A feminist couple in Sweden is attempting to raise their child (who is now two and a half years old) without gender norms. They call the child "Pop," do not use gendered pronouns, and have kept Pop's biological sex a secret.
"We want Pop to grow up more freely and avoid being forced into a specific gender mould from the outset," Pop's mother said. "It's cruel to bring a child into the world with a blue or pink stamp on their forehead."The child's parents said so long as they keep Pop's gender a secret, he or she will be able to avoid preconceived notions of how people should be treated if male or female.
Pop's wardrobe includes everything from dresses to trousers and Pop's hairstyle changes on a regular basis. And Pop usually decides how Pop is going to dress on a given morning.
Although Pop knows that there are physical differences between a boy and a girl, Pop's parents never use personal pronouns when referring to the child - they just say Pop.
"I believe that the self-confidence and personality that Pop has shaped will remain for a lifetime," said Pop's mother.
The article goes on to quote a biological-determinist psychologist who is dead-certain that the child's "real" gender will assert itself sooner rather than later -- and that gender will be aligned with Pop's biological sex. While I obviously don't share the psychologist's strident view that gender and sex are one and the same, I do agree that Pop will probably end up identifying as either male or female shortly after Pop begins school. The gender binary is very, very culturally ingrained. When every other child in Pop's class is a "he" or "she," Pop will face strong social pressure to choose one or the other -- no matter what Pop's parents say about gender. It seems like even they understand this.
Given that the parents expect Pop to choose one side of the binary eventually, what's the point of ensuring that Pop's early years aren't gendered? Is there research showing that those first few years are really central to forming a person's gender identity? I guess I would love to read a more in-depth article about Pop's family and their day-to-day.
UPDATE: Go read Holly's take at Feministe and Helen's post at Bird of Paradox.
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This sounds so much like the fictitious story by Lois Gould, "X: A Fabulous Child's Story", where a couple raises their baby as an "X". You can read it here: http://www.gendercentre.org.au/22article4.htm
In the story, the other parents at X's school demand that X be assigned a gender so X will stop messing with the other children's ideas about gender. Sounds sadly similar to Ann's prediction.
I was going to mention this book, it was the first thing I thought when I read this. I loved that book when I was little. I read it all the time. Then again I went to a hippie school where we sat on the floor and had "love makes a family" month where everyone with gay relatives or friends put up a photo exhibit every year celebrating every different kind of family.
I loved my school.
I loved that book when I was little, too! I think my mom bought it at a NOW conference or something.
Wow your school sounds like something from (what i hope will be) the future :)
Pop's parents know Pop's gender, and regardless of how much they try to minimise Pop's instructions in gender role, they'll still (no doubt) impart some, though probably a lot less than if they didn't deliberately try not to. (And given our parents are probably the single biggest source of gender role instruction in our lives, that's likely to make a huge dent in it).
Eliminate it? Of course not ... but that's not how progress is made on these kind of issues. The progress we've made with respect to racism/sexism/whatnot in the last ~50 years has been a little in curbing our own behaviour, but mostly in reducing how much've it is transferred to our children. To think they'd eliminate gender role in a single generation is folly, but to try and reduce the transfer as much as they can is the most pragmatic thing to do (if that's the direction you want to push, of course, but clearly they do).
I have to wonder why you don't agree with psychologists' beliefs that people tend to go to one gender or the other? I am a psych major who has been involved in several psych labs (going for my PhD in psych after undergrad), and I am offended that you would lump us all together the same way feminists themselves don't want to be. Psychologists do not by any means have this "strident view" that sex and gender are one and the same. Quite the opposite, sex and gender are studied externsively in psychology and are understood to be different.
What psychologists do you know that refer to sex and gender as one in the same besides the one that leans more toward biology? Where did you find your view that psychologists are all the same? Also, the psychologist that did insist that the child's sex will "assert itself" eventually is right. The brains of males and females differ, as do hormones and other bioligical processes. Besides, even if the child identifies as male or female, when puberty comes around, it will be obvious what the sex is, if not the gender. As far as the gender matching sex, it usually does.
Sometimes I wonder at some of the posts on this site because they seem to have a minimal understanding of subjects, especially psychology. This is not the first time psychology has been addressed at feministing, and it is not the first time that the information is inaccurate. You might want to clarify your own research into these areas before making generalizations about a group of people.
And I know I'll get a lot of negative feedback for this comment, but so be it. I have stopped commenting on feministing because it is so hostile, but I couldn't leave this one be.
Aside from your comment, I think that the idea of raising a child to be free of gender expectations is a good one. I also don't think that gender differences are a bad thing, as long as one is not subverted to the other. I also agree that channeling a person in a certain direction in his or her life because of his or her gender is wrong.
However, I am curious as to what kind of difficulties these parents and their child will face, but I hope that those difficulties can be overcome. I think that a child raised without others knowing if it is male or female might have some identity issues, as gender is a huge part of identity for many people.
Actually, that was a misplaced apostrophe. I don't disagree with "psychologists" plural, but with the psychologist quoted in the piece.
The author of this post is clearly talking about one psychologist as opposed to all or most psychologists. (See the emphasis in my above quote.) Hence, she is not making a generalization. She is merely making an observation about one specific psychologist.
While the author may not be in agreement with you as to the causation behind a child manifesting gender, she certainly agrees that the child will manifest gender at some point in hir life. (Again, see the emphasis in my above quote.)
While you are not saying that sex and gender are the same, you are implying that gender strongly correlates with sex because of biological differences in female and male bodies. That's enough to elicit a negative response from many feminists and initiate a long discussion on the contribution of cultural forces in shaping the development of gender in humans. That's a variation of the reaction you are seeing in the original post. What I'm trying to say is that you haven't done much to dissuade people from the assumption that some psychologists see sex and gender as two sides of the same coin.
Beth, I've only ever commented a couple of times here but I was moved by what you are saying.
Ann has pointed out that this was not what she was saying, but the notion that psychologists are biological determinists because they might take a both/and approach to understanding life, applying a biopsychosocial model (of everything, not just gender) is about in feminists circles. But it's not universal. And it is an unhelpful view but understandable because people often have a passionate and defensive stance because, well, sexism is still pervasive and killing women daily. But rejecting information because it makes you unpopular or doesn't 'fit' is not the answer. Feminism has added so much to my work, but I would be fundamentally failing my clients if I based my entire practice on feminist theories.
I'm a clinical psychologist and a feminist and it can be depressing to see people still rallying against an image of psychology that is on the whole grossly outdated, or rejecting really exciting research into the neurobiology of emotion etc. But hopefully we can find a way to present a balance which engenders curiosity in both feminists and non-feminists.
