Is Gender Bender tag ruined?

[naosu]

So... I hope I don't offend anyone with this question. But I wanted to ask it. And I wanted to also paint a picture what I had in mind.

Over 10 years ago... if you had a gender bender tag up it didn't have to be about gender identity or sex. It could be a fairly innocent sex-less story. But society has in the last 10 years especially (Not only that but you get the idea) had everyone sort of... force gender out in the open artificially and been trying to make people take sides on it.

This makes me wonder if people are tired of gender bender tags now? Or a turn off? And can ordinary straight people still like and read a gender bender story now? Or are people too divided on it now?

I'm more interested in an innocent theme if I ever do any story on this. And not guaranteed. Mostly I like to figure out ideas and guage out interests of audiences. If a person for example, privately messages me and says hey when are you going to do an (fill in the blank) story, I'm interested in researching it at the very least.

 

[RepresentingWrath]

GB is very popular on SH. Though, only one kind of GB, male to female. Bonus points if it is combined with girls love, GL.

 

[Alski]

Its still fine in general, but here on smuthub you will be lucky to find something that isnt full of futas or lesbians.

 

[Assurbanipal_II]

So... I hope I don't offend anyone with this question. But I wanted to ask it. And I wanted to also paint a picture what I had in mind.

Over 10 years ago... if you had a gender bender tag up it didn't have to be about gender identity or sex. It could be a fairly innocent sex-less story. But society has in the last 10 years especially (Not only that but you get the idea) had everyone sort of... force gender out in the open artificially and been trying to make people take sides on it.

This makes me wonder if people are tired of gender bender tags now? Or a turn off? And can ordinary straight people still like and read a gender bender story now? Or are people too divided on it now?

I'm more interested in an innocent theme if I ever do any story on this. And not guaranteed. Mostly I like to figure out ideas and guage out interests of audiences. If a person for example, privately messages me and says hey when are you going to do an (fill in the blank) story, I'm interested in researching it at the very least.

GB sells like sliced bread here on scribble. The ultimate combo is LitRPG, GB, GL. The beater. Success guaranteed.

 

[Llamadragon]

The world is a lot bigger than American gender politics. Like, even the part of the world that is politically ok with LGBTQ stuff is a lot bigger than American gender politics. Even LGBTQ Americans living in American gender politics is a lot more than just what you see on the self-admitted entertainment channels that have the indecency to pass themselves off as 'news'. Just because people in mainstream news and on social media makes a lot of money from hyping up gender politics and culture wars, it doesn't mean it's representative of what actual people think, feel, or what kind of media they wish to engage in. They just make money by making people really angry.

Don't get too snowed in and just write what you want to write. The world isn't so black and white that you need to worry about getting stuck in this.

That said, a lot of people are a bit tired of the gender bender stories where the gender bender doesn't matter to the plot. But this is just because it's a tired and unrealistic trope, it has nothing to do with gender politics, and there is still a sizeable audience for it.

 

[Alski]

The world isn't so black and white that you need to worry about getting stuck in this.

Of the 4 responders to this thread so far all are black or white (or a mix of both)

 

[Llamadragon]

Of the 4 responders to this thread so far all are black or white (or a mix of both)

And this is the same forum where people will sit down and take sides on the ethics of issues like cannibalism and incest.

 

[Empress_Omnii]

What is the point of having a GB story to not include talk of identity? Additionally as you say 'ordinary straight people' can read whatever you'd like. Don't limit what you can read if you think the story looks good.

 

[Llamadragon]

What is the point of having a GB story to not include talk of identity? Additionally as you say 'ordinary straight people' can read whatever you'd like. Don't limit what you can read if you think the story looks good.

Your signature is amazing. Truly a signature among signatures.

 

[ShrimpShady]

I was about to say "yeah gender bender is still totally popular" with Kimi no Na wa in mind, but then I remembered that movie turns 9 years old this year. Ha ha soon we will be consumed by the earth and there will be nothing left of us.

But being for real, there is still an audience for it. The dying of its popularity likely has more to do with the fact that it's a pretty tired genre than it does the politics of gender identity. It just means you'll have to really put a new and interesting twist on it to stand out, if gender bending is a central element of your story.

 

[soupsabaw]

For me, it's a turn-off simply because of how I grew up seeing GB stories and tropes. I have always seen it as people of switching the gender of the character and outrageously changing their features. Ex. when changing a man to a woman they give them long hair. The strong representation of this line between feminine and masculine features. It's a turn off; a man can have long hair, and a woman can have short hair. My personal opinion is we just stop with this generalization and stereotypes of this "men have to be masculine, and women have to be feminine" and just leave the character design the same but change labels as people see fit, like if you think they would want to change pronouns or something. But nothing that changes who they are and what they do because gender doesn't change that. I feel as if some people are afraid to say a character is transgender too, so they use the term "gender bend" instead. To me, saying a character is transgender is ten times more appealing than saying they're a gender bent character. Also, when I hear gender bend, I typically think of a fan work and don't associate it with original works. It insinuates that it's the bent version of an already existing character. If my rambling makes any sense...

