Definitely something.
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Out-of-Placers
A story of inconvenient changes
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OOPs now has a Russian translation which updates shortly after the English pages are posted!
Now also in French:
And Ukranian:
I just know this meeting between Kass and Vizlet is going to end up being one of my favorite parts.
Kass still believes that one day either he’ll wake up and this was all a dream, or a cure will be found and she can be restored to a he, or something. Anything. Vizlet seems to know better and is saddened that Kass hasn’t accepted the new reality.
Right not a bit of mild dissociation might be in order. No time for trauma right now! Can have the mental breakdown later, under better circumstances. Until then, carry on denying.
Honestly, it’s a big vibe of transgender dysmorphia with him. His body is communicating one thing, others are treating him in a female role except for his closest friends and confidants, and his appearance isn’t one he wants at all but he has adapted it as close as he can to the way he was…
He has to figure out if he embraces this role forced on him by accident or if he will push that he is to be treated as he sees himself. Which seems to work fine around humans for the most part. But Yinglets still see him as a her.
There’s also the further wrinkle of the forced upon role having SIGNIFICANTLY stronger implications in the culture it belongs to. Like, in human transgender dysmorphia, there are a lot of things that are cross-gender (more these days than there were, in some ways). Girls can like cars, guys can do ballet. And the larger push for LGB inclusiveness means that the TQI have less pushback on which gender THEY prefer.
But when the role you’re trapped in is one of a VERY SMALL minority whose gender roles are CRITICAL FOR THE SURVIVAL OF THE SPECIES…
It’s dysphoria, not dysmorphia. Very distinctly different things, clinically.
And the problem is that he’s clearly dysphoric. His brain is telling him he’s not a girl, he doesn’t belong as much as he tries to adapt, and that alone is traumatizing enough to make integration as a female yinglet painful and difficult. Being sexually assaulted on top of it is a PROBLEM.
Anyway, regardless of the way the any of the cultures in the comic see him, it’s pretty clear that we as readers can best relate to him as a trans man. He’s having a trans masculine experience. And as far as we’re concerned, since he see’s himself as male, despite his physique, then he is male.
Belief that you’re a different sex doesn’t make it so. He might see himself as a man, but he’s not male.
Dude, seriously? A person isn’t their body. Kass the Yinglet is the same person as Kass the Human, just with some very bizarre experiences and perspectives under his belt. The fantastical scenario making people misgender him is one thing, if disappointing, but please don’t start dragging actual IRL transphobic nonsense into this.
That’s a unique take on the situation. Most people seem to be of the opinion that either your gender matches what you were born as or it is what you identify as – in either case, Kass would be male. You appear to be suggesting that surgery (which is what Kass received, albeit of a magical – or at least sufficiently-advanced technological – nature) can outright change a person’s gender, which neither of the above seem to agree with (the former consider it a form of extreme self-mutilation, the latter consider it a method of making your body more closely match your mind).
“Male” is a term referring to an organism’s physical sex. Kass was male, and is now female, having undergone a sex change – similar to those experienced by certain snails, which start as male but become female, or clown fish where the dominant member of a group is female.
In OOP’s universe it is clearly possible for magic (or sufficiently advanced science) to change a person’s sex – indeed, the fact that this has happened and the resulting highlighting of a distinction between sex and gender is an essential part of the work. We have not yet seen Kass produce an egg (Ran’s psychological meddling notwithstanding) but the secondary sexual characteristics all suggest it would be possible.
“Not a girl” is more open to being a reference to gender – specifically, femininity. Kass expresses a masculine gender, so is “acting as a man”. I don’t object to the description of Kass as a “trans man” – the addition makes it clear that gender, not sex, is being referred to – just “male”, which is factually incorrect.
It may be possible for a person’s gender (their social norms, behaviours and roles) to be changed by magic in the comic’s universe, but this has not been shown and is rather something that seems likely to happen naturally over time, through social interaction and personal development.
