Hey, so, I’m in a bit of a complicated situation with my story’s universe and the simultaneous opportunity and danger of including a trans character in the main cast. I’ve been heavily debating whether or not I should do it because while in the long run it would make the cast more diverse in multiple ways (as explained below), it’s going to bring down the mood of the first quarter or so of the book big time. Basically, as I’ve described in other threads, this is a story about a world where humans suddenly gain a brand on their arm that starts filling up with magic, super power imbuing runes. Everyone gets the same rune every week, and when the brand fills up, people have to discard unwanted runes to make room for new ones. But on top of this there are four powers that everyone gets and can’t be removed, and one of them is a potent healing factor that can, given time, heal any injury, cure any disease, regrow any limb, halt the effects of aging, and, most importantly to this discussion... heal old injuries, scars and even reverse disabilities. I realized pretty early on that the implications this power would have on a trans person, if followed remotely consistently, would be horrifying. Within 24 hours, the healing factor would subject them to major body horror as it forcibly undid all of their surgeries and other body alterations, and then render it impossible for them to transition ever again. Now obviously I feel trans people have enough shit to deal with in the real world without adding that hellscape of an experience onto them in my world. But I also didn’t want to add in a ridiculous rule patch to how the healing factor works specifically to protect them because that would suggest that whoever’s giving out the powers cares a lot about trans people (and it will become readily apparent in the story that the mystery entity behind the powers doesn’t care about anyone). So when I got the idea of using shapeshifting powers to introduce my own original fantasy races to this story, one of the things I decided was that the appearance and sex of everyone’s race-shifting form would be totally genetically randomized so that trans people could be able to live in bodies of the sex they want, just as one of several humanoid fantasy races. So, it’s all good, right? Yeah, well, here’s the thing... As a first time writer, the subject matter of the initial nightmare that being a trans person would be before the shifting powers show up sounds like pretty heavy material for me to tackle, and furthermore, having the issue resolve itself before the end of the first act when new fantasy races are introduced seems like it would make a pretty cheap and abrupt resolution to that kind of dark plotline, and part of me is concerned there’s no way to tackle and resolve that kind of plot that wouldn’t come across as disrespectful for the same reason that comic books didn’t have superheroes stop 9/11 so as not to make light of the tragedy. Part of me really wants to play it safe and introduce a trans character to the cast after they change species and just mention the issues facing the trans community indirectly beforehand so that I don’t have to drop such ridiculously heavy subject matter on the reader that early on, and with a character they only just met, when I’m just trying to establish my characters and setting and convince the reader they should care about my characters in the first place. But maybe I’m overreacting? Or maybe there’s another way of introducing a trans character I haven’t thought of? I honestly don’t know and the entire question of what to do here is confusing and a little scary. Any help or advice on how to tackle a trans character in this story would be appreciated.
I do think that trans people are seriously under represented as actual characters in stories, so I would say go for it. Firstly, if you haven't done so already, I'd recommend getting in touch with the trans community. Like a large portion of the trans community, and not just the LGBT(et al.) community as they do face some pretty specific challenges that are less common to the rest of this crowd. Secondly, you should probably establish your character. Not all trans people actually transition. Some do get full gender reassignment therapy, while some find hormone therapy to be adequate, and others forgo such treatments due to costs, religious beliefs, health issues, etc. and only get mental health treatment and others still get no treatment at all. So finding out what goals your character has to deal with their transgenderism and possible gender transition would be important. Secondly, while I agree that it could be a potential bit of train wreck by introducing you transgender character before all these things start happening, I think more importantly, that introducing them after they've been able to magically transform without showing the actual challenges they've faced and how that's caused them to become the person they are, would come off more like tokenism. Like, "that's Bob, he's trans, but it never figures into the story in any way, so he's only here so I can pretend to be inclusionary," tokenism. Which brings me to my final point: treat the character with respect. I'm not saying they have to be a good character, because whether someone is a good or bad person is not dependent on either sex or gender or the dysphoria or lack thereof between the two. But please treat this character like a real person with goals and motivations and more than one dimension. And please, for the love of god, do not use them as the punchline to "U accidently kissed a nother guy, ur gay lol" jokes. Stereotypes in general are a bad idea, which brings me back to my first point. Please get to know actual trans people before writing one. So I guess basically my advice is, do your research and treat your character with respect. As for the problems they might face, it woudl seem like a bit of a cop out if they didn't actually face them given the circumstances, and it could provide some pretty decent character drama showing how they deal with, and possible solve these problems. Having a trans person that can't physically transition, if dealt with carefully, could give you a very accurate representation of trans people that suffer from aforementioned issues that would prevent them from transitioning, which is not an insignificant portion of the trans population, or even just a representation of trans people before being trans was socially acceptable and therapy was readily available.
