How To Sexualize Your Characters

The multimedia author Alan Moore once said something that sharply shaped my thoughts on character development. Since I can’t find the interview where he said this I can’t quote him perfectly, so I’ll have to paraphrase him. 

“Since most people have a sexual side, if you don’t explore this side of a character, you arguably have a character who isn’t fully fleshed out.”

Please ignore the pun at the end there. Thank you.

I happen to agree with Moore on this matter, so I'd like to take some time here to justify and rationalize the sexualization of fictional characters, no matter their sex or gender.

As I absorb criticism of art, I can't help but notice the term 'sexualize' and its variations are seldom used positively or neutrally. As is often the case, when I checked the definition of the term in question, it turned out to be neutral for sure. Here's the definition for your reference.

Sexualize: make sexual; attribute sex or a sex role to.

See? Perfectly neutral. I'd even go so far as to call it innocent.

The typical application of this term isn't without merit though, so let's begin by acknowledging it. Most often this term is used with reference to its third definition, the attribution of sex roles. This is due to women being pigeonholed by sexualization across the media landscape. This has been going on for a strong minute, effectively flooding the media market with a type of sexualization that is defined by a limited scope. Let's broaden it by embracing all three of this lovely terms definitions.

1. Make Sexual

This is easily the most benign way to sexualize a character, as it includes a broad range of human behavior. Flirting, for example, is a common and harmless sexual act. There are countless reasons why your characters might flirt with each other, but it is nonetheless sexual behavior, and so to write your characters flirting is to sexualize them.

Many writers will recommend that you avoid describing your character's clothes, as they typically don't relate strongly to plot. I've never agreed with this advice though, since fashion is a dependable way to signal a character's personal attributes to the reader. This makes fashion useful for expressing your characters in a sexual way. For a pronounced example of this, here is a picture of Janelle Monáe wearing vulva pants.

An outfit like this one will usually be a bit much most of the time when selecting a character's outfit, but my point still stands. If your character is, say, on a date, or preparing to assassinate someone under the pretense of a seduction, then form-fitting or revealing clothing is fitting for the scene you are writing.

Obviously you can sexualize your characters by actually depicting sex acts, but I think that subject deserves its own essay. For now, let me leave you with this quote about writing sex scenes so we can move on to the second definition.

"A lot of young writers want to write about sex very badly… and they do."

-Unknown author.

1. Attribute Sex To

I think the most obvious way to attribute sex to a character is by establishing their sexual identity. Even if you choose not to include any actual sex scenes in your story, this information is still useful to the reader, as it contextualizes—or re-contextualizes, depending on when you give the reader this information—many other aspects of the character.

Think of this: if you read an incendiary quote regarding homosexuals by Jerry Falwell or Rush Limbaugh, you will likely take it a certain way. If someone like Milo Yiannopoulos echoes their sentiments however, you take it differently don't you? This is just as true in fiction as it is in reality.

Another way to attribute sex is depicting one character as attractive through the pov of another. This move is especially useful if you want to contrast the viewed character as sexual in certain points of view but not others. You may choose to do this to depict a person who is being sexually objectified.

1. Attribute A Sex Role To

This is the tricky one, because the assigning of sex roles is where most of the complaints about sexualization come from. However, it looks to me like these complaints are limited to the ascribing of sex roles being stereotypically heteronormative too intensely, and too frequently.

This is not to say that heteronormative sexualization has become a mistake in narrative fiction, it’s just that the market is deeply saturated with it. Writing your male characters as bold, or competitive, or emotionally distant is fine. Writing your female characters as submissive, or accommodating, or nurturing is fine. But mixing up the qualities that decidedly male or female characters have is not only more inclusive, it is more realistic, as narrow definitions of maleness and femaleness have always been frankly inaccurate.

I think this is a good place to mention the trans community, seeing as the assignment of gender roles is their whole bag. They seem to be the least represented group currently, as most of their representation is encapsulated by characters whose transness is accidental, such as Heffer from Rocko's modern life.

In real life, the trans community is concerned by individuals being mis-gendered–that is to say, being referred to by the pronouns they do not identify with. I think it’s fair to say that mis-gendering is a form of sexualization, since it always happens because the offending party is thinking in purely sexual terms. If you are writing a trans character, then including this experience is a relevant thing to depict.

Theoretically speaking, you could write an entire story featuring only trans characters without being explicit about any of their gender identities. I think this is a useful thing to keep in mind when it comes to twists and the unveiling of mysteries, particularly if you write prose. In prose, you have the power to omit anything about your characters that you like. You can reveal anything you want whenever you want. It's all a matter of execution.

Let’s say, for example, that character A is mis-gendered from the perspective of character B, but the audience doesn’t know this right away, as the story begins from character B’s pov. After this, you can switch to character A’s pov, but you keep it cryptic and devoid of gender references. You might also write this character without naming them at first, or you apply an alias they know their own self by. Your twist–or unveiled mystery–is that character A is the cryptic pov, that they were being mis-gendered all along, and this ignorance allows that character to operate in the story in a clandestine fashion.

This is only one example, of course. The possibilities with this—as with everything else in prose writing—are endless.

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Sex and sexualization are relevant aspects of life. Since art exists to evoke the human experience, it shouldn’t be forbidden or even surprising for either of these things to come up in our stories. At least half of the media that is produced is targeted at legal adults. This being the case, the content of this material should be interesting for adults to absorb.

Sexualization—like indulgence—is not a literary mistake, it’s a tool you use to develop your characters, and to build on the themes of your chosen narrative. I hope this essay has proven that to you, and that you will sexualize your characters with creative intellect, boldness, and compassion.

That is, if you choose to sexualize them at all.

-Aleister Hanek, June 2022