Non binary - AIBU to not be ok?

[Hampshiremum2]

We have discovered over the weekend that our daughter has requested her friends refer to her with a new (gender neutral) name, it has gone as far as her friends parents now refer to her with this name too. I am devastated really, she is 12 and I really cannot get on board with the idea. Perhaps I am an awful bigot but it feels like her reasons for wanting to be labelled 'non-binary' (sorry if this is the wrong terminology) are just an attempt to reject stereotypes that girls are all dumb and only bothered about how they look (this is what she has said boys at school tell her). So to my point AIBU to say we can't support this until she is older and able to make a more informed decision? We want her to be happy but this idea that you cannot be happy as a girl without being pretty and Barbie seems madness to me!

On a side note is anyone aware of my rights as to what happens with school, if she asks for her name to be changed and her pronouns can they do this without my agreement? X

You could also consult Safe Schools Alliance about your rights as a parent to be informed and involved in whatever “affirmation” stunts the school tries to pull.

I have teen and YA DDs. I've seen many many of their friends (plus a family member) start out down the non-binary path. With one exception, none of the N/B are doing okay today, many went on to cross-sex hormones and mastectomies. All but one had affirming parents. Not one of them is in college or trade school. Most either work part time or not at all.

That non-affirming exception was the DD of a close friend who refused to accommodate binders or bespoke pronouns (she either wouldn't use any or ignored the requests depending on the day) and told her DD that when she's 18 she's welcome to change her name but until then she wasn't changing her given name. My friend spent $ on lots of vacations off grid and also in spotty wi-fi areas like rural France. She was loving but firm. It wasn't easy. Her DD threw plenty of tantrums. BUT IT WORKED. Today, she's a healthy, happy young woman attending a very good university and is absolutely fine being known as a woman. She's also realized she's a lesbian. Mom is happy and relieved.

I find it telling that all the parents who acted scared of their kids and let the kids run the show are NOT doing well.

FWIW, I'm a petty chill parent, not at all helicopter, more hippy than conservative, and even I thoroughly approve this parent-led approach, not the bullying child-led one of trans ideology.

Just my anecdotal evidence. I wish you well.

Oh yes, that’s for sure . There’s a mixed crazy bag of weirdos on here .

Some great advice here.

A thread recently had as response of "oh like me you mean?" To an announcement of being non binary.

We are all non binary Ffs. It's worryingly a trend that leads to a lot of mastectomies. My area of the country is behind elsewhere but we've had our first young 20 something NB at work but they had to choose to be known as a male as it was too confusing for the pupils . Popped off for a mastectomy a few months in. the irony is that so many female colleagues dress in the same way and have similar pursuits.

Social media informed me that the individual was very stereotypically female till 2 years ago.

This!

Thank you all, I've spoken to school who have confirmed they won't use her new name or make any changes to her pronouns without our permission which is a relief. We have taken the approach many of you suggested and haven't brought it up again, she has had significant mental health struggles recently and I suspect she has been subjected to outsider input as to what might be the cause!

Listen to Gender A Wider Lens podcast, their episode called non-binary identities is really good and talks about it from a psychological perspective, like, what is the appeal, what even is this "binary" that the kids want none of? I think they have a good discussion about it as a cultural phenomenon and how to make it not sucha big deal, which can make it easier to leave/shrug it off than to feel like coming out has been this huge commitment from the kid

Has your daughter started her periods yet, OP?

I wonder whether there's a way to let her experiment with different identities without making too much of a fuss about it, whilst teaching her to be positive about her developing body.

I started my periods when I was 13 and went on the pill when I was 17 and pretty much didn't menstruate again (or even really give it much thought) until I was 30. Then when I was TTC I read a book about tracking my menstrual cycle to maximise my chances of getting pregnant and I learned all about ovulation and the different stages of the menstrual cycle and this amazing process the female body goes though every month or so and I felt kind of sad that I suppressed that for over a decade, and silly for not appreciating how amazing the female body is. I found myself wishing I'd known all these things at 14, not because I wanted to be pregnant at 14, but because I didn't feel like I'd properly appreciated my body for all that time.

I wonder if there's a way to leave the gender stuff to one side as much as possible, but in the context of talking to your daughter about sex and periods, really help her to understand what the female body does and why it is so incredible. The book "My Period" by Milli Hill (who is a gender critical feminist) might help with this.

And similarly, her breasts will be growing, so perhaps you could encourage her to feel positive about them by taking her to get fitted regularly and buying her bras which she likes and finds comfortable. If you had a positive experience breastfeeding her there may be a way to drop that into the conversation at that point.

It might sound weird, but the detransitioned woman Chloe Cole, who had a double mastectomy at 15 and now campaigns against gender ideology, says that she was in a sex ed lesson at 16 and the thought, "I'll never breastfeed my child" suddenly hit her and that was the start of her realising she'd made a terrible mistake. If you can help your daughter to love her female body now and look forward to what it will hopefully be able to do if and when she's ready, she might think twice about hormones and surgery.

And of course, the clearer it becomes to her that female bodies are very different from male bodies and if you are one you can't become the other, hopefully it will eventually dawn on her that gender is meaningless and special pronouns are daft.