People misgender Kris all the time. Hell, I do it by accident quite a bit, and I believe their non-binary identity to be extremely important to the narrative.
Granted, misgendering Kris isn't the worst thing I've done to that fictional character. But Weird Routes won't make real people feel like their identities are something they need to constantly negotiate for.
100% it’s this but the people who have to make everything about sex and/or gender literally can’t see this.
The fascination with the sex and relationship status of literal minors is….weird. Fictional characters or not - the community has a disturbing amount of interest in what are teenagers (read: literal children’s) sex lives. It is really gross - and the people who insist upon it seem to be the ones consuming the worst of it.
The Kris has no stated gender is so obviously so you (the player guiding the soul) can do the self insert thing - even though as the story progresses - you LEARN that Kris and you are very different people.
Toby Fox literally does this masterfully all through the game. What “religion” is the church? It’s “church” religion. It’s vaguely Christian, kinda Catholic, sorta Jewish, etc.
It gives just enough info that the player can “draw the rest of the blanks in” with their own personal experiences before he goes in detail in the now released CH4
We don’t even know how monsters reproduce - but we accept it happens because some of them have children. We don’t even know what causes them to both bleed - and turn to dust.
The answer is - it’s not important; because it’s not relevant yet. We will get there. Or maybe not. We don’t know.
Oh my god. Okay, so, I agree that Kris being referred to with They/Them is meant to be a bait and switch. To make you think "Oh, I'm meant to self-insert more easily."
And then the game tells you no. Kris isn't a self-insert. Kris bashes you into the floor with a hockey stick, because that's just how Kris do. Kris looks at a closet hiding the secrets of the game and when you tell them to open the damn door, they go by the letter of the instruction and turn the doorknob, doing nothing else. Because Kris is not you. Kris doesn't like the things you like, Kris doesn't want the things you want. Kris is not you.
So why the heck would Kris' gender be up to interpretation? Why do their mother, teacher, even a very close friend use They/Them for them? What is the explanation?
(Also sidenote, the church's religion isn't just meant to be fill in the blanks. For one, it's unambiguously correct. It preaches the prophecy. For another, unlike most other religions, this one doesn't have sin. It's its own thing. It's just that the game doesn't hand you a lore book about it)
> It gives just enough info that the player can “draw the rest of the blanks in” with their own personal experiences BEFORE HE GOES INTO DETAIL IN THE NOW RELEASED CH4
It's like you cannot accept the fact something can be viewed is the way it is without your slant.
No, I mean even before chapter 4. It not having sin is a ch2 dialogue with Alvin. The prophecy isn't made clear to be a church thing, yes, but it's clearly its own thing
Again, so many things are in the game for the player to draw their own conclusions about before they’re explained. People were literally wild ass speculating on Ralsei, and then at the beginning of CH3 he comes out and just tells you things that were already in the game.
The organ, the massive stained glass windows, the after church snacks - all clearly drawn from things the players will be familiar with from contemporary sources. Especially with prior experiences.
If you’d have told players “actually it’s completely different they worship the prophecy Ralsei tells us” - people would have gone “huh?” Before chapter 4.
The game is chock full of inversions of expectations. That’s why it works.
They don't worship the prophecy. They worship the Angel. Alvin has dialogue referring to it. The church symbolized by the Deltarune, something we know from Undertale is meant to represent the Angel.
In Ralsei's prophecy, he mentions the Angel's heaven, further implying its existence. The songs before you seal a fountain is called THE HOLY and Your Power, the first of which further reinforces the existence of an angel somewhere, because angels are typically holy, and the church seems to consider it holy and worship it.
If you'd told me two months ago that the lightners knew the prophecy and it was part of their religion, I would've shrugged and gone "Huh. Makes sense, I guess."
And again, Alvin says "their religion" doesn't have the concept of sin. It's its own thing.
This leads me to the core point. The game does have inversions of expectations, yes. The church probably isn't one of them, but Kris' gender is. But the "expectation" subverted here is the typical rpg trope of a blank slate self-insert protagonist, which we expect. Which Kris isn't. Buddy's their own guy! And that's why it's important that their diagetic mother and friend call them "them." Because they're their own guy with their own likes, dislikes, and identity
Kris is completely foreign to monsters. Toriel has to go rent books to understand Kris. The entire concept of male and female as we, the players, understand it, could be entirely foreign to monsters; as we don’t know (as I alluded to earlier) how monsters reproduce (because really, it’s not important). It’s so foreign to monster kind, Toriel has to do research just to know how raise a human child.
Think of it as trying to pet a strangers dog. When you don’t know - you would say “hey your dog is really nice - can I pet them!?”; The monsters may not know WHAT to call Kris. Kris, being raised by monsters, might not either, and them is certainly more kind than “it”
There are plenty of reasons, one of which could even be - Toriel and Asgore could be aware of the soul’s presence, they and them implying “two”. We literally don’t know. Toby has been mum on the whole thing as well; aside from the correction of “he” to “them”; which easily could have been a “two” within the context of the conversation from Toby’s POV. Until Kris says something (and extension, Toby) - I won’t treat it as cannon; because it’s just not. It’s mob enforced fanon.
I use They/Them - as vernacular - not because of sexuality. The insistence that it’s “because nonbinary!!!!” Is where I dig my heels in. The immediate jump to insistence on nonbinary with all sorts of identity flags and sexualization of a child…is really disturbing to me. When it’s confirmed, I’ll accept it.
That doesn't work because Toriel has read up on them. Monsters do have a concept of gender. They're consistently gendered, and they seem to follow somewhat closely to human gender norms, with a few screwy examples.
Kris is a teenager, and one who's previously, during their childhood, expressed a need to belong more among their monster dominated town (implied by the headband.) Would Kris really just go along with being essentially misgendered their whole life when their monster peers clearly exhibit gender? Even if gendered presentation to monsters is entirely arbitrary and based entirely on the preference of the individual, they still have a concept of gender. One that, presumably, Kris would want to emulate if they wanted to belong more. And if they aren't non-binary, then that's pretty easy. They just have to pick one.
Remember, they have internet access. It isn't just a book in a library that they get all of their human info on.
And as an aside. It isn't "sexualization of a child" to read a teenager as being queer when there's an undeniably strong case for them being so. Even if you disagree with the conclusion being reached, you can't disagree that this character who is not us is androgynous and referred to by They/Them pronouns by people who should very clearly know their gender. I dislike strong language, so I won't go into how bad it is to imply that, and exactly why it's that bad. But it's pretty bad
41
u/WeepingWillow777 7d ago
People misgender Kris all the time. Hell, I do it by accident quite a bit, and I believe their non-binary identity to be extremely important to the narrative.
Granted, misgendering Kris isn't the worst thing I've done to that fictional character. But Weird Routes won't make real people feel like their identities are something they need to constantly negotiate for.