However, it's important to remember that we as a society and the medical community have definitions for what it means to be trans,

If we are to take this forum thread as a representative sample, it appears society is in near-unanimous agreement that Hikaru is a trans woman.

If there was a consensus this forum thread wouldn't be 7 pages long and filled to the brim with people disagreeing

I'm not defining what it means to be trans and it wasn't my intention to deny the journey or experiences of anyone. However, it's important to remember that we as a society and the medical community have definitions for what it means to be trans,

"I'm not defining what it means to be trans. That said, here's a definition of what it means to be trans: whatever a bunch of cis doctors think."

The character doesn't show a desire to be a woman in those panels, again it's idealization.

The character's ideal self is a beautiful girl, which means the character wants their self to be a beautiful girl. As a comparison: "NBA players are so cool" is idealization; "My ideal self is an NBA player" is wanting to be an NBA player. The protagonist just doesn't think it's possible for them to be a girl due to internalized transphobia. But the desire is blatantly there.

Without noticing you agreed with me . Wanting to be like an NBA player isn't the same as wanting to be another individual or change identity, it just means that you want to express yourself and look like an idealization.
His ideal is a beautiful fictional girl, not a girl. He doesn't want to be a girl, he wants to be a pure attractive female character who exists in a cute world and enjoy all the perks of being cute and maidenly. It's not a matter of identity, but expression

Being a woman is different from being a manga heroine.

The people arguing that the protagonist of this manga is not a (trans) girl have resorted to arguing that no manga character is a woman. Truly this thread has produced heretofore unseen wonders.

That's not my point. I'm saying that wanting to be recognized as a woman, biologically, psychologically and socially is different from wanting to be a idealized fictional figure.
A girl who wants to be Superman doesn't want to be a man, but the fictional superhero

Your comments remind me of the webtoon I Want To Be A Cute Anime Girl where the main character initially insists that she does not want to be a girl, just an anime girl.

Jokes aside, the closest I get to sympathizing with the plausibly-deniable haters on here is that I'm really not into forcefem stories in general. I suppose by the strictest definition, though, this is one -- and the MC being broadly deeply in favor of those changes right from the get-go helps a lot in making it palatable, rather than it coming off like slow torture the MC begrudgingly accepts over time (so, yeah, not a hard guess where I sit on the cis-trans scale here).

Well, there is a strain of forced feminization stories that are created by trans women. The protagonists in these are often trans girls/women (initially) in denial. (I like the one that's about how the feminizing torture basement provides better transition care than the UK's National Health Service, though that one is considered a "deconstruction".)

While a nice webtoon, I don't think we can use it as a guide for what it means to be trans. We can end up reinforcing gender norms or limiting gender exploration. If being trans becomes something related not to the internal identity of an individual, but instead to their tastes and preferred forms of expression, then we would need to say that some ways of being are less and more feminine/masculine,and I don't think anyone here or anywhere else wants to do after we spent so much time arguing and showing that gender is a construct.

Being a woman is different from being a manga heroine.

The people arguing that the protagonist of this manga is not a (trans) girl have resorted to arguing that no manga character is a woman. Truly this thread has produced heretofore unseen wonders.

That's not my point. I'm saying that wanting to be recognized as a woman, biologically, psychologically and socially is different from wanting to be a idealized fictional figure.
A girl who wants to be Superman doesn't want to be a man, but the fictional superhero

Jhonathan, are you transfem? Because if not, I ask that you don't argue with transfems about what it means to be a trans woman. For the record, "wanting to be an idealized fictional figure" is extremely often the precursor to wanting to be a woman biologically and/or socially (I have no idea what you might mean by "psychologically a woman"). There's an entire webtoon about this even. Furthermore, your point is completely irrelevant because the protagonist explicitly wants to be a woman (not "recognized as") biologically -- see here and here -- as well as socially -- see here and here.