I confess it worries me that I've found few feminists able/willing to offer anything other than a defensive response if you ask for evidence against objectification theory. I suppose it's fine if you relate to feminism as a faith, but not so great if you're a scientist (as many feminists are). But an irreverant and questioning approach in which no theory is sacred or universal is needed, and I think having different views makes for a stronger feminism.
(This has compensated for me rarely posting by being the longest post ever. Apologies!)
I'm sorry-- what's this about 'objectification theory'? Are you asking for proof that women are objectified in our culture? Can you clarify please?
There's lots of evidence that the sexual objectification of women is associated with not-good outcomes of a variety of flavours. Some studies better than others. What's less clear is that eradicating representations of women/bodies/desire going to change or fix things. (Although probably what most of us are after is modifying rather than eradicating. I've written many an angry letter to the advertising standards authority about boobs selling toothpaste but have nude art in my home.)
What I'm saying is that I expect any theory to be subjected to criticism and ideally some testing which seeks to disprove as well as confirm it, and as feminists we usually embrace the term sexual objectification to the degree that we sometimes use it unquestioningly as the best or more problematically only means to understand social phenomenon.
The way I see it, it has become a term which is used to negate any alternative ideas of worth in cultural practices - for instance, randomly, dancers at Rio carnival. Sometimes once someone has decided that something involves sexual objectification of women, they stop being interested in any other views. It's like 'Woman in a bikini. Objectification. My work is done.'
Objectification itself, or reification, or treating things which are not objects as if they were (like 'luck') is a naturally occurring offshoot of human consciousness - we're not going to get rid of it as a mental process, it's involuntary and pretty damn useful. Like stereotyping. What we're trying to do is make people more aware of the processes in certain contexts.
Is that any clearer? Possibly I've made things worse.
i think this is brilliant. i wonder how long i would let it go on though...
Yes, poster, children learn the most about their environment within the first 3 years of life, so not teaching the child "boys do this, girls do that" is very important.
Really? I was under the impression that generally up until about 7 or 8 kids might have a conception of gender, but don't necessarily self-identify as one or the other (I remember reading an NYT article that described kids in play acting as a mommy OR a daddy, etc.)
I don't honestly see how the absence of a gender-label to the child will in anyway make the child less gender-aware. The child will live in a gendered society, go to a gendered school, and live (presumably) in a gendered home.
It's like this: Imagine you live in a place where everyone wears a red or blue shirt. Your own shirt is covered up; you don't know what color it is. You won't, on your very own, decide that you'd like to wear a green or black shirt when you've never seen one. You may have one on, but you can't "see" yourself as a model for yourself. You know that shirts = red or blue.
See, the problem is that the child psyche isn't sophisticated enough to create a total alternative that it has never seen any model of. Children are brilliant and smart and fast learners, yada yada, but they're in a rapid learning/developing mode, not engineering mode.
I see the biggest difference for the child being - not that they will engineer a totally different options - but that adults (and perhaps children) reacting to them will not impose their impressions of gender on the child. They will not speak more softly to pop because she is a girl. They will not tell Pop how big and strong he'll grow up to be because he is a boy. They will be forced to navigate a new middle grow where they simply treat Pop as a child.
But you might decide you quite like a blue shirt with red sleeves.
Plus, I am disappointed by the whole pessimistic "the child's peers will enforce gender norms later anyway, so why bother" feel of this article. I thought a Feministing blogger would never encourage such a give-up attitude about a feminist issue such as gender socialization... :(
Well, I don't think it's giving up to acknowledge what a pervasive force gender norms are. I applaud all parents' efforts to not enforce the gender binary with their young children -- the more parents that do that, the less pervasive these norms will be. I definitely think we're moving in that direction, but it seems silly not to acknowledge we still have a long way to go.
I think that's just realism. I mean, unless it's a bubble-baby.
I think this is wonderful.
Pop's parents know Pop's gender
As far as the article goes, Pop doesn't have a gender. They know Pop's sex, but that's not the same thing.
Yeah, I noticed that unfortunate phrasing.
Karin Martin does research on the formation of gender identity in young children. I couldn't find a link to the full text article, but here a link the abstract for "Becoming a Gendered Body: Practices of Preschools." http://www.jstor.org/pss/2657264
I think it's completely impossible to raise children outside of the gender binary unless you raised them in a highly-unethical lab setting cut off from people. Our world is so extremely gendered. I agree with the original post, Pop will likely adopt a male or female identity once Pop has spent much time around other people. Even if Pop's gender identity and biological sex don't "match", it will still mean that Pop is falling into one of two accepted genders.
And to illustrate my point about how gendered we are: I found it difficult to even write about Pop without gendered pronouns. My first instinct to remain gender neutral is to say "s/he" but that assumes the person will fall into one of the two. I can't say "it" because it's a child and that's obviously awful. I could use ze/hir or ne or another more recently invented gender neutral pronoun but these words are little known outside of academia. Using the singular "they" just makes me think of every English teacher I ever had screaming "Noooo!" (although I know it's becoming more acceptable). How can we even start talking about eliminating all of the other divisions in gender when English (and many other languages) doesn't even allow us to speak in ungendered ways?
The singular they is completely acceptable. There's no authority governing English (unlike French or Spanish, say), and correctness is determined solely by usage.
Acceptability aside, I think there is a real need for a widely used specifically singular gender-neutral pronoun. There are plenty of situations where using "they" for both singular and plural subjects could get really confusing. But for now, it'll have to do.
I've been doing it for at least 20 years and not been misunderstood yet. I actually have more trouble with singular/plural you. I forget names easily so trying to address one person in a crowd is tricky. So, although I curse the lack of thee/thou, singular they/their doesn't seem to be a problem.
It's backwards actually, up to the eary 20th century, young children were referred to as "it", it's clothes, it's toys. Earlier forms of English would refer to them as poppets(where the word puppet comes from, even though they were closer to muppets),then guys for boys/young men ("Guy" is another type of doll).
First wave feminists fought to establish the person hood of children, so why are we moving backwards. Babies/children are not its, dolls, or social constructs, they are people
"Given that the parents expect Pop to choose one side of the binary eventually, what's the point of ensuring that Pop's early years aren't gendered?"
I see it more as Pop being given clean glasses through which to see the gendered world, rather than blue- or pink-tinted.
Pop may, in the end, decide to be a boy or a girl (although given there are plenty who are genderqueer without having been raised in the same manner as Pop, I don't think it's inevitable) but Pop's view of the world, and how other children view Pop, may provide both parties with some interesting insights into how gender is fashioned, and how uncomfortable we are when we can't place people into categories.
