Non-Traditional / Non-Binary / Same-Sex relationships in WtV
Old notes on sexuality in regards to non-standard situations
Non-Traditional / Non-Binary / Same-Sex relationships in WtV
This is still a WiP, though its the two most relevant factions I am covering here.
The Reich officially has no non-standard relationsships, just plenty of, uh, volunteers for its various high-risk projects and programs.
The Rubberpards are sideways past the topic, and the Church is locked into a selfinflicted cycle.
So, for the time this here is the most relevant issue on the topic.
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The Allied Sultanates
In the fantasy / medieval / ancient rome / ancient egypt setting of mine, there are the amazone zebras:_Zebras_With a hundred femaels per male, the males are kept in a harem - for their safety ;) - and though basically a bit bigger than their females, the only physical excercise they have is walking and dancing whilst the females do military drill.
As a result most of the zebra males .. most is a jolly term with there being between 5 to 10 per town, and even a huge metropolis has seldomly more than 200 to 500 ... will appear effeminate from a human point of view.
Be it because they are nonconfrontatory and extremely focused on making others comfortable ( anti-aggression-mechanism ) or because, being expected to "service" physically extremely demanding mares every night, they prefer social and emotional contacts with those of the same gender.
Such social structures I siphoned off from mongol warrior tribes, where there was a strong social brotherhood amongst the warriors of a warband, and where there was truly a vital need to know and understand your co-warriors, so that you could anticipate their reactions in an emergency.
So, for a modern westeners eyes very gayish, but actually far from it.
The amazon zebras, when they are on a month-long excursion through the desert with a carawan, have similar reasons, just adding lesbian sex where needed - as stress relief to cope with the occasional night attack by monstruous insects and the physical tension of daily marching in heavy gear. To the mares mating is a proud deed needed to increase the towns population, to replenish losses. Forming emotional bonds with a male? Males you see once every three months for an hour or two until you're pregnant?
Well, when he's a good one he learns all that is there to give pleasure in the act, and surely one can confide things to a male whom one won't see again personally for a year, so, yes, males can be confidants for those little secrets that are not of tactical nature.
Such thoughts might cross a zebra mares mind at times.
So, yes, similar to their males, for slightly different reasons._Fennekim_The fennekim are less imbalanced, gender-wise.
They also do have the occasional gay or wholly asexual male or female.
However, due to their towns being split into parts for males, for females, and for families, and society strictly imposes that, males bits, unmarried => males city quarter ; female bits , unmarried => females quarter, the concept of crossdressers or trans people hasn't occurred to fennekim. As they are heavily scent oriented, however, this reads differently: Whilst society proscribes that biological males have to stay in the males quarter, when the scent, is definitively female...?
And this works the other way around, too.
As fennekim are polygamists, a homosexual female with a clear male scent that wants to live as a male might one day dress up as a male, attach herself to a passing-through caravan, move into another city, establish herself in the males quarter there and apply for the courtship weeks once she fulfils the local laws for eligibility.
She will know that only a fenwa that wants offspring will participate in the courtship weeks. As otherwise, they'll simply remain in the female quarters, where she'd have her friends and coworkers.
So, what will happen? Well, let's assume she'll gain another fenwas heart and they marry.
What now? The other Fenwa will know from their wedding night that biology won't do. So, they both will make a list of candidates with the desireable traits.
Injuries can happen, and being approached by a married man to, you know... help... Well, the result will be that the family has just gained an uncle who'll serve as a guardian for the kids when ever something should befall the parents.
Yeah, but what when the lesbian fenwa doesn't want to take on a male role?
Well, then she'll live in the females town quarter. She'll have her friends and when they are comfortable with comforting each other, well, fine!
Also, there is always a reason to gossip, trade and work with the amazones. And the zebra mares lifestyle, well, is amazonian for a great part of their daily life. No reason not to extend it to a curious fenwa.
Similarly, for a gay fennekim, when he dosn't find the like-minded individual - and I guess scent helps a lot there - he can either fall in love with his work, becoming an honored and admired master at his craft, which can well include singing, playing music, writing poems and such, but also be horticulture or somesuch.
Any skill that either benefits the tribe / city / family , is adored by other people or is helpful to gain the admiration of a female is an honorable trait in the eyes of the male fennekim population.
So, for the unlucky gay male that doesn't find his personal love, there is still the public admiration for his skills, as well as there are the male zebras, who need all kinds of services rendered, and which, while maybe not sharing the sentiments, will be in a better position to understand the emotions involved than the average straight male will be able to.
For the fennekim's ways to handle it I dug myself through two books on nonstandard societal structures, from the tribal Berber people, where the young males get decorated and have to sing and dance and cook and then the females decide whom they want as husband. Amsterdam gay people shown these proceedings found them "rather overly gay" when it's actually a normal courtship ritual , to various indian subcultures - some of which gave me serious headaches trying to understand the logic in their method.
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The Asgard United Habitats
In the Habitats, there's three groups, and we start out with the_Snowleopards_They were from a group selected for colonisation. They all are very promiscuous, and their psychological profiles and family characteristics where one of the selection criteria. If, they're Bisexual, but mostly for spicing things up. The snowleopards for annual mating pairs, with up to 10 year pledges to care for the offspring. At age 10, parder cubs become part of the wider community as they're able to take care of their own basic needs wholly on their own by then, and the community pledges to teach and educate them in return for their pledge to adhere to the communities standards and expectations until they are adults.
Whilst being biologically capable for nonbinary genderroles, the smallness and preselection of their group makes such situations a moot point.
Next are the Humans
They are all males, derived from a small stock, which just happened to not include - again, in part due to preselection for they were soldiers - no nonbinary genderroles.
Being the only humans, they will have a different emotional attachment amongst each other than would be normal on earth in such a group.
They are all brothers, and without human females, there is no subconscious competition, so much lower levels of aggression amongst them. Aggression exists between them over ideas, but mathematical problems don't lend themselves to testosterone fueled alpha-behaviour. At least not usually.
So, think of a large family with a dozen brothers growing up in the same household and the same parents. It's not 100% your normal rolemodels, but it isn't anything too much out of the ordinary when you look to traditional large or extended family structures.
Finally there is the
Canines
Instinct and biology-wise, they're still very close to their feral ancestors where such things happen, but far less than for humans on earth.
Due to the instinctual canine behaviours, a gay male dog would appear, to a human, as the best and most reliable buddy you could ever imagine.
Maybe a bit huggy and cuddly, but that's a canine for you. I actually doubt most humans would realize that a canine male is actually gay.
A lesbian female canine? Well, their situation is slightly like for the zebras, but slightly only so. However, they have the advantages of scent amongst themselves, no prejudices - as it means either no competition when its a gay male canine ( who'll know by scent what the other would be comfortable with ), or actually less competition ( like, ... -1 ? ) when it is a lesbian female canine.
With 2nd generations uplifts being only females, many of them, simply due to numbers, will never meet a human male personally - at least not long enough for it to become relevant.
Should the human male be interested in the canine female, however, other canine females will soon pick up that she's not interested and either play, ah... Wingman? Wingwomen? Wingdoggy? Well, there's many canine females that'll happily put effort up to reroute the human male away from a female that's not interested, and the canine gay males are well aware where the area of discomfort for the other starts - and would be considered a bad doggo and socially inept when they'd transgress it.