The species change which happened at the same time is separate and was disruptive in a different way; their combination has also had an impact, since the gender roles differ somewhat between species.
It it Kass’ mind or kass’ brain that’s male? All the memories are of Kass the male human. But without an MRI or better yet some sort of mind reading machine, we don’t know how many female thoughts their brain is giving their mind. Kass had a full on clam endorphin spike from being called pretty, was very embarrassed at their VA VA VA VOOM! reaction to seeing Elim shirtless, and I’m pretty sure those two have seen each other in less than that before. Kass definitely gets yinglet instincts, they’re probably going to get bits and pieces of female yinglet instincts at least. Some of those are going to mirror female human thoughts.
I don’t think its a situation we have a corollary for.
Kass may be in a unique situation where his mind (the software) is telling him he’s male but his brain (the hardware) is sending female signals.
He has the instincts of a yinglet: specifically he has the instincts of a FEMALE yinglet. He had an endorphin spike when the girls called him pretty, a va va va va VOOM! reaction to seeing Elims (impressive!) six pack (much to his embarrassment)
People like to pretend identity is on a deeper level like the soul or something, but if the brain is as deep as it goes then altering the brain alters identity. Kass’ brain has been altered to that of a female yinglet to some extent.
he also started gushing about baby yinglets. Giving the baby in trouble a hand is something I believe malehuman Kass would have done in a heart beat (probably with LESS trepidation and existential dread of oh crap am I a girl now?), but the gushing they catch themselves doing is definitely from their new body.
That’s almost certainly going on, and is a *huge* part of why so many trans people undergo hormone replacement therapy. From personal experience, the chemical changes in your brain ease the friction between your mind and body almost as much as, if not more than any physical changes. Kass catching himself gushing about the babies and freaking out about it is outwardly comedic, but almost certainly horrifying from his perspective. Of course, he’s got the one-two punch of cross-species and cross-sex clashing going on, and absolutely zero source of medical relief for either of them. Poor guy needs a therapist something fierce.
Yeah. I don’t think Vizlet realized until just now how bad this ordeal has been for Kass, who is still holding a LOT in. The matriarch better take it slow. There might be a nervous breakdown brewing.
Better get the clam-bucket ready.
I don’t think even Kass realizes how much the ordeal has messed him up. He’s referring to his body in a dissociated way like how trauma victims recount their experiences. And Vizlet is smart enough to notice this.
This. Like, as Matriarch it’s Vizlet’s responsibility to see to the emotional wellbeing of her girls, and even aside from the attack, she just realized that Kass is absolutely not confronting this on their own *at all*. She went easy on Kass last time on account of their being dangerously short on sleep and not in any kind of mental state to start dealing with it, but she’s been remiss in addressing the situation since then, and now Kass just got a brand new trauma to add to the already overstuffed trauma closet.
Yeah I think y’all are right. And Vizlet should take this as a cue that Kass needs her help. Not just right now, but generally, more attention.
Vislet has Matriarch duties to attend to, intrigue to deal with, a council to deal with, and generally no time for this sort of thing. But she also has lots of nice lady yinglets who might be able to help. Well, maybe not Lippie. But the rest of them. Time to invoke one of the ancient rituals of female-kind that transcends all boundaries of species: The Sleepover.
Judging by the looks on Vizlet’s face in panels 5 and 7, I’m thinking that playing with a female Yinglet’s
“Fat Bags” could be what stimulates the females into producing the eggs, Even if the female doesn’t have sex, Which means Kass could be in for a VERY! unpleasant surprise, And Vizlet knows it.
Based on other, more than likely not canon, side pictures done by Valsalia it seems more that Vizlet has breast envy rather than anything related to birth. Supported by her half-lidded “are you serious” look at the end. If it was something more serious I doubt she’d be so blase about the revelation.
It’s more that Kas is trying to play off being sexually assaulted as if it didn’t happen. Trauma is trauma, and it will reel it’s ugly head eventually, no matter how suppressed. Our dear Matriarch here is keenly aware of that and is deeply concerned.
