#gotta get up at 7am tomorrow. hate and hell on planet earth

[sowthetide]

GREETINGS AND SALUTATIONS this is teainabowl AND IM BACK WITH MORE NONSENSE AS PROMISED. family crisis almost averted?? i havent slept in 2 days but lmao who cares. (you cant see me rn but i want you to know that im doing a happy little jump skip dance as im writing this)

BECAUSE!!!!! ok. lets talk about genderbending in fandom. i think what usually gives me the ick in those fics is they do nature vs nurture wrong??? like a lot of the time they’ll just change the NATURE of the character and use the different gender as an excuse which. idk idk it runs me the wrong way. BUT QUENN!!! shes very much still theon?? just, nurtured differently. am i making sense? i have been traumatized by some bio-essentialism bs in the past when trying to look into similar fics bc i love gender fuckery PEOPLE JUST DONT GET IT LIKE I DO (or you, appearantly hkdhhfjh i love your story it means so much to me) 

and asoiaf is SUCH a gendered world??? like it has so much untapped potential where even a single characters gender can have SO MUCH IMPACT (can you imagine if joffrey had been a girl?? or if sansa had been a boy???) 

but what originally started my spiel was the realization that jon wouldnt have gone to the nights watch if he was a girl. and. what then?? slightly horrifying tbh, and makes me wonder if one of the other character had been male (read; they had been given more agency and autonomy in their lives) what would have changed???

but back to jon, bc then i immediately thought, ok, lets backtrack a bit, who would jon even BE. bc a lot of jons character revolves around his (lack of) a relationship with catelyn, his siblings mother. but she would have a harder time avoiding him if he was a she, right?? am i making sense???? a girl isnt seen like as much of a threat to her children i thinks?? idk i love cat and jon so much a love picking apart their relationship bc bc bc ARGHhhgg yk? also i like to think of ned being haunted by lyannas carbon copy who happens to be great with swords (would he be permitted to practice swordplay??) idk

ANYWAYS no we come to the part where i tie it up to what you mentioned in your answer. bc as much as JON being a girl might change his relationship with cat, it would be much more fucked up if it were robb, me thinks. (i too am a bit guilty of using robb as an accessory to cat) but but but. are. are you seeing my vision. catelyn stark with her three daughters when ned leaves for the greyjoy rebellion. catelyn whos convinced that the reason her husband wont send his bastard away is because she cant give him any sons. in the books she calls bran her special little boy and. idk the double meaning this would give it. and bran!!! being the heir!!! hiw would that change things??? would the reception to his accident be different?? and speaking of, what about king robert and his obsession with joining his family with neds? i havent talked about how robb (robyn?) would be different in this au but i cant think hed be as pleased as sansa was? his first shown interaction with joff is him trying to curb stomp the fucker lmao. i dont think he would be likely to have a different opinion bc of gender changes. in the books hes often rash and impulsive and prideful, and id want him to keep those traits, but peoples reactions to them would be different?? and so he would shape them in different ways??? am i making sense i feel like im just rambling. this is getting way too long and wayy to incoherent i need to stop. ok bye for now ill be back (threatening)

GO TO BED!!!! GET SOME SLEEP!!!!! But yay! to family crisis averted? Maybe?

Okay. I'm gonna indulge in some haterism for a second cause I've actually poked around the ASOIAF genderbending tag quite a bit. Unfortunately, a lot of those fics? Lame as hell. There's a preponderance of genderbent Jon Snow, which I think is totally cool! Very interesting genderbend to explore because of how much it changes the trajectory of his story. But then the character isn't really written as Jon at all? Maybe I'm just picky about characterization, but oftentimes fem!Jon just becomes this cookie-cutter "strong/feisty" female protag and it's like...

Sorry. I'm being mean. Obviously, there is no singular "correct" take on a given character, as we're all influenced by our own experiences and perceptions. My take on Theon isn't the exact same as yours, or goddcoward's, or Ashen's, or GRRM's. A unique Theon exists in all our heads, each one a bit different from the others.

But! Genderbends are so much more fun when you can see the underpinnings of the character you know, and there are moments where those aspects really shine through. And it's like OH!!! (pointing vigorously) THERE THEY ARE!!!! Otherwise, why not just write an OC, or adopt a minor character with very little canon characterization? (Admittedly, this can become a problem when you start collecting minor characters like Pokemon cards. I am my own evidence of this phenomenon.) If it ain't Jon, then why have it be Jon at all, y'know?

ngl female Joffrey has been rattling around in my brain lately... 👀fem!Joffrey would definitely be betrothed to Robb, which would be a complete and utter shitshow (appreciative/affectionate). Joffrey as a true mini-Cersei has such insane juice to it as a story idea, especially considering that Joffrey never liked Cersei all that much lol... the mother-daughter dynamic would be BONKERS.

Back to Jon though:

First, you're definitely right that fem!Jon wouldn't be seen as much of a threat to her siblings as Jon was. She would probably be married off pretty quickly once she came of age, as high as possible for a woman who was bastard-born. I don't see Catelyn liking her per se, but Catelyn wouldn't have the same misgivings about her as she did about Jon. Since fem!Jon probably wouldn't become the vessel of the wildling/Others plot, she might have an interesting role to play if she went south... to marry Robert's royal bastard Edric Storm, perhaps? I could see Robert "having his Lyanna" by marrying fem!Jon and Edric. But then shit hits the fan with the usual plot of AGOT, and maybe fem!Jon gets taken hostage by the Lannisters in King's Landing? Or gets caught in Renly's shit since she was with Edric at Storm's End? I am NAWTTTT talking myself into writing another fic. Go to hell. I need to finish Sow the Tide first.

fem!Robb (Robyn between myself and goddcoward) is even crazier. Catelyn would NOT be fucking happy to have Ned's spitting image hanging around Winterfell, while all her sons are under 10 and have the Tully look. I could see Catelyn successfully arguing that Jon should be fostered out, perhaps in the Vale (as a favor on the part of Jon Arryn)? Like, oh, Ned, you and Robert became such good friends fostering together in the Vale... that way, Jon is waythefuckoverthere and can't make any allies in the north.

I'd love for Robyn to have some of the same anger and pride, and she'd probably be similar to Catelyn in that she was raised as the heir for a good bit of time before the "real" heir came along years later (Bran+Edmure). Also, Catelyn would absolutely NOT trust Theon around Robyn. Not At All. Kinda fair though? Robyn would also be older than Sansa was in AGOT, so I think she'd be at least a little bit more worldly and pick up on Joffrey's... Joffreyness. Robb/Robyn are still dutiful characters, but I think there would be a lot more immediate friction between her and her betrothed. Double genderbend Throbb is my true love, however (Quobyn my beloved).

I've gotta finally go work on chapter 40 now, so I can't answer everything, but do come back... I'll be here... revolving all of these genderbends around in my head...

#ask #gotta get up at 7am tomorrow. hate and hell on planet earth #opening my chapter 40 doc like babe it's 9pm time for your nightly dick flattening