Family where mum is daddy, dad is mummy and son, 4, is being raised as gender neutral

[MineKraftCheese]

Can't get my head around any of this.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/family-mum-daddy-dad-mummy-10978802.amp

*Asked by our reporter if he is a boy or a girl, he says he is a boy. But he changes his answer when Nikki interjects with: “Or are you just a person?”

She adds: “We don’t tell him who to be. We let him lead us.”*

Nikki identified as lesbian when she first met Louise, who was then male, at an LGBT meeting in 2011. They wed in a Pagan ceremony in January 2012.
Nikki says: “I don’t fall in love with someone because they’re male or female. It doesn’t matter to me what they’ve got between their legs.
“It’s the mind, personality and soul I fall in love with, not the body.” She identifies as pan­­sexual and dresses masculine some days, while on others she will wear “high heels, a padded bra and lipstick.”

Oh for actual fuck sake. Sorry I can't be more articulate but I'm so sick of this stupid shit and the media giving it loads of attention. Plays with dolls AND with cars???!!! Sounds like A TOTALLY NORMAL CHILD then. Idiots

I'm a woman. I used to play with cars, trains, action man etc so..... I'm a man now? Can't wait for my prostate exam, pay rise to the same level as the men doing the same job as me and being lavished with praise by every woman at work every time I do a basic chore or admin task.

It's strange that they say the kid is gender neutral but he is referred to as "he". But he has long hair so he's partly a girl?!

Honestly, I don't have a problem with any of it apart from wanting to distinguish on the grounds of sex. If the child is a boy then he is a boy, but he is also a person and the fewer gender norms we can instil in children the better I think.

I'm surprised that he's allowed to wear pink socks to school.

I'd be impressed if they were doing it in the sense of 'yes, you're male, but you can do anything, even if it's considered 'girly'' rather than acting like their son is somehow transcending the boundaries of science by having long hair and wearing dresses.

Also, the mum 'dresses as a male'? So what, she wears trousers?

(and of course they got married in a Pagan ceremony and have the same last name as the main character from The Crow. This is just glorified LARP-ing, isn't it?)

Nikki says Star “chose” which of his parents would be which by saying his first word, “Da-da”, and allowing her to lift him out of his cot rather than Louise

What nonsense.

It's attention seeking behaviour, surely. And they strike me as not very aware of child development. It's not a surprise that the child first said "da-da" that's very typical and doesn't represent the child "choosing" anything at all.

In essence this is a heterosexual couple who have a child. They live an alternative lifestyle. Why is this news exactly? The mirror article is essentially inviting you to treat them as a freak show, and I don't know why as parents they would expose their child to that. I suppose people get paid for these articles?

But apparently not unconventional enough to ditch the terms mummy and daddy?

If they were genuine about bringing the child up in a gender neutral environment they could either invent new, nonspecific terms or just use their first names.

I am all for not forcing gender on children, but this is ridiculous and damaging.
If your son (haven't read the article yet, assuming the child actually is male as the mother contradicted him saying so) learnt (probably from other people) that an immature human male is a boy, and that that's what he is, then you don't contradict him!
How is the poor child supposed to learn to talk if you question his perfectly correct use of language?

And I don't think a household where mum sometimes dresses in high heels and all the other trappings of femininity is gender neutral.
Not like more conventional mothers are wearing that sort of thing while cleaning the kitchen; they, too, only put it on occasionally.

It just seems to me he'll end up more screwed up living in the real world than he would be without all this. It's going too far to the opposite extreme.
Somewhere in the middle would be better.

Well they are keen on gender stereotypes as they use them to indicate what gender they're currently presenting as - high heels, a padded bra and lipstick means you're definitely a woman after all. Trousers mean you're definitely a man.

If they were genuine about bringing the child up in a gender neutral environment they could either invent new, nonspecific terms or just use their first names.

Exactly.
A fantasy webcomic can get it right: (Spoiler alert if you haven't read Order of the Stick and want to do so in the future):
www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0629.html

Not exactly rocket science.

That poor child, he will grow up confused,not gender neutral! My ds loves pink, loves babies and sometimes pretends to be pregnant!!! Does that make him a girl? No no no he is a child exploring things he enjoys but defiantly a boy. What a load of rubbish that article is.

Families have been doing this for years, just without feeling the need to give it a label. It's called letting kids do what they want.

Growing up I was a girl and I knew that. But asked what I wanted for Christmas, sometimes I chose Barbies and an ironing board, sometimes I chose a toy motorbike or a toy sword and armour.

Sometimes I dressed up as a princess and watched Disney films. Sometimes I got caught up in a character like George from Famous Five and went round in shorts and wellies, using the unisex version of my name and refusing to wear dresses or do anything 'girly'.

At no point did my parents feel the need to label it as 'gender neutral' or 'gender fluid'. I was a girl, I had different preferences at different times, and that was fine.

I don't know when we suddenly decided that acknowledging that a kid is a 'girl' or a 'boy' is oppressive :s

Shame for the child. Utter cunterry at its best in this scared to offend society.

It's so bizarre that people like this are all about 'gender fluidity' while being so rigid about gender norms.

It's really paradoxical.

It's the gender stereotyping that gets to me! No, it's not a 'female' trait to be playing with dolls, and dressing in a masculine style doesn't make me any less of a woman than when I am wearing a dress!

This is so incredibly harmful to women and girls - especially to those of us who have hobbies, interests and careers that aren't considered feminine. I'm in tech and I'm a manager responsible for mostly men, reporting to exclusively men. That doesn't make me trans or even a particularly masculine woman - it just makes me a standard-issue adult human female whi happens to be very good at and enjoy some masculine-coded things.

How can we ever hope to get on top of ridiculous, gendered prescriptions and how can we ever overcome sexism if the default response to people not conforming to stereotypes is to simply declare them to have been in whichever stupid box anything they do at all is associated with all along?

This is ludicrous!

Oh, yawn.

I wish them all happy and content lives.

The gender stereotyping is just ludicrous.

I just think that this sort of behaviour reinforces gender stereotyping. My DS is 2, he currently has his toe nails painted pink and likes his hair tied up sometimes (as he has a big sister and wants to copy). Am I raising him gender neutral because of this? Am I breaking social boundaries? Am I fuck, I'm letting a little boy do what he likes and I manage not to make a big deal out of it.

This is so frustrating!!!

We need to redefine what "boys" and "girls" can do and like. NOT redefine individuals as being both or neither!
Arggghh

I hope they have not overinvested(!) in the pink vests and socks, because I reckon the first time poor little Star changes for pe some child, or several will tell him he's got girls clothes on.

And I see their commitment to gender neutral underwear doesn't extend to his pants!

I think this pair are rather like the people who have their faces tattooed and then moan that no one will employ them, ram your 'individuality'
In other peoples faces then blame them for responding. Professional victims, and they are bringing poor little Star up to be the same.

I don't get why it's all such a big deal? Surely this just reinforces gender stereotypes?!
The agony aunt who says she bought her son an ironing board, so what? Men do ironing as well as women. Why is buying an ironing board for your son controversial? The whole thing is totally ridiculous!

Straight couple have child and don't feel special enough so have to redefine themselves and poor child as something different because being a dull heterosexual couple doesn't make them interesting enough.

Get a hobby. This endless navel gazing is unbearably tiresome

"Mum is daddy, daddy is mummy" is not gender neutral.

I think "male parent is carer A, female parent is carer B " would be closer to gender neutral.