like there is room for criticism there

but i've been seeing a lot of blanket condemnations going around

tumblr's mo is to take a valid point and then ride it off the edge of a cliff screaming "PROBLEMATIIIIIIIC!"

yep

this one is fun because i am apparently oppressing myself

as a trans person

by drawing genderbends

STOP OPPRESSING YOURSELF STOP OPPRESSING YOURSELF /using your own hand to hit you

i haven't been directly called out on this by any of my 13-year-old followers yet but i've seen enough posts about it floating around that i'm just like. waiting for the day

i think there are some ideas behind it, at times, that are fairly binarist and transphobic (like that someone would be just totally different if born as another sex)

but i don't think the concept is that bad, innately, because otherwise you're basically saying gender is meaningless to the character?

and y'kow i do love a great 'what if ladies' take on 'dudes only' shows

yeah, 90% of the times that i want to see genderbends is when you've got a franchise where the cast is 90% dudes

but you don't need to shove them in miniskirts and bikinis the moment you draw them as a lady

also i have run into a few people in fandom over the years who like... take a queer couple, only genderswap one character from the pairing so that it's a het couple, and then insist on only shipping the characters as a het couple, and that always skeeves me

god, it's been awhile since i've run across that, but that is totally tiresome. unless perhaps there was something going on with one of them being trans, but then that isn't really het. and... i can't think of a single time where i've seen it that nuanced anyway

i think the main reason I've been chafing at all the blanket condemnations of "genderbends" is because i've been a cosplayer for a decade

and like. sometimes people want to cosplay a character but don't want to dress as the opposite gender

and like.... just let them??

my rage is (mostly) reserved for genderbends where suddenly the master chief is wearing a bikini or some shit

how about we talk about how you shouldn't throw the label "crossplayer" at someone if you don't know their gender identity

yeah same

see also: STOP DRAWING VICTORIA VON DOOM IN HIGH HEELS

(things literally only i care about )

if a dude is wearing a suit of armor then a "genderbend" of that dude should be wearing the same damn armor

the only way you should be able to tell if doom is r63 is when she speaks and her voice is a few octaves higher

ANYWAY didn't mean to doomjack

i will concede that bikini armor has one benefit, and that is that you have to buy a lot less worbla

/snrk

i can't even begrudge anyone who wants to save $300+

if you're in armor cosplay you should resign yourself to having to spend 5x what anyone else does

oh yeah, i didn't even think about the cosplay aspect of it. people should probably just shut the hell their faces about that kinda thing.

that's why all of my armor costume plans are on permanent postponement

i know a lot of cosplayers who prefer to base their genderbend cosplays off of pre-existing fanart too, since some contests ask for references and whatnot

or they just aren't confident about their own design skills

so they get really excited about good genderbend fanart of their favorite characters

ehhhh

yea I think it depends really

the one thing that bugs me a little about it is that they should be called "Sex swaps" instead cause thats generally what they are (or technically I guess "gender and sex swaps" or something)

but thats more annoying pedantism than anything else

yeah i mean generally they're both gender & sex swaps

one can assume

i mean you can headcanon whatever you want about the character's biological sex either way

I like genderbends where literally nothing is different except their gender identity. That's the good stuff.

I have nothing useful to add to this.

same

like there are some comic characters that i've considered cosplaying as female versions just because i'm nowhere near as buff as they are & i don't want to wear a muscle suit

but there's no need to actually change the design