 

[RepresentingWrath]

What is the point of having a GB story to not include talk of identity? Additionally as you say 'ordinary straight people' can read whatever you'd like. Don't limit what you can read if you think the story looks good.

Ask Japanese.

 

[Llamadragon]

For me, it's a turn-off simply because of how I grew up seeing GB stories and tropes. I have always seen it as people of switching the gender of the character and outrageously changing their features. Ex. when changing a man to a woman they give them long hair. The strong representation of this line between feminine and masculine features.

Yeah there's definitely a very... reductionistic view of women in this genre. Which is fine, sure, but I can personally only read so many stories about a boring 'normal' guy genderbent into a girl only to hang around other lolis whose entire character can be summarized as 'female knight', 'saintess', or 'princess vampire' or something like that. Oh, and everybody is gay, and they always cuddle and possibly even grope each other at any opportunity including in public because girls totally do that all the time, that's normal.

Not yucking on abybodys yum or anything. People read what they like and god knows I've got my own tastes. People don't read wish fulfillments for the socio-political commentary. I'm just saying, GBs have a reputation, deserved or not, of having a very skewed (and often fetishized) idea of what it means to be female, and this is a much bigger reason for the genres decline than IRL LGBTQ politics.

 

[Corty]

Gender-bending men into women and then still making the character go after women is just a sign that the authors are uncomfortable in accepting the fact that they are fembois deep down.

True Chads writes how the gender-bent character loves to take it hard from behind and wants more.

 

[Empress_Omnii]

Gender-bending men into women and then still making the character go after women is just a sign that the authors are uncomfortable in accepting the fact that they are fembois deep down.

True Chads writes how the gender-bent character loves to take it hard from behind and wants more.

(What about lesbians?)

 

[MarekSusicky]

I like to read GB, but there wasn't the story I had in mind. Most of the time it is used as a clutch, comedic element and then the story is as if MC was woman from the start. Just start like that and avoid GB...

That's why I wrote it. I wanted it to explore what it would be for "forced" change. I mean, exploring what that entails. MC behaving the same, nothing much changed, but having slightly off reactions. Nothing glaring, but noticeable. Different gender, different problems, but only in small details. Personality wouldn't suddenly change, but maybe over time there could be a shift, hormones could change a person after all.

 

[Corty]

(What about lesbians?)

They don't write GB stories; they write straight GL.

 

[RepresentingWrath]

They don't write GB stories; they write straight GL.

True.

 

[Leti]

Tags these days are just gimmicks. Most are irrelevant and is only there to attract readers.

If you can remove the tag and absolutely nothing in the story change, then it shouldn't be there.

Like for example, isekai when the isekai just serves as a cheap excuse to drop the protagonist into a fantasy world, but the fact that they came from another world has no impact on the plot, character development, or setting. If you can swap “isekai” for “a guy who lived in the countryside and moved to the city” without anything changing, then it’s not really an isekai. It’s just dressing.

The same goes for other tags.

Gender bend? If the character’s change in gender has no real impact on how the story progress, then it’s pointless. If they could be any gender and it wouldn’t change the story in the slightest, then the tag is just there for gimmick appeal.

So the answer is not that the Gender Bender tag is ruined. It's just that most recent stories using it are lazy. The tag itself isn’t the problem. It’s how it’s used.

 

[unlaumy]

Meh, i think it's fine. More variety is good.

GB stories where they explore gender identity are like, cool. I'm sure there are many who like them having it a little deeper—simple is fine too, but I don't see why straight people would avoid GB genre just because of that, other than, you know, them not finding what they're looking for.

Over 10 years ago... if you had a gender bender tag up it didn't have to be about gender identity or sex. It could be a fairly innocent sex-less story. But society has in the last 10 years especially (Not only that but you get the idea) had everyone sort of... force gender out in the open artificially and been trying to make people take sides on it.

Literature is always littered with them. The gender identity part is always linked to it. But of course, I won't pretend to be oblivious, Japanese (or other, just less prevalent) gender bender stories are usually devoid of that, and straight people prefer that. But I don't see why the genre is ruined by anything more 'radical' than that kind of works. The genre is popularily connected to them, yes, but what can we do about it? There's an angst novel about a trans(wo)man mc, should it's disallowed from ticking the gender bender genre?

The way I see it, it's, similar to a case of [isekai genre]. It's full of japanese isekai tropes (obviously), and an avid of portal fantasy really can't do anything but to tick that [isekai] box cause there's no other way around it. Are they ruining isekai genre?

As for the sex theme. You just have to find a website or publisher that doesn't cater to it. I assure you, the moment you enter a website nicknamed SmutHub, you have more problem than this supposed sex scenes in muh gender bender stories.

Just an example. JJWX publisher in China. It really really heavily caters to GL stories, and most of the stories are 'innocent' just like what you want in a gender bender. The reason? It pretty much has very light stories with no deeper exploration on homosexuality, cause it's webnovel, write whatever, have fun. They also periodically censor them steamy scenes.