Single-Gender Races

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by SilvercatMoonpaw

Considering that if we're talking scientifically there's probably little reason to have the initial stage before the reproductive offspring my guess is the reproducing generation would be much smaller to conserve resources.

Technically, in plants, it's not a case of one plant being reproductive and the other not. The original pattern was that you had a plant that reproduced asexually, releasing spores that grew into male and female, seemingly different plants, which then underwent sexual reproduction to produce seeds or analogs that grew into asexual palnts. There were forms where the asexual forms were the big ones and forms where the sexual forms were the big ones. Most of the plants we know now evolved from the former type, with the sexual generation being reduced to a kind of parasitic growth on the asexual one. But while one is sexual and the other is not, both are reproductive.

[SilvercatMoonpaw]

Originally Posted by whswhs

Most of the plants we know now evolved from the former type, with the sexual generation being reduced to a kind of parasitic growth on the asexual one. But while one is sexual and the other is not, both are reproductive.

Not sure that contradicts what I said, it's just clearer in language.

[Astromancer]

Le Guin's Left Hand of Darkness has a single sex species. But sex is biological. I haven't read the thread, but gender is cultural/psychological. A single sex species could have thousands of genders. You might not actually know if a single sex species is single sexed. That's if the genders are wild enough.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by Astromancer

Le Guin's Left Hand of Darkness has a single sex species. But sex is biological. I haven't read the thread, but gender is cultural/psychological. A single sex species could have thousands of genders. You might not actually know if a single sex species is single sexed. That's if the genders are wild enough.

Eh, at some point that becomes cliches, cultures, classes, and so forth. Gender is still tied to biology and reproduction, if less loosely than sex. Someone previously mentioned races where the two sexes are similar enough that they may as well be one gender outside of reproduction.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by ericthered

Eh, at some point that becomes cliches, cultures, classes, and so forth. Gender is still tied to biology and reproduction, if less loosely than sex. Someone previously mentioned races where the two sexes are similar enough that they may as well be one gender outside of reproduction.

If we're getting culture involved, technology can lead to single-sex races as well. The anime Vandread had the Taraakans and Mejeerans, who were all-male and all-female, respectively. The Taraakans were apparently nonsexual and reproduced by growing babies in factories (probably exowombs), from the genetic material of the former generation. The Mejeerans had more traditional families, with the more masculine woman taking on the role of the husband/father. They were described as creating a clone of the "father" within the mother's womb, but the results seemed more akin to combining their genetic material (I'd assume they induced meiosis from somatic cells - perhaps adult stem cells - to create sperm cells, then fertilized the egg via artificial insemination of some sort). Note the Taraakans and Mejeerans were actually just baseline humans, but they were culturally separated enough (and also lived on entirely different planets) they basically considered each other as different species.

[David Johnston2]

Of course with sufficient dimorphism you can end up with what are effectively separate single sex races even if technically they are the same race. Ents are animate trees. Entwives are humanoid and they were inclined to live separate apart from infrequent get togethers maybe once in a century. We shall never fathom how the hot girl on tree action worked but apparently they found a way, until they didn't

[AlexanderHowl]

Extreme sexual dimorphism can make a two sex species appear to be two single sex species, especially if they have complicated reproduction. Imagine a species with sessile aquatic males and mobile terrestrial females. The males could be unintelligent filter feeders that periodically release sperm into the local waters that would fertilize any ready female that bathed in the local waters. Nine months later, the females would return to the local waters to give birth to the aquatic larval form of their species. After the aquatic larval stage ends, the males would attach themselves to a rock and become filter feeders, digesting their own brains, while the females would leave the waters to live a terrestrial lifestyle.

[Astromancer]

Some anthropologists here on Earth maintain that large swaths of fieldwork has been ruined because the locals saw female anthropologists as biologically women but male in gender. This was because these women didn't follow the tribe's ideas of the female gender role. Aliens might not get our gender roles or we theirs if we can't sort these things out on Earth.

[Proteus]

In my Vergilius setting (fantastic late-Republican Rome), the minotaurs from Crete were renowned pirates... but were only male. They mated with captives and slaves, though that ownership / access was a limited commodity and thus an indicator of status. Male children were born as minotaurs; female children were fully human, but sterile.

One prominent NPC, Mnisthea, daughter of the warlord of Kato Zakro, was unusual as a daughter nevertheless given responsibility and prominent place. The fate of most other such children was generally understood but left unspoken at the gaming table.

PCs also heard of minotaurs on Crete who would become courtesans or companions, even carving their horns scrimshaw-style to indicate an abandonment of attempts at social or physical dominance.

It was an odd culture, and one I never got to develop fully before life scattered the players to the four winds.

[jason taylor]

One possibility is a race that regularly alters biological sex. They have no concept of gender because everyone plays each role in turn.