Superhero emphasis at Transfiction wiki

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I’m a contributor to the Transfiction wiki, but I have to ask... is it really a wiki about transgender fiction? Each time I look at the recent changes, virtually everything is the upload of a “superhero” type character (commonly an image) with nothing to make clear why it features on transgender fiction wiki.

Maybe I’m just the odd one out and you all love comic books.

Was that the intention? The emphasis of the wiki appears to have become overwhelmingly a showcase of comic book illustrations. (Just surf a few random pages...) The wiki was originally proposed here, as far as I know, so I’ll ask the question here: is the project still on track?

Comments

That's probably Whateley stuff

Whateley Academy is a fairly large LGBTQI+ friendly superhero universe.

At least it used to be LGBTQI+ friendly. There's a dedicated push by some of the newer authors to try and de-emphasize that (because, you know, there's just not enough cishet representation in mainline comics! And popularity!)

Anyway, jaded nihilism aside, that's probably what you're seeing?

Melanie E.

I'll admit that I do get

I'll admit that I do get tired with some authors (Several on another site, far more than here) who insist that _every, single, main character_ be non-hetero. Not just THE main character, and whatever their interest might be, but ALL of them. I prefer stories that are at least somewhat in line with normal Gaussian distribution, with the caveat that people who are similar tend to band together. Thus while X percentage may be hard core lesbian, in any group of woman at an event, they will either be much higher than X, or far lower than X.

The "Hey, you're a new person, we can show you that you're , and were just hiding it!" just wears on me after a while. I prefer entertaining stories, not being bludgeoned.


I'll get a life when it's proven and substantiated to be better than what I'm currently experiencing.

I fully agree.

And Whateley DID over-do it a lot (especially with wanting every character to be trans/lesbian/gay/bi/genderqueer/genderswapped/etc.)

All that said, it seems like the push now is to try and shove that all under the rug to try and legitimize the whole thing... by turning it into another generic superhero place.

Like, I wasn't always a fan of the older direction -- especially with how that was going on all over the place but somehow the dedicated LGBTQ house on-campus still had to keep all its closet doors shut -- but the correct answer, I always felt, was to just embrace it and make it an open thing, not to try and shut the closet doors even tighter and use the heteronormativity of the rest of the superhero world -- the very reason Whateley exists -- to justify it.

Sorry, bit of a bad mood tonight.

Melanie E.

Well, really, the reason that

Well, really, the reason that Whateley exists, in canon, is because super heroes AND villains wanted a place for children to learn how to handle their powers without being immediately attacked by the norms. That, and protect the norms from kids trying to learn to handle their powers.

The Poe Cottage Conspiracy was just eventually part of that.


I'll get a life when it's proven and substantiated to be better than what I'm currently experiencing.

Trans-Human maybe.?

tmf's picture

Transhuman, or trans-human, is the concept of an intermediary form between human and posthuman. In other words, a transhuman is a being that resembles a human in most respects but who has powers and abilities beyond those of standard humans.

Maybe some do get mislead, and think it is the wiki they are looking for?

Peace tmf

Peace, Love, Freedom, Happiness

Openness

erin's picture

If something is open for use, the people who actually use it will control the content.

Hugs,
Erin

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

Fair enough

bryony marsh's picture

You’re right: I suppose it was “use it or lose it” and a vocal minority took over the project.

Having never seen the appeal of comics, it’s not what I was expecting from a wiki about TG fiction. No matter: I’ll bow out.

Sugar and Spiiice – TG Fiction by Bryony Marsh

I'm not familiar with the site but ...

... I'm right with you on the current obsession with so-called 'superheroes'. Any mention of them in a blurb is an immediate put-off for me, too. I grew out of superheroes when I was 13 and selling comics in the school playground for tuppence each - it was a VERY long time ago, almost before we even had TV let alone the www.

R

Well, I hate to say this...

Well, I hate to say this, but very few people showed much interest in the project. When I first started it up, I hoped that authors from both BC and Fictionmania would contribute articles to the wiki, but I found myself doing around 90 percent of the work. When newcomers from the wider community started posting superheroic content, I saw no reason to object. The wiki has grown considerably since that time, with new pages being posted on an almost daily basis.

That said, TG media will always be welcome on the wiki, and I encourage everybody here to pay a visit and create content at their leisure. As mentioned in several previous messages, we can accommodate images, articles, artwork, bios and even entire stories. The one thing we can't do is force anyone to contribute their time to the project. At the end of the day, it is a volunteer operation after all.

BTW: as all of the superheroic material is in the public domain, the characters may be used any way you see fit. You can easily take an existing PD superhero and give it a "transgendered" spin if you so choose.