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In Sweden, a couple have decided to keep their child's sex a secret from the public. The child, named Pop, has a wardrobe full of clothes for both sexes, and is allowed to pick whatever they want every morning. Casual inquiries from strangers are met with the statement that the parents do not wish to give out that information.
In other words, they're doing quite an interesting thing with the child's gender. The full text of the article from a swedish newspaper is lurking in the spoiler.
Spoiler:
A couple of Swedish parents have stirred up debate in the country by refusing to reveal whether their two-and-a-half-year-old child is a boy or a girl.
Pop’s parents [see footnote], both 24, made a decision when their baby was born to keep Pop’s sex a secret. Aside from a select few – those who have changed the child’s diaper – nobody knows Pop’s gender; if anyone enquires, Pop’s parents simply say they don’t disclose this information.
In an interview with newspaper Svenska Dagbladet in March, the parents were quoted saying their decision was rooted in the feminist philosophy that gender is a social construction.
“We want Pop to grow up more freely and avoid being forced into a specific gender mould from the outset,” Pop’s mother said. “It's cruel to bring a child into the world with a blue or pink stamp on their forehead.”
The child's parents said so long as they keep Pop’s gender a secret, he or she will be able to avoid preconceived notions of how people should be treated if male or female.
Pop's wardrobe includes everything from dresses to trousers and Pop's hairstyle changes on a regular basis. And Pop usually decides how Pop is going to dress on a given morning.
Although Pop knows that there are physical differences between a boy and a girl, Pop's parents never use personal pronouns when referring to the child – they just say Pop.
"I believe that the self-confidence and personality that Pop has shaped will remain for a lifetime," said Pop's mother.
But while Pop’s parents say they have received supportive feedback from many of their peers, not everyone agrees that their chosen course of action will have a positive outcome.
“Ignoring children's natures simply doesn’t work,” says Susan Pinker, a psychologist and newspaper columnist from Toronto, Canada, who wrote the book The Sexual Paradox, which focuses on sex differences in the workplace.
“Child-rearing should not be about providing an opportunity to prove an ideological point, but about responding to each child’s needs as an individual,” Pinker tells The Local.
“It’s unlikely that they’ll be able to keep this a secret for long. Children are curious about their own identity, and are likely to gravitate towards others of the same sex during free play time in early childhood.”
Pinker says there are many ways that males and females differ from birth; even if gender is kept ‘secret,’ prenatal hormones developed in the second trimester of pregnancy already alter the way the child behaves and feels.
She says once children can speak, males tell aggressive stories 87 per cent of the time, while females only 17 per cent. In a study, children aged two to four were given a task to work together for a reward, and boys used physical tactics 50 times more than girls, she says.
But Swedish gender equality consultant Kristina Henkel says Pop’s parents' experiment might have positive results.
“If the parents are doing this because they want to create a discussion with other adults about why gender is important, then I think they can make a point of it,” Henkel says in a telephone interview with The Local.
“You can talk about there being a non-stereotypical gender; if you are a girl you can do the same as a boy, and if you’re a boy you can do the same as a girl.”
Henkel also says a child's sex can deeply affect how they are treated growing up, and distract them from simply being a human being.
“If the child is dressed up as a girl or boy, it affects them because people see and treat them in a more gender-typical way,” Henkel explains.
“Girls are told they are cute in their dresses, and boys are told they are cool with their car toys. But if you give them no gender they will be seen more as a human or not a stereotype as a boy or girl.”
She says that without these gender stereotypes, children can build character as individuals, not hindered by preconceived notions of what they should be as males or females.
“I think that can make these kids stronger,” Henkel says.
Anna Nordenström, a paediatric endocrinologist at Karolinska Institutet, says it’s hard to know what effects the parents' decision will have on Pop.
“It will affect the child, but it’s hard to say if it will hurt the child,” says Nordenström, who studies hormonal influences on gender development.
“I don’t know what they are trying to achieve. It’s going to make the child different, make them very special.”
She says if Pop is still ‘genderless’ by the time he or she starts school, Pop will certainly receive a lot of attention from classmates.
“We don’t know exactly what determines sexual identity, but it’s not only sexual upbringing,” says Nordenström. “Gender-typical behaviour, sexual preferences and sexual identity usually go together. There are hormonal and other influences that we don’t know that will determine the gender of the child.”
