When It Changed Analysis

When It Changed is a story set in the future in another planet where all its society is constituted by women. In this story, the author is making a statement about gender relations and gender inequality that is still relevant even almost 50 years after the story was written.
From the beginning of the story, the author shows us our biases and stereotypes. In fact, we do not know that the main character is a woman and instead assume that it is a man until halfway of the story. This is due to the author’s usage of characteristics usually associated with men. As a matter of fact, when the protagonist says: “The funny thing about my wife …” we automatically assume that surely the main character is a man because of heteronormativity. This initial feeling is then
This does not, however, apply only to personality character traits but also to physical traits. In our society, women are seen as petite while Janet, the narrator, is “one meter eighty centimeters in my bare feet” and the muscles of Katy’s forearms “are like metal bars”.
This story also depicts very accurately the state of gender relations and how women are perceived by men. When the Earth men arrive they immediately ask, “Where are all your people?”. The narrator initially does not understand question but when the man asks it again, she finally understands that what he actually means is where are all your men. To the man, women are not people. When she tells him that they all died in a plague the man sees it as “a great tragedy” and then tells her “we’re here” as if that was all that the women had been waiting for and that without men, their lives were