Imagining Acamar

[Doc]

Angry Tuna, Sentient chickens, hermaphroditic worms. I'm beginning to enjoy this planet.  

Yeah, it's a very amusing planet.

To totally derail the thread, I must now mention that marine clownfishes are all born male. When they reach adulthood and pair off, one member of the pair, the more aggressive one, becomes female. No, this does not mean that we will get a movie called Finding Nemo II: Nemo's Transition in which Nemo falls in love and becomes a girl and, with her dad's support, copes with the reactions of the other reef-fishes who are from cisgendered species. Marine angelfishes are all born female and when they pair off the more aggressive partner becomes male.

On the planet Acamar, the sex of Acamarian people is determined behaviorally, like the sex of marine clown and angelfishes on Earth. An Acamarian's sex and gender may change at any time during the person's life, based on how that person behaves and how zie is treated by others. In the past, any Acamarian who wished to change sex, any Acamarian who found that eir sex was changing in a way the person did not desire, and any Acamarian who felt that eir sex-characteristics were too ambiguous or too unambiguous for eir liking could take a week or two to attend a retreat hosted by any of the numerous Acamarian religions. At these events, religious leaders would instruct the people to behave in masculinizing or feminizing ways, and treat the retreat-goers in the manner that would strengthen their desired sex-characteristics. In modern times, most Acamarians find it more convienent to change their sexes by playing feminizing or masculinizing video games.

Imagine another Acamar, where sex and gender work in yet another different way than they do for us. Tell us about it.

[Louise]

Ursula LeGuin describes a planet similar to Acamar in her novel The Left Hand of Darkness.  All inhabitants of this planet are androgynous and only take on gender roles for purposes of procreation.  During lovemaking, one of the partners becomes male and the other female; if conception occurs, the pregnant partner remains female until after she gives birth and nurses, then she returns to an androgynous state.  When the partners again make love, the one who previously took the female role might now take the male role.  In this way, both partners can take turns being mother and father.  But, except when pregnant, most people are genderless.