Both Nordenström and Pinker refer to a controversial case from 1967 when a circumcision left one of two twin brothers without a penis. Dr. John Money, who asserted that gender was learned rather than innate, convinced the parents to raise 'David' as 'Brenda' and the child had cosmetic genitalia reconstruction surgery.
She was raised as a female, with girls’ clothes, games and codes of behaviour. The parents never told Brenda the secret until she was a teenager and rebelled against femininity. She then started receiving testosterone injections and underwent another genetic reconstruction process to become David again. David Reimer denounced the experiment as a crushing failure before committing suicide at the age of 38.
“I don’t think that trying to keep a child’s sex a secret will fool anyone, nor do I think it’s wise or ethical,” says Pinker. “As with any family secret, when we try to keep an elemental truth from children, it usually blows up in the parent’s face, via psychosomatic illness or rebellious behaviour.”
But with a second child on the way, Pop's parents have no plans to change what they see as a winning formula. As for Pop, they say they will only reveal the child's sex when Pop thinks it's time.
At first I was confused - surely it would be fairly obvious what sex the child was pretty soon- but the more I thought about it, the more interesting it is. I wonder how much gender stuff happens very early on in a child's life.
What do you chaps think? Good, evil, bizarre? And what do you think will come of it?
Bizarre, sorry. Gender roles are okay, it's okay for males and females to be different, provided they aren't discriminated on. It's okay for little boys to be little boys, and little girls to be little girls. I hate this sort of forced equality play.
Is it not okay for Pop to be whatever he or she wants?
I have a small child, and she doesn't know whether she wants fucking PB&J or a cookie half the time, asking her to make a gender determination is stupid. No child is mentally or emotionally capable of making a life altering decision like that, and they certainly aren't going to do it based on you letting them choose their clothes every morning.
This kind of crap is 100% about the parents, and can't possibly have the true emotional well being of the child at heart.
As long as they aren't harming the kid then whoop dee doo. Just don't get too sad when, before you know it, she's already abandoned all the cars and trucks and only wants to play house with the dolls.
I too believe gender is a social construct, and would most likely do the same with my children if I ever have any.
I don't know that I will go so far as to "hide" their biological sex, but I am of the mindset that gender roles are in most cases completely prescribed by culture given that as little as a hundred years ago, pink was considered a color for men to wear, and blue was the color for baby girls, and even further back had men wearing the latest "fashions" which included lots and LOTS of lace and makeup. What the previous sentence means is that things like "dresses are for girls" and "boys like trucks" are completely made up by our shared culture, and I think that breaking the chains those have placed on people is the first step toward legitimate gender equality.
And demonstrating that gender roles ARE social constructs that can be avoided goes a long way towards achieving that goal.
This is not to say that legitimately enjoying "gender appropriate" things is bad or wrong, but enjoying them because your gender should enjoy them IS bad and wrong.
If Pop DOES have a penis, and ends up liking trucks then that is cool. If Pop has a vagina and likes tea parties, also cool.
However if Pop has a penis and likes tea parties and dresses? ALSO cool. And in many cases a little boy would NOT be allowed to like these things WITHOUT mockery or even negative responses from his parents.
Please note the obvious gender stereotypes I have made in this post and recognize that they are used to illustrate a point.
I think raising a child in a household which supports non-traditional roles and egalitarian ideas about how genders should be treated is more likely to produce a positive result than some poorly conceived political experiment.
Gender is not a god damn social construct, gender is a construct of your genitals. How we TREAT the genders is a social construct.
No. You are wrong. Sex is your physical makeup, Gender is a social construct. That's how the entire social/scientific community has decided to delineate the two. You are wrong.
I think raising a child in a household which supports non-traditional roles and egalitarian ideas about how genders should be treated is more likely to produce a positive result than some poorly conceived political experiment.
But that doesn't get you on the news, so...
I have zero issue with this. My little girl is constantly told "Play with the toys you want, enjoy the things you want". If she wants to play with GI Joe, I am totally okay with this. But this story is a political stunt, nothing more.
Gender is not a god damn social construct, gender is a construct of your genitals. How we TREAT the genders is a social construct.
No. Sex is the construct of your genitals. Gender is a social construct.
After looking up the dictionary definition of 'gender', I will concede this...but I think for a lot of people the words are interchangeable (right or wrong).
