and to this i will say again that the story does not exist in a vacuum and is not infallible. the author has biases and makes decisions in the context of persistent, institutional transmisogyny in her environment.

last edited at Dec 16, 2025 10:55AM

and to this i will say again that the story does not exist in a vacuum and is not infallible. the author has biases and makes decisions in the context of persistent, institutional transmisogyny in her environment.

So the argument is that if an author chooses to write about a crossdressing boy, that is necessarily an attack or admission of cowardice? Does that only apply to certain authors? And where does that leave genuine crossdressing men who are also in the minority and even here, being overlooked? I'm also surprised we've so quickly jumped to assuming negative things about the author because a character might not express themselves in the way we want. There are two marginalized and ridiculed groups here, not one. This discussion sort of mirrors the earlier posters comment about Xiaoen's behavior towards Xiaoyang and how their both having struggles seems to pit them against each other at times, as though it's a case of "them or me."

last edited at Dec 16, 2025 11:06AM

Popping in to say, falling outside of gender stereotypes is not a trans make. Nor is liking clothing/activities associated with the opposite sex. There's been gender non-conforming people in every country, all throughout time. Not all are "eggs", and not every representation of them is an anti-trans dog whistle. I guess I get the confusion, there's a lot of focus put on the strain on his family life. But that's not a trans exclusive issue in a hyper-traditional family and culture like his. People get disowned not just for being gay or trans, there's a strong emphasis on filial piety. Not getting married (or choosing an unsuitable partner), not studying hard and choosing a career that can support your parent's retirement... hell, being born a girl was considered enough at some points in history. His parents EXPLICITLY wanted a son, for some pretty sexist reasons. That's how he even got there. Then, he wasn't what they bargained for. The conflict works either way! Idk what the author really intended with this character, but I do know I miss the plot being about the main couple...

my poor oppressed femboys!

no. there is no attack in simply stating the fact that the vast vast majority of cisgender people have unconscious bias against trans women and against transness in general. the argument is that the author is, for the time being, reinforcing a kind of narrative about gender and transfemininity that folds into this unconscious bias, which is affecting the decisions the author is making about the story, and these decisions are frankly, irresponsible.

I don't think this author is transphobic.

Popping in to say, falling outside of gender stereotypes is not a trans make. Nor is liking clothing/activities associated with the opposite sex. There's been gender non-conforming people in every country, all throughout time. Not all are "eggs", and not every representation of them is an anti-trans dog whistle. I guess I get the confusion, there's a lot of focus put on the strain on his family life. But that's not a trans exclusive issue in a hyper-traditional family and culture like his. People get disowned not just for being gay or trans, there's a strong emphasis on filial piety. Not getting married (or choosing an unsuitable partner), not studying hard and choosing a career that can support your parent's retirement... hell, being born a girl was considered enough at some points in history. His parents EXPLICITLY wanted a son, for some pretty sexist reasons. That's how he even got there. Then, he wasn't what they bargained for. The conflict works either way! Idk what the author really intended with this character, but I do know I miss the plot being about the main couple...

There's so many different aspects to identity out there and nuances, plus different perspectives and views on the wording and how the words are used. Along with various things that are hard to describe with words.

my poor oppressed femboys!

That's lovely, ironic and doesn't really respond to what I was saying. Anyway that's all I'll say on this.

Popping in to say, falling outside of gender stereotypes is not a trans make. Nor is liking clothing/activities associated with the opposite sex. There's been gender non-conforming people in every country, all throughout time. Not all are "eggs", and not every representation of them is an anti-trans dog whistle. I guess I get the confusion, there's a lot of focus put on the strain on his family life. But that's not a trans exclusive issue in a hyper-traditional family and culture like his. People get disowned not just for being gay or trans, there's a strong emphasis on filial piety. Not getting married (or choosing an unsuitable partner), not studying hard and choosing a career that can support your parent's retirement... hell, being born a girl was considered enough at some points in history. His parents EXPLICITLY wanted a son, for some pretty sexist reasons. That's how he even got there. Then, he wasn't what they bargained for. The conflict works either way! Idk what the author really intended with this character, but I do know I miss the plot being about the main couple...

I agree with this; experiences can and are often shared but the conclusion is not always the same. No issues with how Xiaoyang decides to present but I'm not going to assume or decide for Xiaoyang or any person (fictional or not). If things change, they change (my memory is they don't change and the TL said as much but we'll see). I also agree that it works either way, based on the setup and how the family would treat Xiaoyang.