Or - if Pop is biologically male - it could lead to a lot of schoolyard beatings and other "Lord of the Flies" type intimidation from the other male kids who were raised to be more traditionally masculine.
Or - if Pop is biologically female - it could head to Pop being a social outcast among the other female kids who had more traditionally feminine upbringing.
Schoolyards are cruel places, where social norms are brutally enforced by the dominant children (while school authorities look the other way and pretend it isn't happening)
Perhaps Pop's parents live in some bubble of progressiveism - Stockholm's version of Park Slope or the Upper West Side - where Pop might have some hope of not being at the permanent bottom of Pop's schoolyard pecking order.
But, if Pop lives in a Swedish version of Bensonhurst or Brownsville - Pop has a really sad future ahead of them.
You could apply this argument to any group kids pick on:
"If Pop is mentally disabled..."
"If Pop is [insert race here] and the other kids are [insert race here]..."
"If Pop is disfigured..."
"If Pop is gay..."
"If Pop is a nerd..."
Does this mean we ought to make our children as homogeneous as possible so as to save them from their peers?
Boo hoo. I was a very clearly femininely gendered female, and I was still a social outcast. Kids will find any reason to form cliques and enforce them.
This makes me really uneasy. I applaud this couple's attempts to raise their child free of the constrictions of gender stereotyping etc, but does that mean that ANY acknowledgment of the actual sex of the child should be disregarded too? It just seems so extreme. I think it's great that they have chosen a gender neutral name, that they allow the child to dress itself and are not pushing any particular gender behaviours on the child, but do they really have to go this far? Can't you enjoy being a boy/girl and see the beauty and value in both, while not devaluing the other?
Seems to me that this child is going to have a huge headache when puberty arrives, or before then even when her/his sex will become physically obvious. Her parent's have removed one burden, but replaced it with another. She will constantly have to explain her parent's political choices. Everyone that ever encounters her/him is going to have to alter and adapt the way they talk to her/him. It's interesting and makes people talk, but does the child's whole life and identity have to be sacrificed?
I think it's a very heavy handed response to a problem that is much, more more subtle than that. Also - I noticed myself assuming the child was female... I wonder why that is?
Yeah, I agree. I can't help but wonder what happens when the kid hits puberty. Male or female there's already such a crushing need to appeal to the other sex, that this may simply exacerbate it. It seems to me that the people who are most sheltered by their parents from society--whether its from a conservative desire to shun society, or a liberal desire to repudiate it--are the one's that have the most difficulty growing up. And can we really be surprised that, being mostly unfamiliar with it, its terriby difficult to navigate it?
Male or female there's already such a crushing need to appeal to the other sex,
What the hell kind of statement is that? Lesbian kids! Gay kids! Bisexual kids! Asexual kids! I'm a lesbian but I didn't know there was such a possibility until I was 16, so I thought I only liked characters in books.
Let's not get too angry here...1) No doubt gay 7 bi- kids also feel the need to be attractive to others, even others of the same sex; 2) I think your statement about yourself proves the point, no doubt in a hetero-normative society LGBT children certainly feel the pressure of appealing to the opposite sex.
"Appeal" is a sexually loaded term. I had no need to appeal, just to get along.
Pop might rebel and become either hypermasculine (if Pop is male) or hyperfeminine (if Pop is female)! Teenagers tend to revolt against their parents values as a way of showing their independence - and with a value system this extreme (especially when that value system runs up against the traditional gender binary schoolyard value system and when it also runs against the child's own sexuality and sexual desire) they might have an adolescent rebellion shitstorm on their hands!
Beyond that, why can't we abolish sexism but still have gender differences?
I'm a very proud masculine male, and while I support women's liberation and an end to sexism, I have absolutely NO desire to live in a world without gender!
Why of course. Lets work toward a culture that recognizes a nearly infinite number of variations on gender and many of them can be quite different from each other.
Everyone gets to find out where they fit.
You get to be a manly man, other people get to be girly girls, and many others get to embody personas that differ in their own particular way.
Problem solved.
Or does that somehow cramp your manly style?
That is quite true. Nothing turns an effeminate boy into a tough guy like getting his ass kicked on the playground.
Like so much social experimentation, this poor kid's childhood is going to be in for a real shock once it comes into contact with the real world. The first time Pop has to go to the restroom the game will be up and then what?
Huh. I must be doing something wrong.
I started out as an effeminate boy who got his ass kicked on the playground. I decided to identify as a woman when I was 17 and then in my twenties, I medically transitioned to female.
So much for the playground beatings.
I mean, I don't think I qualify as a "tough guy." Being a woman kind of disqualifies me from being a guy and the tough/macho thing never really appealed to me.
Putting aside sarcasm for a moment, the abuse I suffered during my childhood taught me to hate violence. I'm saddened by those who embrace it so readily as a solution to conflict.
I'm talking about in general. Obviously there will be some who buck the trend. It's well known that most men who are hypermasculine started off as effeminate or as (to use an old-fashioned term) Mamma's Boys. You see the same trend among girls who are raised like boys (Tomboys) who become hyperfeminine.
Before tattoos became commonplace outside the Navy, Marine Corps and bikers, what was the most common tattoo on the arm of a "tough guy"?
MOM
The point is that trying to bring someone up in a gender-neutral environment is not only futile, but is more than likely to backfire and the kid has a good chance of over-identifying with one gender or another.
Got some studies to back that assertion up?
It's not all that hard to find people who faced society's gender conformity, was burned by it, said f*k it, and bucked the system. This a feminist blog after all. There are more people fitting that description who post here than you can shake a stick at.
Sure, plenty of people choose hyper-conformity as a consequence of oppression and plenty choose to rebel and do their own thing. It's a crap shoot. Life is like that.
Apparently the rebels have made an impact, because gender expectations are noticeably different than they were fifty years ago, before the start of second wave feminism.
In spite of this thread being dead, I'm going say one more thing.
Essentially, the naysayer's on this topic have been saying variations of:
People who actively challenge societal abuse will always hear variations of this response. Radical is in the eye of the beholder. Sometimes a sane response to an insane system seems radical by contemporary norms. *shrug*
Being one of those people who started as a child who didn't fit the system's insane expectations, I think Pop's parents are doing something good. As long as Pop's parents are loving, supporting,and understanding, that matters most. If I had had all three of those things when I was "bucking the system," rather than doing it alone with no one's support, it would have made a world of difference.
