Panel 1: Bilbo Baggins holding a character sheet.
- Bilbo: “After all, why not?”
Panel 2: character sheet now has a transgender pride flag in it.
- Bilbo: “Why shouldn’t I make this character trans?”
Panel 1: Bilbo Baggins holding a character sheet.
Panel 2: character sheet now has a transgender pride flag in it.
Ooh, I do this too! I like to throw a twist into my characters, just to make them different from me. That way they become less of a self-insert, and I get to explore a different life experience.
I also had my very patriarchal, xenophobic dwarven cleric go through a bisexual awakening after meeting some fit, hairless male monks. It was remarkable how normal it felt for him to have that dawning realization, even as he was already married (to a proper Dwarven woman). I was a much better ally after that campaign, especially when a new player joined us, who was bisexual.
For my one trans character, I asked my gender non-conforming friends for advice, so that I wouldn’t accidentally make an ignorant caricature.
Make your characters Ace! Or Pan! Taste the rainbow in your games, even if you’re limited to one or two colors IRL.
No. I wanna be miserable.
Exploring identities through roleplay is a valuable experience. I discovered I was bisexual because I made a gay mad scientist, and it turned out that didn’t take much effort to stay in character.
That said I made an enby war survivor for a game about pilots and as a cis guy I have no idea what I’m doing. Thankfully nobody has seen any problem, including a trans friend, but I constantly feel like I’m about to fumble it.
Ayyyyyy, part of the reason I found out I’m trans is through realising I enjoyed playing female characters moreso than men, and had an easier time doing it.
Serious question: as a man you have no idea what a woman feels like or think, so when you are playing a “female” character you are just playing what you think a woman is like. How does this make you not a man?
Through a fun social activity I got to explore that aspect of my life in a safe environment and realised it was mismatched with my body, so I dubbed myself a woman, henceforth, because that was the label that felt most correct for my perception of reality.
Although I’ll also have to retort with a serious question of my own: why should I rationalise my perception of my own gender to you?
Oh I’m not asking you to rationalise, just trying to understand. “Woman” is a well defined term and has been for millions of years of combined human history and experience, across all cultures and civilisations. It isn’t something anyone can be unless you already are one.
Not feeling like you belong to a set called “man” doesn’t mean you belong to the set called “woman”, especially if you believe that “non-binary” is a thing that exists, as it asserts that a male/female binary exists.
Funny that you mention that, because there are several historical examples of transgender individuals throughout time, and across several civilisations.
That is true, but it’s not like I just “flipped a switch” overnight and went “Oh, if not man, then woman.” I ruminated on the subject for the better part of two months figuring out what the hell I was, experimenting with different masculine, feminine, and non-binary forms of expression until I figured out that being a woman was most comfortable for me.
Thankfully I’ve come to that conclusion, though it was difficult to accept it at first, considering the society I’m inserted in is transphobic by default, not helped by people preaching some twisted form of gender prescriptivism rooted in their own, static perceptions of masculinity and femininity. Because of that, I and several other people have to justify their right to exist unmolested in this world when we just want to express ourselves genuinely and be happy and comfortable in our own skins.
For real, mate, I’m not in the mood to argue that I am allowed to exist and be content with my own body.