Dreams, hyenas, and children that never were

[rodentfanatic.livejournal.com]

So, LKH showed up in my dreams last night, and since she actually acted rather LKH-ish rather than some totally whacked-up dream version, I thought I'd share. Basically, I had been reading a new book of hers, and writing down what I thought about it, and Darla showed up to take the sheet with what I'd been writing back to to LKH, who was in the living room downstairs. I then checked her website, and it had my review posted there...but only the good parts. So I went downstairs, but LKH wouldn't talk to me, and Darla showed me my written review that had the bad spots crossed out, and said I'd hurt LKH alot. The majority of the review had actually been good, but then at the bottom I had written something along the lines of "What the hell is this crap?"

And then, uh, my and LKH ended up getting into a conversation, and I kpet having to walk on eggshells about not offending her by telling her exactly how I felt about the turns her series had taken. I kept trying and trying to ask about Narcissus. Like, he was described in the books as "he" and "hermaphrodite", but Richard calls him "she" and I happen to know that "hermaphrodite" is considered quite an offensive term towards intersexual people, so I tried to ask her

1)Does Narcissus identify as male him/her/zirself, or is that just Anita's perception of "his" gender identity based on the fact she first took "him" to be a man in a dress?

2)Does Narcissus identify as a "hermaphrodite" him/her/zirself, or is at least not offended by the term, or is that just what Anita (or whoever it was that informed her Narcissus was intersexed)called "him" in their ignorance? As I recall, Narcissus wasn't present when the term was used, so we don't actually know "his" feelings on it.

She never did give me an answer.

I'm very interested in gender identity, particularly the gender identity of intersexual people, so Narcissus was a fascinating character to me. Most intersexuals (humans with ambiguous genitalia) are not "true hermaphrodites" (have both ovarian tissue and testicular tissues), and I don't think Narcissus was, since he did get pregnant. My personal theory is that Narcissus was someone who was physically female but had ambiguous genitalia and lacked female secondary sex characteristics (breasts, female hormones, hence looking male while clothed)and identified as a male who just liked dresses...though that is going on Anita's perception of him as a simple crossdresser. He could easily be some shade of genderqueer, or gender fluid, etc., though given LKH's very "gender essentialist" views, it seems unlikely she'd ever think of this.

Apologies if I got any terms wrong, offended anyone, etc. I'm still learning about this subject, and I don't want to come off as treating people like Narcissus as "freak shows" or oddities to be put under a microscope and studied. It's just that you rarely see this spectrum of humanity represented, and I really wish we could have seen more of who this fabulous Oba was.

So, any thoughts on Narcissus? Or any other part of this entry, though he's the real meat of it, I'd say ^^

Also, even though I know that he will likely lose the baby due to shifting, and that Anita was never actually pregnant, I have this fantasy of his little girl and her little boy playing together...and they're both perfectly human with no special powers whatsoever.

Although, really, I would worry about Anita with a child of either sex. A little girl would be chastised for liking anything that wasn't "manly", and would likely come to be viewed as competition for the man-harem...and as for a little boy, well,...*shudder*...I can't help but think of Thea, if you get my drift.

Comments

[othellia.livejournal.com]

Not really on the subject, but I had an LKH dream too about a week ago. Jean-Claude was driving some kind of jeep. It scared me. But since then my subconscious has gifted me with two Doctor Who related dreams to make up for it. :D

[mystoflare.livejournal.com]

I'd hope if Anita were to ever have a kid, she's either have a fit of actual humanity and actually shape up to take care of it (HA!) or stop sexing long enough to think "Hey, I have too many people to protect, I can't take care of a HUGE HORRIBLE BURDEN OF INCONVEINENCE baby! Hey, I'll put it up for adoption and foist it off on someone else!"
In my universe where the DoomCrotch is falling far from grace, she mercifully does that for her firstborn, a boy. Then her subsequent offspring either suffer or manage to get out because Earth Logic reality is intruding on the DoomCrotch's "reality" and the Evil Jealous Hater Prudes are taking away the kids. And I agree with Narcissus' baby playing with Anita's relatively normal kid, that would be adorable for the kids to be playing together all happy while Anita's wangsting the day away :D

