Good points, and I think we generally agree. I definitely didn’t mean to exclude anyone in those real or hypothetical situations you mentioned. To me, those examples are more about showing how gender is, or can be, biologically fluid. There are many “odd” situations that aren’t binary. So amongst the many unusual ways that sex can occur biologically, “male brain in a female body” or “I reject the concept of gender entirely” are valid and believable.

I agree with your last point as well, but in the context of this post, would you tell Rachel Dolezal that she says she’s Black, so she’s Black? I guess I was trying to find some sort of difference between gender and race identity, the way the question was posed.

I’m definitely not claiming to have an unassailable argument, so thanks for responding with good points.

I’m no expert on either topic. But I believe humans basically start off as female in the womb, and either become male or don’t. And there are many intersex conditions. The body responds to hormones typically associated with either sex. So gender is fluid in a biological sense. If someone transitions to male, female or nonbinary, they already kind of contained that potential.

However, race is a social construct, usually based on heritage as well as biological appearance. So it’s hard to say how much biology is really involved. Does the human body contain the ability to be any race? Or to cultivate an appearance that prompts other humans to socially categorize you as one race or the other?

Maybe for people who are mixed race, there is a sort of spectrum available to them. They likely know how to present themselves in a way that gets them categorized as one race or the other.

But otherwise, not really. If you’re White, and you say, “I identify as Black,” the question might be: do you have Black heritage? If you don’t, you can’t really create it out of thin air. There wasn’t a situation while you were in the womb where various hormones could have influenced you to appear more Black than you do. If your parents are both White, they were going to have a White baby, no matter what. Race is a social construct, but it’s based on appearance and heritage. It’s about belonging to a group, not about being an individual, the way gender is.

If you’re assigned female at birth, and you say, “I identify as male,” then cool! Your body already has the capability to become hormonally male. You can socially identify as male. Any human, of any race, has this potential. Any two parents could have a baby that is any sex or gender, depending on various factors.

Yeah, fictional romance is more interesting when it’s forbidden in some way. Otherwise, who wants to read a romance novel about a nice couple who meets at the library when they’re both single, and proceeds to have a wholesome relationship? Great for real life, but boring to read about or watch a movie about.

Many of the traditional reasons for forbidding a romance are gone in the contemporary world. Different race, different social class, same gender, rival families? Not convincing.

So you’re left with stuff that’s plausible but icky, like being in a relationship already, or being teacher/student or boss/employee. Or pornographic stuff like step-family. Those are problematic and people will criticize them.

You could set your story in a historical setting in which the countess and the gardener are truly forbidden from passion, or a fantasy world where the ogopogos and sasquatches are sexy rivals.

Or just have a lukewarm type of forbidden-ness, like “his family’s greeting-card store is in competition with my family’s greeting-card store” or “we’re coworkers.”

“oh, Trump wouldn’t do that, it’s illegal”

Phew, what a relief!

Also, when Trump does illegal stuff, people tend to allow it and obey him. If they try to shut him down using the legal system, he goes ahead and does it anyway.

I kind of just roll my eyes when someone says, “Aha, it’s illegal! He can’t do that!” We don’t really live in that world anymore.

It really is. You’d think they’d choose a positive news story.

The eyeballs are a good example. But perhaps an ignorant pro-vag-washing man could retort, "Well, nobody jizzes in my eyeballs!’

Maybe the issue is self-loathing as well as misogyny - they think their cum is disgusting, so they assume it contaminates a vag?

I agree. Many people are imagining, “instead of using his vast wealth to fix the world, he dedicates all his money and mental energy to an elaborate bunker that will ensure his survival in a specific apocalyptic scenario he believes is likely to happen.”

It might be more like, "amongst all the random wealthy-person shit he’s bought, there are guns and motorcycles (because he thinks they are cool) as well as a pantry full of canned food (because everyone should have an emergency kit and you never know).

But I could be wrong.

Not even a grown-up book! Read a different magical fantasy book aimed at children or teenagers. And see how good those are, too. Many of them were written before Harry Potter.

I do think HP is good at the pacing and mystery aspect of it. The magical world isn’t really that alluring, unless you are a 12 year old kid in 2001 who never read another book until now.

Reminds me of JD Vance.

Some people first glom onto left-leaning causes and opinions. They advocate for open-mindedness and human rights for all. They might even get really into the righteous purity of it all, where they get to criticize others for not being progressive enough.

But then maybe they don’t get satisfaction out of that for long. Maybe they find that another leftist is criticizing them for their wrong-headed views. Maybe they aren’t getting enough cookies for being a feminist.

So they switch over the right-leaning side of things. Maybe that allows them to be more openly hateful.

Or maybe they just changed their minds.

Honestly, I don’t know much about Rowling’s beliefs other than being a TERF. Maybe she supports all other “feminist” and anti-racist and left-leaning progressive causes. Perhaps she didn’t go all-in on the likes of Trump, the way Vance did.

But you’d never know, since all she talks about is being anti-trans.