Thirty Days - Day Six

Day 6 – When you write, do you prefer writing male or female characters?

Short answer: I don't have a preference. I've been writing long enough that it's not difficult for me to slip into the mind of a character of either gender to write them.

Longer answer: In the past, I tended towards roleplaying male characters, despite being female myself. In my stories, genders have always been pretty well balanced. Sometimes it feels more challenging to keep a female character from veering toward Mary Sue cliches, though, and I think in the past, when I was less confident about myself, I drifted toward the male characters so no one would think I was projecting myself or playing out a fantasy. This was especially the case back when I was active in Thundercats fandom about ten years ago, and ran into too-many-for-my-comfort-zone people who assumed that fiction/roleplay = real life, and my willingness to RP or write explicit sex meant that I was writing my sex life or fantasies on the internet.

As time passed, I got over that, and now I'm just as comfortable writing from either point of view. (It also helps that I don't give creepy people the opportunity to talk to me and squick me out anymore. I only chat in real time with people I've gotten to know in online communities I frequent.)

At first glance, it seems that males dominate the top slots of favorite characters of mine, but it's not really a gender thing. I like a lot of female characters as well. Cheetara, Merla, Haggar, Romelle, and Larmina are all canon female characters I enjoy writing. In the DWD fandom, I roleplayed Sarah Bellum and Loopy McQuack for some time and had a blast, and I also enjoy writing Rhoda Dendron as well. Sometimes I worry that people may think I project through Rhoda or Sarah, being that they're both scientists and I worked as one for many years, but then I tell my paranoia to shut up and say I just find them easier to identify with, much like I do Bushroot, because of that common background.

When it comes to OCs I've put a lot of time and energy into, I've got a good balance of both male and female, so I don't think there's a bias there, either.