I don't see anyone arguing (at least not here) that oppressive "norms" in society shouldn't be opposed. I do see people pointing out the obvious fact that trying to raise a kid to be gender neutral is as demented and stupid as trying to raise a kid to not be tall or short. It's not something parents can control (well, they could stunt a child's growth by starvation).
With the exception of hermaphrodites and transgenders (both of which are rare), the chromosomes deal you a hand and you're pretty much stuck with it unless you undergo multiple operations. Raising a kid to be ignorant of what he or she is would be futile (if other people don't tell them, the eventual rush of hormones will) and in my opinion negligent (possibly abusive) parenting.
The term is intersex, not hermaphrodite.
Transgender is an adjective, not a noun. You have transgender people, transgender men, and transgender women... not "transgenders."
I think it's telling that the people on this thread who are gender normative are the most likely to accuse these parents of being bad parents. As someone said down thread, your privilege is showing.
What's wrong with the word "hermaphrodite"?
From the Intersex Society of North America webpage:
From the Intersex Initiative website:
In high school biology I remember watching a documentary about an individual who did have one ovary and one testicle. They had a penis, a working uterus and they developed breasts. The doctors speaking on the documentary indicated that this individual could reproduce as either a man or a woman. Surely this person would be called a hermaphrodite?
Admittedly this is extremely rare, but it doesn't make this person mythical, just uncommon for fitting a very tight definition. I'll happily believe that most intersex people don't fit this definition but that doesn't mean hermaphrodites are a myth.
The core issue here is that people who are not born with the standard biological characteristics associated with the categories of female or male wish to be called intersex. They do not wish to be called hermaphrodites.
More generally, you should not refer to members of an oppressed group using terminology that they have deemed to be undesirable. Furthermore, it is bad form to argue against the desired terminology because you are not a member of their group and you speak from a position of relative privilege. This is similar to gay people not wanting to be called sexual inverts or black people not wanting to be called negroes. It is not your place to dredge up antiquated terminology and argue that it is somehow valid.
I have yet to encounter an intersex person who refers to hirself as a hermaphrodite. Clearly, the organizations that represent intersex people discourage such language. So, the moral of the story is, be respectful, don't argue, and refer to people using the desired nomenclature. If you don't do this, they are going to be pissed at you and they have every right to be.
I'm not arguing for the terminology in dealing with people in everyday life. It's just that the way you described it intersex was more accurate, and you indicated that people who fit the literal definition of a hermaphrodite didn't exist. I thought that needed correcting.
I look upon the term hermaphrodite as a scientific term to be used in relevant circles. Because, as you rightly pointed out there is a difference in definition the term may be useful in scientific discussions where an enhanced degree of precision is required. If you tell me that intersex people prefer that term in their everyday lives then I'm happy to oblige.
I forgot to mention that intersex is also an adjective.
Example:
I just discovered a new blog that talks about intersex people.
That's straight from the original article. The parents aren't hiding the child's sex from the child and they are leaving it up to Pop to decide when everyone else finds out what Pop's sex is.
I've said this in other places, as have others. Adults gender babies and young children like crazy, long before the child even has a grasp of what gender really is or even has a concept of what behaviors/ways of being come naturally to her/him. So, essentially, adult's gender normative expectations influence a child's behavior in ways that aren't necessarily natural to the child.
What the parents are doing is designed to allow the child to find out for hirself what comes naturally. In other words, the whole point of this process is not to exert adult control over Pop. It's up to Pop to do what is natural to him/her:
Ironically, in response to the parents emphatically not trying to control Pop's gender, people are characterizing this as some horrible social experiment foisted on a child. To quote Little Sara from further downthread:
I agree. I feel they're using their child as an experiment.
It could be worse. These idiot parents could try to raise their kid to believe that gravity is just a social construct and encourage him to jump off the roof.
I can't decide how I feel about this. On one hand it seems like the parents are doing their best to ensure Pop ends up being exactly who Pop wants to be (wonderful); on the other, it seems like they are using their kid as a test subject (not so wonderful).
I'm concerned about what happens when those two aims conflict. I would assume the parents would relent when the child shows a strong will to step outside the box they've made for ze (a term I will use for the purposes of convenience). But what happens when the culture puts demands on the child and the child shows signs of capitulating to those demands? Do the parents stand firm or do they accept the child's decisions?
The more I think about this the more I become convinced that these parents may have vastly overestimated the power they have to influence this child's identity. I know my parents were only a (small, by my reckoning) part of my conscious development.
It's cruel to bring a child into the world period. The stamp on the forehead is far from the worst thing that happens to most people.
But even if the parents are deluded enough not to realize the above, how do they figure using the child as an unwilling subject of a social experiment is any less cruel than stamping its forehead? And we are all supposed to applaud them for it for being such awesome feminists? What more proof do people need that premeditated reproduction is all about ego stroking?
There is another on the way to join in the fun. Probably because they realize the sample of one is too small.
Anyway, since it's not double-blind, and unless they keep the child ignorant about which biological sex has which anatomy (the article says Pop knows there are physical differences, but doesn't say Pop knows what they are) which would be pretty screwed up in itself, they will get nowhere with their social experimentation.
"It's cruel to bring a child into the world period."
Uh, can you explain this?
"how do they figure using the child as an unwilling subject of a social experiment is any less cruel than stamping its forehead?"
The article states that Pop has much more choice than the average, gendered child, in that Pop can choose an outfit and can wear hair in different styles. Unless you are trying to argue that enforcing gender roles is preferable to letting the child decide how they wish to act, I don't see your point.
"What more proof do people need that premeditated reproduction is all about ego stroking?"
An explanation on this would also be nice.
I've been thinking of doing a community post on these issues; my biggest problem is figuring out how to avoid making it so long that no one would want to read it.
Anyway, if cruelty is deliberate infliction of harm of someone, and everyone (I mean everyone who is minimally high-functioning, since you can be literally brain-dead and still capable of reproduction) knows that harm will befall their children at some point (death and all the negatives associated with it is a guarantee, for instance), then they are deliberately inflicting harm on their children by deliberately reproducing. You could argue that making their children experience harm such as the process of dying (which nobody likes, as far as I'm aware, while most people don't mind being gendered - not to marginalize those who do mind, but to point out the inconsistency) is not their intention but merely an inevitable part of life and therefore not cruel. I would disagree with this idea (perhaps I could outline my reasons in the community post if I ever make it), but suppose it's true for the sake of this discussion. Most people don't see gendering their children as harm (I do, if you are wondering that, but that's beside the point), but they do see it as inevitable, so we would have to say that they are not being cruel according to our assumed definition. But Pop's mother seems to think gendering a child is cruel in some absolute sense, regardless of intentions, so she would have to agree that bringing a child into the world at all is also cruel regardless of intentions, otherwise she's being inconsistent.