I too believe gender is a social construct, and would most likely do the same with my children if I ever have any.
I don't know that I will go so far as to "hide" their biological sex, but I am of the mindset that gender roles are in most cases completely prescribed by culture given that as little as a hundred years ago, pink was considered a color for men to wear, and blue was the color for baby girls, and even further back had men wearing the latest "fashions" which included lots and LOTS of lace and makeup. What the previous sentence means is that things like "dresses are for girls" and "boys like trucks" are completely made up by our shared culture, and I think that breaking the chains those have placed on people is the first step toward legitimate gender equality.
And demonstrating that gender roles ARE social constructs that can be avoided goes a long way towards achieving that goal.
This is not to say that legitimately enjoying "gender appropriate" things is bad or wrong, but enjoying them because your gender should enjoy them IS bad and wrong.
If Pop DOES have a penis, and ends up liking trucks then that is cool. If Pop has a vagina and likes tea parties, also cool.
However if Pop has a penis and likes tea parties and dresses? ALSO cool. And in many cases a little boy would NOT be allowed to like these things WITHOUT mockery or even negative responses from his parents.
Please note the obvious gender stereotypes I have made in this post and recognize that they are used to illustrate a point.
None of that really matters since these kids aren't old enough to make a decision as complex as their gender, and probably won't be for quite a while.
Gender is not a god damn social construct, gender is a construct of your genitals. How we TREAT the genders is a social construct.
No. Sex is the construct of your genitals. Gender is a social construct.
After looking up the dictionary definition of 'gender', I will concede this...but I think for a lot of people the words are interchangeable (right or wrong).
And for a lot of people, irony is interchangeable with "amusing coincidence."
I've heard of experiments like this before which generally result in parents who are disappointed but resigned when by age two their child is already clearly latching on to all the same respective gender stereotypes anyway.
I've never heard of an experiment like this before.
Most such "experiments" involve the imposition of a particular role. This is the exact opposite - it's the nonimposition of any gender role.
Bizarre, sorry. Gender roles are okay, it's okay for males and females to be different, provided they aren't discriminated on. It's okay for little boys to be little boys, and little girls to be little girls. I hate this sort of forced equality play.
Again, they're not "forcing" anything on their child. They're refusing to force a gender role on their child. Not the same thing at all.
I think it's height of silly goosery to use your kid as a prop in some kind of political statement
The "political statement" here is "imposing gender roles are harmful." If they believe that imposing gender roles is harmful, then it logically follows that they wouldn't want to allow that harm to come to their children. You're basically saying that only hypocrites can be parents.
I am comforted by Richard Dawkins’ theory of memes. Those are mental units: thoughts, ideas, gestures, notions, songs, beliefs, rhymes, ideals, teachings, sayings, phrases, clichés that move from mind to mind as genes move from body to body. After a lifetime of writing, teaching, broadcasting and telling too many jokes, I will leave behind more memes than many. They will all also eventually die, but so it goes. - Roger Ebert, I Do Not Fear Death
I've never heard of an experiment like this before.
This is exactly why I think it's wrong. We have no idea how this will affect the child, at all, because it is completely unprecedented. What if he/she ends up horribly confused and becomes depressed/suicidal? That's just one horrible possibility out of many.
Also, who is to say that Pop will not be mocked by his/her peers for being genderless?
The parents are effectively using their kid as a guinea pig.
They are forcing a political statement on their child, to say otherwise is silly goosery. They are forcing their child to be a guinea pig in a political experiment.
After looking up the dictionary definition of 'gender', I will concede this...but I think for a lot of people the words are interchangeable (right or wrong).
The word gender used to be a lot more useful when people thought of it as either being grammar or sociology.
On my part, I don't think this will do any particular harm to the child. By the time he's 4-6 it'll be relatively obvious if he's male or female.
What the previous sentence means is that things like "dresses are for girls" and "boys like trucks" are completely made up by our shared culture
IMO it doesn't even matter if those statements are true - in the scientific sense(I have seen evidence that male baby macaque monkeys prefer to play with trucks over dolls to a greater degree than female baby macaque monkeys); the fact that 2% of the variation in what toy you like come from your sex doesn't outweigh the 98% of effect from everything else, which is what we should be focusing on. Tiny percentage tendencies are an irrelevance.
