Games Need To Stop Being Afraid Of The Word 'Transgender'
Guilty Gear Strive Bridget is now officially trans. Well, as official as you tend to get in video games. Bridget, much like pretty much every trans character to come before her, has never actually said the words "I'm transgender". To briefly catch you up on her story, Bridget was born male but raised female, due to her village's superstition when twins of the same gender are born. For most of her existence, she has been treated as a femboy or trap, and trans people, starved of any decent representation, have looked to her as an icon - even as large swathes of the community fetishised and mocked her. In Strive, Bridget discusses her gender journey, and decides that being a woman offers her a sense of gender euphoria. Another character, still getting to grips with everything, calls her "cowgirl," and then quickly corrects himself to "cowboy", but Bridget tells him cowgirl is fine because, and I quote, "I'm a girl".
A character who was born male saying openly "I'm a girl" is concrete proof that she is transgender, so why not just say the word? Bridget is far from the only video game character to treat 'transgender' as a curse word, but it's becoming increasingly difficult to understand why. Trans people are no longer mythical creatures. When I was at school, I don't recall being aware of a single trans person. This is not the reality today. Trans people may be more reviled today, but we're certainly better known. We are frequently in newspapers and discussed in the highest courts or political chambers of the world. People hate us. But they know us.
Related: Nintendo Switch Sports Finally Let Me Enjoy Sports As A Trans Woman
The coyness no longer makes sense. It feels akin to the way bisexual characters were treated on
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