Course:CSIS200/2025/Mpreg and Omegaverse Fanfiction: Transing Gender and Sexuality

Graph depicting AO3 users genre/tag preferences.

Mpreg and Omegaverse within Broader Fanfiction Culture

Fanfiction has long been a form of media that has focused on queer stories. According to the fan-conducted 2024 AO3 demographics survey that reached over 16,000 participants, slash fiction, fanfiction about queer pairings (male/male pairings in particular), was reported by fans as signficantly more popular than fanfiction about heterosexual pairings. In the same survey, 81.4% of participants reported identifying as LGBTQ+. It's evident that a signficant portion of fanfiction communities are made up of queer folks, with queer stories being at the centre. This contrasts with the consistent lag in queer representation in more mainstream media. Fans and scholars of slash fiction have highlighted the genre's use of queer reading techniques and ability to challenge heterosexual narratives. However, not all forms of slash are treated equally.

Mpreg is a subgenre of slash fiction that features at least one man experiencing pregnancy. Omegaverse is a subgenre of mpreg, that is distinguished by its unique gender system of six gender categories based on a mix of human and wolf traits. Despite these genres being characterized by nonnormative depictions of gender, the limited existing literature regarding these subgenres offer mixed perspectives on whether these genres challenge or reinforce normative gender. Amongst fans, these subgenres of slash remain contentious, with omegaverse ranking amongst the most disliked genres in the AO3 survey. Despite the controversial nature of these subgenres, mpreg and omegaverse have grown in popularity, even crossing into more traditional forms of media. In 2025, Taiwanese show ABO Desire was debuted, claiming to the world's first Omegaverse show.

Promotional poster for show ABO Desire.

Gender and Sex in Mpreg and Omegaverse

Male characters who become pregnant in mpreg works typically become pregnant through magic or technology. This makes mpreg works especially popular in fandoms such as Harry Potter, where magic is already an established part of the text. In Harry Potter mpreg fanfiction, potions or spells are commonly utilized as explanations for conception. For example, a spell can result in a male character undergoing a bodily transformation resulting in a mix of male and female anatomy, gaining the ability to conceive through anal intercourse. Delivery of the child most commonly uses cesarean section or spells that allow for teleportation. Birth through the rectum or a vagina are rarely featured in works and are considered taboo, with anal delivery being referred infamously as an "ass baby". Additionally, breastfeeding and enlarged breasts are also typically considered taboo in mpreg communities. While the male characters in mpreg fiction have their bodies altered in a way that "can be recognized as transgendered", they usually maintain their cisgender identity.

The omegaverse is characterized by its unique gender structure of six genders that are based on a combination of human and wolf traits. The normative gender categories of male and female exist on one axis and secondary genders, which may be alpha, beta, or omega, exist on another axis. While there are six categories, omegaverse slash fiction typically focuses on pairings between alpha and omega men . Alphas are typically characterized socially and sexually dominant. During intercourse with omega partners, alphas are tops and have the ability to impregnate omegas. They possess a dog-like penis that allows for "knotting", a process in which the base of their penis swells to keep them anchored in their partner. The anatomy of omega men typically include a mix of normative male and female genitals. While there are variations between omega male anatomy depending on the author of the work, but omega men commonly have a penis and a uterus, possessing an ability to become pregnant by receiving semen through the anus. They are also capable of producing "slick" from their anus, a self-lubricant that eases penetration. 

Chart from outdated omegaverse Wikipedia page depicting the omegaverse gender/sex system.

Challenging the Normative Constructions of Gender

Social constructionism is a framework that examines how phenomenons or categories are created by societies through sociocultural practices. This includes gender, in which the dominant social construction of gender is of a binary system, in which the two categories man and woman are synonymous with their physical sex. Of course, this construction of gender has long been challenged by those who find this binary system limiting and harmful. More contemporary understandings separate gender and sex as different concepts. Sex is often described as not a product of social construction, but a fixed and biologically determined system of categories that include male, female, and intersex, while gender is understood as a cultural construction of femininity and masculinity. This social constructionist perspective of gender and sex has generally been adopted within queer theory in order to de-emphasize the idea of correlation between the material body, particularly the genitals, with gender.