I too believe gender is a social construct, and would most likely do the same with my children if I ever have any.
I don't know that I will go so far as to "hide" their biological sex, but I am of the mindset that gender roles are in most cases completely prescribed by culture given that as little as a hundred years ago, pink was considered a color for men to wear, and blue was the color for baby girls, and even further back had men wearing the latest "fashions" which included lots and LOTS of lace and makeup. What the previous sentence means is that things like "dresses are for girls" and "boys like trucks" are completely made up by our shared culture, and I think that breaking the chains those have placed on people is the first step toward legitimate gender equality.
And demonstrating that gender roles ARE social constructs that can be avoided goes a long way towards achieving that goal.
This is not to say that legitimately enjoying "gender appropriate" things is bad or wrong, but enjoying them because your gender should enjoy them IS bad and wrong.
If Pop DOES have a penis, and ends up liking trucks then that is cool. If Pop has a vagina and likes tea parties, also cool.
However if Pop has a penis and likes tea parties and dresses? ALSO cool. And in many cases a little boy would NOT be allowed to like these things WITHOUT mockery or even negative responses from his parents.
Please note the obvious gender stereotypes I have made in this post and recognize that they are used to illustrate a point.
None of that really matters since these kids aren't old enough to make a decision as complex as their gender, and probably won't be for quite a while.
I've never heard of an experiment like this before.
This is exactly why I think it's wrong. We have no idea how this will affect the child, at all, because it is completely unprecedented. What if he/she ends up horribly confused and becomes depressed/suicidal? That's just one horrible possibility out of many.
Also, who is to say that Pop will not be mocked by his/her peers for being genderless?
The parents are effectively using their kid as a guinea pig.
I think these are valid concerns.
I think that this has a much better shot of working in Sweden than it would in the US.
I am comforted by Richard Dawkins’ theory of memes. Those are mental units: thoughts, ideas, gestures, notions, songs, beliefs, rhymes, ideals, teachings, sayings, phrases, clichés that move from mind to mind as genes move from body to body. After a lifetime of writing, teaching, broadcasting and telling too many jokes, I will leave behind more memes than many. They will all also eventually die, but so it goes. - Roger Ebert, I Do Not Fear Death
I have a small child, and she doesn't know whether she wants fucking PB&J or a cookie half the time, asking her to make a gender determination is stupid. No child is mentally or emotionally capable of making a life altering decision like that, and they certainly aren't going to do it based on you letting them choose their clothes every morning.
Is it a crucial life-altering decision if he or she can always change his or her mind the next day?
Valuing scholarship above all else, the inhabitants of the Ivory Tower reward those who sacrifice power for knowledge.
But it seems to me that all the parents are doing is just preventing the child from exploring a part of their identity entirely.
Allowing the child access to the clothes and toys of both genders is preventing them from exploring a part of their identity?
Is today backwards day?
I am comforted by Richard Dawkins’ theory of memes. Those are mental units: thoughts, ideas, gestures, notions, songs, beliefs, rhymes, ideals, teachings, sayings, phrases, clichés that move from mind to mind as genes move from body to body. After a lifetime of writing, teaching, broadcasting and telling too many jokes, I will leave behind more memes than many. They will all also eventually die, but so it goes. - Roger Ebert, I Do Not Fear Death
I've never heard of an experiment like this before.
This is exactly why I think it's wrong. We have no idea how this will affect the child, at all, because it is completely unprecedented. What if he/she ends up horribly confused and becomes depressed/suicidal? That's just one horrible possibility out of many.
Also, who is to say that Pop will not be mocked by his/her peers for being genderless?
The parents are effectively using their kid as a guinea pig.
There are also many GOOD possibilities to come out of this
Not to say those concerns are invalid, but they also blind themselves to the potential benefits of this.
They are forcing a political statement on their child, to say otherwise is silly goosery. They are forcing their child to be a guinea pig in a political experiment.
I think it's height of silly goosery to use your kid as a prop in some kind of political statement
The "political statement" here is "imposing gender roles are harmful." If they believe that imposing gender roles is harmful, then it logically follows that they wouldn't want to allow that harm to come to their children. You're basically saying that only hypocrites can be parents.
