[ SECRET POST #2457 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #2457 ⌋

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

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 038 secrets from Secret Submission Post #351.
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]

02. http://i40.tinypic.com/2cxuexy.jpg

[(Anonymous)]

It's not so much that I disagree with you but... I mean... come on.

[(Anonymous)]

Maybe Cthulhu identifies as being transgender, cis scum.

[kallanda_lee]

Isn't that mostly because a lot of people know Cthuluhu from popular culture, and not necessarily from the source? Personally I found Lovecraft to be a cumbersome read. I didn't know there were versions when Cthulhu had babies...I'd probably default to "he", too.

[badass_tiger]

Are you even sure that they're actually specifically referring to it as male, though? They could just be using general 'he'. Unless they're talking about it finding a mate and its mate having babies, I doubt they're actually using a specific he. Like you said, I'm pretty sure even the original author used 'he'.

[forgottenjester]

People probably use 'he' for the same reason the original did, convenience. English is kinda lacking in the gender-neutral pronoun department. So I guess you're going to live a very disappointed life.

[(Anonymous)]

I'd think "it" would be appropriate for reality-destroying literally-Lovecraftian horrors.

[forgottenjester]

I wouldn't use it simply because they're not objects. They are very much alive and sapient and all that. I would use a person pronoun out of fear.

[(Anonymous)]

Check your privilege.

[233c]

Given that Lovecraft himself was famously xenophobic and women were nigh-nonexistent in his work, preferring to center stories around white men of means who were as smart as Lovecraft thought himself to be, using male pronouns for most of his pantheon (except where specified) isn't too much of a stretch.

It's not really that big a deal, is it?

[rosehiptea]

I've only read a little Lovecraft but that summarizes my feelings on this question. I highly doubt he sat around wondering if Cthulhu were really male.

(Of course there's reclaiming the source material and such but I don't particularly want to be the same gender as Cthulhu.)

OP here

[(Anonymous)]

My grievance is not with people who refer to eldritch abominations with masculine pronouns. I'm talking about people who depict Cthulhu and friends as male-identified in exactly the same way as a cisgender man. This convention is primarily something I've encountered in parodies, but of course you have writers such as Brian Lumley (whose attempts at the Mythos already suck whale grease through a fire hose-sized straw) and Donald Tyson, who assign a conventional gender dichotomy to mind-shattering creatures from past the stars and beyond the moon. Cthulhu is described as "It" just as often as "he" in Its origin story, and Nyarlathotep can probably assume the appearance of anything or anyone it wants, regardless of sex or species. And then there are species such as the Elder Things and the Yithians, who are explicitly said to be sexless. You *could* interpret the projected gender binary as a last-ditch effort to classify incomprehensible things, but I think that's giving too much credit.

Re: OP here

[(Anonymous)]

Whating the who with the huh?

Look, if it bothers you that much - and clearly it does - then don't read whatever it is that's got you all twisted up. SIMPLE.

Re: OP here

[(Anonymous)]

With all possible respect, I think you are riding this train well past the point where the stations end.

Lovecraft was a batshit-loony racist asshole who never wrote a single line of dialogue for a female character, which is a relief since the very few lines of dialogue he wrote for his interchangeable male characters were, uniformly, fucking awful.

He created the genre of cosmic horror largely out of his own crippling mental and emotional disorders, and those who have come after him have done some extraordinarily good work in that genre, mostly because literally all of them are more talented writers than he was.

So if you want to say that some of those followup writers are not meeting the standards of gender-progressivism that you'd like them to, that is totally a legitimate critique, and fair enough.

But if you're saying that they're less progressive than Howard Phillips Motherfucking Lovecraft, there are two problems with your theory. First, the author is dead and your theory is irrelevant, and second, even if the author weren't dead, your theory would be insupportably ridiculous.

So, y'know, there's that.

[(Anonymous)]

Asenath is a female name, so it's not that surprising or inappropriate.

[chardmonster]

Ia! Ia! Cisscum Fhtagn!

[233c]

awesome

[(Anonymous)]

"All this reflection was no doubt morbid."

[queerwolf]

The stuffed Cthulhu I have looks like a he so your argument is invalid.

[(Anonymous)]

Good point. I'm totally going to think of their genders differently from now on.

[caffeine_buzz]

My immediate thought upon reading this was Nyaruko. (Yes, the Japanese really can turn anything into a cute anime girl.)

[(Anonymous)]

"He" was originally a convention. Cthulhu and most of the pantheon were often referred to as entities to convey the impression of other worldliness. A few seemed to have gender, like Nyarlathotep, who often appeared as a male human, but most of them didn't. Even the problematic "Black Goat of the Woods," generally considered a female, was referred to as "he" on occasion.

There is a sad lack of Cthulu in this thread.

[elephantinegrace]

Seriously, anyone know where that guy went?

Re: There is a sad lack of Cthulu in this thread.

[forgottenjester]

The Agent is still around but is mostly anon.

[(Anonymous)]

..."Paltry gender classifications."

Lol. Look, the original author, who made this shit up, called it a he (even though, granted, he might have been using the general "he"), so I don't really get this secret as anything but a Cthulu fanboy wanking to himself in the dark.