"Unless you are trying to argue that enforcing gender roles is preferable to letting the child decide how they wish to act, I don't see your point."
I'm trying to argue that it's preferable to not reproduce. I'm also pointing out the obvious fact that Pop will encounter ridicule and ostracism from others and will likely eventually have to choose between being free to express Popsself however Pop wants or being accepted in society. It doesn't mean that ridicule and ostracism are okay, quite to the contrary. But to deny their existence is simply ridiculous. Maybe someday the gender binary will die out, but it's definitely not the case today, so what the hell are the parents thinking subjecting another human being (who will likely feel restrained by societal standards more than most of us) to having to deal with it, not to mention the rest of the shit that goes on in the world?
As for ego-stroking, that's fairly obvious since it's impossible to bring a child into existence in the interests of the child since it can't have any interests until it actually exists. Every act of deliberate reproduction is done to gratify the people reproducing (whether in some immediately personal sense or to make them feel like they are contributing to the world somehow). There is no mutualism there at all. The child gains nothing from being brought into existence.
Let's just say I'm not that into children, but I don't think you can accurately make the blanket statement "[a] child gains nothing from being brought into existence." Yes, there are many children (and adults) who lead tragic lives, but there are also millions of people who experience joy, love, etc.
As for death... 'Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all?
That's an awfully nihilistic sentiment. I'm sure you know this, but nevertheless, it's a shame if that's how you consistently see life. (I've felt that way before, but I wasn't at my best during those times.)
While this is really interesting, it's definitely a derail. Do the community post, please.
I think that when it comes to consciousness and life, all living people really believe the old rationalist assertion - "It is greater to exist than not to exist". If we believe the contrary, as you profess to, then it has to be asked why you, right now, are still existing. If a child gains nothing from existence then it's only consistent that each of us gains nothing from our continued existence (else the child would, in potentiality, actually gain something from coming into being).
You've already asserted that the promise of death is a harm that is inflicted upon us. Death is a foregone conclusion, no? I do not think it itself is really the threat you claim it is. The real threat of death is uncertainty. When death becomes an immediate certainty and it cannot be put out of mind any longer, many claim to achieve a peacefulness. So given that, as you claim, nonexistence is something to be desired, and given that the threat of death is its uncertainty... well, you know where I'm going with this. But we are all still alive, which means that we all believe that existence is really greater than not.
So, getting back on topic (and I would encourage you to make your own post!) I do not believe that these parents are inflicting any great intentional harm on this child. I would contend that it is in fact possible for this child to function in whatever way ze wishes, even outside conventions. Many thousands, even millions, of people already have. There will certainly be immense hardship, but that's not necessarily an insurmountable thing.
I wonder, though, that regardless of Pop's sex, if Pop won't just be treated as a boy. We all know that the default is male, and if given no clues as to sex, I think Pop will be treated as male. What about hairstyles? Any short hairstyle is supposedly intersex, but really, it's a masculine style. "Intersex", as far as styles go (so intersex hairdos, clothes, toys etc) in our society means it is a masculine style that is OK for females to also use. It never means it is a feminine style that is OK for males to wear, or a style that sincerely has no gender to it (with, maybe, maybe, the exception of plain white T-shirts, but even those are cut differently and it is assumed women can wear men's t-shirts, but men cannot wear women's t-shirts, because women have shape and men don't have shape). Of course the article said Pop also has dresses to wear, so on those days Pop would be treated as a girl. Pop won't be receiving no gender cues, rather, Pop will be receiving both, depending on what Pop is presenting that day. And I think, more often than not, Pop, regardless of biological sex, will be receiving male cues.
Thats a great point. I was thinking that people would be forced to think between the lines....but I bet you are right and that they will just choose a gender line based on Pops look that day and act accordingly.
Well, one commenter has already noted they assumed female. People may do a variety of things; certainly as anglophones (many of us, anyways), we'll probably associate male because "pop" is a slang term for father, and thus has pretty male connotations. One shouldn't expect this to apply to Swedes (even though ~80% speak English)
Yeah, people'll guess and send cues. But they'll be tentative, since they don't know, and they'll send a mix (since there'll be a good mix of assuming male and female). The result is a much weaker gender role.
Yeah, I had male associations with the word "Pop", and according to this website they do recognize "Pappa" as slang for father in Sweden:
http://www.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474977216389
FYI-- in the original article, "Pop" is just a stand-in for what the family actually calls the child. They chose not to reveal the child's real name for privacy reasons.
As long as the parents are allowing Pop to express feelings that are gendered when Pop wants to, this seems fine. It's when you start actively repressing your child that the line is crossed (David Reimer comes to mind here).
Somehow I think we've gotten distracted from the goal here. There's nothing wrong with men being men & women being women. The point is to eliminate discrimination & misogyny, and to enable individuals to express themselves freely. Eliminating sexism does not require eliminating the gender binary. I find this as offensive as I do forcing American Indians to repudiate their culture (as we did up through the '60s), or the Anglicization of Italian immigrants, or these damn English-only laws. If an individual doesn't like the way society identifies them, then they're free to create their own identity.
We, of all people, should be able to understand, respect, and celebrate differences. Indeed, its the only way we'll ever progress.
What do you mean there's nothing wrong with men being men and women being women? What do those categories even mean? And why wouldn't it be better if Pop could just be Pop and not worry about having to fit into one of your categories of difference.
"Eliminating sexism does not require eliminating the gender binary. I find this as offensive as I do forcing American Indians to repudiate their culture (as we did up through the '60s)"
This is actually offensive. You find the coerced repudiation of a culture a person was raised with and loved and internalized for the purposes of an imperialist agenda to be as offensive as not forcing one's child to adopt the behaviors our culture has dictated he/she should have based on his/her genitalia? You go celebrate difference for difference's sake on your own.
Not everyone feels that feminine and masculine behavior is inherent to their respective sexes or even that gender expression is limited to male or female. Obviously you disagree, but for plenty of feminists, it is a goal.
Actually, it's damned difficult to live as someone who doesn't identify with either side of the binary because the culture doesn't recognize that as a possibility. People will insist on gendering you as female or male regardless of identifying with neither gender (or both genders).
So, having a social caste system that only recognizes two categories of people is incompatible with creating your own identity, should that identity lie outside of the two categories. I find that to be quite offensive, because it involves the dominant culture trying to force a person to adopt a way of being that ze wouldn't choose for hirself.