Thats how I took it too. I read it as, “Oh sweet child, you were almost raped and assaulted. You need to address this or it can destroy you.”
Yep. Too, it’s a bit creep (not the person, the thought expressed) in our society that someone getting forcibly groped can still be mentally rewritten as “boob envy.” We make progress each decade, every year, year by year. We realize more and more about ourselves. Not too long ago, and if a person speaks w some of the older generation, a young woman speaking up about being “hit on” gets eyerolls and mutters of, “She’s just bragging” or “She thinks she’s all that.” Let’s keep moving forward. Ty for your response.
its also the response thats expected of men, something bad happens? “shut up and deal with it, stuff needs doing and we dont got time for you to cry about it, besides that kind of stuff cant happen to men”
That’s what I was thinking too… Like, Something like that happens to a woman- Every decent woman out there brings chocolate and sweets and blankets and plushies and “It’s okay girl, you take it easy and start the therapy whenever you’re ready.” and every decent guy out there is sharpening knives and cleaning guns going “Where are they?”
A guy has it happen to them? Nope, no one even bats an eye.
My thought is also that Vizlet might not be super-impressed at female secondary characteristics being dismissed as “useless fat-bags”, and more generally the dismissive treatment of females as helpless, screaming girls.
I don’t think this is actually the right interpretation, it’s probably more a combination of “sexual dysphoria” plus “feeling sorry that they feel they have to ‘man up’.” But I thought I’d mention it.
I had the same reaction.
I think its far more likely that Viz is just realizing how emotionally dead males are/make themselves/ are made that way by the world and whooo boy is that attitude not going to help them get through this.
Her reaction is to Kass’s plans to just get over it. Not anything Brakka did.
Just got to suck it up and not make the same mistakes next time.
As a male the entire universe is under your control. If the outcome was less than desired there must have been a mistake.
Of COURSE kass should have been able to yinglet fu three larger stronger attackers. The universe where a male is helpless against the whims of fate is simply inconceivable…
I don’t completely disagree, but I think you’re overstating it. Remember, Kass himself was drafted into his homeland’s army, knowing from the start that the war was hopeless, and deserted with Elim to escape the war, ending up a refugee in a foreign land. Kass has known a share of helplessness in the past, but not as much as an unarmed victim of gang assault does.
“I’m pretty used to gettin’ fecked over in ozher ways anyway, heh.” Yeah, Kass sees a parallel between getting drafted into a losing war for a corrupt government, being a refugee beholden to a foreign power, possibly doing some of the less-savory jobs working for House Ivenmoth, and also the whole “getting turned into a scav bitch” thing, to what very nearly happened to him at the hands (and other bits) of the exiles. But I think the point many are making here is that he is, in fact, responding to this the same way as he’s responded to all the others – man up, get over it, and try to find a way to rectify or at least make the most of the situation (for my previous examples, these would be deserting with Elim and fleeing to Val Salia, getting a job with House Ivenmoth to get some cash for himself and the other refugees, try a variety of methods – like recruiting Isher and later Yannit, as well as doing his best to excel at the jobs he’s assigned in hopes of being noticed – to get into the officer’s corps, and finally leveraging his unique situation into semi-promotions for his friends and better accommodations for his fellow refugees), which is very much the thing society expects Men to do.
Kass still thinks of himself as male human. Can’t say I’m surprised, but that seems to have inadvertently touched a nerve for Vizlet. Kass hasn’t been a yinglet for all that long, comparatively.
Remember when Vislet tried to talk over Kass, while ignoring how Kass felt, which led to the great smekining between zhem? Ya, Vislet can’t be talked over eizher when Kass is ignoring how she feels too. And zhat is kinda what Kass is doing, zhough instead of a smek, Kass needs a hug, which Vislet likely does not do to ozhers, minus in de breeding pen. But she has been around humani enouzh to know how humani need to be touched by ozhers when dey are hurting inside.
