On Writing Women. Looking for honesty...

[DragonOfTheAerie]

Intersex is when you have sex organs that don't fit the "standard" definition of male or female. They are still sexual beings and can still feel arousal.

Asexual is when you don't have any sexual feelings or feelings of arousal, regardless of type of sexual organs.

So you can have someone who is asexual intersex, which would be an "intersex person with no feelings of arousal".

Also i'm pretty sure that asexuality is about attraction/desire for sex and st least some asexual people do experience arousal and have sex.

But, not being asexual, maybe i shouldn't comment.

 

[TheCrystallineEntity]

^I thought it was the other way round, that being asexual meant that you have no desire for sex whatsoever. Maybe I'm wrong?

 

[Tom]

I thought I was asexual for several years (turns out it was just baggage from being trans) and it's a pretty complicated identity. A lot of asexual people experience no arousal, some do, and it seems there's not a single concrete definition of asexuality. It's a very fluid, individual thing.

 

[Tom]

^I thought it was the other way round, that being asexual meant that you have no desire for sex whatsoever. Maybe I'm wrong?

Thought what was the other way around?

 

[DragonOfTheAerie]

^I thought it was the other way round, that being asexual meant that you have no desire for sex whatsoever. Maybe I'm wrong?

There's a spectrum. A lot of people experience it in different ways.

 

[TheCrystallineEntity]

So..is there any word that concretely means = no sexual desire nor sexual organs?

 

[Tom]

^I thought it was the other way round, that being asexual meant that you have no desire for sex whatsoever. Maybe I'm wrong?

Generally that's what it means, but there's a lot of wiggle room in the term. It can vary from people who are like "no, I don't ever want sex, and I feel no sexual attraction" to people who experience kind of a gray area.

 

[Tom]

So..is there any word that concretely means = no sexual desire nor sexual organs?

Not that I'm aware of. Asexual generally means no sexual desire, and intersex is a blanket term that covers people outside of what we'd define as "male" or "female", ranging from chromosomal variations to ambiguous sexual organs or none at all.

 

[TheCrystallineEntity]

My characters aren't human and don't have any sexual organs, so calling them asexual is kind of redundant.

 

[DragonOfTheAerie]

My characters aren't human and don't have any sexual organs, so calling them asexual is kind of redundant.

All these terms were made to refer to humans, so maybe there needs to be a new term for non humans?

 

[TheCrystallineEntity]

^Agreed. I'm not sure what, though.

If I were to write a book with a male point of view character, I am not entirely sure how I would write it.

Of course, now that I've said that, this could easily escalate into discussions of what makes a woman a woman and what makes a man a man, which then could veer into potentially dangerous territory, so I might stay quiet on that.

Although, given all of the other topics in my books, asexuality would be the least of the moral guardians' concerns.

 

[TheCrystallineEntity]

Dragon: There is a term for how the characters' give birth through energy fusion, so perhaps I can make a suitable term and add it to the dictionary in my second book.

 

[noob of the north]

Hmmmm

I've always been more "masculine" in manner and interests than my female peers. Growing up, most of my friends were boys. I still have a lot of male friends. And most of the characters I relate to the most in books are male. So I guess i never was very bothered by this. (I really really loved LOTR.)

It deserves mentioning that I hated, was apathetic toward, or flat-out refused to read most of the usual "girl" books. Little House on the Prairie? Blech. Anne of Green Gables? I guess it was okay. I had to read Caddie Woodlawn for school and my not so humble opinion was that it was shit. I especially loathed books where the tomboy girl grew up by the end of the book and started to like hoop skirts and girly things and accept that she was a woman or whatever. (Caddie Woodlawn. Excuse me while I retch.) Tomboy characters were about the only way i saw myself in female characters and to treat it as a phase that would be matured out of or even as a character flaw to be overcome was disgusting and alienating to me. (FYI, i never grew out of or overcame any of my basic character traits. Whatever magic wand that passes over every female teenager and gifts them with obsessions with hair, makeup and nails mysteriously passed me over.)

On the other hand, I love to read about badass women, complicated women, strong women, conflicted women, women of all types. Heck. My WIP is 60,000 words in and the sole male character hasn't arrived yet, The cast is almost entirely women. It's a very diverse, mixed bag of women of every color, shape, size and personality.