Well hell, I could say it was damn difficult being black too...but that would miss the point that its damn difficult being a minority of any variety. Just like I don't think the solution to dealing with racism is to make black people act white, I don't think the solution to ending gender roles is to make everyone uni-sex.
I was specifically speaking of genderqueer people and their experiences. Just because the system works for you, don't assume it works for others.
Right now, we draw a line down the middle of a vast array of behaviors and say "this male" and "this is female." That doesn't allow room for very much individual variation.
The point is not to make everyone unisex, but to create conditions under which a person can choose to be whatever comes naturally to them. In the long run, that means allowing a multitude of genders: that is, more than just two.
Expecting everyone to be unisex is effectively the same as collapsing a two caste system into a single caste system in which everyone is assumed to be the same. If you read the article closely, that's clearly not the parents' intent. They are trying to give the kid an chance to adopt what ever ways of being make sense to hir.
The gender roles are the source of most of the discrimination & differences in outcome. Assaulting them directly is really the only way to produce change.
If you honestly think its easier to overturn 70,000 years of gender role socialization than it is teaching men to respect & value women then God bless you...but every other civil rights movement has made pretty good progress celebrating differences as opposed to eliminating them. Heck touting the special leadership qualities of women is a cottage industry, but the logical conclusion of your argument would throw all that out the window.
How sad that diversity is un-valued even here. God bless us indeed.
I actually think that enforcing the gender binary is quite harmful to any attempts to promote real diversity. The way I see it, diversity doesn't just come from established social categories. It also comes from within us, our ability to change at different points in our lives, to have areas within our mind we have never explored - basically, that we may be alien even to ourselves. By fitting people into strict categories of 'man' and 'woman', with clear meanings of what that entails, we're limiting the ability of people to explore other options.
In other words, difference shouldn't just be recognised in the cute little categories we've divided it into today. It needs to come from something much deeper, and that wouldn't allow for categories like gender that always to some extent pre-determine how we see others and ourselves.
Thank You!
We can have a gendered world where there is gender and sex equality!
We don't have to be one androgynous mass - sexualityless drones dressed in identical grey hospital scrubs - cut extra baggy so angular male bodies and curvy female bodies are safely disguised!
You can have equality between men and women without having to abolish the social categories of masculine and feminine!
It's very interesting that you think if we abandon gender labels, everyone will become "sexualityless drones dressed in identical grey hospital scrubs". So, according to you, if you aren't a "masculine man", you are... nothing? You aren't a writer or an activist or a son or a father or a partner or a friend? And you have somehow become asexual because you don't have gender? And you lose interest in colour?!
I think you're being a bit extreme here. And it seems like we're looking at thing upside down. Did the colours blue and pink, attraction to other people and obsession with looks starts AFTER genders came up? Isn't it the other way around? Didn't people start associating certain characteristics with gender and then stereotype them no matter how scattered those features really were?
Please explain to me your sentiments because I don't think I get it at all.
Oy. Just because you're nice and comfy with the gender binary doesn't mean everyone else is. The gender binary worked out well for you. That's great. For a lot of us, it's caused a great deal of trouble. Nobody here is advocating that everyone become genderless, but from your tone you seem to be advocating that everyone label themselves either "man" or "woman," and act "masculine" or "feminine" accordingly. Eek.
(For the record, I would love to be able to dress that way consistently. And so would many people.)
I have to agree with the commenter above. Your comment is extremely offensive to people who lie outside the "gender binary" as you call. I would like to think that we have come a long way in thinking of gender in duotones, and here we've got people talking about male and female and that is it?! What about people who are androgynous? What about people who are pangendered?
Also, I don't understand the need to make the statement "there is nothing wrong with men being men and women being women". Whoever said there was anything wrong with it and when you tout this claim, you seem to be implying that men acting as men and women acting as women is something derided when that happens to be what is upheld by society as the "norm". Are you cisgendered? If you are, your privilege is showing.
I am totally against gender divisions. I reluctantly understand that they need to exist for the sake of convenience, but I am not sure what are the positives of segregating people into genders. Maybe I am being too naive here, I don't know.
Regarding the article, I think one thing we need to keep in mind is that this is happening in Sweden. I am not sure how enforced gender norms are over there. I don't think it is quite comparable to US. Also, do Swedish people automatically associate "pop" with "father"?
And by "commenter above", I meant Arvilla.
My god, I need to scroll down before I start commenting...
*stands up and cheers*
"We, of all people, should be able to understand, respect, and celebrate differences. Indeed, its the only way we'll ever progress."
I don't know why but I always have these knee-jerk reactions about people saying we should embrace the gender binary. Like, I get what you're saying...I mean, it's beyond foolish to not recognize that physical differences exist. But the idea of embracing it always strikes terror in me. Maybe because there is no real respect for the female half. You know? Like, yeah, respecting and valuing both gender sounds great, but we are not anywhere near that goal, when the human default is still considered male (huMANity anyone?) and women are categorically oppressed all around the world. So to me, this whole "embrace our differences" argument always sounds like a bid toward cultural feminism that insists on letting men do manly things like rugby and fixing lawn mowers and beating each other up and letting women do womanly things like crying and having babies and having no selfhood. (Did you notice the hierarchy in those descriptions?)
I think the real realization will be realizing that there is an infinite expression of humanity in each individual, male or female, that traverses the myriad human emotions and actions and impulses and desires, all of which are interacting and melding with each other on a constant basis, simulatenously. And thus, none of which can categorically be described as specifically female or male. The shades of difference would be so nuanced that there would virtually be no difference anymore. That's where I'd like to see us headed. In fact, I think we're already there, but it's such a subjective experience and that's what makes it so hard to articulate.
I don't think it's useful to hide a child's physical sex from zir. I don't have kids yet, but when I do, I want to raise them, as much as possible, without imposing gender. But that doesn't mean hiding the realities of sex and gender from them. They should understand their bodies, they should understand that gender exists, they should be aware of what gender means in society, and they should be free to express their own genders however they want. The fact is that while gender is a cultural construction, it is still real. Kids will have to deal with it. Pretending it doesn't exist—or, in this case, pretending that it exists for everyone but the kid (at least that's what it sounds like)—hinders a child's ability to deal with the real world. There are better ways.
well, gender exists, it is real, but it is not constant.
meaning of gender in a society is constantly changing, from time to time and from culture to culture.
i suppose gender in sweden is quite a different thing from gender in the u.s (or gender in my country, that is hungary).
i think you can't teach your kid what gender is, because even in their own little environment (like school) it is not the same as in an adult environment, or in one specific school it can be very different, just like someone mentioned above.
gender is a construction, indeed, but it is us that construct it. showing "gender reality" to a kid is not teaching, it is creating.
