Herein lies the first problem. It is a jarring image, and I can’t imagine for a second that that wasn’t intentional. Essentially, they’ve made this character be transgender for shock value, or because they wanted to play it for laughs. Haha, aren’t those transgender people absolutely hilarious?<br /><br />This sort of attitude is bad enough at the best of times, but sad to say, this is not the best of times. Making the transgender character be a super mutant is not at all subtle. It paints an image of transwomen as brutish, ugly freaks who you can spot a mile off. You can put a pig in lipstick, but it’s still a a pig. Or a super mutant. Or a man.Then, just for good measure, because apparently they weren’t insulting enough already, the character is a crazed villain. Who you get to kill. Fantastic.
Hmm, genderqueer is a pretty standard term for those who don't fit either of the standard male/female gender roles. Shouldn't be a cause for offense. Additionally, it's better to think of gender as a spectrum rather than a binary, either/or state. 99.9% of the population will cluster at the two ends of the spectrum, but there are individuals whose neurobiological makeup is different and who fall somewhere in between. Such individuals have always existed. Some cultures found ways to incorporate them into their society where Western culture generally has not, e.g. a southwest American Indian tribe had a handful of holy individuals who were androgynous and thought of as being a higher, genderless being that was sacred to the tribe. Certain sects of Buddhism have their own understanding of transsexuals, interpreting the unusual gender expression through the lens of karmic rebirth. Regardless, gender identity is as susceptible to variation as any other part of human beings, although true androgynenes are rare, even rarer than traditional transsexuals like myself.
