"WT" == Wade Tritschler <tritscwa@mala.bc.ca> writes:

<fade in on a small room, with an LCD projector on the ceiling, a
_Very_ large green and black snake sprawled on the floor, and
someone's windowmanager projected on the screen at the far end of the
room.  The first 96 lines of the 'fic are visible in one of the emacs
frames>

Off Screen Narrator: Today we have Jesbet Worldkiller, second king of
the Moon Kingdom of Silver Millenium. . .

Girl in Black:  Actually that's second non-human king, and fourth king
overall. <drops to the floor, the large green-stone mace hooked on her
belt flopping, then sits down next to the snake>

OSN:  Oops!  Many apologies.

Jesbet:  No Offence Taken.  (This is said in a loud warm booming deep voice)

GiB:  Use a private voice, please.  That one echos a bit too much.

Jesbet:  Better? (this time her voice matches Ripley's in A.R.)

GiB:  Much.  Did you like the movie?

OSN:  Before we get into that we need to finish the introductions and
talk about the 'fic.  Anyway, the person in the black uniform is
Sailor Mercury, on break from the ongoing attempt to clean up the mess
left by the so called `Revenge Wars'

Mercury:  We both read the first part, so on with the 'fic.

WT> Ranma 1/2
WT> Odd Outcome
[chokki]
WT> Sometimes I think it is when I met Mousse.  Other times I think 
WT> it is when I encountered Ranma for the first time.  Then there are 
WT> times that I think being born as I was at all, an Amazon and heir 
WT> to the leadership of my tribe, was the problem.

J: took me a bit to pin it down.  Agreement error. 

WT> 	What?  Did you expect me to be babbling on in Shampoo-
WT> ese as Akane calls it?  Sorry to disappoint you, but that's just my 

M: `as Akane calls it' is an apositive, a phrase that amplifies a
noun, and should be set off with a comma ^_-

J: and were I writing this I'd make `Shampoo-ese' one word, without
the hyphen.

WT> Japanese.  I can think quite normally, thank you.  Actually, if it 
WT> wasn't for working at the Nekohanten, having to chase after 
WT> Ranma, and having to fend off Mousse's advances I probably 
WT> would go take a class some where.  However, I simply don't have 

M: somewhere is a single word.

WT> 	Oh, you know about Akane and me already.  Okay, well 
WT> that makes it a little easier.  It funny, isn't it.  I came to Japan, 
WT> bound by honor and Amazon law to kill Ranma's female half.  

M:  Were this home, one would have to add `my pride' to that list.

[chokki]
WT> 	In all the time I was together with Akane I hadn't let 
WT> myself think much about punishment.  The village law was 
WT> actually blank on the point of same sex relationships, but that 
WT> didn't mean I was off the hook.  Such relationships are not 
WT> unknown, but are frowned upon or worse.  Some rumors I have 
WT> heard of what can happen to people in those relationships are 
WT> very shocking.  Now I was looking at the possibility of becoming 
WT> one of those rumors.

J:  OK, I'm still not totally conversant on human customs, but
traditional matriarchal/matrilinear societies are much less hung up on
this kind of thing than patrilinear ones.  In a matrilinear culture
lines of descent are measured through the female line, which makes the
identity of a child's father far less important to pin down.
Patrilinear societies, on the other hand, feel a need to curtail
female sexuality in order to be sure of kinship ties.

In the cultures of the peoples of the North American Great Plains,
persons of divergent gender were regarded as sacred, and were actively
encouraged to adopt a role that they felt they could deal with best.
If one was born female and prefered a male role in society one was
accepted as a man and was taught male duties and skills, and was
expected to have a wife(or wives, sometimes) and kids.  It didn't
matter if they weren't of one's own blood, one had the right and
responcibility to raise them.

With the influx of Westerners things have changed a great deal.  Most
of the people who lived on the plains are dead.  The survivors are
desperately clinging to what's left of their culture, but . . .

M:  I see the  current set of villiage laws as being the result of
recent Patriarchal influence, from the old Chinese Empire, the influx
of outside influences in the eighteenth and ninteenth centuries, or
the mess that the Communists managed to make. Obaba would be old
enough to remember what things used to be like.

J: As a result of the above, I just can't see this kind of homophobia.
One's primary attractions being towards women should not have too much
of an impact, especially if there is some knowledge about the way
humans concieve children no problem arises from a societal standpoint.