I am comforted by Richard Dawkins’ theory of memes. Those are mental units: thoughts, ideas, gestures, notions, songs, beliefs, rhymes, ideals, teachings, sayings, phrases, clichés that move from mind to mind as genes move from body to body. After a lifetime of writing, teaching, broadcasting and telling too many jokes, I will leave behind more memes than many. They will all also eventually die, but so it goes. - Roger Ebert, I Do Not Fear Death
But it seems to me that all the parents are doing is just preventing the child from exploring a part of their identity entirely.
How are they preventing the child from exploring? If anything I would almost lean toward them giving the child too much leeway at this stage in it's life. Though I don't really know that there's such a thing in this specific case, and the kid probably doesn't know what's going on anyway. Just that he/she gets to pick whether or not they want to wear the blue onsie today or the pink one.
ArchTrust me, I'm a scientistRegistered Userregular
Like I said, the fiancee and I have had a LONG discussion about this- if we ever have kids we will be buying the most gender-neutral things we can until our child is old enough to decide for themselves what they want to play with.
And at no point will "but that is for boys/girls, why don't you do/use X instead" be said.
They are forcing a political statement on their child, to say otherwise is silly goosery. They are forcing their child to be a guinea pig in a political experiment.
I think it's height of silly goosery to use your kid as a prop in some kind of political statement
The "political statement" here is "imposing gender roles are harmful." If they believe that imposing gender roles is harmful, then it logically follows that they wouldn't want to allow that harm to come to their children. You're basically saying that only hypocrites can be parents.
Instead of imposing gender roles, you're imposing gender neutrality. In any case, you are imposing something on your child, and you're doing so with absolutely no fore knowledge of what the long term effects will be.
That's a political statement, and it's you making your child a political guinea pig.
I too believe gender is a social construct, and would most likely do the same with my children if I ever have any.
I don't know that I will go so far as to "hide" their biological sex, but I am of the mindset that gender roles are in most cases completely prescribed by culture given that as little as a hundred years ago, pink was considered a color for men to wear, and blue was the color for baby girls, and even further back had men wearing the latest "fashions" which included lots and LOTS of lace and makeup. What the previous sentence means is that things like "dresses are for girls" and "boys like trucks" are completely made up by our shared culture, and I think that breaking the chains those have placed on people is the first step toward legitimate gender equality.
And demonstrating that gender roles ARE social constructs that can be avoided goes a long way towards achieving that goal.
This is not to say that legitimately enjoying "gender appropriate" things is bad or wrong, but enjoying them because your gender should enjoy them IS bad and wrong.
If Pop DOES have a penis, and ends up liking trucks then that is cool. If Pop has a vagina and likes tea parties, also cool.
However if Pop has a penis and likes tea parties and dresses? ALSO cool. And in many cases a little boy would NOT be allowed to like these things WITHOUT mockery or even negative responses from his parents.
Please note the obvious gender stereotypes I have made in this post and recognize that they are used to illustrate a point.
None of that really matters since these kids aren't old enough to make a decision as complex as their gender, and probably won't be for quite a while.
We may be able to glean interesting data from this. I eagerly await results.
Though, you know, the more I think about it, the more I find that the notion "All gender differences are socially imposed" is a non-falsifiable claim.
Say that Pop ends up assuming a number of behaviors stereotypical to his/her sex, what will proponents of the "gender as complete social construct" theory have to say about it?
Ultimately, perhaps we just won't be able to glean anything from studying this, as we've failed to glean any really useful information from gender-effect-on-development experiments in the past.
GnomeTank, the ideal way (what I suppose people are assuming) this little experiment goes down is the parents say, "play with whatever you want", and not, "you played with dolls yesterday, are you sure you don't want to play with trucks today?", and as such I see no use of the child as a guinea pig. You're going to need to be more specific with us.
I would be curious to do a little data poll to see how opinions fall on this, and more important, which opinions are from actual parents, and which are from people who have no kids.
but giving a female kid a pink room and nothing but dolls is just as imposing. Consciously or not parents all program their kids to understand social norms and what is expected of them.
Gnome if you really want to make that argument it's not much of a stretch to apply it to anything you teach a kid.
I would be curious to do a little data poll to see how opinions fall on this, and more important, which opinions are from actual parents, and which are from people who have no kids.
Okay this is that bullshit "only parents know how to be parents" line.
The problem is that people think of male and female as binary properties:
They're really not.
