Hey, How're You Doing? Hope You're Well.

hey, how're you doing? hope you're well.

i scrolled through the mtau tag and saw the thing about secondary sex characteristics in skeletons (both in general and in cross' case): about how they have 'marks' around their eyes which is usually seen as a "female" characteristic for skeletons... that got me super intrigued. i love the thing abt monsters having much freer sex and gender expressions, makes a lot of sense, with the souls and all, but it did get me thinking...

if skeletons can be categorized into seperate sexes at all, then

a) how does that work if they don't have genitalia (just bones)? do they categorize skeletons into male/female/other based on the markings and that's it? so, skeletons would then define sexes not based primarily on genitalia, like humans, but based primarily on eye markings or lack thereof. and in the case of ecto-bodies, because from what i've gathered they can summon genitals with their ecto,

b) you said most monsters are hermaphroditic to begin with; are skeletons one of those? if so, how does sex categorization work in that case? and if they don't have 'both' parts by default, are they just stuck with specific junk that "aligns" with what they'd be categorized as? (so, basically how humans tend to do it)

additional questions: would the last question being correct imply that intersex monsters exist?? additionally, bcs i must ask, can skeletons "choose" what junk they'll have when they summon their ecto bodies, or is that more of a "you get what you got" kinda deal? (the glossary does say that monsters are much more malleable physiologically, because mana and all...)

srry if this is kind of rambly, i guess my point is, i'm loving this and i especiqlly wanna know how cross' transgenderism would work. if monsters as a society are generally very open and less rigorous than humans, and not only that, but also physically much less "black and white" [through some humans' lens]... then what does "being trans" mean for a monster? for a skeleton?

if any of this is spoilers or you don't have it figured out yet feel free to leave it out. but i love that you made cross being trans canon to your story and i'd love to know how you go about the whole cis/transgender concepts based off the rules you've set for your world. i'm super autistic about your autismtic love-project

have a fantastic day. also if i had money i'd give you a bunch. stay safe

wow! i have to say i've been feeling really crummy these past few weeks, so opening tumblr to see this ask really made my day. sorry for the delay in answering it -- you gave me a lot to think about xD

as usual, for a longer ask like this i'll break out the proper formatting:

1: How are skeleton monsters categorized into sexes at birth if (a): they have no visible genitalia and (b): hermaphroditic is default?

Typically, monsters are not gendered for the first few years of their lives -- even if they, like Cross*, are born with "secondary sex" features like "feminine markings". I went over this a bit in another post talking about markings, but most monsters default to "it" (or sometimes "they"**) when uncertain of someone's gender. *Cross is from a very atypical universe, and his dad kind of worships humanity as the standard, hence him being assigned female based on his markings. Such practices are not the norm. Typically, a monster will start experimenting with gender presentation around 4 or 5 years old, depending on their lifespan, and probably decide on something permanent around 8 or 9 -- until such a decision is reached and announced, neutral is default. **For monsters, being "dehumanized" isn't usually a negative thing. It's more typical to use "it" for very un-humanoid monsters like rocks or slimes and "they" for more humanoid ones like goats or skeletons, hence why monsters defaulted to "they" for Frisk and Chara, but might use "it" elsewhere. It's just a cultural thing.

2: (Clarification) Are skeleton monsters hermaphroditic by default?

Yes, in most universes. Some AUs will see monsters in general with more human-aligned sex characteristics, skeletons included.

3: Can skeleton monsters choose what genitalia they will have when forming an ecto body, or are they "stuck" with their default?

First, being able to form and maintain a fullbody ecto construct is more of a boss monster thing than a skeleton monster thing -- it just so happens that in most universes, Sans and Papyrus are the only skeleton monsters left alive, and they are both bosses, yes. I say this to clarify that not all skeletons are bosses by default, so not all skeletons would be able to form full genitals or bodies at all. Second -- most of the time, yes, a mature boss monster will have enough control to choose the genitalia that will form! This depends on the boss and the AU, though; one from one of the more human-aligned AUs mentioned above may not be able to choose, but that isn't really the norm. Most can. It's just a matter of preference... and maybe magical skill and mana production. Ecto can be a bit tricky.