"There's an entire webtoon about this" truly the most reliable source, next someone is gonna send me a fanfic explaining the history of medical transition.
I'm not defining what it means to be trans and it wasn't my intention to deny the journey or experiences of anyone. However, it's important to remember that we as a society and the medical community have definitions for what it means to be trans, in the same way we have definitions for what it means to be cis, straight, gay, lesbian,bi an so on. I bet you also would take issue if a story where the characters undergoes medical transition said that this character is cis.
The character doesn't show a desire to be a woman in those panels, again it's idealization.
In future chapters this idealization can come to become dysphoria or a desire to be a female, but right now it didn't

Being a woman is different from being a manga heroine.

The people arguing that the protagonist of this manga is not a (trans) girl have resorted to arguing that no manga character is a woman. Truly this thread has produced heretofore unseen wonders.

That's not my point. I'm saying that wanting to be recognized as a woman, biologically, psychologically and socially is different from wanting to be a idealized fictional figure.
A girl who wants to be Superman doesn't want to be a man, but the fictional superhero

Its funny how much a single chapter of a pretty simple comedy is just breaking peoples brains.

People will twist themselves into all sorts of insane logical pretzels to avoid ever acknowledging a character as trans. We've now come to the radical conclusion that a "yuri heroine" actually cant be a woman, but is in fact a "moe existence". And of course we rehash the same tired arguments about how "erm akshully femboys are radical and cool and trans women are conformist/evil".

I for one am looking forward to more of this series.

They don't want to be woman because "women are cool" or because they think this will improve their lives, they want that because if they can't be that they can't be themselves, it's the same need a cis man/woman have to be their own gender.

The series tries addressing this. I would just let chapters release and see how you feel then.

I have seen what you imply, the character doesn't show interest in being a woman in future chapters

Well, at that point, you're either not being honest or there's something else going on. If being envious of women's skin, hair, cute clothes, and their general bodies while being dissatisfied with their own body and saying "I wish I were born a girl and want to forget my past," doesn't mean anything, there's not much to say. We'll have to agree to disagree.

Given the context of the work, that's normal. Also what he's envying is only the body, what they want is to have the appearance of a maiden, that's not what being trans means. He's not envying her identity as a woman, but her physical features, ones that he now has a man. What he needs to get past, and the work shows it, is this closed view of the world, the idea that for being born male he cannot enjoy the same things as girls, also he needs to stop idolizing woman. The girls showing interest in his male body comes as a way to show that they aren't as pure as he once believed and that his male body has qualities

Its funny how much a single chapter of a pretty simple comedy is just breaking peoples brains.

People will twist themselves into all sorts of insane logical pretzels to avoid ever acknowledging a character as trans. We've now come to the radical conclusion that a "yuri heroine" actually cant be a woman, but is in fact a "moe existence". And of course we rehash the same tired arguments about how "erm akshully femboys are radical and cool and trans women are conformist/evil".

I for one am looking forward to more of this series.

They don't want to be woman because "women are cool" or because they think this will improve their lives, they want that because if they can't be that they can't be themselves, it's the same need a cis man/woman have to be their own gender.

The series tries addressing this. I would just let chapters release and see how you feel then.

I have seen what you imply, the character doesn't show interest in being a woman in future chapters

My thought on this manga is:

-- it seems that through this manga, soul is made up as "man" or "woman". In this case, the 'girl's soul happens to 'trap' inside the man's body, and she happens to be a lesbian.

-- So when he becomes the ideal girl that he wants to be, he gets excited and happy because he can now become who he wants to be, but is shocked that there's still a male part that he couldn't get rid of.

-- I sincerely believe that this guy here has a "soul" of a girl who likes girl because he yearns to have a female body. If he's truly a cis man, instead of praying for a female body, he would be extremely proud of his body and his male part. He wouldn't need to change his body as a girl to fall for another girl.

-- And also, a cis "man" dislikes to have lesbians to have relationship because look at the real world: they would definitely complain that they are too lonely and that they don't have female companion because of...(Just my two cents)

-- Oh and according to observation through Twitter/X, a cis man would say something like "you didn't like men? That's because you haven't found the "one" yet something like that..and would work extremely hard just to "straighten lesbian" . But in this case, the protagonist said "he wants to be a girl so that he could fall for a girl ". I believe he has the "Yuri heart" in a male body

-- Yes, I think this manga does touches topic about trans. I think this might be how trans feel about their body.