Speaking as someone who was badly wounded by the gender binary and all of it's attendant, mindless conformity, I find their approach to parenting to be refreshing. Here are two parents allowing their child to decide where ze fits into the gender binary rather than automatically shackling ze with a social identity that may or may not work for them. Now, there's a novel concept.
I can see the villagers waving their torches and clubs already.
What if they don't send the kid to school?
Unless they lock Pop in the house all the time, Pop will still be out and about in society and will still be exposed to society's views of gender. If Pop is homeschooled then yes, it's possible that Pop might not be in as much contact with society's ideas of gender norms, but if the parents ever take Pop shopping or bring Pop to a playgroup or enroll Pop in group activities outside the home (which they would have to do if they didn't want to stunt Pop's social growth), Pop will still be exposed to the idea and enactment of gender roles. And don't forget the role of mass media -- I didn't see anything in the article about whether the parents allow/plan to allow Pop to watch much TV, what kinds of movies Pop would be allowed to see, what kinds of music Pop would be allowed to listen to, or what kind of books Pop would be allowed to read.
I love it when you
call me non-gendered papa
Uh, yeah, 94'
Interesting. I say good for Pop's parents. Awesome.
And yes, the singular 'they' is fine. I am a total grammar geek, but I use it.
I'm not convinced this is a great idea, but I don't see this as the parents trying to avoid Pop becoming a gendered being. It looks to me like they are trying to avoid having *other* people gender Pop.
I'm the mother of two very small children. I can tell you that the ONLY way to avoid having gender roles shoved down your child's throat at every opportunity by every person you meet would be to not let people know what the kid's genitalia looks like.
Pop will obviously still be exposed to the gender binary but that's different from having one half of it rammed into your developing psyche at every turn.
I saw this article, and it makes me uneasy too, but if I stopped and looked at my feelings, I guess it would come more from a space that, "I don't like it when parents impose their personalities on their child," not, "there's something wrong with not being told you're a girl or a boy." This seems more political than personal, and the imposition of a political statement upon a child is weird to me. It's kind of like teaching your children, "it's christian to hate gays," or "In this family, we're all....(fill in the blank)" But hey, that's sort of what raising children is, I know, and it's their kid, their family life, and I hope Pop grows up ok. It's just a very new thing to try, and there's the potential for hurt. There's also the potential for good, perhaps, even if it's hard for me to see.
Also, I wonder if this might make sense to think about in the context children who are born physically intersex? That's not a topic I know a whole lot about, but it seems that children with non-conforming physical attributes are commonly assigned a sex and therefore a gender, sort of randomly by a doctor (I read the Mickey Diamond studies and found them harrowing...)who then tells the parents to "treat the child like a boy," and yeah-problems ensure sometimes. If anyone knows more about this, feel free to correct me. But this way, it seems like the child could identify as the sex they truly are, when they're old enough to be conscious of that deal, and any gender identity they want could flow from that.
Raising a child at all is merely a form of cultural imperialism across generations rather than political borders, so what they're doing is no more objectional than imparting any values or knowledge on one's children whatsoever. I certainly see no reason to favor the dominant culture simply because it is dominant.
Besides, this is nothing compared to the inevitable experiments with transhumanism that will change what people are rather than just how they're raised, so you might as well get used to the idea.
How lovely to be raised without predetermined expectations that certain behaviors are "feminine" (belonging to those labeled woman) or "masculine" (belonging to those labeled men) and instead with the expectation that all traits are human traits available to you! I have yet to encounter any way of looking at gender classification that doesn't say "people come in certain types and certain types have certain traits" so the whole thing seems so terribly limiting for human growth and potential. I'm inspired by this attempt not to do that violence to a child unnecessarily.
One concern I have is that people don't interact as closely with babies or small children if they don't know their gender. We hold babies differently, talk to them differently, etc based on the gender we've assumed for them, but when we don't know, we keep a certain distance. (we = adults studied) It's all very present proof that one is not considered a subject in our society without gender. Sad. Still less sad than teaching a child that their options for how to live out their humanness are limited by these "woman" or "man" boxes (or any other gender categorization boxes one might offer).
i think this is very interesting and i certainly don't think it's any more harmful than putting your kid into a gendered box from day one, as long as pop is allowed to choose what pop wants to dress like and act like and what toys to play with, etc.
i can't say my upbringing wasn't gendered, but i can say my parents were very willing to let me build my own identity in early childhood. sometimes that involved wearing only androgynous t-shirts and pants and sometimes it involved months of only princess dresses, but i was always free to chose and i think i'm a much more well-adjusted woman for it today.
this sounds like something that is mostly just going to piss off OTHER adults, but hey, maybe they'll pick up something and learn to actually love a child without subjecting it to a rigid system of gender identity. the kid probably will choose to identify as male or female in the end, but having a few years with no (or less) pressure to pick the doll OR the truck can't hurt, in my view.
The fact that a child has nothing to gain from coming into existence has nothing to do with tragic lives per se. Like I said, a person doesn't exist before they...well, exist, so they have nothing to gain or lose, no interests or desires, nothing at all. So it can in no way benefit from anything. If you gave a million dollars away to a nonexistent person, they would have no use for it. I think it's fairly obvious. Even if life were all sunshine and lollipops, nobody would have anything to gain from coming into existence.
But the fact that there are many tragic lives
is highly relevant. So you are willing to sacrifice a lot of people just because many more enjoy life... but it's not like those many more would have cared one way or the other had they not been born themselves. So all these reassurances only serve to console those who are already alive and do nothing but disservice to future people.
A lot of people seem to be objecting to the idea that these parents are in some way holding their child back from developing a gender at all. Someone even said, "I don't think it's useful to hide a child's physical sex from zir."
The child is two, and nowhere near puberty. Also, the OP stated that the parents "have kept Pop's biological sex a secret," and (correct me if I'm wrong) I assume that to mean from other people. It would be a little difficult to hide someone's physical sex from them. Pop can probably talk by now, and if Pop isn't yet, Pop will soon be asking questions about genitalia and boys and girls, and will figure out which physical category fits (at least by observing the parents).
When Pop gets to school the traditional roles of "boy" and "girl" will become much more obvious. When puberty hits, Pop will have a whole new set of things to negotiate, but so does everyone (remember?), and by that time the child will probably at least be leaning toward some gender identity, if only in terms of who most of Pop's friends are (not that this is determinate -- I'm a woman, and many of my friends in elementary school were boys).