4: Can intersex monsters exist?

The current definition of "intersex" from what I could find, according to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, is presenting sex characteristics that "do not fit typical binary notions of male or female bodies". It's more complicated than that, and I'll get into that in a second, but TLDR; in order to be intersex, there must be a binary -- so since most universes don't see monsterkind adhering to a strict binary, in most AUs there would therefore be no intersex monsters. (Not because mixed sex characteristics cannot exist in monsters, but because monsters don't care to differentiate someone because of that.) The complexity I mentioned earlier is this: the difference between "intersex" and "hermaphrodite". Hermaphrodite is basically having a fully functional set of "both" genitals, where intersex is having a mixed set of characteristics that aren't necessarily each capable of reproduction. (Not that the intersex person cannot reproduce, but that they cannot both impregnate someone else and they themselves carry a pregnancy -- just one or the other.) A monster is, by default, capable of both insemination and carrying a pregnancy, so to be intersex would be to imply that they somehow had a SOUL incapable of doing one method of reproduction, which shows up sometimes in some universes but very much isn't the norm. Furthermore, things get more complex here when you consider that monsters don't typically use their genitals for reproduction in the first place -- given that humans base the idea of "sex" (and therefore the concept of being intersex) entirely on genitals, it's difficult to say whether or not a monster could qualify.

5: How does Cross being trans work? How does being trans work for skeletons in general, or even for monsters as a whole?

I covered this a little bit in question 1, but to reiterate: Cross is from a very atypical universe, and his father based a lot of that AU on human customs. Cross' experience with being trans is therefore very similar to what a human would experience -- his father decided he was a woman based on some arbitrary bullshit (in this case, face markings that are typically only seen on female-presenting skeletons), Cross got old enough to realize that was wrong and started fighting it, and despite his dad wanting to throw the mother of all pissy fits to get him to conform, he ultimately had more urgent matters (everything with the X Event) to attend to and therefore Cross "got away with it" long enough to get out of there. As for other monsters, though, it's... different. I don't think most monsters really have the concept of being trans -- the closest are probably ghost monsters, but even then the similarities are mostly allegorical. That's not to say that monsters don't ever transition between genders, just that for them, doing so isn't a big enough deal to even blip the radar; not everyone is right about everything they decide on at 8 or 9 years old, after all, so if later someone decides to start wearing dresses and makeup and go by a different name, that's really the end of it. Everyone switches and moves on. To make a better comparison to the social significance I'm talking about, it's like if someone dressed exclusively in White Girl Fall Fashion for a few years and then suddenly switched to, like, Camo -- people will probably notice that, and some might even ask about it, but ultimately, like, who cares that they're wearing camo now? (For example, I think in a lot of universes Alphys is a trans woman; Toby originally designed her as a man and just added eyelashes to change her design into a woman. I just don't think that would be a big enough blip on anyone's radar to even really be a talking point. Just like -- "Oh yeah, I heard the royal scientist is a woman now. I sure hope her experiment goes well so I can see my family soon!) I think whether or not a monster even knew what "trans" was would probably generally depend on if they were from a Post-Emergence timeline and how long they spent on the surface around humans, or else how deeply that human culture seeped into the Underground via the dump (and how that particular human culture viewed transness.) For example, I don't think Horror or Dust really know much about it (or care), Nightmare knows of it but cares even less than most monsters do, but Killer's crossdressing is a bit more consciously subvertive because he's from Saudi Arabia (which historically does not have the best views towards queer people, to put it gently), and Cross is the only one who has a really "human" view on sex/gender. (Aside from Abaddon now, obviously xD) I think you could maybe consider Killer some flavor of transfemm/genderqueer, but I wouldn't personally know what to label him given that he defaults to masculine pronouns and presentation. But for most skeletons I have to say it's pretty much the same as any other monster; they might change presentation at any time or have any mix of "typical" sex characteristics, but ultimately if they say to call them "he" then you know that's what's correct. And it's not really a huge deal; monsters don't really fixate on that kind of thing.

anyway, i really love getting asks like this, so thank you so much! i'm super flattered that you like my world qwq