As for the MCs, Xiaoyang is my favorite character in the series so I'm biased about these batch of chapters. I feel like a lot of the core themes of the series about freedom of expression, love but constraints of family, obligations, growing up and the refuge that is Peach Town are all part of the Xiaoyang and Xiaoen sibling experience. It does leave our tall friend out a bit though.

last edited at Dec 16, 2025 2:21PM

As a dude who has always loved to have long hair (and had it cut as a child against his will too often), that haircut scene really went straight to and through the heart...

they dont get to skip over trans fem identities and go straight for more nuanced and complex identities and expressions when there is such a lack of explicitly trans fem characters. whether yall want to acknowledge it or not, leaving it ambiguous and refusing to explicitly name things either way, does oversimplify and does erase transness of all varieties. we simply are not at the place where cis authors and cis audiences can thoughtlessly play touys with far more nuanced trans identities than either party wants to honestly address.

it does simply become a bit wearisome when so many authors choose to write heavily trans-coded narratives and then continually fall back on "cis person who likes to crossdress" or other relative ambiguities. there's a million and one of the latter (including when it's mapped onto a character that displays transfemininity or explicitly mentions not liking being x gender) but hardly any explicit trans characters in public consciousness. even more wearisome when something that does explicitly have a trans character gets hit with the axe or endlessly debated on anyways on how it "isn't actually trans". breaking gender norms is entirely valid and i fully support it, but i feel people forget or don't acknowledge that transness is by default breaking norms too!

to note that i have been enjoying this story quite a lot in every other aspect, top notch yuri and small town story stuff, really, just felt like offering my piece on that. very cute haircut, and bags of bricks for dad

Born to be Miku, forced into cishet.

My little goblin deserves better.

they dont get to skip over trans fem identities and go straight for more nuanced and complex identities and expressions when there is such a lack of explicitly trans fem characters. whether yall want to acknowledge it or not, leaving it ambiguous and refusing to explicitly name things either way, does oversimplify and does erase transness of all varieties. we simply are not at the place where cis authors and cis audiences can thoughtlessly play touys with far more nuanced trans identities than either party wants to honestly address.

Im not sure i follow you, friend. Im trans so just from my experience, i think it's beautiful if a story can depict messy nuance. In this sense, gender exploration, even if they dont explicitly name the gender identity. I imagine in this small town rural, conservative setting, they might not even have words for these experiences, much less be able to talk openly about it. Now Im curious about Tracy Hu's, the author, background in China and what she grew up knowing about gender variance. Hmm. Cool to wonder!

I think it's cool to show nuance, and doesn't erase us? I think it shows a harsh reality that isn't always pleasant, though oddly tangential to the main plot. Idk if they are calling the kid a crossdresser or just giving them the opportunity to safely, quietly explore gender expression for the first time. Perhaps the kid may be a transwoman in the future, and crossdressing is more socially accepted there. Who knows. I hear you that it's frustrating how little accuracte mtf trans media there is. I hope the author gives us just a bit more clarity on their gender, since theyve made it such a big deal for the plot, ya know? But over all i think it's still okay to live in nuance here, considering sociocultural backgrounds, and general messiness of life. It took me many year of exploration to get to a definitive point.

But also, I might be misunderstanding your point altogether? Anyway. Storytelling is a dope medium to display some true and some madeup parts of life. Glad transness made it onto the radar. Curious to see how the author navigates us back to our main characters in sweet yuri love. They need to finally shack up and date and smooch plsss.

last edited at Dec 17, 2025 2:52AM

all crossdressing boys won't be boys when i'm done with them

After that opening, seeing Xiaoyang happy with the hair and outfit, just left me in tears!

I think the issue kind of boils down to trends and what's considered acceptable to depict. There's a lot more comics with ambiguous gender characters or "crossdressing" guys that are constantly playing in the space of transfem identities, yet deny that label for making the character "just" a crossdressing guy. And Xiaoyang is ABSOLUTELY dealing with transfem themes and spaces beyond just clothes, but in Xiaoyang entire presentation and troubles, with the exception of gendered language. And that just... with a trend of characters like this, but with the work trying to make sure the audience knows they're "really male" and "just crossdressing", it really starts to leave a sour taste every time it happens and a character isn't acknowledged as trans (not necessarily a trans woman, but transfem in SOME way be it genderfuild, agender, some other non-binary identity)

I like Xiaoyang. I like what the story is doing with the parallels between Xiaoyang and Xiaoen and how it ties into the larger themes and narratives of the comic. But Xiaoyang is part of a trend that is lowkey transmisogynistic, because it's a trend that combined with the lack of explicit transfem (and trans women especially) representation, that softly reinforces transfem erasure - intended or not.

