Gender fludity/Gender flux and third person pronouns

I tried this on another forum, but they got mad at me for saying agender and gender fucking were not the same as gender flux and gender fluid. Thus how the pronouns would be used and changed and signaled should be different. Really? Honestly a little ticked that they think that trans need to be treated exactly the same. And the "can't tell" line applies to someone who is gender fluid and in a fictional world.

Oh you definitely can know in the world building I set up. I still fuck with what people think gender should be (Men also wear cosmetics. Men also wear skirts), but there are still physical presentation differences described. (Amount of makeup, how the make up is worn, what kinds are worn, the amount of skirts. The hair presentation. I go over that bit by bit).

Agender isn't likely to change their presentation day to day. Gender fluid and gender flux might mess with their presentation moment to moment.

gender fucking isn't literal sex... the kink is named differently as genderplay.

But whatever.

So I have a nonbinary character who changes presentation mostly day to day from masculine to hyper masculine to neutral to feminine to hyper feminine. Sometimes within the same day.

They literally say they are nonbinary:

"I’m nonbinary. I am attracted to nonbinary people and men."

Because they are in a queer joy world building and I can do as I like. And there is no threat to their person and it's standard customary to list these things in the introduction. Also sometimes fish for a household in the introduction.

So that's established. And they change their gender presentation each and every time the narrating character sees them according to the cultural standards.

I've been using the neutral "They" because the narrating character wasn't sure before the character was nonbinary prior.

The language I set up does not have gendered third person pronouns.

Therefore I thought I could change up the pronouns in the "translation" of the language to reflect the fact that their presentation had changed.

The narrating character is attracted to nonbinary, primarily, women second, and men a little, though prefers more feminine men. I thought it would be fitting that the narrating character would definitely notice the difference in presentation.

So, what I want to know is if I put:

Narrating character notices nonbinary character is presenting as X today clearly because of hair, makeup, voice and movements, that I can change the pronoun from neuter They to she, or he and not lose the reader clearly.

I think this is totally different from character is nonbinary and doesn't care about gender, thus uses open pronouns to mess with people.

I'm looking for tricks in order to get the reader to go with it, considering I've explicitly stated this character is nonbinary. I've stated their gender presentation. What else can I do tho help the reader get on board with the pronouns switching every time the character changes their presentation?

man... cis people love assumptions and are allergic to looking anything up, or thinking about if they understand anything, before they put in their two cents...

anyway, I think that's a fun idea. I've always had a bit of anxiety about trying something similar, but I definitely think it can be done. I think you'd just need to make sure you're telling the reader it's the same person, at least the first few times. maybe like, in a new scene with new pronouns, a mini-introductory sentence or two, just noting it's the same character, and noting why the pronoun change. "[name] was presenting differently today [x y and z way]- i found myself thinking of them as her". i think you could get away with being less straightforward and explicit, but it might be initially confusing. but a lot of writing is, and that doesnt always mean its bad. sometimes good writing means you have to go back and reread a bit to totally get whats going on.

i think generally as long as you take some other routes to give the reader a really clear idea that it's the same character, youd be good. giving them some markers of identity that don't change, appearance wise or otherwise, or having characters or the narrator acknowledge them in a way that reaffirms their identity to the reader.

Jasper wrote:man... cis people love assumptions and are allergic to looking anything up, or thinking about if they understand anything, before they put in their two cents...

*sighs* They got mad and started down voting or whatever.

"Doesn't care about their gender and presentation" isn't the same as someone gender fluid and gender flux. Angry down vote instead of understanding why not.

The place they referred me to had agender, basically (a variant) and where the asker wanted to just change it moment to moment to "mess with the reader". That's different from gender fluid, which is more stable, or gender flux. And not everyone agrees on pronouns, but I still wanted to play with them in a way to make it look as arbitrary as they are.

The answer was, "The people viewing the character won't be able to tell."

When I pointed out that gender fluid and "doesn't care about their gender presentation and wants to change it moment to moment" was not the same thing, they got mad and started pushing the link over and over again ad nauseum as if it would help, but then didn't seem to understand the term "gender presentation". Really? Urked.

Jasper wrote:
anyway, I think that's a fun idea. I've always had a bit of anxiety about trying something similar, but I definitely think it can be done. I think you'd just need to make sure you're telling the reader it's the same person, at least the first few times.

The narrating character isn't sure at first and says, "Maybe it's a twin that looks like them."

But then the NB character comes to introduce themselves, so that the narrating character is 100% sure.

So after that, the narrating character changes the pronouns, but since the language lacks gendered third person pronouns, I just change the pronoun.

NB Character UM (initials)
YK (narrating character)

This is after the introduction to UM as NB.

I thought something like this:

UM was presenting more like a woman, and very feminine at that. The cosmetics softened her features making her very pretty.

UM was presenting more masculine today and had a neat topknot, and a thin line of eyeliner curving over his eye. A grin was on his face as he looked at YK

The character also moves differently, changes their voice pitch. And to me, that seems like utter fun, especially when that's not the central plot.

I wanted to do something like this, but I wasn't sure I could pull it off and a previous character I assigned as gender flux wasn't as brave and I couldn't introduce clothes changing magic that easily, so I figured I'd give it a go for this manuscript and see if I could pull it off without having to introduce gendered third person pronouns in the question. I thought it might be cool to change the presentation with a snap later on after I get the mechanics of the magic system settled. Haha. Why not make being queer seem like FUN? We get so much crap in the world already.

I was wondering if later I could skip the little paragraph and go straight for he/she after the name. (Word count)

So after it's established a few more times, then UM wiped his brow. And UM lifted her skirts. Same name, without having to describe it every single time.

I'm trying to make English bend for me in ways English speakers think it can't, but this isn't well-tread territory.

No, absolutely, I think after a few times you could just change the pronouns at will. it'll be entirely "gettable" by then, i think. and I think the little examples you wrote are great!
i love the magic-accelerated presentation change. this character sounds like they'll be very fun