Using the queer theoretical framework of gender as a social construct, there are certainly many ways in which mpreg and omegaverse subvert normative social constructions of gender. By including male characters' bodily transformations and experience of pregnancy within their male identity, mpreg "queers both pregnancy and masculinity because their boundaries have been stretched, broken, and realigned". Mpreg insists that the material transformation of the body in ways that appear more female does not compromise male identity, which serves to detangle gender and sex. In the context of omegaverse, although alpha and omega men are categorized as two separate gender categories, they are both considered cisgendered men. Similarly to mpreg, omegaverse expands the boundary of masculinity to include differently sexed bodies, including bodies that are able to naturally become pregnant and genitals that are analogous to the vagina.

Reinforcing the Normative Constructions of Gender

Although the omegaverse gender structure includes six genders, the focus on alpha and omega men reduces the complexity of gender dynamics to two genders. While alpha and omega men are both considered men, there are many ways in which stereotypical heterosexual dynamics are reproduced. Alphas are commonly depicted as domineering and the more privileged social group, while omegas are typically submissive and experience gendered oppression. The sexual scripts in the omegaverse also mirror Western heterosexual scripts. The default sex act in Western heterosexual scripts is penile-vaginal intercourse. Although the default sex act in the omegaverse sexual script is penile-anal intercourse, it is made analogous to penile-vaginal intercourse, due to the similarity in function between the vagina and the omega anus. The process of knotting also has connotations of bonding and ownership over the omega partner. This reproduction of stereotypical heterosexual dynamics and gendered power imbalances codes alphas as male and omegas as female, despite alphas and omegas both being men. Many omegaverse works explore the nuances of this gendered dynamic through, for example, storylines of omega men resisting stereotypes or navigating how their marginalization impacts intimate relationships with alphas. However, this has also lead to the critique that the omegaverse enforces heteronormative dynamics into queer relationships. By enforcing stereotypical heterosexual dynamics onto characters that are male- and female- coded, the omegaverse essentially reinforces the normative constructions of gender.

While the concept of a pregnant man clearly subverts the normative social construction of a man, there are plenty of norms that reproduce normative heterosexual dynamics. The decision of which character in a slash pairing should be pregnant tends to follow a set of unspoken norms. Typically, the character that acts as the bottom during intercourse will be the one to carry the child. Authors have their own preferences of which character bottoms or tops. However, their decision often implicitly implies which character they interpret to be more feminine or masculine, with more feminine character imagined to be the bottom. This reinforces normative constructions of femininity and masculinity, as it parallels Western heterosexual scripts, in which women are the receiving partner in the default sexual act of penile-vaginal intercourse.

Popular mpreg fanfiction on AO3.

Popular omegaverse fanfiction on AO3.

Ingram-Waters points out that the norms and taboos of mpreg works often serve to maintain the masculinity of pregnant male characters. The common taboo of anal or vaginal delivery seems to "feminize" the characters in a way that many mpreg fans are uncomfortable with. This is also why breastfeeding and enlarged breasts are unpopular in mpreg works. Although mpreg allows subversions of normative constructions of masculinity through male pregnancy, the norms and taboos make sure that the pregnancy does not overly compromise the masculinity of the characters. Therefore, despite how mpreg challenges normative constructions of gender by including pregnancy and bodily transformations within the borders of masculinity, the genre cannot fully disentangle sex from gender when there are still rules dictating acceptable male anatomy.

Conclusion

On the surface, mpreg and omegaverse subgenres seem to align with the social constructionist understanding of gender and sex that has been adopted by queer theory. By including pregnancy and anatomy that aligns with normative female anatomy within the boundaries of masculinity, these subgenres start to disentangle sex from gender. However, mpreg and omegaverse do not fully refuse the correlation between sex and gender, as normative heterosexual dynamics are reproduced and norms and taboos are utilized in order to maintain a construction of masculinity that that includes acceptable and unacceptable anatomy.

However, how gender is depicted in these subgenres is largely dependent on readers and writers. While the ways in which mpreg and omegaverse are typically written may not align perfectly with queer theoretical understandings of gender and sex, there are works that subvert genre-specific norms and taboos in each subgenre. The broader fanfiction community is largely dominated by queer folks who want to see queer stories, so there is no reason to believe that mpreg and omegaverse fiction cannot build upon its limited transgressions of normative gender to meet queer theoretical understandings of gender and sex.

Bio

Angie Chen possesses a Bachlelor of Social Work and is a fourth year student completing her Bachelor of Arts majoring in Psychology at the University of British Columbia. She has been a part of fandom and fanfiction communities for over a decade, and continues to be an avid reader and writer of fan creations. As a queer and racialized fan, she has a personal interest in social justice within fan studies.