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AIBU?

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Original poster

To wish people understood the difference between biological sex and stereotypical gender roles?

27 replies

Rumandraisin1 · 26/10/2017 17:38

www.standard.co.uk/news/london/couple-bringing-children-up-as-gender-neutral-ask-for-open-minded-nanny-to-adhere-to-strict-rules-a3668416.html

And since when did you take a two-year-old into the toilets based on their sex rather than that of the adult accompanying then - let alone based on their sense of gender identity at that given moment?

OP posts:
Fekko · 26/10/2017 17:47

They sound like a pair of jackasses.

Do they bother to mention that they want the nanny to take the kids to the museums, play centres and make biscuits with them? Someone who maybe has qualifications in early years development and a first aid certificate? Clean driving license, non smoker, can cook, is drb checked?

Dear god, I call most small children 'sweetie' as I can never remember names. Can you imagine the interview

'we have 2 young persons for you to monitor'
'How old, boys or girls?'
'Not telling you. Their names are Subject A and Subject B. They dress in identical boiler suits'

user1492877024 · 26/10/2017 17:49

Yep, some very "sick" parents about. Poor child. Although, I do agree with banning the word "Hun".

Kitee · 26/10/2017 17:52

Poor children.

Pennywhistle · 26/10/2017 17:53

When they were little if he was out on his own with them my DH took our boy/girl twins into the gents.

When I was on my own with them
I took them to the ladies. Nicely gender neutral.

How is a female Nanny going to be able to take them into the gents or a male nanny going to be able to take them to the ladies?

A 2 and 6 year old aren’t going to be able to go alone.

Fekko · 26/10/2017 17:55

The kids will rebel, as children do. Maybe it's a windup or DM plant? I've never actually met anyone in real life with these ideas. The closest was a relative who was very anti dolly and pink for their little girl - she is now a very girly 6 year old girl.

Jenala · 26/10/2017 17:56

I know it's crackers! I remember learning the difference in GCSE sociology

geekone · 26/10/2017 18:02

Sad and very militant rather than liberal. They are not able to experience toys or BOOKS😱 If they are not in the list.... shame.

Fekko · 26/10/2017 18:05

I wonder what the poor kids get to eat.

StickThatInYourPipe · 26/10/2017 18:06

I would be very interested to find out what these children are like when the grow up.

And as pp have said above, I thought you took the child into the toilet based on the adults gender. I never take my friends young children into the men's toilets and would not be too happy for a man to be in the ladies.

Silverthorn · 26/10/2017 18:22

Bonkers. The kids are gonna cotton on when they start school or interact with other people.

Fekko · 26/10/2017 18:27

It reminds me if kids in the 70s with the hippy dippy parents. They all rebelled- watching itv, eating findus crispy pancakes/white bread and ketchup, wearing makeup, dying their hair, buying toys denied them in childhood, changing their name to john...

ticketytock1 · 26/10/2017 22:40

Mother of god what is the world
Coming to??!
I swear we are raising a generation of entitled brats.
Last week in work I attended a course focusing on the company's attrition and why we need to lower it.
The solution? Pander to millennials and only give them positive feedback. If they fail a quality check (financial services regulated role) we don't tell them and spin it to a positive. Incase they get upset and leave
Ffs grow some resilience
People are too fucking precious, full of their own warped sense of self importance and too many of us are indulging it
Rant fucking over!!!!

emmyrose2000 · 27/10/2017 08:16

The so called parents are batshit. The kids would be better off living far, far, away from nutjobs like that.

WhooooAmI24601 · 27/10/2017 08:26

My older sister once dated a man who I wasn't keen on. One christmas his family all came to our house for a party and my Mum sat chatting to his Mum and they somehow reached a point in the conversation where his Mum declared (after a couple of glasses of wine) that they'd tried to raise him and his two siblings gender-neutrally.

He was an utter wanker; full of his own sense of self-importance and the most condescending piece of shit I'd ever met. When DS1 was born he criticised me for his name, saying I should have used a gender-neutral name because children with 'strong, masculine' names feel they have to live up to their name.

These parents would do better to raise their DCs to see genders as equal rather than non-existent. The whole thing is going to end so, so terribly for those children whose whole lives are filtered in this way; what happens when outside influences begin to take effect?

upperlimit · 27/10/2017 08:28

Well, I have a 3yo who has a full blown hissy fit gender conflict that he isn't going in to the men's toilets when I'm out with him. I artfully solve this agonising gender turmoil by, erm, picking him up and going in the women's.

MistressPage · 27/10/2017 08:51

It's utterly ludicrous. Those poor kids are going to be so confused Confused

MsUnderstanding · 27/10/2017 09:02

The toilet thing is nuts, the rest seems reasonable to me.

Increasinglymiddleaged · 27/10/2017 09:28

I don't really understand what gender is. Male/ female is biological but gender just seems to be made up. All this gender neutral stuff as a result surely enforces the very social construct you are trying to challenge. With my DC I just constantly challenge labels like 'tomboy'; that there is such a thing as girls' and boys' toys and that girls and boys can't hang out together and be friends. But they are girls, that is a biological fact.

podiumFinish · 27/10/2017 09:41

@Increasinglymiddleaged

Yes you do. I'm not quite sure why you pretend not to Hmm. So that strangers on MN will tell you you're spot on?

According to some "gender is a social construct". Many of us believe it's intrinsically linked to sex.

Increasinglymiddleaged · 27/10/2017 13:05

But it's air isn't it? It isn't real.

Increasinglymiddleaged · 27/10/2017 13:09

Many of us believe it's intrinsically linked to sex.

So you believe that having a vagina makes girls want to play with dolls? Or is there something I'm not getting?

DeleteOrDecay · 27/10/2017 13:54

Podium you think girls are naturally attracted to pink things because they are biologically female and boys are attracted to cars and trucks because they are boys?

Load of nonsense.

ArgyMargy · 27/10/2017 13:59

Why are any of you taking this tabloid nonsense at face value? YABU

DeleteOrDecay · 27/10/2017 14:03

The parents sound ridiculous. They obviously don’t know the difference between sex (biological fact) and gender (social construct). I’m against gender stereotypes but that doesn’t mean my DD’s can’t play with stereotypically boy/girl toys if that’s what they enjoy, nor does it mean I can’t refer to them as their biological sex. It’s more about raising them to know that they don’t have to be put in these boxes based on their sex and that they can play or do what ever they want to and the fact that they are girls shouldn’t hold them back. I would raise boys in exactly the same way.

Hotheadwheresthecoldbath · 27/10/2017 14:23

What are gender neutral toys?
I get that you don't want to limit children to just dolls for girls and building kits for boys but gender neutral?Seems a bit limiting.

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