Depiction in Fiction
May. 8th, 2009 12:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
auntysarah posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
transHaving read the first two of China Meiville's Bas-Lag steampunk novels, Perdido Street Station and The Scar, I've started reading the third, Iron Council.
Now in his fantasy world they have a magical surgical technology called Remaking, which is much more advanced than anything we have, and is capable not only of organ transplants, etc., but can blend two different species together, as well as blend human and machine. It's mostly used as punishment.
That being that case, it's somewhat surprising that it took him until the third novel to bring up trans people. When he does, they're all desperate male-to-female sex workers living in squalid and marginal conditions.
Now while that's a little disappointing, it's perhaps forgiveable because a major theme in the Bas-Lag novels is that the vast majority of the population are pretty downtrodden, living at the bottom of the heap in an anarcho-capitalistic oligarchy. What really bugged me is that there are gay and bisexual characters, and that's presented as part of their identity; the "men remade as women", however, are introduced in a brief aside as if they only exist as a product, because there are those who have a fetish for having sex with them. They're not trans because of who they are, they're trans because trans women are needed to cater to the market segment which exists because there are Bas-Lag's equivalent of trannychasers.
Now in his fantasy world they have a magical surgical technology called Remaking, which is much more advanced than anything we have, and is capable not only of organ transplants, etc., but can blend two different species together, as well as blend human and machine. It's mostly used as punishment.
That being that case, it's somewhat surprising that it took him until the third novel to bring up trans people. When he does, they're all desperate male-to-female sex workers living in squalid and marginal conditions.
Now while that's a little disappointing, it's perhaps forgiveable because a major theme in the Bas-Lag novels is that the vast majority of the population are pretty downtrodden, living at the bottom of the heap in an anarcho-capitalistic oligarchy. What really bugged me is that there are gay and bisexual characters, and that's presented as part of their identity; the "men remade as women", however, are introduced in a brief aside as if they only exist as a product, because there are those who have a fetish for having sex with them. They're not trans because of who they are, they're trans because trans women are needed to cater to the market segment which exists because there are Bas-Lag's equivalent of trannychasers.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-05-08 12:00 pm (UTC)The point about the image of trans women as (exclusively) commodities is really interesting when applied to the real world. Hmm. I need to think about that.
they have a magical surgical technology called Remaking, which is much more advanced than anything we have, and is capable not only of organ transplants, etc., but can blend two different species together, as well as blend human and machine
And that sounds ideal for trans men, but of course we don't exist.
Though now I kind of want to write a dystopian spec fic story with downtrodden female-to-make sex worker living in squalid and marginal conditions because there's a market of women who have a fetish for sex with Feminist Decaf Men....
(no subject)
Date: 2009-05-08 12:21 pm (UTC)And that sounds ideal for trans men, but of course we don't exist.
Indeed. Trans women are there for the sexing, and there are no trans men because, well, obviously, right? *growl*