Working on ideas by myself is all well and good, but I know I do much better when I have some feedback from others to push me along. I love it when people pose questions for me to answer, it really gets me going in terms of re-thinking some aspects AND seeing things I'd have not seen in the first place.
So, I'm not much of a science fiction writer. Sure I've got a cyberpunk novel I'm working on but that is completely soft Sci-fi and I'm not even sure if I'm doing THAT justice.
Below is the excerpt of brainstorming from my writing journal I'd like some help with, it's for a science fiction setting that's been tumbling around my brain since I was in school.
~*~
The NaNo boards are inspiring. And along with the STUPID PEA BRAINED SEXIST blog post from hell last week, I am feeling inspired. Sexist McMantits said that females were ruining the genre of science fiction because we were focused on the characters and the introspective and not the BIG IDEAS that only MEN can write.
Now, I don’t think I can YET pull it off because this will take some hella worldbuilding to even make it SEEM plausible, even though it technically really is. But I have one of those BIG IDEA sci-fi settings that has been floating around my brain for a couple of years. When I was in science class I was reading an article in one of the science magazines my teacher sometimes had that was talking about the slow and steady decline of the y chromosome.
The article mentioned a woman who was a biology major who sex typed her own blood for practice and it was consistently coming up XY instead of XX like it should have been because she was a woman, right? Genetically she was supposed to be male. She however had stronger X genes and they overrode the genetic coding to make her male.
It also mentioned a family line in which they now never had male children. Consistently for several generations. They believe that some of those girls are like the one mentioned above. Genetically male, but developmentally female. No male sex organs. Just, genetic override.
Basically my setting would be in the future when the Y chromosome declines so much that most genetic lines have this particularly genetic mutation. This will have a bunch of repercussions in the USA alone. Think of it. The government, the economy, and the business sector… pretty much everything would go into the control of women.
Sounds simple enough but the genders always have different ways of approaching things. So I have to think up the repercussions of the gender revolution. Not to mention what will happen in societies where women have NO rights to begin with.
Though, I suppose it might usher in a late sexual revolution for such corners of the world. Certainly there would be a lot about that in the news. Probably many developing stories in the news. Perhaps even minor OR major wars in the more unsteady men-dominated parts of the world. Riots. Violence en masse. Suicide bombers of both genders. Genocide. Mass graves. Crimes against humanity. The world would be a hot mess in all the patriarchal societies. It’d be bloody. Full scale panic and hysteria once the women see (if they see) they outnumber the men so much that they CAN revolt and DO.
If they don’t there may be wholesale slaughter of female children. Perhaps keeping one or two per man so that they can have their way and choice with them. Automatic slaying of female children save one(two?) per male child born. When there are no more male children all females will be born. And then choked out as the last of the men die. :(
Perhaps a rebirth of religions. Seeing the impending choking out of the race as the end of days. Perhaps worshiping and praising male children. Entire populations might be wiped out in certain places. Third world countries would likely be getting the worst of it. Where women aren’t really taught anything and they can’t support themselves. As more and more age and fewer men are
No smooth transitions. More and more women running for office in the US. Older men clinging to their politics not wanting to let go. Perhaps more female cabinet members first. Then a vice president. More in local governments. Then state. More judges. Appointed officials. Last would probably be president.
More interests into scientific pursuits. Specifically the medical fields and genetics. Closer look at human cloning and stem-cell research. Perhaps it becoming illegal to throw out embryos from invitro fertilization. A rush for sperm banks. A rush for donation and retrieval of Gamete cells from male corpses soon after death. Federal State of Emergency.
Pay rate for sperm donations would go up and the age at which you can first donate would go down. Protective custody for men of breeding age? Increase in single parenthood. Outlawing contraceptives? Increase in recreational drug use? Increase in addictions. Economy boom in female-related markets, baby markets. Increased number of children per family. Government incentives to have male children. Bonuses to families who can support many children.
Fiercely competitive women over men that are available. Segregation of the sexes in the schools. Call for male teachers. Fewer male schools so much/many of them would be boarding schools. (Tie in to protective custody). Sex becomes less scandal and more survival.
Bloat of women going into ‘male’ fields such as construction. Slow down in building and engineering as more women need to be trained and allowances made for strength difference (at first). Incentives to go into the dirty jobs usually associated with men. Vasectomy illegal?
It’s in the works. I don’t have an actual plot for it so far but it might be interesting to explore it from the male perspective. Historical studies of the fifties family and gender dynamics. Study of male-dominated societies. Study of ancient matriarchal societies. Being protected from hordes of women. In and out of labs and doctor’s offices. Constantly donating to the genetics labs. Study of your DNA. Perhaps being scared of women.
Decrease in violent crimes (stabbing, shooting beatings) and more into crimes of the mind. Lots of sabotage between women. Over loaded courts. Working release on male prisoners, as the crisis begins. Close consideration of prisoner’s DNA and gametes for viability. Sterilization of prisoners with unviable DNA and keeping them separated from those who are viable. Rehabilitation goes on to include sperm donations on a regular schedule.