WT> 	"Were you just a commoner in the village you may have 
WT> gotten away with this."  Great grandmother finally said, still 
WT> turned away from me.  "Were Akane an Amazon you may have 
WT> gotten away with this.  However, neither of those are the case.  
WT> You are my heir and Akane is an outsider.  Many in the village 
WT> will not stand for this.  Do you realize that?"

M:  This seems too dogmatic.  If there were not provisions for
adopting outsiders the society would have collapsed, for the villiage
is far too small to maintain a clean gene pool even for the three
hundred years that Obaba has been alive.

[chokki]
WT> 	"It not that... way... with Ranma."  I said, but was shook 

M: shaken/shocked

[chokki]
WT> 	She didn't need to elaborate.  I knew and nodded in 
WT> acceptance.  Great grandmother was bending a lot for this, for 
WT> me, more than I ever expected.  I don't know if you can truly 
WT> understand how volatile this situation is.  Great grandmother was 
WT> correct to say she was being lenient, very lenient.  The village is 
WT> not a stable place.  It is forever in a power struggle between the 
WT> various families.  My family has ruled for only three generations.  
WT> I was to be the fourth.  However, if this were to get out, not only 
WT> would my own position be in all likelihood destroyed, many of 
WT> my family would likely suffer as well.

J: we have it from the source material that Obaba is something to the
tune of three hundred years old, so I doubt that would be the case.
If Obaba has abdicated in favor of her daughter, Shanpoo's grandmother
or great-grandmother, in order to help Shanpoo, then Shanpoo would be
in preparation for seventh at lowest.

M:  Plus most matriarchal are either anarchies or age/merit based
oligarchic democracies, where a council of Elders is in charge of
daily emergencies, but the whole group needs to be more-or-less in
agreement on major things.

Even if there is somesort of kingship involved, loosing one's status
as king material is more likely to be _good_ for one's family than bad
for it.  (look up information on the `Big Man' setups in the Pacific
Islands for where I'm coming from here.)

WT> 	I suppose to those outside, those more open minded, such 
WT> things are not to be taken so seriously, and many would say there 
WT> is nothing wrong with it.  In the village it is a different story 
WT> entirely.  Even here you encounter prejudice, but it is often 
WT> limited to words, or some unequal treatment.  In a village of 
WT> warriors the magnitude is far greater.  Not everyone is prejudice,

M:  Prejudice_d_.  Prejudice is the thing, prejudiced is the person.
 
WT> but those that are will act, and act harshly.  Those rumors I told 
WT> you about, they aren't... pleasant.  One poor woman was 
WT> kidnaped during the night and taken deep into the woods.  When 
WT> her family found her... I don't really wish to repeat it.  She was 
WT> alive, but I think she would have been better off dead.  Such 

J: In a matriarchal society this is _terribly_ likely to be punished
severely.  The perpetrators would be caught and either exiled or
executed in some public way.  Allowing things like this to happen,
especially if they are perpetrated by men, is deadly.  If this kind of
thing isn't dealt with the whole society could fall apart, for where
is the line to be drawn?

M:  I wouldn't be surprised if the perpetrators get impaled.  That
wouldn't help the victim, but seeing someone die like that would have
a drastic effect on recurance.

By impaling I mean the practice of taking a fairly thick stick, about
8 cm in diameter, sharpening one end, and burying it so that the point
is at about belly-button high on the impalee.  One then picks up the
impalee and inserts the pointed end into their rectum.

This is, of course, a perfectly awful way to die, and something that I
wouldn't wish on my worst enemies, but it is very effective at
deterance by fear.

WT> things aren't limited to just those directly involved either.  The 
WT> effects can extend to friends, family, and even those who are 
WT> sympathetic.  Threatened with this it is no wonder many cave in.  
WT> No doubt this would be used as a weapon to remove my family 
WT> from power, perhaps from the village entirely.

J:  This makes a full ten percent of the human population vulnerable.
The village is too small to let that happen.

[chokki]
WT> loves to seek solace with one-and-another.  Oh, how could the 

J:  One another, deshou?

M: Sou omou . . .

[more of nice scene chokki]

M:  One can incorporate both views into the story, don't get me
wrong.  You seem to have based most of the conflict in this part about
the village's reaction.  Some of what I've read indicates that if one
is divergently gendered one needs to adopt one role or the other, in
effect _enforcing_ a butch/femme dichotomy.  I don't see either of
these two being willing to accept that easily, and Shampoo's adopting
a male role would likely spell the end of her political career. . .

[chokki] 
WT> him off.  Well, things didn't exactly turn out as I had hoped.  He 
WT> never did get the point, and now I had to worry about Akane who 
WT> couldn't defend herself from him.