Okay, gonna think out loud for a bit here. Your two basic options are to address the issue or not. If you don't address the ramifications of this setting for trans people at all, by not having any trans characters, there's no problem. Plenty of fantasy setups have ignored how they'd affect queer people, so it's not like there's not plenty of precedent -- you're not going to get in trouble with anyone if you just decide not to. I think it's a valid option, and especially if you're not comfortable or sure of writing it, that's cool. Or: you do include a trans character. You can alter the rules so it's a bit less horrifying, or you can acknowledge that the horror exists. For the former, maybe people have some degree of control over their healing factor -- people with piercings can choose to keep them if they get really good at it, for example. I'm kinda guessing from the setup in general and from your comment about the mysterious entity not caring about anyone that control being given to the humans isn't really fitting, though, right? So, you acknowledge the horror. You've already got a 'fix' of sorts in the shapeshifting ability, so it's not just "surprise, you're being detransitioned now and there's nothing you can ever do about it" -- there is some sort of a light at the end of the tunnel. You should realize that this still isn't ideal, though. This is still leaving people with the options of continuing to live in a body that's working against them, or making do in some randomized other body that probably also isn't really what they want. This wouldn't be a solution -- it's still kinda body horror, it just might work out in a way that's more bearable than posting up in the same ol' horrible human body. So, if you do want to include a trans character, do you want to go best case scenario? The trans person you include is one who lucked out on that reroll and got a body they're happy with? Do you acknowledge that it didn't work that way for everyone? You're still building a world that's fucking over swathes of trans people with a new genetic lottery that they have just as much a chance of losing as they did in the original 'being born' thing. But, if you can't change that while staying true to your core concept, you can at least frame it in such a way that the badness is de-emphasized. I do agree that unless it's really part of your main plot (ie your main character is trans), it might not be best to lay this subplot out there early on while you're still establishing things. Jumping straight in with something pretty dark isn't typically how pacing works, eh. So my thoughts are, again, two options: 1) You introduce a best-case-scenario trans character post-shapeshifting powers. They turn up and they're like "Yeah, being an orc rocks, as it turns out, I'm way into this." As a reader I would still prefer acknowledgment that every trans person doesn't love this whole deal and shit was very raw there for a while and still pretty raw for plenty of people, but you don't have to focus on it heavily just because you have a trans character. 2) You introduce a character earlier on who's trans but not out / not in the process of transitioning. This way there's no backsliding. They could be out socially, but not have had any surgery or started HRT (which avoids narrative misgendering and having them come out at some point in the plot), or they could be not out at all. Again, best-case-scenario -- they win the reroll, they get a body they like possibly way more than they liked their human body, they're into it. But this way you do have a trans character, from the beginning (or early on, whatever), while avoiding the nastiness of a forced destransition. Hopefully some of that helps. I know it was a lot of noodling.
I don't really have a lot to say on this since other posters have summed it up pretty well with their own tl;dr's, but I have to just say that the idea that this healing power forcibly 'heals' all alterations to someone is actually a pretty cool idea. The contrast between someone whose been missing their legs for their whole life having the miracle of their legs regrowing up against people with body modification surgeries such as sexual reassignment suddenly having those undone is really interesting. You should really work with this concept, I think you have a cool idea with it.
Something about this seems off to me, actually. If someone is born with a congenital disability, say a missing limb, and say somehow they have surgery to "correct" it (not currently a procedure that can be done, but hypothetically)--then if this magic went into effect, would they go back to the state they were born in, i.e. with the missing limb? If not, it doesn't follow to me that a post-op transgender person's surgeries would reverse. The notion of transgender people having been"born in the wrong body" is antiquated, but the fact remains that for many people who get the surgery, it's correcting a problem with the body they were born with. In other words, you need to pick whether what's happening is that (a) everyone's bodies revert to the state in which they were born, or (b) everyone's bodies are healed into ideal condition. I hope I'm making sense. It just seems off to refer to reversing a trans person's surgery as "healing." Anyway, I'm cis, so take what I say with a grain of salt, and hopefully some of the advice you get comes from trans people because this does sound like quite a pickle.
