But it's true that they're 99% of the time written as female. And, I mean, the whole reason we started using the term intersex is because humans can't be true hermaphrodites, so describing futa as hermaphroditic female characters is pretty accurate to their usage.
Do we really want to go down this path of what gender the primary authors are of these characters and who the target audience are of these characters, as well as the frailty of the male self-identity and social pressures to enforce heterosexuality?
Also, no, it's not the whole reason why we started using the term intersex. Intersex was introduced over 100 years ago to describe the way we use it today (Goldschmidt, Richard (1916). "Die biologischen Grundlagen der konträren Sexualität und des Hermaphroditismus beim Menschen".) But yes, true hermaphrodism (
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) is highly improbable in humans - but not impossible.
Again, simply because it is being called that doesn't make it correct.
Futanari could be called:
- females with a penis in addition to a vagina (modern usage in most circles)
- males with a vagina in addition to a penis (the original use of futanari in 12th century Japan)
However, the fictional characters exist outside of a binary. The fictional characters are neither male nor female.