[quizzicalsphinx.livejournal.com]

. . . this is how bad it's gotten: I was about to respond "I don't know if you meant 'If Anita were to ever have another kid', but she already had a daughter, whom she appears to regard as a minor burden at worst and an unnecessary nuisance at best." Then I realised you were talking about Anita, not LKH. I swear, the two have actually fused in my mind.

[darkladynyara.livejournal.com]

Hehee. I did the same thing when I read that.

[rodentfanatic.livejournal.com]

It's just as well; they've fused in the author's own mind as well.

If I ever write that fanfic, I'm naming Anita's little boy Angel. It'll hit on the Catholic roots just like Trinity does, and I'm pretty sure it's a Spanish boy's name as well.

[yaoihuntresse.livejournal.com]

The other problem is that if she had other kids the first one she gave away will be exalted as the one she nobily gave up while they feel like burdens.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_shiisa_/]

While reading the Wikipedia article on hyenas...

Quoting: [...] The spotted hyena is an exception to this as females are larger than the males. One unusual feature of the spotted hyena is that females have an enlarged clitoris called a pseudo-penis, demi-penis or sometimes mistakenly referred to as a nanophallus. Female hyenas give birth, copulate, and urinate through their protruding genitalia, which stretches to allow the male penis to enter for copulation, and it also stretches during birth. The anatomical position of the genitalia gives females total sexual control over who is allowed to mate with them. Researchers originally thought that one cause of this characteristic of the genitals was androgens that were introduced to the fetus very early on in its development. However, it was discovered that when the androgens were held back from the fetus, the development of the female genitalia was not altered. Spotted hyenas have a Matriarchal social structure. [...]

...I had this WEIRD idea: what if Narcissus had just spent too much time in animal form?
Yes, feel free to trow heavy objects in my general direction. But it would still be quite... amusing? :D


About the baby/babies, well- let's just focus on the very cute first hypothesis and ignore the full implications of mommy!Anita, shall we? Please? *cringes*

[rodentfanatic.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I found that out about hyenas in high school. I told everybody I knew because I felt it was just that awesome a notion that the girl fucked and gave birh with a penis.

And, yes, that concept amuses me too, actually! Hee. That'd make a good bit in a parody fic. Or, heck, a serious one!

And, yes, I like just thinking about the cute and fluffy side too, because the type of mommy Anita would actually be is just...uggghhh, twisted.

[easol.livejournal.com]

I can imagine Anita shrieking, "AAAAAAA I want one I want one I want a vagina that looks and acts like a penis IWANTIWANTIWANT!"

[rodentfanatic.livejournal.com]

It's funny because it's true!

[yaoihuntresse.livejournal.com]

*chuckles* It would definately appeal to her "manly" desires.

[tartful-dodger.livejournal.com]

Eeee, Narcissus is one of my favourite characters of the series! There aren't all that many queers who are actually allowed to be/look/behave queer in her books. :)

I'm pretty sure that the use of the word hermaphrodite was purely LKH/Anita ignorance, however it's not really that implausable for Narcissus to use it himself given that there's a small subsection of the intersex community (usually of the radical queer sort) that use the word reclaimatively. I can see him being part of the Herms With Attitude arm of the intersex community, as very generally straight intersexed people would probably be horrified by somebody like Narcissus.

On the other hand he's also quite sensationalist and liable to spread rumours that added to his general mystique, and could be ftm and having a giggle at everyone else's expense? Would possibly explain why such a tiny guy could be so unquestionably alpha of the hyenas. :)

[rodentfanatic.livejournal.com]

There aren't too many queers who don't decide to be straight for Anita, either! I guess since Narcissus doesn't have a giant schlong (and might well have taken Asher from her) he got to escape! Way too awesome for the Crotch of Doom.