That may be part of it. I also wonder how much of it is Kass refusing to think in terms of being a victim and just accepting reality.
In this case it’s a psychological defense. Turning to the human-and-male identity because, right now, the female part is a screaming pile of Nope.
I suspect that Brakka’s position has just gone from ‘up shit creak without a paddle’ and progressed to ‘rough-water rafting down Shit River with a leaky boat and a wooden spoon.’ I don’t know what he did to get exiled, but this is the type of incident that gets a lynch mob formed: The entire enclave will have kill-on-sight orders, and scouts will scour the city looking for him. Yinglets are very protective of their females.
By now the best thing Brakka could do is take a new name and hide in the first non-yinglet caravan heading anywhere-but-here.
Dis, is kinda complicated. Kass can’t learn how to “boyfight” as it is against de rules. But Vislet is stuck wizh eizher asking Kass to live in de Enclave for Kass’s protection, just pretending the problem didn’t happen zhat a feemale got assaulted, or seriously starting a campaign to do somezhing about ValSalia’s yinglet outcast problem.
Kass may have zheir own ideas about what needs to happen, but de stress of not having Elim by zheir side is really starting to tell. For a soldier, one needs a mission, a purpose, a goal to work for, and Kass just don’t have more zhan writing down what it is like being a yinglet zo zhat de Drinnish get treated better.
Zo, it is zhat, I zhink. Kass needs a mission to accomplish, zo to stop zhinking about bad stuffs, and goodness knows zhat de “Voices” in our heads are bad enough wizhout added trauma. I can only imagine de willpower Kass has to not just give in to ze stupid zhoughts dat bounce around in our heads.
Kass probably could learn to fight – the usual social rules can bend for her, given her (utterly fake) origin story. But it wouldn’t do much good: Even a combat-trained yinglet is still a yinglet, and pretty much useless when fighting alone. Their strength is in numbers. It might makes her feel a lot better though.
Once the comforting and empathy is done, Vislet could actually use this to her advantage. Doubly so. First, it would give her a justification to reform the exile system, or lean on the patriarchs to do the same: It doesn’t work. Worse, all those emotionally-unstable, impoverished yinglet exiles are ruining the reputation of the whole species! Secondly, she can make a serious effort to find Brakka without tipping off Narklet as to her awareness of the cloak-and-dagger around Zhat Zhing. As far as everyone else is concerned it’s a simple yinglet-hunt for a criminal who has committed a major crime.
Hard part might be getting Brakka alone to interrogate before he ends up torn into pieces.
Much has been said about how awful Brakka was/is, zhat he assaulted an innocent Ying Laydee and her friend, Elim. And it was awful.
However, for most yinglets, dey get interaction with humani on de regular. Being kicked is common, us flying zhough de air, clutching our injured chests and bellies. Yinglets are often treated as the lowest of de low by humani, and in no way are de outcasts doing more zhan reinforcing how Humani already feel about us.
If it was not for de Trademaster, de Humans would have eliminated de Valsalian Enclave, and de outcasts as well. It was only de Trademaster’s edict zhat gave Yinglets any legal standing as sentient beings. And dat only goes zo far as his ability to enforece his will on ozhers goes.
Zhis is expressed in dere being no humani besides de Trademaster, and maybe Elim, zhat likes being around yinglets. Zhat no matter how low status a humani may be, dere are no Humani willing to live in de enclave. I zhink dis is sad, but it has to be some of de pain Vislet is showing here, dat being abused and treated horribly is part of what it means to be a yinglet, zhough she is trying desperately to change dis, for herself, and her children’s futures too. Kass needs to see it, zhat as bad as de Drinnish had it, zhe Yinglets are as worthy of help, and in even more need of it.
One part of this I often wonder about: could a human be accepted in a yinglet enclave? Maybe in the Val Salian enclave, maybe. But didn’t the recent culture update mention some xenophobic tendencies among yingledom? It may be as difficult for a human to join an enclave (if not more so down south) than for a yinglet to be respected in the city.