I agree that talking with and getting to know people in the trans community is vital here. Maybe I'm not understanding this (I'm dyslexic, so the concept of something being reversed can be difficult to grasp), but...if it's, in your words, a "potent healing factor that can, given time, heal any injury, cure any disease, regrow any limb, halt the effects of aging, and, most importantly to this discussion... heal old injuries, scars and even reverse disabilities" it would seem that the healing factor would help the person, rather than torture them, because it would heal the fact that they started off in the "wrong body" (as a trans friend once explained to me). I think it would accelerate their transition process into wholeness with their inner self, not reverse it. Wouldn't it heal them by melding their inner self to an outer one that reflected their inner self? Maybe I'm missing something, but that's what I would expect to happen. Because, take for example, someone who had knee surgery to remove damaged cartilage and mend a knee. The healing factor would heal the knee more completely rather than reverse the surgery, correct? So it follows that gender reassignment, which, like the knee surgery, was done to mend their body, would also not be reversed and that the healing factor would thus heal the person more completely.
Oh, yeah -- that's something I meant to touch on and forgot. Since you (op) mention that the healing factor effects injuries, lost limbs, scars, etc, I assume it is healing perceived damage. But 'disability' is a broader spectrum of things. I have a friend who was born with hip dysplasia, for instance -- would it fix the innate problem with the joint, or would it only heal the scar tissue from subsequent injuries and surgeries? Would it 'fix' my double-jointedness by making my body a more 'standard' human body but reducing my mobility as a result? I guess you have to think about the way this healing factor works. And I'm really interested in this -- I have characters with similar abilities and I like fiddling with the various ways in which they can work. So, is there a 'basic functional human' template to which this power 'heals' everyone (I am using a lot of single quotes here, eh), or is everyone's body being fed the necessary energy to do what it would, eventually, do anyway? Like, my body would eventually heal up my nose piercing if I took the ring out, but because I've had it long enough for a fistula to form, it's not an open wound that's being prioritized. If you get your appendix out, your body is not going to eventually grow another appendix. So if this power is growing appendixes and forcing nose rings out, then it's outside of the realm of what's 'healing'. So how does it work? Since this is fantasy, not sci-fi, I'm gonna say 'magic'. So ... how does the magic work? Is there a template somewhere that this mysterious entity is applying to all humans? How stringently-applied is the template? How is it overseen? If there's no template, well, how does it make people 'heal' things their body has no actual ability to physically heal? (I don't mean to sound nitpicky -- I think you've got an interesting idea here. But pulling your systems apart and really considering how they work on the most basic levels, and seeing what happens when you tweak those things, is always fun and useful.) edit: As a closing sentence of sorts, my point I think is that there could be loopholes here, and both (certain, if not all) trans people and people with unrelated physical conditions could benefit from them. A system that wants to revert the human body back to the peak version of what it was at birth, yeah, not gonna be particularly friendly to most trans folks. One that just wants to heal injuries, though, probably isn't going to affect HRT or people who've fully healed up from surgeries.
The problem with this is that we really don't know what causes transgenderism, whether it's a physical disability, mental disability, developmental disability, the result of childhood trauma, or if it's the resulting symptom of a number of different issues. Gender reassignment surgery doesn't actually fix the underlying reason as to why people are dysphoric but it helps alleviate the problems of having dysphoria. So unless this persons transgenderism is the product of a problem that can be treated purely in a physical manner, assuming that it's even recognized as a problem by whatever juju is doing the fixing, then repairing the persons body isn't going to fix the fact that they don't feel they belong in that body. I personally imagined it to be based on a genetic approach. Like the power knows your genetic potential and gives your body the ability to reach it's genetic potential. This wouldn't work on things like Sickle Cell Anemia, Huntington's Disease, and Hemophilia, but could fix things like limb loss, scarring, diabetes and cancers, depending on whether epigenetics were involved or not.
