@Cirrus Light  
Funny thing is, I’ve been taught that they’re different, with gender is your mental, and sex your physical, like how a drag-queen would have a feminine gender, but a masculine sex.

@Meanlucario  
I’m starting to grow very annoyed with those two words because they never have the same meaning in-between two conversations and two people.
 
In the tale, the empire that built the tower of Babel fell when their language was confounded.
 
Could people please stop confounding our language?
 
Gender refers to male or female. Sex is an act that sometimes takes on the same meaning as gender but often is ambiguous when you use it that way.
 
“His sex” has two meanings. “His gender” is a way to remove that ambiguity.
 
Earlier I said “gender might be a bit odd for changelings” because that has a very different meaning than “sex might be a bit odd for changelings”.
 
“Gender” is a nice and a more appropriate word, especially for use around children. So we’re not redefining it, sorry.
 
 
I really say that partially because I had to use the word “gender” earlier for its original meaning and partly because even keeping up with all the social stuff I’m not even sure what you mean. That the body changes but not the reproductive organs?

@Daneasaur  
Or C: the sex of the receiver never changes, only their gender.

@Background Pony #FD7F  
Generally there are two rules to a shapeshifter conceiving.
 
Rule A: Shapeshifter is locked in their current form until the offspring is carried to term.
 
Rule B: Shape shifting before the offspring is viable results in the offspring simply vanishing with the previous form into nothingness.
 
Of course there are more than that, such as a normally-male-who-was-female-for-some-fun will be forced to retain the womb and proper parts for incubation and birth, but the rest of the form can shift.

@Background Pony #FD7F  
Butt birth.

if this “Rarity” pregnant  
Change back to the thorax, what will happen

@Meanlucario  
The plot dickens.

@Smudge_Proof  
That would just be the dickens.

@Smudge_Proof  
B A L L C E P T I O N

@Daneasaur  
But what if his own balls are touching?

@Daneasaur  
And who knows what in the world Thorax has going on down there!

@Smudge_Proof  
Thanks to spike’s internal junk, it’ll never be gay as the dragonballs will never be touching.

@Meanlucario  
Tags on this site are operated by vulcans, which is why as an individual with Autism, they don’t irritate the shit out of me, I suppose. (Note I don’t actually know if any of the DB staff have Spectrum. XD )

@Meanlucario  
Lol, yeah.
 
He’s leaping after the image of a mare, after all. It wasn’t a male that got him to do that.
 
…plus, gender might be a bit odd for Changelings. For all we know only the queen is female.
 
I can’t recall if “To Change a Changeling” had any really female voices in normal changelings or if just whiny and high pitched male voices in addition to not-whiny or high pitched ones…
 
But yeah Spike is kinda acting like a little animal with no object permanence in this image. Not a biggie, works alright for a quick little cute thing like this, but that’s kinda important to point out.
 
 
_{now just imagine you had a male friend who could shapeshift into a crush you’re crazy about…
 
and by “male” I mean “of the sex you’re not attracted to if there is one”, jeez :p}
 

 
@Daneasaur  
But the comics aren’t chronological or anything. So I don’t see how show canon contradicting issue 51 (@thps48) means a different issue (filly Twi abusing Spike) is now retconned.
 
Even if they were in the same issue, though, they’re still different arcs.
 
At any rate, as others have pointed out, we saw Filly Twilight and they could’ve canonized the comic in Amending Fences in her canon filly appearance, but they didn’t, so I think we could at least agree it’s arguable either way, without enough solid proof either way to keep people from thinking whatever they want.
 
Ie, either accepting it as canon or not is acceptable.
 
But actually that depends on how it was resolved. Did Twi keep caring for Spike and taking him to classes and stuff? Because if so then Amending Fences did kinda decanonize it.
 
But if they had Celestia or Twilight’s parents take over his upbringing, then it could easily be after those events.
 
>>929764t
 
At any rate, Spike certainly doesn’t act like he’s been abused. Imprinted, but not abused. Your greatest nightmare being your motherly older sister caretaker kicking you out doesn’t mean you have abandonment issues, or that you even think it’s likely. It just means you love her. Which is kinda sweet.
 

 
I’d rather not think Celestia was so stupid, that Twilight’s parents thought of Spike like a pet, or that Twilight yelled at him like that, and I think it’s fair enough to say that’s reasonable.
 
And accepting it as canon isn’t so wildly insane that you’d be crazy for it. So no point in arguing, really.

@thps48  
I can see why people would say the gay tags should stay, I’m just giving my reason why I think it shouldn’t have them.

@Meanlucario  
Others applicable tags include “character proxy”, which was in fact founded after it was discovered changelings sometimes disguise themselves as somepony other than Cadance and the tag “fake cadance” didn’t work for an image of some changeling doing a pony. X3

@thps48  
Seeing how surprised he is disguised as Rarity, I find it kind of questionable, especially since it more like Spike’s pent up lust for Rarity is taking over, and not Spike himself.

@Meanlucario  
Spike is glomping Thorax. For those who have “gay, disguised changeling” in either their Watch or Hide lists. :3

Still question the Gay tags, but whatever.

@Sr Pelusa  
51, but yeah.

Not gay whatsoever.

@Cirrus Light  
I think that was the one that had all this stuff on starswirl, which was thrown out with the bathwater when the show did Shadow Play.

@Sr Pelusa  
How so?

@Daneasaur  
The comics were retconned after issue 52/Legends of Magic.
 
Thankfully.

@Meanlucario  
Works the same way as Star Trek’s canon. If it’s not in the movies or Tv series, it’s not canon.