adri

the position of the mischevious pig marks the hours

It’s time for YOU to listen to me.

Characters in a lot of queer media often have the ability to identify pronouns on sight. Which is sweet, and convenient, but it also feels like a little bit like a lie to me. Misgendering feels like a fundamental part of how I experience queerness, not because everyone is cruel or anything, but because I don't live in a world of psychics.

This is one of the reasons (among several) that I just could NOT get into The Light from Uncommon Stars, despite all the applause it seemed to garner. The main character is a young transgender woman who runs away from home to become a violinist and much of her story is very sweet. But every time she met another character you could tell if they were going to be a "good guy" or a "bad guy" because all the characters you're supposed to like get her pronouns right on sight without any prompting, and all the characters you're not supposed to like misgender her as soon as they see her. It drove me up the wall. I get wanting wish fulfilment where your friends never mess up and hurt you by misgendering you, but it really made all the depictions of genuine allyship or bigotry in the book feel flat and contrived.