Gender and Sexuality

[Claire Twy]

I'm curious about the absence of males in society. Where did they all go? Did they become extinct? For that matter, are we sure that there aren't males in the society? Perhaps that could explain the difference in genitalia. Hear me out, what if there are males and females, but due to the conformity and to rid people of 'selfist' ideas, the government labelled everyone as 'she' so as to further remove the individuality of its citizens. Given that the author seems to be basing his world off of ours by exaggerating our dependence on technology and obsession with keeping up with trends on social media, is it a far cry to say he could be referring to the current hot debate over gender and sexuality? With people claiming their identities and discarding their biological genders in our society, like many other issues, the society he painted could be a futuristic representation of what we could evolve into, where everyone becomes one single sex.

[Josephe-Anne]

I'm curious about the absence of males in society. Where did they all go? Did they become extinct? For that matter, are we sure that there aren't males in the society? Perhaps that could explain the difference in genitalia. Hear me out, what if there are males and females, but due to the conformity and to rid people of 'selfist' ideas, the government labelled everyone as 'she' so as to further remove the individuality of its citizens. Given that the author seems to be basing his world off of ours by exaggerating our dependence on technology and obsession with keeping up with trends on social media, is it a far cry to say he could be referring to the current hot debate over gender and sexuality? With people claiming their identities and discarding their biological genders in our society, like many other issues, the society he painted could be a futuristic representation of what we could evolve into, where everyone becomes one single sex.

It's interesting that you mention this because, from my understanding of the book, there were males and females. That's why they said some people have innies (females) and others have outies (males). I think the whole point of the Hierarchy trying to downplay the differences between the sexes is due to the fact that they began regulating reproduction. They also succeeded in abolishing the family unit by separating children from their "birth-givers" aka mothers. By abolishing family ties, the Hierarchy ensures that their values and agendas are pushed rather than having parents teach their children.

One other thing still bothers me about this book though. I still can't figure out whether Kim is a male or a female. The way the author described Shan's "mams" and hips, clearly Shan is female. Keli must also be female because she is pregnant in the story, but the author never specified whether Kim had an innie or an outie. Do you think Kim is a man or a woman? What clues point to his/her biological sex?

[Gabrielle Norconk]

I'm curious about the absence of males in society. Where did they all go? Did they become extinct? For that matter, are we sure that there aren't males in the society? Perhaps that could explain the difference in genitalia. Hear me out, what if there are males and females, but due to the conformity and to rid people of 'selfist' ideas, the government labelled everyone as 'she' so as to further remove the individuality of its citizens. Given that the author seems to be basing his world off of ours by exaggerating our dependence on technology and obsession with keeping up with trends on social media, is it a far cry to say he could be referring to the current hot debate over gender and sexuality? With people claiming their identities and discarding their biological genders in our society, like many other issues, the society he painted could be a futuristic representation of what we could evolve into, where everyone becomes one single sex.

It's interesting that you mention this because, from my understanding of the book, there were males and females. That's why they said some people have innies (females) and others have outies (males). I think the whole point of the Hierarchy trying to downplay the differences between the sexes is due to the fact that they began regulating reproduction. They also succeeded in abolishing the family unit by separating children from their "birth-givers" aka mothers. By abolishing family ties, the Hierarchy ensures that their values and agendas are pushed rather than having parents teach their children.

One other thing still bothers me about this book though. I still can't figure out whether Kim is a male or a female. The way the author described Shan's "mams" and hips, clearly Shan is female. Keli must also be female because she is pregnant in the story, but the author never specified whether Kim had an innie or an outie. Do you think Kim is a man or a woman? What clues point to his/her biological sex?

Yes I agree, as the author mentioned in the forward, both sexes exist in this society and they refer to the differences in genitalia as outie or innies. I think the main reason by eliminating gender and sexual identity is to remove individuality. It's easy to think that eliminating labels of differences would increase acceptance throughout a society but contrastingly this felt more oppressive then having differences and being distributed against because of that. Additionally, I think the idea that it should not matter what the character's sex or gender is when evaluating them as a person. Our natural insistence to continue to designate a gender/sex label for each character shows that natural desire to seperate people into groups. I think part of the point of this story is to show that that isn't always the best practice.

He said that he arbitrarily chose she/her to be the overarching pronoun use but that he could have chosen any pronouns. I do think this choose represents a deeper meaning then pure randomness, though I don't have a solid idea of what that would be.

Perhaps I didn't evaluate it correctly, but I am pretty positive that Kim is female for several reasons. If they were male then I think the scene where they have sex with a male for the first time wouldn't have been that traumatic as it sounded. The differences between types of sexual acts performed with two different genitalia versus two of the same genitalia is starkly different. I feel that sex with penetration can feel more vulnerable and power based, and therefore be more traumatizing if not enjoyed. The way that they describe themselves also came across as female.