On another note, many humans do either enjoy the company of yinglets or are at least indifferent to them The gate guard during Vizlet’s recent visit comes to mind. His quick and impassioned defense of Vizlet, as well as easy offer of an honor guard for her suggesta he is not acting merely on orders, but also respects/likes the yinglets in general.
It may not be the majority opinion of folks, but it’s hardly unheard of to enjoy their company.
Could a humani be accepted into an enclave? Well, bring clams, and find out! :3
For Valsalia, it may be somewhat different as dere has been years since de decree giving yinglets personhood legally. But Yinglets do yinglet zhings, humans still do human zhings. De oracle of bakersroof doesn’t sell baked goods to humani for instance. Guards having been hand picked to be accomidating for yinglets going to and fro would be supportive of zhem, it would not only be career suicide not to be zo, but in time dey would get to know de locals, like any officer doing zheir job should.
As for de common humani, de ones zhat do more zhan kick or begrudgingly tolerate us, mostly treat us as pets. If by enjoying us, you mean how Ran played dress-up wizh Lopin, ya, zhat’s depressingly common. Zhat dere is a lot of Yings zhat love being treated zo? Well it does not help our cause much overall.
And of course, zhere is de depraved ones in eizher camp. De less said about zhem, de happier we will bozh be, minus to say zhat dere has not been a relationship where a male yinglet brought a human home to de enclave in a romantic way zhat I know of. Interspecies zhings are weighted for de humani side. Zo much for equality, eh? I even feel for poor Isher, she could use a yinglet in her life, zhe way humans treat her too.
You’re not wrong.
I guess I just choose to be hopeful and see the positives.
Weh ..
I see hope. We are so, so close to emerging as a people we can be proud of. But would I give zhat zhing to Isher so she could feel loved and accepted in a community where she didn’t stand out (anymore zhan Poak does at least)? Yeah, in a heartbeat.
For zhe hope zhing, Kass does not see her own potential, stuck wishing for de past. And until Elim gets better, I don’t know if Kass will move forward. Seeing her best friend wizh a Yinglet stabknife sticking out of him likely didn’t help Kass accept being a yinglet after all. *whines*
I can’t see a human being /fully/ accepted, but there may well be some humans who visit the enclave often enough to made welcome there when they do come over. Not many though: Most yinglet enclaves seem pretty isolationist. Val Salia is an exception, and Vislet has to navigate some difficult political waters just to keep it that way. If she went so far as to introduce formal education, that would be too risky.
Sweet lord this got pretty dark real fast…
Yeah it did. In my opinion, this is one of those scenes that sets OOPs apart from other web comics: the characters have a depth of thought, emotion, and expression that rings true to life. Human or not, they feel like real people, not staged actors going through their paces in service of the narrator’s goals. I’m honestly amazed, at times, how well the dialogue is written, and I’ve read my share of serious novels and plays. You won’t find many writers who can put so much real soul into their characters.
oooh… that that look cuts deep in a sobering way.
Consider the following: Brakka and Vizlet share a few appearance quirks that I haven’t really noticed in other yinglets. We also just had a sizable arc discussing how sometimes a younglet will have a lot of the appearance and mannerisms of one parent, and this isn’t restricted between male/female. In short, there’s a very good chance Brakka is one of hers. Makes her exasperation with him over his behavior and exile even more on the nose. To take this even further, remember that he has an extremely cynical view on the derpiness of his species. We now easily have a situation set up where not only is he Vizlet’s son, but one that she fostered in particular to be smarter than the average yinglet in line with her aspirations. Somewhere, it all went wrong and he grew up jaded and bitter. And THIS, is the outcome she now has on her shoulders.
