservicey later on), Yuu Kashima, Kino. They never "embrace femininity" even if they are "non-feminine" in different ways.

[(Anonymous)]

Does Dark Rose Valkyrie have anything like that? I want to know what I am getting into...

Agreed that sometimes Japanese media ends up being really confusing regarding matters of gender from a foreign perspective. Sometimes it is a fetichistic take which is horrible, the fictional equivalent of corrective rape really. Even Ouran Host Club left a bitter taste in my mouth, because in the end the girl marries the guy who kept complaining that she had to be more ladylike and becomes more ladylike. So... ehh.

But regarding Naoto I agree with the above comment in a way, the whole point of her (deliberately using her pronouns for the sake of practicality) story was something else: she wanted to be taken seriously but wasn't while presenting as a teen woman, which is very valid criticism. Teen women face an absurd level of scrutiny (even more so in societies like Japan ...) they're often sexual material for predatory old het men and "kids" for older women at best. In trying to present as (her image of) a mature man in order to be taken seriously by society and even to take herself seriously, she hides the parts of herself that are fragile because she internalized others' prejudices against young women (that they're fragile etc). When asked how she feels about her gender she says that being a girl "doesn't fit her image of a detective" (obviously, a prejudiced one cause society sucks.) and it's a male-dominated field so it's hard to be a woman there. When Yukiko says that what Naoto wants is not to be a man or a grown-up implying that what she wants is to be respected regardless of gender or age - Naoto AGREES.

This journey of self-discovery is one many young AFAB who are unhappy about being women go through I feel. Some reach the conclusion that they are trans while others may reach the conclusion that they want women to be respected. But Naoto never changes her clothes (even as she ends with the guy in a way) she just goes "by the way yes I am a woman and was lying about it for reasons". The fact that fans propelled her to a trans hero even though her reason for feeling gender dysphoria and presenting as male was societal male chauvinism feels weird to me to this day. If anything, Naoto reads as NB to me since her level of gender dysphoria is hardly that intense: she isn't necessarily a woman or a male, she is a proud detective and looking feminine and young doesn't fit her image of what a detective should be... because society sucks.

Wow, sorry that was huge. LOL I have been procrastinating this essay for a while and now I just did it on Fandom!Secrets past midnight because Why Not huh. go brain

[(Anonymous)]

Naoto agreed with the other characters who told her she didn't want to be masculine and really wanted to be very very girly because the writer of the game wanted her to, for the writer's reasons, characters don't have agency I am begging you

[(Anonymous)]

? No one has ever said that she wanted to be "very very girly", did you read any of what ? She herself kept wearing THE VERY SAME CLOTHES, except when asked she would say "oh yes, I am a woman". You're allowed to dislike canon but canon is still canon.

As a cis woman who went through similar experiences regarding how I feel about gender after joining the workforce as a young lady I would love to not be invalidated.

[(Anonymous)]

+100

[(Anonymous)]

Way to miss all the points and accuse Ayrt of saying something they clearly didn’t.

[(Anonymous)]

You're trying to make Naoto's story about something it's not. It has nothing to do with gender presentation, it's about the sexism built into society that makes a woman feel like she won't be respected in her chosen profession as a woman and so she presents as a man because she feels like she can't be a woman and still be taken seriously in what she wants to do.

[(Anonymous)]

I just felt the Bridget thing was handled in... not so great a way. The origin had some really strong 'nature vs nurture' things going on and it felt like Bridget didn't really stand a chance.

Took me a while to convince myself that Bridget decided to live as a woman on HER terms and not her family's terms and that it wasn't ham-fisted or anything