Increased studies on if violent/abusive/criminal behavior is passed on in genetic coding. Studies on development in embryos from parents who have used drugs/continue to use drugs. Studies on birth defects in natural embryos as opposed to clone embryos, or lab created embryos.
What if they men are gay? Are men expected to raise what boys are born? Do they take male children from the mother’s as soon as they are weaned? What about women who are high risk pregnancies? Do they get sterilized or are their eggs/ovaries harvested? Upswing in use of surrogates? Earlier pregnancies?
Population crisis as more females are born in the rush to try and create males?
Later into the crisis Only viable women can breed? Those with sturdier bodies no family history of pregnancy complications? Parallel to the breeding mothers from THE GIVER? Possibly being choosing for fertility from birth (a la Brave New World).
Increase of Amniocentesis for gender identification. Upswing in abortions for XX children.
My brain is hurting now and it’s a stretch to think of anything else. More on this later. I’d love to see where it goes. I would absolutely love to see this one through. I love this kind of ‘what if’ situation. I’ll need something that will really show off the world. The attitudes in it, and just how much things will have changed. I don’t want technology to be terribly more advanced, just the sciences and what we’ve learned from genetics and biological sciences.
The NaNo boards are inspiring. And along with the STUPID PEA BRAINED SEXIST blog post from hell last week, I am feeling inspired. Sexist McMantits said that females were ruining the genre of science fiction because we were focused on the characters and the introspective and not the BIG IDEAS that only MEN can write.
Now, I don’t think I can YET pull it off because this will take some hella worldbuilding to even make it SEEM plausible, even though it technically really is. But I have one of those BIG IDEA sci-fi settings that has been floating around my brain for a couple of years. When I was in science class I was reading an article in one of the science magazines my teacher sometimes had that was talking about the slow and steady decline of the y chromosome.
The article mentioned a woman who was a biology major who sex typed her own blood for practice and it was consistently coming up XY instead of XX like it should have been because she was a woman, right? Genetically she was supposed to be male. She however had stronger X genes and they overrode the genetic coding to make her male.
It also mentioned a family line in which they now never had male children. Consistently for several generations. They believe that some of those girls are like the one mentioned above. Genetically male, but developmentally female. No male sex organs. Just, genetic override.
Basically my setting would be in the future when the Y chromosome declines so much that most genetic lines have this particularly genetic mutation. This will have a bunch of repercussions in the USA alone. Think of it. The government, the economy, and the business sector… pretty much everything would go into the control of women.
Sounds simple enough but the genders always have different ways of approaching things. So I have to think up the repercussions of the gender revolution. Not to mention what will happen in societies where women have NO rights to begin with.
Though, I suppose it might usher in a late sexual revolution for such corners of the world. Certainly there would be a lot about that in the news. Probably many developing stories in the news. Perhaps even minor OR major wars in the more unsteady men-dominated parts of the world. Riots. Violence en masse. Suicide bombers of both genders. Genocide. Mass graves. Crimes against humanity. The world would be a hot mess in all the patriarchal societies. It’d be bloody. Full scale panic and hysteria once the women see (if they see) they outnumber the men so much that they CAN revolt and DO.
If they don’t there may be wholesale slaughter of female children. Perhaps keeping one or two per man so that they can have their way and choice with them. Automatic slaying of female children save one(two?) per male child born. When there are no more male children all females will be born. And then choked out as the last of the men die. :(
Perhaps a rebirth of religions. Seeing the impending choking out of the race as the end of days. Perhaps worshiping and praising male children. Entire populations might be wiped out in certain places. Third world countries would likely be getting the worst of it. Where women aren’t really taught anything and they can’t support themselves. As more and more age and fewer men are
No smooth transitions. More and more women running for office in the US. Older men clinging to their politics not wanting to let go. Perhaps more female cabinet members first. Then a vice president. More in local governments. Then state. More judges. Appointed officials. Last would probably be president.
More interests into scientific pursuits. Specifically the medical fields and genetics. Closer look at human cloning and stem-cell research. Perhaps it becoming illegal to throw out embryos from invitro fertilization. A rush for sperm banks. A rush for donation and retrieval of Gamete cells from male corpses soon after death. Federal State of Emergency.
Pay rate for sperm donations would go up and the age at which you can first donate would go down. Protective custody for men of breeding age? Increase in single parenthood. Outlawing contraceptives? Increase in recreational drug use? Increase in addictions. Economy boom in female-related markets, baby markets. Increased number of children per family. Government incentives to have male children. Bonuses to families who can support many children.
Fiercely competitive women over men that are available. Segregation of the sexes in the schools. Call for male teachers. Fewer male schools so much/many of them would be boarding schools. (Tie in to protective custody). Sex becomes less scandal and more survival.
Bloat of women going into ‘male’ fields such as construction. Slow down in building and engineering as more women need to be trained and allowances made for strength difference (at first). Incentives to go into the dirty jobs usually associated with men. Vasectomy illegal?
It’s in the works. I don’t have an actual plot for it so far but it might be interesting to explore it from the male perspective. Historical studies of the fifties family and gender dynamics. Study of male-dominated societies. Study of ancient matriarchal societies. Being protected from hordes of women. In and out of labs and doctor’s offices. Constantly donating to the genetics labs. Study of your DNA. Perhaps being scared of women.