Wow, that makes this whole situation many more layers of worse if true since that implies that not only is she indirectly responsible (or at least she might feel so) for the situation at hand but everything that has lead up to this point too. honestly props I did not think a single comment could make this situation feel more coldly discomforting but I stand thoroughly corrected. bravo
Me thinks Kass needs to practice his soldier skills again, It is different being a stick rat after all. Also Vizlet needs to stop thinking of Kass as a smart yinglet, he will never be a yinglet born and raised.
Now go give Elim a hug!
Oooooh. Making waiting on the next page extra painful.
Kass needs self-defense training, and Kattajak might be the person to provide it.
Maybe… or maybe not. Kattajak’s methods seem like they may be largely instinctual, and draw extensively on his own innate bloodlust. Kattajak is a person who revels in the hunt, the fight, and the kill – I assume Zeska was the same, and so is Zally. That is not Kass – or Elim for that matter. They are both highly-skilled (although Kass largely has the wrong skillset for his body… then again, had the others not shown up, he probably would have killed Brakka by himself), and entirely willing to kill when necessary, but they very much do not enjoy it. So Kattajak’s training might not click for Kass… although observing him and Zally sparring might be informative for Kass to develop his own methods (like how he now presumably knows how to throw a punch as a yinglet, after observing Brakka punching him in the face – “So zat’s how you’re supposed to his wizh zhese stupid little arms”).
I don’t think Yinglets have self-defence. The concept doesn’t work for them. In any fight, an individual yinglet is pathetically weak. Even one with exceptionally good training wouldn’t win a fair fight against a moderately-experienced human. Yinglet defense is all about the group, and any training would reflect that. No lone yinglet would ever willingly enter a dangerous situation.
Someone attacking you? Then don’t fight – run away. And come back with six more yinglets.
Yinglets do practice martial arts, de spear dance among ozhers. Running away for us on our pazhetic stick-legs from a human really isn’t a good idea, even if we are faster in de short term, de humani have endurance. Unless we can hide and get out of sight, running don’t work, zhough our instinct is just to run. It takes practice being a hunter to not run away from what scares us.
As for who needs to teach Kass Ying-fu it is fairly obvious zhat Vislet would know about Zally’s training and abilities. She might want in on some of it herself, seeing how if zhings go zhouth wizh de council, Vislet may have to defend herself against some of her own people, gender roles be dammed. Zally would be the one to teach de ozher feemales, she is de only one who could, but not cause a uproar over a male teaching forbidden boyfighting to a feemale.
Started rereading the comic, and found some interesting parallels between the first page and this. Elim talking about hi wKass is already back on his feet, seemingly, but probably hasn’t had the situation set in yet.
We are definitely dealing with a similar delayed reaction here, with Kass not yet able to really process the assault. I hope it goes a little better than him waking up screaming again, and going into full meltdown…
It’s a shame Vizlet can’t stay to help him when this inevitably crashes down.
She kind of could, if you reverse that. Kass is formally employed as diplomat, after all – she doesn’t need much of an excuse to meet. All Vislet needs to do is extend an invitation to discuss something-or-other, find a suitably quiet location and order a bucket of clams. Then they can spend a few hours together to help Kass deal with things. Private meetings are diplomat business, and no-one needs to know if they are there to discuss trade relations or deal with personal issues while getting smashed on molluscs. They might even be able to discuss actual diplomatic matters.
Yay! A new Learn to Live Yinglet comic dropped today!
Boo! I can’t look at it, because: “This deviation has been labeled as containing themes not suitable for all deviants.”
Maaan!
It’s, uuh… I’ve criticized DA’s use of that labeling before, but it actually applies in this case.
1. Kass definitely seems to be having significant gender dysphoria – particular recent events include this page, and the one where he asks the elevator guard to call him ‘sir’.
2. Have there been transgender yinglets before?
3. Was it Zeska?
Zeska… one ofs Patriarch Kattajak’s daughterz… and za Bandit Queen ofs za Runs-Awayz!
*blink blink*
Errr… Whos I knowz nozhinks abouts. Nozhinks! O_o
Test Test am I banned here? Posting dead in Chrome trying FF now.