In a message dated 98-07-25 14:36:55 EDT, Mike Allen wrote:

The magic of the curse has turned Ranma into a fully functional female.  
 His genes are XX when female.  More things are different between men 
 and women past the obvious ones.  Our brains are different.  Hormones 
 are different.

That's as may be, but I'm not sure that's a hard-and-fast truth 
when it comes to Jusenkyo curses.  Does Ryoga, Shampoo or
Mousse have the brains of a mere pig/cat/duck in their cursed
forms?  No!  Their true selves are merely locked away in the
form of said creatures.  And the same goes for Ranma.  Now,
Scott Jamison's doing a terrific job taking the opposite tack, 
insofar as Ranma's curse gives him the mind of a female as
well as the body, but it's quite clearly a completely different
person when in 'Ranko's' form.

In any case, it's more a question of interpretation rather than
'this is right, this is wrong.'  Either side can be taken.  I've 
personally given Ran-chan a period in one of my fics; my 
mentor insists that it's impossible given the 'form-without-
substance' aspect of Jusenkyo, but he respects my 
interpretation as a simple, enjoyable one-shot fic.

Anyway, I don't wanna be dogmatic about it, nor do I wanna 
see anyone else doing so -- that's the easiest way to get
Tybalt's attention, after all.

In a message dated 98-07-25 16:13:29 EDT, T.H. Tiger wrote:

One final note. It seems to me, that with no factual basis to work on. your
opinion on this matter is affected by your personel desire. If you like the
idea, of Ranma becoming completely female, then you will accept that he
could do so.

If on the other side, you find the idea disgusting, you will not for any
reason believe he could ever be attracted to a guy.

The two sides will never agree.

Couldn't have said it better myself.  Hey, Tiger-kun, if you
write this well on a thread, can we have a story from ya 
soon?  ^_^

Oh, one more thing:  there was some question as to why 
Ran-chan was in 'the bin.'  It wasn't so long ago that that
was where suicide attempts were locked away; protective
custody, ostensibly (see "The Bell Jar" by Sylvia Plath).
Of course, that still leads to the debate about why he (er,
*she*) would do it...

In any case, she probably didn't commit herself.

Hm.  A little more than my two yen worth, but I'd enjoyed 
the story, and figured I might as well join the fray under
the circumstances.

Itsu mo,
Ucchan   ^_^