For every aspect of masculinity and femininity as conventionally measured, people will vary all over the shop. Being male or female is measured as an aggregate of these properties by people. Some boys will be super masculine in some ways, and quite feminine in others. There's no reason why we shouldn't try to liberate these properties from the restrictive categories and let people express their personalities; if the built in differences exist, they will emerge naturally instead of as a result of coercion/social pressure.
GnomeTank, the ideal way (what I suppose people are assuming) this little experiment goes down is the parents say, "play with whatever you want", and not, "you played with dolls yesterday, are you sure you don't want to play with trucks today?", and as such I see no use of the child as a guinea pig. You're going to need to be more specific with us.
But they are taking it farther than this. I already do this with my little girl. They are going beyond just being open, reasonable people, in to the territory of being secretive about the gender, which takes it from "Good parenting" to "bizarre".
Like I said, the fiancee and I have had a LONG discussion about this- if we ever have kids we will be buying the most gender-neutral things we can until our child is old enough to decide for themselves what they want to play with.
And at no point will "but that is for boys/girls, why don't you do/use X instead" be said.
This just seems to be taking it a step further.
My mother attempted to do this. I had a yellow room and was bought all manner of different types of toys.
It wasn't good enough, though. My dolls were still Barbies rather than action men, my clothes had kittens on them instead of trucks, so I ended up caving to social pressure and going female. Had my parents been stricter with keeping both options open to me and making a point of not letting me be swayed by outside influences, I think I'd be a lot happier today than I am now.
While you eat, let's have a conversation about the nature of consent.
but giving a female kid a pink room and nothing but dolls is just as imposing. Consciously or not parents all program their kids to understand social norms and what is expected of them.
I would be (not pedo) interested in how they decorated the kids room when they first delivered.
Registered User regular
Posts
I have a small child, and she doesn't know whether she wants fucking PB&J or a cookie half the time, asking her to make a gender determination is stupid. No child is mentally or emotionally capable of making a life altering decision like that, and they certainly aren't going to do it based on you letting them choose their clothes every morning.
This kind of crap is 100% about the parents, and can't possibly have the true emotional well being of the child at heart.
But steve loves you! Why you gotta be like that
Alright-
I too believe gender is a social construct, and would most likely do the same with my children if I ever have any.
I don't know that I will go so far as to "hide" their biological sex, but I am of the mindset that gender roles are in most cases completely prescribed by culture given that as little as a hundred years ago, pink was considered a color for men to wear, and blue was the color for baby girls, and even further back had men wearing the latest "fashions" which included lots and LOTS of lace and makeup. What the previous sentence means is that things like "dresses are for girls" and "boys like trucks" are completely made up by our shared culture, and I think that breaking the chains those have placed on people is the first step toward legitimate gender equality.
And demonstrating that gender roles ARE social constructs that can be avoided goes a long way towards achieving that goal.
This is not to say that legitimately enjoying "gender appropriate" things is bad or wrong, but enjoying them because your gender should enjoy them IS bad and wrong.
If Pop DOES have a penis, and ends up liking trucks then that is cool. If Pop has a vagina and likes tea parties, also cool.
However if Pop has a penis and likes tea parties and dresses? ALSO cool. And in many cases a little boy would NOT be allowed to like these things WITHOUT mockery or even negative responses from his parents.
Please note the obvious gender stereotypes I have made in this post and recognize that they are used to illustrate a point.
But that doesn't get you on the news, so...
Edit:
No. You are wrong. Sex is your physical makeup, Gender is a social construct. That's how the entire social/scientific community has decided to delineate the two. You are wrong.
I have zero issue with this. My little girl is constantly told "Play with the toys you want, enjoy the things you want". If she wants to play with GI Joe, I am totally okay with this. But this story is a political stunt, nothing more.
No. Sex is the construct of your genitals. Gender is a social construct.
gender is the social construct
sex is the dangly or dimply bits
BZZZZZZZZT incorrect please play again
After looking up the dictionary definition of 'gender', I will concede this...but I think for a lot of people the words are interchangeable (right or wrong).
None of that really matters since these kids aren't old enough to make a decision as complex as their gender, and probably won't be for quite a while.
And for a lot of people, irony is interchangeable with "amusing coincidence."
I've never heard of an experiment like this before.