Thanks for your input, everyone! As for the people talking about the healing factor “healing” the condition of being in the wrong body or otherwise asking for clarification as to how the healing factor works: it does not fix birth defects, and in fact anyone who’s had surgery to fix those things will initially be in the same boat as the trans people and have a similar incentive to hop bodies. It only reverses damage that has been done to the body, not stuff that came about as a natural result of their genetics. As for the healing factor transforming all trans people into the biological sex they identify as and healing their wrong body, that would not only conflict with the rules above, but also for the power to work that way that would seem to me to imply a level of political investment in the subject of transgenderism on the part of the mysterious empowering entity that I do not desire to imply it has. Whether it’s aliens, an eldritch horror or an inscrutable god, the mystery entity is never shown to have any investment in the human condition beyond giving them a bunch of magic toys, hiding behind a rock and watching the fireworks. The only reason the fantasy races have randomized sexes at all (and why each fantasy species body you get after the first is guaranteed to be the opposite sex of the last one, forgot to mention that part, so there’s no chance of a transgender person losing all of the extra flips of the coin) is to encourage as many of those weird humans as possible to join a new race. After reading the replies I got, it looks like my best option is to have her not yet transitioning, so it’s less horrible, though still very sad, when she finds out it’s just become impossible. The fact that the main characters are only 18 or so also helps make this a much more likely situation. I can already picture a scene where she’s hanging out with her two friends, one of whom just got her hearing back after losing it as a baby, and not having the heart to spoil her joy so soon and privately breaking the news to the other friend. Lastly, I’ve decided to let her win the first genetic lottery so we have a main character highlight of why anyone would leap at the chance to leave the human race, and also just to give her a break since things are going to get a lot worse for the protagonists later on. But the concept of the trans people who have to settle for a less than ideal body to not suffer dysphoria is definitely something I want to touch on. Especially since the rules I laid out imply that aside from the minority shifting out of necessity, most of the people changing race are doing it because it offered them a better genetic deal, which would mean some trans people would have to contend with being unattractive in a race full of 8s and 10s, and a race that’s probably heavily fetishized in the media as a result as well. Damn that’s gotta suck.
I'm not the OP so I don't know what logic their story uses, but I'd assume, myself, that this power would probably grow limbs on people who were born without them? Or maybe not, I dunno. The OP's point though, I think, is that he's confronting the fact that someone having a gender surgery "fixed/reversed" and "healed" is the problem, not that he himself thinks of it as 'healing a surgery/problem'. Like this magic force decides "your natural state was supposed to be this so now you're healed" regardless of what that person's natural state was really meant to be, at least that's what I thought the OP was thinking. Maybe even someone who had a bitchin' facial scar they liked has the scar healed up and 'fixed' under the magic's power. I don't think magic needs to make too much sense. People scrutinize magic systems and want to know how it logically works, but I think it's enough to just explain "the magic uses its own logic to decide what gets fixed, reverting bodies back or into whatever form it deems should be natural". Edit: Just read the OP's second post so I think I misunderstood what he was going for a little bit, actually.
Okay, first off, this idea sounds amazing. Putting aside any backlash from your readers, the characters that can be made based on what you've said here is a phenomenal range of potential. The amount of emotional conflict within this character would be their entire arc, whether it be to accept that they can't fight it, or to fight it anyway and come out on top. I think this is a wonderful idea that you should pursue. Now, let's get a bit more real. Including a trans character is like intentionally setting up a minefield, and then putting a blindfold on yourself and trying to leave the minefield. There's a good chance you'll explode, and there is a reason for this. You will never please everyone with how this character's story ends. I've said before that writers shouldn't worry about pandering to all of their readers because they'll never please anyone, but this is a bit more of a touchy subject, wouldn't you agree? In this case, the experience of the individual trans person is so different compared to other trans people that it is literally impossible to please everyone in the trans community, and, let's get a bit more honest, some people are going to be pissed. You should understand that, simply by including a trans character, people will get mad at you because they feel like your character didn't accurately portray their experience, but this shouldn't discourage you. If you include this character, you cannot, I repeat cannot, take any steps back. If you include this character, you have to be willing to show them to the world, knowing full well that people will be mad. If you include this character, you have to decide, from the moment the story begins, exactly what this character's story will be, and you cannot change their story based on the emotionally charged comments of the people who dislike the character because they aren't exactly the way they wanted the character to be. If you do, you'll only be shooting your character in the foot. You have to be able to put your character on a pedestal and say: "This is the character! This is who they are! If you don't like them, then you don't like them! End of story!" My point is, your character is unique, so don't change them based on the fear of backlash; that's how good characters get turned into sloppy ones. I think that's a brave step for a new writer, Lord knows I don't trust myself to be able to do it, so good luck.
