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Notes -
Some thoughts:
One way to kill two birds with one stone: A happily married couple with multiple genetic kids. The parents are of the same apparent gender, but it is made clear in some way that the kids are the exclusive results of a genetic pairing of the two parents. You know there is a male and there is a female. But you can't plausibly tell which is which.
The problem with Trans in our society is that we don't really have the technology to do a successful gender transition. I'm not sure what degree of controversy would still exist if you could press a button, and it would change you at the genetic level to the other gender, and reverse any effects of your previous gender on your body.
If aliens are in the game, please don't be boring. One of the fun things about Dr. Who is that some of the episodes with aliens involved are actually ya know, alien. Not just humans in lame skin suits like most of star trek and star wars.
Gender trans people might be super boring in the future. The real controversy is around species trans. What to do with the people that want to transition into a reptile form? They basking in the sun on busy roads, laying their eggs in hospitals meant for human babies, and insisting on eating meat like the consummate carnivores they've transition into.
Creating contrast with aliens might be useful, but to avoid accusations of "you are calling trans people aliens" you can always make the aliens the stodgy ones stuck in their ways. That is what the Star Trek episode did with the halfy faces people. Maybe have an alien race that is unwilling to undergo the slightest amount of body modification. No haircuts for aliens! Or no dyeing their hair. Or no tatoos. Etc. The trick here is just finding some reason why that thing needs to be important to the aliens. Or maybe their gender roles are just much more solid and unswitcheable. The female warrior is not just unlikely, it is forbidden. The male caretaker is forbidden. Etc. Make it a matter of survival to have flexible gender roles.
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