Most such "experiments" involve the imposition of a particular role. This is the exact opposite - it's the nonimposition of any gender role.
Again, they're not "forcing" anything on their child. They're refusing to force a gender role on their child. Not the same thing at all.
The "political statement" here is "imposing gender roles are harmful." If they believe that imposing gender roles is harmful, then it logically follows that they wouldn't want to allow that harm to come to their children. You're basically saying that only hypocrites can be parents.
This is exactly why I think it's wrong. We have no idea how this will affect the child, at all, because it is completely unprecedented. What if he/she ends up horribly confused and becomes depressed/suicidal? That's just one horrible possibility out of many.
Also, who is to say that Pop will not be mocked by his/her peers for being genderless?
The parents are effectively using their kid as a guinea pig.
ART BLOG
I mean yeah, my kid can play with whatever they want, but I'm going to explain the physical differences between sexes for a reason.
And their identity will be shaped by other things aside from gender anyway, like the country they live in.
The word gender used to be a lot more useful when people thought of it as either being grammar or sociology.
On my part, I don't think this will do any particular harm to the child. By the time he's 4-6 it'll be relatively obvious if he's male or female.
IMO it doesn't even matter if those statements are true - in the scientific sense(I have seen evidence that male baby macaque monkeys prefer to play with trucks over dolls to a greater degree than female baby macaque monkeys); the fact that 2% of the variation in what toy you like come from your sex doesn't outweigh the 98% of effect from everything else, which is what we should be focusing on. Tiny percentage tendencies are an irrelevance.
BAM
Transgendered at six years old.
If it can happen at six, I am willing to believe it can happen even earlier
I think these are valid concerns.
I think that this has a much better shot of working in Sweden than it would in the US.
Is it a crucial life-altering decision if he or she can always change his or her mind the next day?
Allowing the child access to the clothes and toys of both genders is preventing them from exploring a part of their identity?
Is today backwards day?
There are also many GOOD possibilities to come out of this
Not to say those concerns are invalid, but they also blind themselves to the potential benefits of this.
And at no point will "but that is for boys/girls, why don't you do/use X instead" be said.
This just seems to be taking it a step further.
None of that cajoling or anything, trying to break it back out of its self chose gender, either.
Instead of imposing gender roles, you're imposing gender neutrality. In any case, you are imposing something on your child, and you're doing so with absolutely no fore knowledge of what the long term effects will be.
That's a political statement, and it's you making your child a political guinea pig.
The link is blocked for me, but did you just use one person out of 6.5+ billion as a supporting evidence for your argument that it is "possible"?
Though, you know, the more I think about it, the more I find that the notion "All gender differences are socially imposed" is a non-falsifiable claim.
Say that Pop ends up assuming a number of behaviors stereotypical to his/her sex, what will proponents of the "gender as complete social construct" theory have to say about it?
Ultimately, perhaps we just won't be able to glean anything from studying this, as we've failed to glean any really useful information from gender-effect-on-development experiments in the past.
but giving a female kid a pink room and nothing but dolls is just as imposing. Consciously or not parents all program their kids to understand social norms and what is expected of them.
Gnome if you really want to make that argument it's not much of a stretch to apply it to anything you teach a kid.
Okay this is that bullshit "only parents know how to be parents" line.
Please don't continue this tangent.
They're really not.
For every aspect of masculinity and femininity as conventionally measured, people will vary all over the shop. Being male or female is measured as an aggregate of these properties by people. Some boys will be super masculine in some ways, and quite feminine in others. There's no reason why we shouldn't try to liberate these properties from the restrictive categories and let people express their personalities; if the built in differences exist, they will emerge naturally instead of as a result of coercion/social pressure.
But they are taking it farther than this. I already do this with my little girl. They are going beyond just being open, reasonable people, in to the territory of being secretive about the gender, which takes it from "Good parenting" to "bizarre".
My mother attempted to do this. I had a yellow room and was bought all manner of different types of toys.
It wasn't good enough, though. My dolls were still Barbies rather than action men, my clothes had kittens on them instead of trucks, so I ended up caving to social pressure and going female. Had my parents been stricter with keeping both options open to me and making a point of not letting me be swayed by outside influences, I think I'd be a lot happier today than I am now.
I would be (not pedo) interested in how they decorated the kids room when they first delivered.