You're too biased, there are many men into Yuri. 60% of the readers of Yurihime are men

Its funny how much a single chapter of a pretty simple comedy is just breaking peoples brains.

People will twist themselves into all sorts of insane logical pretzels to avoid ever acknowledging a character as trans. We've now come to the radical conclusion that a "yuri heroine" actually cant be a woman, but is in fact a "moe existence". And of course we rehash the same tired arguments about how "erm akshully femboys are radical and cool and trans women are conformist/evil".

I for one am looking forward to more of this series.

Being a woman is different from being a manga heroine. Someone desiring to become the character in a manga wants the experiences, pleasures and circumstance the character has, they don't want to change their identity they want to change their whole existence, they want to escape the real world.
Wanting to become a Moe girl is not the same as having an emotional, psychological, physical need to become the other gender, because that's who you truly are. A trans woman is a woman, someone who want to be acknowledge and perceived as a woman, because this is their true self. They don't want to be woman because "women are cool" or because they think this will improve their lives, they want that because if they can't be that they can't be themselves, it's the same need a cis man/woman have to be their own gender.
Saying that a character wanting to be a Yuri heroine is the same as them being trans dilutes and diminishes the meaning of transexuality, gender dysphoria and gender reassignment, it opens space for the idea that trans people aren't the gender they identify as they just want to be part of it for ulterior reasons.

I guess I don't understand what you mean by "aggressively." Especially Prunus Girl I'd say is extremely open to a trans reading.

All of those works say and reaffirm constantly that the crossdressing characters are males who identify as such. There's no ambiguity.
Those series are as open to a trans reading as every other story in existence

I would say that a story about a "male" who frequently or exclusively wears women's clothing and enjoys doing so is perhaps more open to a trans reading than most stories lol. But I'll stop pressing the point because, unlike the protagonist here, none of those characters explicitly express that they want to be a girl.

Even though the MC is definitely (intentionally by the author or not) trans, the narrative itself fails to satisfy the theming - because it doesn't present it as a serious potential arc the MC might go through, but rather something that they can make fun of.

There have been several people in this thread who've argued that the MC is not trans. Those are the only people I take issue with. If your concern is whether the manga will treat the trans themes well, I think that's valid. I personally don't expect it to be anything more than a dumb comedy lol so my expectations are calibrated accordingly.

Clothes don't define gender. The way one chooses to express themselves isn't exclusively related and does not limit the way one can identify themselves.
A man who wear feminine clothing is a man who wears feminine clothing.
Even the protagonist here doesn't want to be a girl, he wants to be a Yuri heroine, a Moe existence

I think crossdressing manga often exist in a sort of superposition where they're clearly trans but don't say so explicitly, presumably to avoid alienating a transphobic audience. That said, I can't say I recall many that are "very aggressively not [trans]"; most of the time they more sort of leave it ambiguous, like Prunus Girl, Koisuru Otome no Tsukurikata, or Misaki-kun wa Kouryaku Chara Janai. (Most of the time the crossdressing character's love interest is a cis boy too.) I don't expect the protagonist of this manga to explicitly say "I'm trans" or anything like that, but I think it's reasonable to expect her to enjoy living and being accepted as a girl, which is good enough for me. I don't think it's particularly useful to speculate about "what we're supposed to see the character as"; if the most natural interpretation of the character is that they're trans, then the character is trans as far as I'm concerned.

I'd argue all three of those are of the aggressively not trans category. Especially Koisuru Otome no Tsukurikata. But if some people enjoy reading it that way I can't stop them. But I think we should still be honest about what's being written, just so we don't get others hopes up, at the very least.

I guess I don't understand what you mean by "aggressively." Especially Prunus Girl I'd say is extremely open to a trans reading.

All of those works say and reaffirm constantly that the crossdressing characters are males who identify as such. There's no ambiguity.
Those series are as open to a trans reading as every other story in existence