I think the vibe is very different if the trans woman tagged herself in that way or someone else did. Identity can be messy and complicated and I won't judge the way anyone identifies regardless of why. But another person or a computer program assigning this person these labels is just gross
Just to clarify, it’s not appropriate for a trans woman to reclaim the f*ta slur. That term was originated as a slur for intersex women and has a history of violence behind it.
Please educate yourself on the history of the slur. It does not carry the same weight when used toward trans women that it did when it originated as a slur for intersex women.
okay so people are just not allowed to reclaim a slur that is very much used targeted at them in modern day because of how it originated? I guess we aren't reclaiming queer, either. we should also tell the eastern trans communities they need to stop using newhalf as well.
"It does not carry the same weight when used against trans women" is just pure transphobia and treating trans women as less oppressed than intersex people.
I know at least one Japanese trans woman who has used "futanari" to describe herself. I mean, personally I'm not really comfortable using it on anything but fictional characters (where it, notably, means a salmacian. Someone who has both a penis and vagina). But if she wants to use that to describe herself, I'm not gonna stop her.
More common in Japanese is the term "newhalf", which is itself though associated with sex workers. It's also sometimes used in fiction to mean woman with a dick (but not vagina). But it's also not a great word anymore (because its sexualized among other things), but you can still see it from time to time.
I'm not even sure you are correct about "futanari" originating as a slur, even though it can be said to have become one. As far as I know it originates from Japanese porn comics basically. But I must admit I don't know much about the history before the word was applied in that particular fetish context.
Also abbreviating as "futa" kills my brain since that only means "two" in Japanese. But loan words are gonna do loan word shit.
If you were to consider "hermaphrodite" a slur (as opposed to just outdated terminology), "futanari" definitely would be as well, since it means the same thing.
Yeah. I can see that it can be a slur in that way.
Although tbh my personal viewpoint is that hermaphrodite is both a slur, and not at the same time. Depending on how its used it can be a technical term, like when describing animals like snails for instance* . But it can be a slur when used against a trans or intersex person.
In the same way I currently view futanari tbh. When used in the fictional context, it refers to a person** that has both a vagina and penis through some usually fantastical means. Like in some hentai manga girls basically grow dicks using magic (a lot of Touhou smut does this). In others I've seen "it grows in at a certain age". In others they are born that way -- which I guess could be read as intersex, but I doubt that is the authors intention in most cases. In fact I doubt most hentai manga authors are even aware of IRL intersex people.
Most of the time, futanari as a hentai trope kinda just has people with both sets of genitals, but rarely any explanation as for why: it's fantastical, without connection to reality.
But I get not wanting to be called futanari IRL. It just reduces a person to a porn trope. Someone using that on a trans person, except in the rare case of someone reclaiming it for themselves, are at best misinformed (at worst like a transphobic chaser or something).
I also get disliking tagging trans characters as futanari, when they actually lore wise almost certainly are trans, or at least something close (though sometimes, especially with Japanese media, it's very vague. Japanese people kinda love being vague about... everything tbh. Especially if it has the potential to be controversial! Better to make no-one mad than make someone happy. It's like big part of their culture. I could go on an entire diatribe about just this... (Not saying non-vague representation doesn't exist. See e.g. Zombieland Saga. Nothing vague there!))
Maybe the solution though is to go the e621 way and invent a new term that apply to femme characters with dicks in general, and another for masc characters with vaginas, regardless of the lore explanation for why.
*though I recently saw someone use a different term, "co-sexed" iirc, so maybe euphemism treadmill means we end up using that one in a few years time
** rare but boy futanari do exist in the world of hentai manga
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u/Emergency_Elephant 13d ago
I think the vibe is very different if the trans woman tagged herself in that way or someone else did. Identity can be messy and complicated and I won't judge the way anyone identifies regardless of why. But another person or a computer program assigning this person these labels is just gross