Author: Knowledge
Main Editor: waterpear
Editor/Proof-reader: Rewrite
“Gender-less. Explain,” Bonbon commanded in her cavemare-like voice.
For the past thirty minutes, Bonbon had been leading Ever to the Apple family home. In exchange, the horsefly would answer any of her questions. Ze had not expected the earth pony to ask zir about everything ze said. The still yellow horsefly had used the work ‘ze’ and ‘zir’ to describe zir kind, the earth pony had become curious as to what the words meant, which led to explaining they are genderless pronouns. This in turn led to the current question about genderlessness.
What had surprised Ever the most in the last thirty minutes was how much of zir explanations Bonbon seemed to understand. She had described her difficulty as if her mind had first been buried under dirt and darkness and then lost. Ever surmised that Bonbon was trying to fill the void in her mind, so had constantly been asking zir what things meant. In response, Ever had been speaking as ze would to anyone, and enjoyed seeing Bonbon worked out what ze meant from context clues. When she didn’t understand, she would just ask for zir to explain more.
This was just great for the horsefly, for ze did not like talking down to anyone. It had been zir experience that people learned new ideas only if you used them in the appropriate context, and that avoiding the use of those words only led to people developing a subpar vocabulary.
Before Ever responded, ze adjusted zir voice box to something void of any emotion a pony could sense. This voice was closer to the horsefly’s natural voice. “I cannot really explain genderlessness without explaining gender first. You see, ‘genderless’ is a category that only exists because gender exists. It is a relationship of dependence, like shadows depend on there being light. The problem is that gender is a tremendously complicated subject. I don’t know if I can explain it,” Ever said, anticipation of the earth pony’s inevitable response showing in zir steady but fast wing flaps. Ever didn’t like ‘explaining’ things, for it made zir feel like a teacher, but it was great to have such an eager mind with zir during this time of uncertainty.
“Gender. Explain,” Bonbon insisted on hopping up and down like a four-year-old, causing mane and tail to bounce in opposition with her body.
“Well, gender is like, uh,” Ever said while stroking zir non-existent beard. It took a few uh’s and hmm’s before something came to the old horsefly. “Our hooves. Gender is like our hooves.”
“Gender like hooves. I want you to explain,” she commanded while looking at her hooves. This did not make walking easy, so they had to stop for a second. After that, Bonbon took a sudden left turn and continued to lead Ever as an ever increasing pace.
Adopting the most old male professorial voice that ze could muster, Ever Ruler complied to the request of learning-loving mare. “You know how most ponies are right-hoofed and left-hoofed and how their hoofedness become evident early in their lives. There is a complicated combination of sociological and biological factors at place that I do not understand which contribute to how hoofedness plays out. You might remember that some ponies are good with both hooves. Being left-, right-, or both-hoofed is important, because it determines how ponies prefer to do many of our daily activities like how we play sports, how we open doors, how we write, and, according to these cultures, the kind of thinking we are proficient at. But hoofedness isn’t all-important, because there is an equal number of activities in which our hooves are irrelevant.
“Gender is very similar. You know that some ponies are male, that some ponies are female, and while you might not know this, I would bet love on it that some are both. Like left- or right-hoofedness, gender becomes evident early in most people’s lives, and the reasons behind this are beyond me, not to mention awfully controversial. According to what I know about most mammalian cultures, being male or female is important because it affects how you play your sports, the etiquette you follow, and, according to these cultures, the kinds of thinking we are proficient at. Gender is not all-important, because there are many instances where gender is not important. Does one have to actively invoke femininity or masculinity to sleep? Probably not.
“Now there is another important similarity between left- or right-hoofedness and male or female gender, and it is becoming competent in both or switching which one is competency. Would you like to hear about it?” Ever teased. Ze had been talking for awhile and wanted a bit of response from zir guide.
Bonbon guided Ever to the left before responding. She seemed to be processing the horsefly’s words for every detail, and then committing them completely to memory. “Hoof switching like gender switching. Explain,” Bonbon giddly demanded, and Ever was all too ready to spoil the mare with all the ideas she wanted.
Now Ever adjusted zir voice to that of Rainbow Dash. This next lesson seemed appropriate to be said in the tomboy mare’s voice. “Normally, we let the hoof we don’t use atrophy from disuse, and people find themselves completely incompetent in using it for anything but the most simple tasks.” Bonbon giggled as she seemed to recognize the voice and notice the comedy of hearing it come from a yellow bug pony.
Ever continued. “However, if you train your weak hoof enough in those activities for which you normally use your other side, you can become more proficient in that other hoof. If you stop using your strong hoof and only use the other one, the latter will become the stronger, and this is very difficult at the start because you lose a major part of your ability to interact with your world. Some cultures which dislike the left hoof because they see it as wrong will make their left-hoofed citizens become right-hoofed. Possibly, if you create a good workout regime, you could make yourself equally proficient in both hooves, which is probably better because then you do not have a weak side. Some cultures. understanding this, actually promote ambidextrousness by proactively forcing their young use both hooves for every activity.”
Bonbon frowned, because she didn’t like the idea of a culture forcing people into things. It brought back vague memories of a dark room with the sense of earth all around. Then she remembered bright flashes, stopped in her tracks, and began to tangibly tremble.
Ever noticed this and put a perforated yellow hoof on the mare’s back. “Are you alright?”
Bonbon calmed down at the friendly touch. “Yes, gray mare was with me.”
“I don’t understand,” the horsefly responded.
“Neither do I. Explain,” Bonbon said, her happy-go-lucky smile coming back to her face. She began to lead Ever to the left, increasing their pace to a trot.
“Explain what? That you don’t understand or how gender is like hoofedness?” Ever asked still unsure about the mare.