Guys, it doesn't have to be a fight. Femboys and trans girls are both things, the whole point of acknowledging the gender spectrum is that there are lots of possibilities and the lines between them aren't always clear cut. And in real life, people don't always know right away how they feel about themselves!

Yes, Xiaoyang uses male gendered pronouns/descriptors. But it is also true that people who are actually trans often use masculine pronouns and terms for themselves, either because abandoning those words is another stage of coming out that they aren't ready for, or because they are trying to mask/socially conform, or because they just haven't thought about that issue in that way yet. And yes, the haircut scene very strongly implies that they are experiencing gender euphoria at seeing themselves with a gendered haircut. But it could also be that they're just pleased to be able to express themselves the way they want without being judged. The whole point of gender identity is that it's their choice. Until that choice is made explicit, we don't actually know what's in the character's head.

I see this all the time in media: People get really hung up on THIS THING MEANS THIS AND NOT THAT and they end up getting mad when the story goes the other way. It comes up a LOT when the prospect of a character being bi comes up, and it also comes up when a character is trans-coded. People seem to really just rankle against ambiguity. But ambiguity is common in life, you should get used to it.

The fact that Xiaoyang's gender identity isn't explicitly laid out isn't a flaw or a shortcoming of the story. At the very least it's jumping the gun to say so. We don't know the whole story yet. They are a gender-nonconforming person where the simple fact that they are gender-nonconforming in any sense is incredibly frowned upon. Hell, not too long ago, Gramma was talking about chucking babies into the river because they weren't boys, how do you think that is going to influence the coming out of girls who have "boy-parts"? I suspect it wouldn't have made Xiaoyang feel confident about expressing a feminine gender identity, at least. Maybe that's part of the journey, and there's a scene coming where they change the pronouns they use, or start calling themselves grant-aunt or whatever. We won't know until it happens. But it is also possible that they fall somewhere else on the gender spectrum, and those people also exist.

I get it, transphobes love to scream from the rooftops "Bridget is a femboy, not a trans girl!" but the difference between that situation and this one is that Bridget DID explicitly identify as a girl, so the backlash is transphobic. That hasn't happened here, and calling the story "transmisogynistic" when we don't even know yet what the story is? That isn't helpful, either for literary analysis or proselytizing trans issues.

I like the story so far! Hope the next one comes soon!

Great points all around (in the manhua, I'm not addressing the comments above). I will say it's much harder to make those choices without a community to support you. It makes me admire Mu Xiaoen even more. Like, girl really built that community.

Man, there was a certain line that sure did hurt :')
Also, I'm rooting for the dude, hope he can slap some senses in his dad (literally would be very fine).
Thanks for the chapter!

Damn, that style change is hot.

And I liked the chapter. The previous ones showed that you can't do anytime about an environment trying to crush you. "Just change" isn't easy when you have nowhere to go after your parents and community kick you out.

But Mu Xiaoen did make a place for Xioyang to go, and a way out. Often that's the first thing that's needed to find the strength to escape an abusive place.

I still don't fully buy Shi Xingyuan's message that you "have to fight for your freedom", or the general idea that you should just leave someone like Xioyang's dad do whatever they want because it's "not your problem". Queerphobia should be fought against, not left to ruin other people's lives while people who know it's wrong watch silently.

But giving those who need it a place to go is at least equally important, and no one can fight every fight, so what Xiaoen did is great.

And screw you too, dad.

Letssss goooo gurlll smack that shit out of that homophobic trashy dickhead. Alsoooo daymmm that talk is so deep the way she explain her bae's side, that level of knowingness and understanding about her bae made me cry sooo touching shit my kokoro cannot.ToT

Damnn I love the idea of "if you do not belong, then build your own" even if you're scared, do it scared.

I still don't fully buy Shi Xingyuan's message that you "have to fight for your freedom", or the general idea that you should just leave someone like Xioyang's dad do whatever they want because it's "not your problem". Queerphobia should be fought against, not left to ruin other people's lives while people who know it's wrong watch silently.

Dear dad's homophobia is a feature of his stubborn patriarchal convictions, not a bug. Curing that part will not make him any less unpleasant to the people that trigger his bigotry.

"but being a girl has never been easy" oh shit are we going there. please tell me we're going there.

Peachtown will save the world