For the last nearly twenty years I've been writing TG fiction. Most of my work contains one basic theme. "People know more about us than we think they do, and accept more that what we imagine."
I continue to regurgitate this theme because I hate the guilt feelings that I, and others like me have about our desires.
Sometimes I feel like I'm shouting into the wind. Other times, worse.
I wonder of what we read does shape how we think?
When BC as a community sets a fictional standard of excellence that includes transforming our bodies to Hollywood's fantasy of what a female looks like, are we as guilty as Hollywood and Madison Avenue have been in increasing eating disorders and mental anguish?
Recently a person I respect and have come to have affection for, complained to me about her weight. She said "I feel incredibly uncomfortable with showing my body." I believe this person is one of the truly beautiful people on this site, although I've never seen her. I wonder if she realizes that the people who would be repulsed by a few extra pounds aren't friends worth having.
My spouse is incredibly beautiful, yet she didn't have reconstructive surgery after her masectomy. She said she didn't believe the risk was worth it. She made that decision thirty years ago and we've never regretted it.
Are we crossing an ethical line as TG writers when our heroines find happiness only after they become physically lovely?
I'm interested in what you think.
Jill
Comments
Not on board
In the last year I'm increasingly not on board with so many TG fantasy goals. Fortunately, by some miracle I can not fathom, I enjoy acceptance here, and in a very unlikely community outside here. Being a searcher who has a habit of eviscerating herself to dig through her entrails to find any fault, life is completely painful at times because of my own faults, and looking around me the suffering of others is so obvious to me.
I find the whole TG thing to simply be a stopping place along the way, and in a decade or two, I think all the surgeries and drugs will simply disappear because I am hoping that the puritanistic way of thinking will simply go extinct, and good riddance. I would not have pursued transition, hormones and surgery if the culture I was in was willing to simply let me be me, a mild, slightly effeminate small male. Oh, the castration was not a mistake, and I would highly recommend it, though in the <30 set, saving some sperm perhaps.12 years ago, I cleaned up pretty good and looked authentic to most. These days that is not so.
Oh, I expect the rebuttal that "I was always female", and won't struggle with that, but the present day cost of being me was far too painful, and devastating. The only hope is future acceptance.
Remember in "The Lord Of The Rings" where both Frodo and Bilbo get on the Elve's boat to sail off to the West? They'd had enough. It had been far too hard, too draining, the cost too heavy. I feel that way, not talking about suicide.
To my sisters in this nightmare, I wish you the best, know how you struggle. May you have mercy, find love along the way, and come to accept who you are.
Gwen
Reader beware
Yes, what we read can change our beliefs and how we view the world and ourselves.
But we cannot impose an ethical standard, on fiction writers (non-fiction should be held to ethical standards) to only present, good, reality and truth. It would eliminate most fiction. The reader must take a reader beware stance, and critically review ideas, before adopting them.
Dear Jill...
Dear Jill...
I think that perhaps life influences fiction. I don't have much time to read many of the works posted but I do follow several people on youtube that are transitioning. They all seem to feel that they must conform to a certain standard of beauty and many do undergo procedures that defy imagination. And all of this is to allow them to feel 'comfortable' in their own bodies.
Whatever is bothering us cannot be escaped by putting on a 'mask' and changing into another person. What troubles me now will trouble me no matter how I try to change physically so I do the next best thing. I deal with my 'shit'. I would like to think that my tales deal mainly with themes of loneliness, dissociation, isolation and some darker themes. I try to write what I know. I always make an attempt to have the main character be completed not through surgery or magic, but by meeting another person who happens to compliment the main character. In fact they compliment one another. I feel this is a truly representation of what we all really need.
The fact that writers have different motivations for writing is something that will never change. I agree that too many of us are wrapped up in the physical, the fantasy and whatever dictates society imposes upon us. And, unfortunately, beauty and perfection of physical presence is one of the biggies. Life is far from perfect and sometimes I wish writers would reflect that more often.
May We All Know Peace...
Kelly
Well Stated
Thank you.
Angela Rasch (Jill M I)
Not really different
Popular fiction is always like that: romance, mystery, adventure, sports, fantasy. All genres of fiction are about escape and all escape is about becoming someone different and better.
This is one of the defining differences of literary fiction from popular fiction. Literature concentrates on flaws and failures, popular fiction concentrates on ideals and successes.
We have plenty of TG literature here as well as a wealth of TG popular fiction. It is as it should be, both are valuable and valued.
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
Maybe I get the terms wrong...
... but I think that helping the people become better, understand new and important things etc. is not necessarily an escape. (Just my 5 cc.) Also, a story might be both about flaws and failures and about ideals and successes - and a lot of good stories are that.
As for the fiction influencing the life - the fiction is a form of art, and the art is the way we communicate our dreams. So, I believe that the question eventually is if our dreams influence the life.
That question has a simple answer. Take a look at the room around. Do you see anything that hasn't been at some point just a dream in someone's mind?... Take a look out of the window. Do you see anything that hasn't been a dream before? Look inside yourself, at your ideals and beliefs, at the very words you are using to describe them. Do you see anything that hasn't been a dream before?
(You might see mountains and lakes, trees and stars, and say that they haven't been dreamed first. I am not a religious person an don't believe in the existence of a Creator - but if one exists and has created this all, they surely must have been the greatest dreamer ever. And if there is none, all this must still have been somehow implicit and possible at the creation of the Universe - that is, it still might qualify as a kind of a dream. :) )
Again, just my 5 cc.
Sure
We may claim we are different but anyway... When we face the dilema of the beauty and the beast we say the beast is the best though in real life the first impression benefits the beauty.
We do have right to dream...
Don't we? As I see it it is not about our perception of ourselves. It is strange however you look at it. :-)
It is more about our fantasy of being that beautiful girl...
Strangely, on average, the more passable and able to go "stealth" the author is, the more realistic image is portrayed in their stories.
And people like me, who can be mistaken for a girl only by halfdeaf halfblind people in badly lit noisy places... I had period when I was fascinated by magical transformation stories. Then those stories started to depress me... And I try to avoid them. Strangely, stories about guys who put on a bit of lipstic, skirt, brush their hair a bit and everybody thinks they are girls... These are OK in my current view :-) even while they are more magical, than magic transformation stories ;-)
Yes, thank heavens
You only have to examine authors like Charles Dickens and Mark Twain to see the effects fiction can have in real life.
It can create guilt, aspirations, and teach us how to behave or, sadly, how not to behave.
I don't have a problem with aspiring to beauty; I do with presenting killing as worthy or even fun, as Hollywood as always been doing (as long as the killing is of people "not like us"). In my childhood, it was Indians or Cowboys in black hats; nowadays, it seems to be virtually anyone.
If you a looking for help in
If you a looking for help in writing you're right. I'm sure you're able to handle all yourself, but this is just an advice.