Honestly, I think your current idea is great. I don't know any trans people (mostly because there are way fewer of them than most people think), but your idea sounds like it could lead to some great character moments. I think the best way to help end discrimination against trans people is to treat them like people, and not purse puppies. Not sure if this is the answer you wanted, but I say explore the effect that power would have on them.
Actually, that already is a reality for many trans people. Not every trans woman has the resources for the cosmetic surgery to soften their features into something that the world at large would consider to be traditionally "feminine" for example. My trans friend was actually studying to be a makeup artist for this reason. Before you decide the character's arc and reactions, you should definitely talk with people in the trans community, though. You may be making general assumptions about being trans that aren't the case, which would affect the character's experience.
@Simon Price I say go for it. May not be everybodies cup of team, but you gotta write the story the way you want it. As long as their is a purpose and not a negative one for it in the story. I have written much worse things, but none that get too close to sensitive subjects (well not yet).
Oh I totally get that. I’m just saying that being a member of an exotic new species full of attractive people would probably make it even worse in a way worth exploring.
As for doing research on the trans community beforehand and getting to know them, I think that would be a good idea, but does anyone have any specific advice about where to go online or the best way to go about it?
IMO this the only issue with tackling this issue in this story. If the power reverts the trans person's body back to the sex they were born as, then you are implying that this is the "normal" state for their body, and that the sex-reassignment surgery was an abnormal and injurious alteration. If the power heals the trans person's body of all injuries and wounds but leaves them as their re-assigned sex, then you are implying that their original state was aberrant, and that their re-assigned sex was "correct". You also need to think about what would happen to pre-op transgender people. If you the former situation is the case (that a post-op person would be reverted to their birth sex) then a pre-op transgender person's sex would remain unchanged. If the latter is the case (that a post-op person would remain their re-assigned sex), then a pre-op transgender person should transition to their preferred sex if the power is used on them. You can then open this up to other alterations. Obesity, or even extremely muscular physiques are not normal states for a human body to be in. Should they also be reverted? What about neurological states such as autism, schizophrenia, or even sociopathy? Would the power alter such brains so that they are no longer that way? If so, you're implying that these things are sicknesses which should be cured. If not, you are implying they are normal states. People will obviously have differing opinions on this depending on the condition you are talking about. Personally, I think this is an incredible idea, and I would write it. Whatever you write, you'll offend somebody, so my advice would be to just write it and give zero fucks if people get upset. If you wanted to be sure the reader knew it wasn't your views you were portraying but those of the characters within the situation, you could express this through dialogue. A pro-trans character might be delighted that their trans friends' bodies remained their re-assigned sex, while a less accepting person might feel this is wrong. Or vice-versa if trans people's bodies are 'healed' to their birth sex, the pro-trans person's horror can be contrasted with the unaccepting person's glee. The discussion between them will expose your level of understanding of both sides of this argument, and then if the reader wants to be upset about it, they can be upset with the characters.
I would start with the National Center for Transgender Equality (https://transequality.org/). They're a well-respected non-profit that I donate to every year.
My general plan for this is that since I want the nature of the entity giving the powers to be an unsolved mystery, I don't want it to look like this entity has any real opinions about human politics one way or the other, since that would be kind of weird for it to do when one of the prevailing non-religious theories is that some hedonistic hyper-advanced race of aliens decided to make humanity into a new reality tv show by giving them powers and watching the fireworks as society slowly devolves into chaos. So I'm going with the rule of the power working to keep the body consistent with its genetic blueprint, combined with a supernaturally enhanced immune system. Basically if anything's missing from the body that their original genetic blueprint and the additional process of growing up asked the body to build, or anything that the body's natural defenses would already recognize as a problem and in some way fight to correct, it gets healed over time. This has the side effect of the healing factor insisting on maintaining anything the person's genes got "wrong" that might have been surgically removed or altered. Soooooooort of. For muscularity, basically, another of the powers everyone gets makes everyone tougher, stronger and faster, and since I want women to be just as strong as men and I also don't want to have to make all of the strong characters super muscular, muscles are rendered irrelevant to these people, and more of a physical reflection of how supernaturally strong they are that won't exceed certain limits based on your sex and your body's frame and shape. As for obesity, you can still get fat because the body still burns fat and uses all of the usual nutrients for the most part, though the superpowers make exercising much easier and more popular so it becomes far less common. Again, the supernatural forces responsible for these powers have no interest or comment on what bodies or minds are right or wrong, though personally, philosophically speaking I don't think there's such a thing as having a "wrong" brain, because there's no other brain that you could have had while still being you. But basically, while it will fix brains that have been damaged physically, it won't make people born different suddenly "normal". Thanks! Yeah, I do plan to explore, somewhat, the implications of whatever-it-is's definition of a body's natural state, but more as a worldbuilding exercise showing the various views people have of who or what is responsible for the powers in the first place (as you can probably imagine this has some pretty hefty religious implications, though attempts to reconcile it with any specific pre-existing deity quickly become an exercise in frustration as more and more powers show up and life gets weirder and weirder).