And yeah, that's what I thought about Narcissus too--that even though in most cases it would just be an ignorant insult, he seems like the type who might be inclined to use it as a term of self-identification. Though if he was an FtM, I would just fucking love it, espcially since I've never seen an FtM in a book where being genderqueer wasn't the subject.

BTW, do you think the healing factor that the weres have would reject/reverse a sex-change operation? I've got a pre-op MtF wererat in a fanfic I'm writing, and I'm wondering whether or not that might be an issue for her. That is, the idea/knowledge that she might never be able to completely transition physically.

[easol.livejournal.com]

Nah, I think she didn't want Narcissus because EWWWWWWWW he has girly bits! Too close to the ghey!

Which is why we've never seen him in the flesh since.

[windiain.livejournal.com]

Reversing seems unlikely, as I don't think I recall body parts magically growing back, but it's been a while since I read the books. But I'll go with reverse being a 'no'. Reject may be another matter, given the amount of time and patience that has to go into dilating the constructed vagina to make sure that it remains a sane-sized opening and such. Accelerated healing might bugger that up. I guess, so long as you were careful about it, you might be able to make sure all the parts healed up in the right places, and accelerated healing would help there. But god only knows what shifting would do to it. I imagine that the knowledge of maybe not being able to transition fully would be a valid fear and concern to raise in the story, though. Up to you how successful you want it to be.

FTMs, on the other hand, would probably have it easier. Certainly chest surgery would result in a much better appearance, as I imagine that the accelerated healing would result in there being no scars, and likely little to no risk of loss of nipples or nipple sensation. Lower surgery would probably work out okay, too. My question would be would the flesh used from the forearm (or wherever) for a phalloplasty eventually grow back?

Of course, I could be forgetting some shifter rules that undo the results of surgery that would render those facts wrong. I'm basing this on the idea that with SRS, flesh from the person's own body is used, so rejection isn't as likely as it's supposed to be there.

Actually, raises another question - what about shifters with breast implants? Are there any? What would happen to the implants when they shifted? Would it get messy, or would you get a shifter running around with curious lumps on them?

[rodentfanatic.livejournal.com]

I was all serious while reading your reply...and then that last bit about breast implants just totally cracked me up.

[naeko.livejournal.com]

Reversing seems unlikely, as I don't think I recall body parts magically growing back, but it's been a while since I read the books.

I think Cherry was a werewolf because Gabriel or Elizabeth (clearly I'm up on my book lore!) infected her so she could grow her leg back after a car accident, or something.

[windiain.livejournal.com]

Oh, bugger. That bollockses up that theory then. Sigh. I feel strangely let down that lycanthropy is a cure for limb loss, actually. Makes you wonder why more people don't get bitten in the hopes of curing things. Also, I'm a tad annoyed with LKH, given that cutting off a limb is a cure for lycanthropy in a lot of legends. Bah! BAH, I say!

[tartful-dodger.livejournal.com]

I reckon were healing abilities would have definite disadvantages when it comes to pretty much all body mod stuff. Think the only way around it would be a permenant silver dilator, and even that's errr.. stretching it?

[longtail.livejournal.com]

There is an old African legend about the Hyena Kings, that they can turn female and back again. So I think LKH was playing off of that, and not doing a very good job of it.

Narcissus seems to identify as sexually ambiguous male, because he's been adamant about having nothing but males in his pack because a female would try to take over. Given that Narcissus is himself a female if he can get pregnant, he's pretty much inadvertently insulted himself as being too much of a weakling to defend his pack of omega males, no matter how much they work out.

Intersexuality

[cherose.livejournal.com]

Hi:

Check out the Harry Benjamin standards for transsexuals, and go the the North American Intersex Society's web site if you're truly interested in learning more.

Blessings,

Wilma