Decrease in violent crimes (stabbing, shooting beatings) and more into crimes of the mind. Lots of sabotage between women. Over loaded courts. Working release on male prisoners, as the crisis begins. Close consideration of prisoner’s DNA and gametes for viability. Sterilization of prisoners with unviable DNA and keeping them separated from those who are viable. Rehabilitation goes on to include sperm donations on a regular schedule.
Increased studies on if violent/abusive/criminal behavior is passed on in genetic coding. Studies on development in embryos from parents who have used drugs/continue to use drugs. Studies on birth defects in natural embryos as opposed to clone embryos, or lab created embryos.
What if they men are gay? Are men expected to raise what boys are born? Do they take male children from the mother’s as soon as they are weaned? What about women who are high risk pregnancies? Do they get sterilized or are their eggs/ovaries harvested? Upswing in use of surrogates? Earlier pregnancies?
Population crisis as more females are born in the rush to try and create males?
Later into the crisis Only viable women can breed? Those with sturdier bodies no family history of pregnancy complications? Parallel to the breeding mothers from THE GIVER? Possibly being choosing for fertility from birth (a la Brave New World).
Increase of Amniocentesis for gender identification. Upswing in abortions for XX children.
My brain is hurting now and it’s a stretch to think of anything else. More on this later. I’d love to see where it goes. I would absolutely love to see this one through. I love this kind of ‘what if’ situation. I’ll need something that will really show off the world. The attitudes in it, and just how much things will have changed. I don’t want technology to be terribly more advanced, just the sciences and what we’ve learned from genetics and biological sciences.
~*~
I've had the two people I've shown in person point out that this should be set REALLY really really far in the future to have such a big change happen. I realize it would take many generations for this kind of genetic disorder to take over, so please do not focus on the time-line as much as the ramifications I'm trying to hash out.
I really hope I'm doing this right...
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Comments: 14
You might check out Nicola Griffith's excellent sci-fi novel, Ammonite, wherein the entire planet consists only of women as all the men had been killed off by a virus.
I'm passed the fertile wishes these days, and very happy about that.
I love children they are just not in my stars unfortunately.
Most of this information sounds like background, facts that can be worked into the narrative through various devices such as news reports. Who are your main characters and where is your plot line going?
It seems to me that your scenario would start out more insidious, not being noticed at first (except perhaps by scientists) before exploding into the situations you descibe. Also, you will have to address the population issue. With the male population in decline, would the birth rate go down?
A future setting would give you a certain freedom to adapt your situation; you could even add some futuristic elements to your science.
That said, I would advise you to come up with a good story and interesting characters as you have done in the story you've started. Put them in that world you've envisioned and see how they interact. You can tweek their world to make the story more exciting and interesting.
Play to your strong points, characters and story. Ultimately, I believe that is what most people what out of a tale.
Cheers,
frank
(Calling yourself an XY male kind of just made my day! By the way.)
The odd thing about this story is the fact that I've got a setting first with no plot or characters. Usually I get a vague one-line plot and a mess of characters first and have to world build later.
I hope you're still moving forward with your cyberPunk story. I really liked what I read. You're a tallented story writer.
Story, in my opinion, stems from people: their hope and fear, lust and hunger, hesitation and determination. It sounds as though you want to cover a lot of sociological and technical ground. Why not use two alternating viewpoint characters? They could be antagonist and protagonist, or they could be fighting a common enemy. But the story needs to be about them, not the world.
Again, just my opinion. Good luck.
It will give a jump start as to what you wish to accomplish.
There are two ways you can go about doing this with characters.
You can have it from a male perspective or female, POV.
You have to ask yourself do you want just one narrator? A few?
Do you wish to start in the future?
Or maybe begin in the past when this change is beginning to happen, having foreshadowing that the future won't look so bright indeed.
Maybe start with the destruction of cities on Earth, and show through past events how it came to pass.
Just an idea.
Thanks for posting to my group, Anythingwriting
for example, from the page on Y-chromosomes:
Origin
The X and Y chromosomes are thought to have originated from a pair of identical chromosomes[4], termed autosomes, when an ancestral mammal developed an allelic variation, a so-called 'sex locus' - simply possessing this allele caused the organism to be male[5]. The chromosome with this allele became the Y chromosome, while the other member of the pair became the X chromosome. Over time, genes which were beneficial for males and harmful to (or had no effect on) females either developed on the Y chromosome, or were acquired through the process of translocation.[6].
Until recently, the X and Y chromosomes were thought to have diverged around 300 million years ago. However recent research, particularly that stemming from the sequencing of the platypus genome[2], has suggested that the XY sex-determination system wouldn't have been present more than 166 million years ago, at the split of the monotremes from other mammals[3]. This reduction in the age of the XY chromosomal system by around 150 million years is based on the finding that platypus X chromosomes show much stronger homology to the avian Z sex chromosome than with other mammalian X chromosomes [3]. This suggests that the platypus X and avian Z chromosomes both evolved from the same chromosome of a common ancestor of the two[7].