To be surprised DS knows about sexuality?

[Moisdrol]

I was chatting with DS, 7, earlier this afternoon and we were talking about his friends in school and he mentioned that he thinks his friend is a lesbian because he caught her looking at Millie Bobby Brown on Google images twice. I was quite surprised by this because I or DH have never mentioned anything about sexuality before (not that I have a problem with him knowing about LGBT topics). When I asked him why he thought she might be a lesbian he just said because he thinks she has a crush on Millie Bobby Brown. I never knew about sexuality at 7 so I’m really surprised by his peers knowing about it. I’ve also heard kids in his class using bad language which was shocking to me. Is this common??

@Mischance the response the father gave inadvertently may be heard by a young child as gay = bad.

The father needs to ask himself if he would have said the same if the child refered to liking the opposite sex?

That will help them identify if there is an unconscious prejudice held.

Why do so many people not recognise that children can be aware of their sexuality at an early age? Not all but a lot do, I knew at 5 I fancied men, by 7 had crushes etc there is a lot of people inferring that's wrong.

I'm not sure what point you're trying to make here.

To a six year old same-sex parents are also parents.

Would you say the same to a child saying they fancied someone from the opposite sex?

No. Very much not! Started to crush around 11years old at Middle school. Why do some people insist that a 7 year old knows what a real crush is 🙄

I worry some of these could be being abused and not be aware the stuff happening to them is not normal or wrong.

I’m baffled by the idea that a child can ever be too young to be aware of same sex couples. If you really think they’re too young to know about it then are you against same sex couples having children? Or should they be pretending not to be a couple up until their children reach a certain age?

Because I was that 7 year old. Why do you think my lived experience is not authentic 🤔.@Tomorrowillbeachicken ?

Just because you were 11 doesn't mean I didn't have an experience at 7. It is linked to hormones so different ages will have experiences.

Take a biological develop I got my period at 9 friends got theirs at 15 we both had the same experience at different times.

I would say the same if they had said they were straight - a label at that age is entirely unnecessary.

Being gay isn't a label. The child is just trying to explain what's going on in their head. I can't imagine my child telling me they were gay and me saying 'you don't need a label.' Whether it's mean to be or not, it sounds like rejection.

On the crush topic - psychologists/experts acknowledge that the average age for a child to have their first crush is between the ages of 6-9. Whether they know it is a "crush" or not is another matter but these days you more frequently hear celebrities, for example, talking about how they have, say "a girl crush on...." or "I was totally crushing on...." - so if they've heard, for example, a celebrity saying something like "I've got such a girl crush on Taylor Swift!" - it's perfectly plausible that they would at least know the word and have some idea of context.

When I was 7 and 8 I had a massive crush on Michael Praed; and he certainly wasn't my friend! Oh how I wished he was!

Times have changed. I was an 80s/ 90s child and in those days there tended not to be so many openly gay parents. Now there is.. I've been teaching my children that men can love men and women can love women since the oldest was very small. When he started school there was a gay couple and he always knew his class mate had a mum and a mummy. My youngest who is three was, today, pondering the fact her friend at nursery has 2 mums but no dad. It isn't a big deal to them at all as it isn't unusual.

This.

Differing sexualities is hardly ground breaking news in 2023?

Your child likely goes to school with children who have same sex parents.

Opposite sex attraction is experienced by a greater majority than same sex attraction so is seen as the default. But I do believe sexual orientation is pretty fluid when people are young, many heterosexual people go through a stage when they are pre- adolescent of having same sex feelings or crushes. Sometimes younger children have strong feelings about or obsessions with people like crushes but not sexual, this can be the same or opposite sex and usually has nothing to do with what orientation they will end up with. So I agree with the poster who said labels aren't needed. As long as a child knows they are loved and accepted by their parents.

Well you would have known about sexuality at 7 because you’ll have seen heterosexual couples everywhere.

What you mean is you didn’t know about gay people.

The sooner the day comes where we DON’T teach our kids about gay people the better - it should just be known, like heterosexual couples are, without any teaching required.

My DS is 6 and we have gay friends, hes never not known that any adult can be with any other adult.

@YorkshirePuddingBelongs I was just thinking this. I think many of us on here come from a generation where there was a lot of homophobia and fewer gay or lesbian couples felt safe to come out and of those that did come out, very few of them were raising children.

I'm trying to say they understand that parents love and care for them but they don't understand romantic love.

Times have moved on thank goodness.

Most kids in school have friends with gay parents, or there’s gay teachers.

@Moisdrol in the nicest possible way, I think you need to ensure you are talking to your kids about all types of relationships. Whilst you (and I) didn’t have those conversations at home or school, times have moved on and it is part of making your child aware of the world and people around them.

At seven? Of course they do. Not fully but they're surrounded by couples and by the idea of love and dating and marriage. The idea that sometimes men love and date and marry men and women love and date and marry women is not a complicated one.

When my kids were in year 1, they learned about weddings and marriage and had a pretend class wedding ceremony with a local vicar. That's some very in your face promotion of heterosexuality for 5 year olds to take on board, so I would hope that the alternatives also get a look in.

I have no idea if DS has met someone who is gay - and has known that they were - but I talked to him about it from an early age, mainly along the lines that two men or two women could fall in love and get married, just like a man and a woman, and he just accepted that.

There was some bullying in school with other children calling DS and his friend gay, but the school dealt with it and DS was very cross about people thinking there was something wrong with being gay.

(He's currently cross that people can get bullied for having ginger hair)

@alfagirl73 When I was 7 and 8 I had a massive crush on Michael Praed; and he certainly wasn't my friend! Oh how I wished he was!

You're not the only one. I wanted to marry him.

My son was chosen as the groom in year 3, he was very quiet on the walk home from school, when we got home he burst into tears because he didn’t want to hold ‘Katies’ hand and have babies with her!

God you’re very naive and narrow minded. So what you’re saying is he’s never had exposure to anyone who is gay, even in books or TV. That’s pretty appalling on your part as parents.

I think at 7 you can understand that some people have 2 mummies but none of my dc had crushes at 7 or assumed anyone else did. My 9 year old has proposed to a girl in his class and has even asked her dad's permission to marry her but neither of them understand properly about what marriage/sexual attraction etc actually means. I think children of that age use terms like crush or gay in a different context to how adults see them. My nieces of around that age were telling my nearly teenage son about their boyfriends and ex boyfriends. DS replied rather loftily that boyfriends/girlfriends before secondary school "didn't really count". To be fair, he's right. In primary school, for my dc, having a girlfriend has meant you make a card and buy them a little present on valentines day. Somewhere around 12 or 13 it becomes more sexual and there are kisses and touching involved.