That's fine, but the reader will still assume that there is a political point to it. You don't need to actually say it. If a trans person's sex is reverted back to their birth sex, then the reader will infer a particular stance on trans issues. Whether they infer that this stance is your own, or related to some point you're trying to make, or just something to do with the story, depends on how it is written (and on the mindset of the reader of course). Actually, this solves the problem entirely. If you are a human with two X chromosomes, then you are born female. If you are a human with one X and one Y chromosome, then you are born male. Reverting the 'victim' to whatever was genetically pre-determined removes all socio-political baggage, as it's then purely a genetic thing. You'd just need to make sure this is consistent throughout. You could also play with some interesting facets of nature/nurture here. Would a mentally ill person be reverted back to a genetic state of being mentally healthy if their illness was caused by their experience? Or would they stay the same if it was a genetically pre-determined inevitability? (I'm not asking for the answer. It's just something to think about). I completely agree with your philosophical standpoint. We know that some brain types (autism being one example) are pre-determined. But it is arguable whether brain types which cause things like sociopathic minds are genetic inevitabilities, or entirely caused by one's experience, or both. Probably both, but it's hard to know for sure. Again, if you 'heal' a sociopath, you're implying that there isn't a genetic component to this mindset and that it's all experiential; if you leave sociopaths as sociopaths, then you're implying that they were always going to become a sociopath due to their genes.
That's not exactly a solution to the socio-cultural baggage so much as it is 100% the socio-cultural baggage: one side claims that the simplest possible factor (the shape of the chromosomes) is the only thing that matters, the other points to the mountains of biological research into how it's not this simple.
The thing is, I don't like to bring human concepts into how powers work. It results in something I like to call "lawyer pixies". For example, how exactly does the whole invitation rule with vampires work? Is there an army of invisible magical lawyer pixies following every single vampire around, reading up on the local property laws, learning every language and studying every single social custom of human etiquette, and making case-by-case decisions on what qualifies as a house, who's qualified to give an invitation, what qualifies as an invitation, and what qualifies as entering the house, and whether or not to let vampires in every time? Because if not how the hell does it even work? It's a power that cannot simply run naturally without continuous sentient intervention because the rules for how it works can't be anchored wholly in reference to physical laws and states. Thus none of my powers work like that. It follows the biological blueprint to determine what does and doesn't need to be healed because adding in human concepts and the actual human opinions of what qualifies as good and bad makes my head spin at the rather ridiculous things that implies about how the powers operate, and results in inconsistent rules, which I don't like working with.
Please, avoid Trans-trenders or Anti's. I feel they'd just rip you to pieces if for this idea. However, I feel it'd be an interesting journey to see this character going from a place where they can't accept themselves, to a place where they could. And there is such a thing as transitioning guilt where sometimes people don't like their post surgery bodies and want to de-transition. So you could also play around with those themes.
Honestly, I disagree. We're all well aware of the bodies we've got. If everyone's bodies are getting reverted to past, pre-surgery, pre-injury, etc., states, I don't think a reasonable reader is going to see it as a political statement when this affects trans people in the way you'd expect. It sucks, yeah, but it's the rules of the setting -- they're applying to everyone. I think it'd be a political statement to present it as trans people being 'healed' into no longer being trans by this magic. And it'd be telling of the author's world view if they set up this whole thing without considering trans peoples' experience of it at all (which isn't a judgement; it just tells me that we're a blind spot for this theoretical author). It'd be a political statement if trans peoples' gender-related surgeries and hormone treatments were ignored by the magic. But I don't think that following how this magic works to a logical conclusion is, in itself, taking any kind of stance. You had your appendix removed? Bam, new appendix. You had your uterus removed? Bam, new uterus.
