Rarewomen: important eligibility information for this year and change for next year.
So in the light of the entire Xavin discussion (a character who was introduced as and read as genderqueer/genderfluid by most people in a run that was taken over by Joss Whedon, who then retconned Xavin as identifying as a woman), we've come to a big decision and a change for next year.
Starting next year, Rarewomen will become a fest for any and all non-male identifying characters. Given that we consider ourselves a feminist fest, the last thing we want is to exclude characters who might be read as transwomen by trans individuals (as Xavin is by some), and we also really don't want to be the kind of fest that assigns the gender of a female to characters who may be genderfluid/genderqueer (even if their canon fucked up and assigned them a gender in a very cissexist move.) And we really, really don't want to be the place for cis-people to argue over the gender identity of non-binary-conforming characters. So this is the only thing that makes sense.
In anticipation for this change, we're letting Xavin (Runaways) and The Machine (Person of Interest) in this year, with an apology extended to everyone that we didn't make this change early enough to include other genderfluid/genderqueer/gender-questioning characters.
But next year! More awesome characters who are not men! This is something to be happy about, and we're looking forward to running this challenge again next year with this change.
Lastly, we're almost done with revisions, and sign-ups should go up some time today. Thank you everyone for your input and help with the revisions. :)
Starting next year, Rarewomen will become a fest for any and all non-male identifying characters. Given that we consider ourselves a feminist fest, the last thing we want is to exclude characters who might be read as transwomen by trans individuals (as Xavin is by some), and we also really don't want to be the kind of fest that assigns the gender of a female to characters who may be genderfluid/genderqueer (even if their canon fucked up and assigned them a gender in a very cissexist move.) And we really, really don't want to be the place for cis-people to argue over the gender identity of non-binary-conforming characters. So this is the only thing that makes sense.
In anticipation for this change, we're letting Xavin (Runaways) and The Machine (Person of Interest) in this year, with an apology extended to everyone that we didn't make this change early enough to include other genderfluid/genderqueer/gender-questioning characters.
But next year! More awesome characters who are not men! This is something to be happy about, and we're looking forward to running this challenge again next year with this change.
Lastly, we're almost done with revisions, and sign-ups should go up some time today. Thank you everyone for your input and help with the revisions. :)