Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments

deco-nouveau t1_j57nq4g wrote

Reply to comment by Writteninsanity in [WP] The queen is dead. The kingdom burns around you. Her soldiers fight on, but the invader is relentless. You do the only thing you can; you flee to beg mercy from your god, to call on your protector to cast out your enemies. You leave the hive in search of its beekeeper. by ArseneArsenic

The fact that some of the warriors and workers were male is frustrating. They're bees!

Otherwise, this is excellent

114

Writteninsanity t1_j57nvjp wrote

I’m actually doing an editing pass to remove gendered language aside from queen. The first pass should be done soon.

Edit: Ya know, aside from the he / hims to refer to the keeper. Aside from that it should all be gender neutral unless I missed something now. I know that the bee's names should all be feminine but...

Wanna know what? I liked the names but you're right. Names changed to still be Roman inspired but now female. Thanks.

154

DezXerneas t1_j58oziq wrote

It's fine to use masculine pronouns with Bees/Ants. They don't really have genders like us so any language you use wouldn't be completely wrong.

19

leech_of_society t1_j594skt wrote

What? Nearly all bees are female. Male bees are only made seasonally, are thicker, look way different, and die off after queen mating season. Every single worker bee is a female and the males are only made when they're needed.

10 out of 12 months every honey bee you see is female, and even during those two months only 1% of all bees are male.

48

GertrudeHeizmann420 t1_j598r1w wrote

Genders, not sexes. Bees do not have a concept of "woman" or "man" and therefore it doesn't really matter what names you give them

17

RinLY22 t1_j59bt33 wrote

Well, the bees aren’t the ones reading this now. It’s us humans that do operate on the basic understanding of genders - and how certain names etc reflect that.

For readers that are invested/familiar with the knowledge that bees are generally female - it would not be as immersive and thus enjoyable to read if you used the wrong references.

You can call a woman Bob or Andrew, but it’s going to be confusing.

31

N0tBurn1ngEvidenc3 t1_j59uf52 wrote

Bees have 3 genders none of which match human genders

Drone, Worker & Queen

15

leech_of_society t1_j5af4tq wrote

That's fair. We chose to label drones as male because of their chromosomes and them having a penis. But I'd still argue you should call them by the feminine pronouns, because we as humans decided they're female.

6

Winjin t1_j5bb2up wrote

Would you mind if I try translating it? Any specific recommendations?

As far as I understand, the names are female, but I should do my best to keep them referring to themselves as genderless as possible.

2