J:  Of course, I think that would be adequite provocation to do
something permanent and nasty to him . . .  <firm tap of tail-tip
against the wall for emphasis>

[chokki]
WT> 	The next day I headed off to the school for my usual 
WT> attempt at getting Ranma on a date.  Sometimes he can be a 
WT> world class insensitive jerk.  All I ask for is for him to give me a 
WT> decent chance, but noooo, he has to fight me on everything.  Then 
WT> he goes and complains when I'm forced to use more drastic 
WT> measures to get some attention from him.  I wish he'd get it 
WT> through that thick head of his that I have no choice, and that if he 
WT> was a little more co-operative I wouldn't have to go to these 
WT> extremes.  As is great grandmother is already taking considerable 

J:  `As it is'

M:  I'm sure I had something to say about this. . .
Oh, yeah.  Maybe she should come up with the idea of _writing this
down_.  I doubt her written Japanese is as bad as her spoken.

[chokki]
WT> 	It was around 5am when Akane got eliminated, leaving it 

M:  I don't know about you, but to me two to three hours is not enough
time . . .

J:  I'd write that as `It was about three in the morning when . . .'

[chokki]
WT> 	Oh, we didn't start off right away.  Being in Ukyo's place 
WT> was enough to keep us low key for a while.  We talked a little, 
WT> joked about the poker game and Ranma, and caught up on what 
WT> had been happening to the other.  Akane's days were about as 
WT> interesting as mine, although she was far less concerned about 
WT> her father's attention.  In that way she was lucky.  The small talk 
WT> didn't last long though.  All the tension built up over our brief 
WT> but tormenting separation suddenly was let out and the inevitable 
WT> occurred.
WT> 	We slept away what was left of the night, and for that 

M:  Plus there's the fact that the sun would be up by the time they
fell asleep if the game broke up at five . . .
 
[chokki]
WT> 	I regained consciousness sometime later.  I was in 
WT> another cave, my hands and feet bound in chains, Mousse's 
WT> chains.  I wasn't exactly in the best of shape either.  Whether it 
WT> was the explosions themselves, or the resulting cave in, I felt like 
WT> a car had run over me.  I tried to break free but Mousse was 
WT> proficient in at least chain bindings.

J:  Shampoo knows the bakusaitenketsu, so she should be able to break
free if she has even a tiny bit of slack. . .

M:  Unless she is so badly panicked that she can't think straight, in
which case she'll kick herself later.

J:  and that last sentence is a little awkward.

[chokki]
WT> 	I was in shock for quite a while.  For a short time my life 
WT> had ended, and suddenly it had all returned to me.  I quickly 
WT> unlocked by bindings then rushed into the other chamber to 

J:  `unlocked my bindings', and if she has enough slack for that she
has enough to blow a few links of the chain and tear Mousse's head
from his shoulders. . .

WT> confirm what he had said.  Sure enough she was there, 
WT> unconscious but otherwise unharmed.  I don't think I have the 

M:  `unconscious, but'.  Sorry, it's one of my pet peeves.

[chokki]
WT> According to great grandmother he's leaving for China the next 
WT> chance he gets.  That is surprising needless to say.  I'll believe

J:  `Needless to say, that is surprising.'  ga ii to omou.

[chokki]

M:  Yoush.  Other than the above complaints, and some spacing
problems, this part was quite good.

The way you set up the village just doesn't seem viable, however.  We
are talking about a society that has lasted thousands of years without
ripping itself into shreds.  Because of that one can tell that things
are at once very stable and fluid, like a matriarchal society ideally
is.  The way you portray it, however, is too rigid to last more than a
couple generations, look at what happened with the Puritans.

If you fix that I think the story will be stronger for it, although I
could be wrong.

J: We're hoping to be able to read more, so please don't let this
discourage you.  <She suddenly yawns, six inch fangs streaching
forward for an instant, then folding back into her jaw as it closes>

OSN:  Thank you both for showing up, and I hope to see you <somehow
making it clear that OSN means the audience> all next time.
<fade to black as the two continue to talk, the volume off>
------------------------------ cut here ------------------------------

Ja ne,
	Suika
-- 
The ladies men admire, I've heard,
Would shudder at a wicked word.
Their candle gives a single light;
They'd rather stay at home at night.
They do not keep awake till three,
Nor read erotic poetry.
They never sanction the impure,
Nor recognize an overture.
They shrink from powders and from paints ...
So far, I've had no complaints.
                -- Dorothy Parker
                                               wroberts@tvi.cc.nm.us