LGBTAI+ Questions and Discussion thread II: Make It Double

[Coidzor]

This isn't urgent at all, so feel free to let it be while people are still debating how to manage the thread, but if I could get some advice here I'd be grateful; I'm not sure where else to ask a question at the interface between genderfluidity and gaming.

Quite the opposite. It's a refreshing change of pace. A breath of fresh air, even.

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I'm setting up a PnP RPG campaign, and I asked the group's previous GM if there's anything I should be particularly wary of doing as a GM. Among the usual player likes and dislikes, he mentions that one of the genderfluid members of the group "hates gendering. Just, like, avoid that." He goes on the clarify that said player dislikes "all gender and sexual based things. Don't include it. Don't even mention it" including but not limited to gender-specific pronouns and gender-specific marketing.

Fair enough; I can do that. Then he continues: "[the player in question] can also get grouchy if it's not included so it's honestly a gamble" and advises me to "just skirt the issue."

You've played with this person without ever picking up on this at all, that no pronouns are ever used when they're around, that not even the NPCs or animal-equivalents have spouses, families, or children in game?

And if not, then why are you GMing for a group of strangers that have formed a group together but that you've never met or interacted with?

So now I'm at a bit of a loss. Ordinarily I'd just ask the player in question, but if even mentioning it distresses them I'm not sure that's the best way forward.

You pretty much have to ask this person if the other guy doesn't have the ability to answer your questions and you'll need to have your own understanding of how to interact with them anyway.

If they can't deal with being informed that you've been informed that they have a lot of gender triggers and you need to find out what they are so that you can actually GM for them, then, well, you can't GM for them anyway and any attempt at doing so is doomed to failure.

Now, of course, you need to be tactful in how you bring it up with them, and if you have any questions about how to best begin that conversation and phrasing you'll get some suggestions. Currently nothing specific comes to mind beyond acknowledging that you've been informed that they have some form of trigger that you need to understand as the GM.

Granted, given that it's *their* triggers, they should be the one informing you of them in the first place so this is all kind of irregular anyway, but you still gotta do what needs to be done even if they aren't or won't on their own for whatever reason.

You've got to be able to talk to your players as the GM, though, at the end of the day, and if you can't have that conversation with them, then the both of you are better off not playing with one another.

So with that in mind, my question is twofold:

1. What is gendering in this context and where ought I to go to learn more about it? I've never heard of it as regards gaming, at least not without people going out of their way to add it.

2. How do I ask the aforementioned player about how to avoid offending them with the things they don't like mentioned?

As far as I am aware, gendering only really means the one thing when it's unmodified like that. It's objects and creatures possessing gender and assigning genders to them.

Now if it was (stereotypical) gender roles or gender proscriptivism, like men must be hulking, unfeeling brutes, women must be shrinking violets or whatever, yeah, that's something you don't want to have in your games anyway, but that's kind of an obvious thing to avoid and wouldn't really come up under most advice as it's assumed that if you want to DM and aren't 12 you have a better grasp of how to tell a story than that.

As for your second question, I believe asking them about their triggers and their concerns about going into a new game is where to begin.