AIBU to think this mother is horribly WRONG (hypocrite alert)

[proudnglad]

Ok so yesterday I called for a ban on gender threads. Now, this one is an extreme and unusual one so I think I am allowed a hypocritical U-turn.

A mother in Grazia today says she has not told anyone (except very close family) the sex of her toddler and doesn't intend to do so.

She wants 'it' to be gender neutral so that 'it' doesn't conform to stereotypes etc etc.

Where on earth is she going to send 'it' to school where 'it' won't get bullied or ridiculed or alienated?

The fact that I have to call a child 'it' is awful in itself.

Does anyone on here understand this or defend her decision? Show yourselves!

I have a friend who did this; gave her baby a gender-neutral name and told us all she'd had "a child". We thought she was utterly barmy and wondered how on earth she'd keep it up - she managed for about 8 weeks until the dad let slip that he was a boy. He's still dressed in whatever colour clothes come to hand (eg last time we met up he had a pink top with flowers, and a pair of blue trousers) and seems to be growing up perfectly normal, plays with whatever toys are around, doesn't seem to have suffered any ill effects - but maybe that's because we've known for a couple of years what flavour he is.

Good point.

I dressed my dd as a baby in a lot of ds old baby clothes. People always assumed she was a boy. She grew up surroundeed by "boy toys",but still ended up asking for Barbie dolls (who all got punk haircuts!! Some kind grandparent bought her a toy ironing board and iron but she never got near it as DS took a shine to that (his love love of ironing sadly did not last though!!)

The child will discover for themselves what they are when they go to school , that is if the mother allows 'it' to risk being tainted by outside influences (sounds like a bit of a control freak IYAM). At some point they will get curious about why all their peers what to know if they are a boy or a girl, and they will investigate in the toilets.

I am willing to bet, that if it is a girl, by the time she is 5 she will naturally tend to prefer girlie toys, and if it is a boy, he will prefer guns. Sorry, I do not believe all this stuff about kids being gender stereotyped. In general, they are what they are.

What SGM said.

I hate how gendered everything is. I tried to buy some nice brightly coloured slippers for my wee one the other day and had the grand old choice of blue or pink. That's it. It's so bloody limiting.

I also don't believe that both gender stereotypes are respected. If they were then why is it ok for girls to wear blue but boys in pink/playing with dolls etc get funny reactions. My brother just about had a hairy fit when he found out I had bought DS a pram and baby doll to play with. People are always thinking he's a girl. I don't really care. I will care when DS feels he isn't allowed to like pink anymore.

It is easy enough to see that the amount of gendered behaviour differs from culture to culture and from era to era.

A quick look at fashion in the 17th and 18th century is enough to show that it is not genetically determined which sex takes to pink clothing and frills. In those days it was just as much the gentlemen.

When I grew up in Scandinavia, girls climbed trees and played with toy cars (we were none of us allowed guns). All the Scandinavian boys I know have played with dolls. I noticed in the summer that a holiday football club set up on our Swedish island attracted pretty well the same number of girls and boys and there seemed to be no problems with them playing together.

Of course, some things are genetically determined: adult men do not have much need for bras (nor women for codpieces) and boys are statistically more likely to be good at throwing and boxing. But I fail to see how it should follow logically from this that a boy cannot wear a pink T-shirt or a girl cannot get a hammer and saw for her birthday.

Cory but most people do 'let' their sons play with dolls and girls play with play tools/footballs don't they?!

Who are these people that discourage or disallow this?

Everyone I know would have no problem with this.

My dd is tomboy and has NO 'girl's toys whatsoever and not a hint of pink in her wardrobe.

My friend's son is obsessed with wearing pink fairy outfits and does so with impunity.

I know a few people. Sadly my brother is one of them. I remember seeing a woman shout at her around one year old boy for picking up a doll in tesco because it was a girls toy.

It is also hard to avoid. I try not to buy just blue stuff for ds but it is hard. Even places like the elc have boy and girl versions of their toys such as pink and blue garages and tills.

Plenty of parents of only one sex enforce the stereotype.

Actually saying that, my dh wouldn't be pleased if my ds wanted to do ballet instead of football so maybe I should be looking closer to home for examples!!

But the fact that dh is SAHD and I am career bitch does undermine some stereotypes. Am I going off topic?

I'm going to try this with my next one.

I think a lot of gendered behaviour is learned, but there is some that is innate...
Dd had no pink anything as a baby, no dolls (she had cuddly rabbit and bear though).
At 14mo she would rock a wooden spoon in her arms like a baby, though she played with duplo, trainset, cars, blocks, teaset etc too.
We did buy a dolly buggy after that, though she put animals in it, as we bought no dolls until she was 3.
Ds is v different- same toys as dd, but obsessed with cars and cats. He is getting a doll for christmas (boy baby doll), as he likes DD's doll, but toys for him are all about what goes in where, and what can come apart, what makes things go...

I do completely understand this mother's decision. I wouldn't do it myself, too much risk of child being teased/left out, but U can see why she wants to do it.

I cannot stand all the assumptions that are made about children simply because of their gender. It's not ok to do it to adults - that's called sexism - so why on earth do we still do it (in fact even more so than 20 years ago) to children?

Reasons not to read Grazia #417

I think using your kids as a social experiment to proove your own agenda is cruel, verging on abuse.

I think it's cruel too. Also think they run the risk of screwing their child up.

Gender identity is very important for small children (from about 2 or 3 onwards), as much as it is for adults. I don't mean gender stereotypes btw that's a different thing.

I certainly don't think it's " cruel " or " abusive ". I do however think she's a total crank who has completely lost the plot.

ffs

It's 2010.

depends how long she's going to do it for - for the first year or two i can see how not telling anybody what sex a child is could be good, they won't get treated in a silly gendered way (i believe there's NO difference due to gender at that age)

however, once the child can talk it becomes the child's choice i would say. so long as the mother accepts that then no problem.