I guess i don't necessarily *need* female characters in books. I'm probably more likely to relate to the guys anyway. But maybe that's because females like *me* aren't common.

Yeah, I agree. I look for female characters who relate to me a bit, and they can be hard to find. I was raised by a single father, and I don't relate to the romantic girly girl, or the Sex and the City-type women (Pretty well-written show, but I never really related to any of them the way other people did: "O, I'm just like Charlotte!". Heck no.) I also like the tomboyish characters (especially more adult tomboys) who aren't necessarily putting a romantic relationship on top of their list of priorities, but still are very interesting characters, and warm and caring when it comes to friends or animals. They don't have to be the stone-cold warrior type women, just ordinary people who don't necessarily like what a lot of people call "women's stuff". I don't mind if characters like that stuff, that's fine, but I find the adult tomboy girl a bit rare in fiction. I like Veronica Mars, and Claire in "Six Feet Under", and Darlene from "Roseanne". That sort of character, but they're all teens or just about. I guess that's why I write, to try and make some adult tomboys.

 

[Mythopoet]

Well, in my opinion Dickens, Eliot and Conrad are all extremely overrated and nigh unreadable. And I am really struggling to figure out how this description, "All the main characters were males doing male things. The only women in the books were hyper idealized virgin-esque, almost angelic beings that I could not relate to as a pre-teen girl growing up. The women did not have any of the struggles, passions, interests, or desires that I had. They were sparkling, glittering card board cut outs." could possibly apply to Dune. Are you reading some book called Dune other than Frank Herbert's Dune?

 

[Heliotrope]

Nope. It was Frank Herbert's Dune. The Princess was very Tolkeinesque. Superficial. Lady Jessica was a mother archetype, not a real person. It just felt like the women were not fleshed out to me. They were set pieces.

 

[Mythopoet]

I feel sorry for you.

 

[Heliotrope]

Mytho, why do you feel the need to get personal? Contribute to the discussion. Offer your thoughts and opinions. I would love to hear some insight. ^^ Getting personal is not helpful.

 

[noob of the north]

Exactly. I love male characters too. I love all characters. For me it was coming to this realization of a pattern after reading Pullman's interview of why I struggled with LOTR, and I was wondering if other women felt the same.

I struggled a bit with LOTR, and even though the Peter Jackson-movies were supposed to be more women-friendly (the scripts were written by two women) I wasn't all that satisfied with the female characters in the movies either. My favourite female book characters are however Weatherwax and Ogg from Terry Pratchett. Not only are they pretty decently written, they're hilarious, and everytime I get slightly miffed by female characters in fantasy, I turn to them for comfort.

 

[DragonOfTheAerie]

Yeah, I agree. I look for female characters who relate to me a bit, and they can be hard to find. I was raised by a single father, and I don't relate to the romantic girly girl, or the Sex and the City-type women (Pretty well-written show, but I never really related to any of them the way other people did: "O, I'm just like Charlotte!". Heck no.) I also like the tomboyish characters (especially more adult tomboys) who aren't necessarily putting a romantic relationship on top of their list of priorities, but still are very interesting characters, and warm and caring when it comes to friends or animals. They don't have to be the stone-cold warrior type women, just ordinary people who don't necessarily like what a lot of people call "women's stuff". I don't mind if characters like that stuff, that's fine, but I find the adult tomboy girl a bit rare in fiction. I like Veronica Mars, and Claire in "Six Feet Under", and Darlene from "Roseanne". That sort of character, but they're all teens or just about. I guess that's why I write, to try and make some adult tomboys.

This! You finally articulated it. Adult tomboys are rare. It's a state that's acceptable among girls but unacceptable among women, to be matured out of. I never did...or at least I haven't yet. If anything i've gotten to be more tomboyish.

That was why I hated Caddie Woodlawn...everything about her identity i related to was abolished when she "matured." As of rejecting her tomboyishness was the last stage of her character development. Ew.

 

[Svrtnsse]

My favourite female book characters are however Weatherwax and Ogg from Terry Pratchett.

How do you feel about Tiffany Aching? I like to view her a bit like Pratchett's version of Harry Potter, except more bad ass, but maybe that's just me.