“Gender. Explain, please. I want to know more,” Bonbon replied as if nothing had happened.
“I don’t know if you will learn the truth from me. These are just my musings from my horsefly perspective on a subject I am not qualified to really talk about. As to the topic of gender--,” Ever started, but Bonbon interrupted.
“Ever, use new voice. Rainbow voice funny but I want to hear new one,” Bonbon said.
Ever buzzed in mirth adopting the voice of Glaucon, the bright-eyed warrior philosopher at the refugee camp. “Back to the topic of gender, normally people only use one gender their entire lives, at the expense of atrophying the parts of their personality which are used more exclusively by the other genders. I say other genders because there are plenty of cultures with more than two, and because some species are so structured so that a two-gender system is impractical if not impossible. This is not to say that gender and biological structure are identical. Though from what I observed of your culture, they are.” Suddenly, the horsefly facehoofed. “I am on a tangent. Ah...Glaucon, why’d I have to pick your voice?”
After recomposing zirself, ze took on the stern voice of Glaucon’s younger brother, the broad-shouldered Plato. “Let us return to the metaphor at hoof. By forcing your personality to only use your weak gender, you will start off crippled in social interaction because gender proficiency is so important to many of our activities that using your weak one will be very obvious in most cultures. Some cultures force certain individuals to change how they express themselves in order to change the individual’s gender. With exercise aimed at seeing the whole of personality, you will become proficient in all gender expression.”
Bonbon turned Ever left while increasing their pace to a slow gallop. Ever started another tangent due to the nature of the personality ze was mimicking.
“At the school, in which I once ruled—unwillingly, mind you—some of my followers would try to disabuse new residents of the gendering their cultures had given them, amongst other things, of course. My followers would encourage them to see things in ways that were often uncomfortable because of their gendered narrow-sighted sensibilities. As they would put it, they would turn the foreigners away from the metaphorical cave of gendering where they had been restrained so that they could only see a shadow of their full personality, and turn them towards the green sun. In the green sun, they would see the original wholeness which their inner personality, now fully realized, reflected. The green sun of genderless wholeness was, of course, a deification of myself as some kind of being of the transcendent Good. These followers of mine thought that philosophers who have well-ordered personalities will know the highest good because, unlike gendered people, they will have knowledge of the full spectrum of possible personality. They will be genderless and use ‘ze’ and ‘zir’, like the supposedly enlightened horseflies do.”
Again Ever stopped, this time to hit zirself in the head. “Why do I even bother using their voices. I always go on tangents with them.”
“Gender like hooves still?” Bonbon asked, very concerned about her new friend.
“I don’t even know anymore,” Ever responded.
“Genderless is what Ever is?” she asked, massaging her head to facilitate thought while the horsefly rubbed zir face into zir hoof in the futile task of inhibiting it.
“Yes, as a horsefly, I can’t be limited by gender for survival reasons,” Ever said still mad with zirself.
“Genderless is being not limited?” Bonbon asked.
Ever turned to face Bonbon now less mad at zirself for not completely confusing the pony with zir babbling. “Yes, but it is not only that. Going back to the hooves example. You could use neither of your hooves. Likewise you could be genderless by not participating in gender, limiting yourself to only ungendered activities. But you are still right in so far as gender means participating in a limitation to your personality. A genderless person would therefore be a person without these kinds of limitation”
Bonbon nodded, her mane bobbing enthusiastically with her head. “Bonbon can become genderless through exercise?”
“Uh, I guess, but remember I was just musing. You shouldn’t take everything I say seriously. While my followers thought it was the best life ever, they thought that about a lot of things which later proved to be quite silly or extreme.”
Bonbon waved this off. “Bonbon will exercise because Bonbon wants to be like Ever.”
This completely shocked the horsefly. “I would be a hypocrite to my species if I told you that you couldn’t become anyone you wanted to be, even an existing person like myself, but may I ask why me?”
Bonbon had a large smile plastered on her face. “Ever is smart and remembers many people. I want to be smart and remember people. I want to meet gray mare again.”
Ever was just utterly shocked that anyone wanted to be like zir. “Uh, well, I hope you don’t get what you wish. I am far from being smart, and trust me, you don’t want to remember as much as I do.”
Bonbon tilted her head in confusion.
“Let’s just keep going to the house,” Ever said, not willing to spoil the hopes of earth pony with any nasty details from zir life.
She smiled again and guided Ever left. This time the horsefly noticed it and facehoofed.
“Bonbon, are we going around in circles?” ze asked.
“Yes!” This cause zir to double facehoof.
“Bonbon, have we been going around in circles for the last forty minutes?”
The earth pony calculated it for a bit, not quite sure. She didn’t know the answer, she still answered. “Yes!” Ever face-planted into the ground with zir rear hooves up in the air.
“Bonbon, have we been going around the house I am supposed to go to in order to turn in this form?” Ever said, waving the pink slip with one zir rear hooves.
Bonbon hopped as she knew the answer to this question. “Yes, yes.”
As the horsefly mourned the death of all rationality and the mare celebrated her ability to understand things, something flew through the air. Next followed the sound of something smashing a window.
Bonbon paused in her merrymaking. “What was that?” she asked, her ears swivelling to find the source.
“I don’t care anymore,” Ever rolled in the dirt.
“I want to find out,” the ever curious pony revealed. She picked up the self-loathing horsefly with her mighty earth pony strength and carried zir on her shoulder to the Apple family house from whence the crashing sound had come.
“I’d be a pony pickin’ corn, the girl finally caught that bug after forty minutes of chasing it! Oh, Big Mac, stop complainin’ about the damaged window. Come and look at the bug this mare’s caught. It's a real big, ugly yeller one!” said a voice of a pony with the wisdom of the Road of Generations.