jessara40k_lj (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
jessara40k_lj) wrote2010-09-19 02:32 pm
jessara40k_lj) wrote2010-09-19 02:32 pm
Trans Issues on Erde
I didn't think about transpeople in Erde (the world my original fiction's posted in) until recently, but since I have considered it now, I figured I should mention a bit about them.
Medically they have things a bit better than in the real world, sometimes a lot better, because medicine is at a similar standard throughout the world, it's more advanced overall than in our world, and the surgeries and hormone treatments involved in achieving their desired identities are proportionately a little less expensive as a result. Socially it varies, in some places there's a lot more acceptance than anywhere in our world, but there are still areas/cultures where a transperson cannot risk being open about their identity without risking their life.
In the Families it still varies, but there's often a lot of pressure to have biological children, especially in smaller Families for those closely related to the Family Head, so even in the more accepting Families, it's expected that a transperson will hold off on anything that would compromise their ability to have children until they've had at least one - unless the Family in question is large enough that one member not reproducing isn't that significant. I know that in one matriarchal Family it's expected that consorts will take hormones to be able to breastfeed children, and that the current Family Head had her consort castrated once she'd had as many children as she wanted. But I also know that one patriarchal Family often pressures their consorts into hormonal breast enlargements (or sometimes surgical breast reductions) and labioplasties - which still carry the risk of damaging sexual function.
The Terenevs are both large and liberal, socially speaking. Usually the only negative consequences of coming out as a transperson within the Terenevs is elimination from the list of those suitable to form an alliance through consorting - meaning that Terenev transpeople tend to consort or espouse for love, generally either within the Terenev Family or outside the Families altogether. There are bigots within the Terenev Family, but the Family is pretty good at policing itself and the laws allow the Families leeway to deal with a lot of internal problems, which the Terenevs tend to do more stringently than the formal authorities would. It isn't unheard of for an understanding member of a more conservative Family to suggest offering a transperson as one of the options for a consort when trying to make an alliance with the Terenevs as they're fairly well-known for being permissive in their social circles. It isn't common, and it's never the consort of the Family Head, but every two or three generations a Terenev consort will transition prior to the production of any children. Even the Terenevs would expect their Family Head to wait to fully transition until they have produced children, and to at least appear to be bisexual (normal as they see it) or heterosexual, rather than purely homosexual.
I'm tempted to write at least a short piece about Terese's consort, who I think is a transwoman, even though (s)he doesn't realise it himself - women are supposed to be dominant and he's submissive after all, even if he hates looking at his penis and testicles and hopes Terese has him castrated soon, since she doesn't want children, even though he still wishes she'd have him take hormones to grow breasts. He dresses in a way that would be considered ultra-feminine in our world - think Victorian doll type dresses - but that's about being an ornament for whichever woman he belongs to. But...I really don't know if I've got the skill to do that idea justice. It might be a bit easier because I'd be writing from Terese's viewpoint, and she isn't that good at reading people's emotions, and also he's trained not to express his desires unless ordered to, but...I don't want to hurt anyone with my writing, and I can't help feeling that I might be trivialising transpeople's experiences if I write it out and post it, as opposed to leaving it as background knowledge for myself.
Medically they have things a bit better than in the real world, sometimes a lot better, because medicine is at a similar standard throughout the world, it's more advanced overall than in our world, and the surgeries and hormone treatments involved in achieving their desired identities are proportionately a little less expensive as a result. Socially it varies, in some places there's a lot more acceptance than anywhere in our world, but there are still areas/cultures where a transperson cannot risk being open about their identity without risking their life.
In the Families it still varies, but there's often a lot of pressure to have biological children, especially in smaller Families for those closely related to the Family Head, so even in the more accepting Families, it's expected that a transperson will hold off on anything that would compromise their ability to have children until they've had at least one - unless the Family in question is large enough that one member not reproducing isn't that significant. I know that in one matriarchal Family it's expected that consorts will take hormones to be able to breastfeed children, and that the current Family Head had her consort castrated once she'd had as many children as she wanted. But I also know that one patriarchal Family often pressures their consorts into hormonal breast enlargements (or sometimes surgical breast reductions) and labioplasties - which still carry the risk of damaging sexual function.
The Terenevs are both large and liberal, socially speaking. Usually the only negative consequences of coming out as a transperson within the Terenevs is elimination from the list of those suitable to form an alliance through consorting - meaning that Terenev transpeople tend to consort or espouse for love, generally either within the Terenev Family or outside the Families altogether. There are bigots within the Terenev Family, but the Family is pretty good at policing itself and the laws allow the Families leeway to deal with a lot of internal problems, which the Terenevs tend to do more stringently than the formal authorities would. It isn't unheard of for an understanding member of a more conservative Family to suggest offering a transperson as one of the options for a consort when trying to make an alliance with the Terenevs as they're fairly well-known for being permissive in their social circles. It isn't common, and it's never the consort of the Family Head, but every two or three generations a Terenev consort will transition prior to the production of any children. Even the Terenevs would expect their Family Head to wait to fully transition until they have produced children, and to at least appear to be bisexual (normal as they see it) or heterosexual, rather than purely homosexual.
I'm tempted to write at least a short piece about Terese's consort, who I think is a transwoman, even though (s)he doesn't realise it himself - women are supposed to be dominant and he's submissive after all, even if he hates looking at his penis and testicles and hopes Terese has him castrated soon, since she doesn't want children, even though he still wishes she'd have him take hormones to grow breasts. He dresses in a way that would be considered ultra-feminine in our world - think Victorian doll type dresses - but that's about being an ornament for whichever woman he belongs to. But...I really don't know if I've got the skill to do that idea justice. It might be a bit easier because I'd be writing from Terese's viewpoint, and she isn't that good at reading people's emotions, and also he's trained not to express his desires unless ordered to, but...I don't want to hurt anyone with my writing, and I can't help feeling that I might be trivialising transpeople's experiences if I write it out and post it, as opposed to leaving it as background knowledge for myself.