It seems to me the great benefit in this is not eliminating gender entirely, but, at least in this individual child's life, revealing gender for what it is, and eliminating the overwhelming socialization would otherwise occur. On days Pop wears a dress or has long hair and bangs, people will treat her as a girl. When Pop sports short hair and denim and sneakers, people will treat him as a boy. Pop will (ideally) grow up knowing that gender is unconnected to physical type, and will someday identify somewhere on the gender spectrum with that knowledge. Maybe Pop's gender and physical sex will line up, to some extent. In any case, I hope that what results is a human being who is sensitive to the complexity of sex and gender and who will judge other people on real merits rather than prescribed, stereotyped roles.
Maybe Pop will be a feminist.
You know, this is a difficult subject with many angles to inspect, and yet my biggest thought during my whole reading was simply, "They couldn't find a better name than Pop? I mean, I don't care what gender I am, I would prefer a name not Pop."
Note to all:
"Footnote: Pop is not the child's real name but is the name used in Svenska Dagbladet's interview with the child's parents from March 6th."
Well, one thing gets to me.
Gender identity is not the same thing as... gender identity.
In trans contexts it can refer to one's sense of what biological sexual characteristics one should have - body map and all that - and does not necessarily correspond with gender roles.
In cis psychologists' contexts it refers to one's sense of what gender roles one should follow.
There's no reason these should have anything to do with each other. But the psychologists keep equivocating, refusing to distinguish the comfort/discomfort in one's body with comfort/discomfort with one's assigned roles, and using the evidence for biological effects on comfort/discomfort in one's body to conclude that biology determines gender roles. Gah.
Sometimes, I think we need to eradicate the words masculine and feminine, use male and female for biological sex (including brain sex and body map), and butch and femme for social roles (regardless of biological sex).
I'm 180 degrees opposed to you there.
I like masculinity and femininity, and masculine and feminine gender roles - my beef is with gender oppression
As for using "butch" instead of masculine and "femme" instead of "feminine" - I can't get with you there either!
As a heterosexual male, I'd be really offended to be called "butch" and I'm sure a lot of straight men would agree with me on that.
Why would you be offended to be called "butch"?
Perhaps he dislikes Paul Newman.
I actually don't see "butch" as simply a synonym for "masculine" and "femme" as simply a synonym for "feminine." They are often used to describe people who are (exhibiting) masculine or feminine (traits) but considering their history of use in the queer community, particularly how they are used today, I see them as far more nuanced and complex. Butch and femme can be genders unto themselves, modes of gender performance, part of sexuality, and/or an identity that goes beyond gender or sexuality. That's certainly not everything butch and femme mean to all who identify as such. I'm specifically thinking of the book "Butch Is a Noun" by S. Bear Bergman.
Designating someone a role that they won't necessarily like on the basis of gender is oppression!
Sorry Greg, but that's just not possible. Any end to gender-based discrimination will take place in the form of the death of gender roles. There's no alternative mechanism.
You won't need to change how you act at all, it'll just no long be a masculine way to act, but a human way to act. And you'll be long dead by the time it's finished; don't worry about being unable to adapt to it or cope with it, it won't come up.
Isn't "Pop" a gendered name - since it's a common slang term for "father"?
If by "common" you mean USA... which isn't where these people are.
Again, Pop is not the child's real name.
I'm assuming the name is something neutral like Pat, or something nontraditional like River or Skye.
Well, here in Minnesota, "pop" is a carbonated beverage. Barring over the top marketing, fizzy drinks don't generally have a gender.
They seem very confused between what you might call gender role (yunno, girls are pink and like dolls houses and babies, and boys are blue and like trucks and going to work) and gender identity, who you really are, which is probably something that happens in the brain at about the age of 3 - however you're being brought up. I'm trans, so if how you're brought up is all it takes, I'd have carried on being a man, having all that nice male/hetero/cis privilege. I was good at it - no-one knew I was really a woman.
But the only way I could continue to exist in the world was as a female woman. Whatever the price I had to pay.
When I was young I picked up all the masculine social expectations, because I knew that if I didn't perform them adequately I would be punished - and all the feminine ones, because that was just who I really was - I just couldn't be me.
I wonder how they would react if pop does turn out to be trans or homosexual?
Anyway the biological determinist is probably right. The usual outcome is either
female body, female gender identity, likes men to have sex with, or the other way round, so that's the way to bet.
This is a very, VERY good point. Thank you.
Yes, I read it as keeping Pop's sex secret from *other people* too, not from Pop.
They are just trying to raise a kid without gender crap.
And yes, gender is learned *very* early. By the age of three, kids have definitely absorbed gender roles.
It amazes me when people say 'look, my kid likes playing with dolls/ trucks!' as gender appropriate, when said kid is 3 or 4 years old. As if they haven't absorbed the gender roles they are expected to conform to by that age! The brain is developing so fast. Kids aren't 'hardwired' - they absorb everything, from infancy. I don't see how people *don't* get that even very small kids must absorb social expectations.
A study showed that *babies* are treated differently by adults, depending on whether said adult thought the baby was a boy or a girl. If boys cried they were interpreted as bored or angry, girls were seen as being scared or wanting affection. How can this NOT affect how the child develops?
If Pop does turn out to conform to the expectations of their social gender role, fine. I suspect Pop will not, because NONE OF US DO. We are all performing gender.
Holly at Feministe gives a wonderful take on this story. It's well worth reading.
I think she said what I was trying to think, only much more eloquently.
I'm sorry, but this is fucked up. Denying the child the opportunity to develop hir gender identity, whether it be cis or trans, should be considered child abuse. This is a human being, NOT an experiment.
Ok, after reading the actual article (heh) I feel somewhat more comfortable with this. I was under the impression that the parents were repressing Pop's gender expression more than providing hir with many opportunities for gender expression.
Still, I can't help but feel this is unfair to the child. As painful as the gender binary may be for a lot of people, I would imagine that being raised so differently from one's peers would be even more painful. The parents seem to be thinking idealistically rather than realistically, and therefore do not seem to be considering the best interest of their child.
Maybe you ought to
read it once more and you'll feel
more comfortable.
I don't know I feel about this exactly. As a theoretical experiment, I think it's interesting to discuss. As a real-life choice, I'm not such a fan. My partner and I offer our children all of the same choices - hair, clothes, toys, play, hobbies, etc. as Pop's parents do. My children choose from both (dominant) culturally masculine and feminine items, and we're fine with their choice. My 4YO recently has become aware of transgender people and has started asking a lot of questions. Great, it opens up a lot of topics to discuss, and I'm glad he's comfortable enough to ask in a non-judgmental way.
Still, we don't feel the need to hide who they are. Yes, there are people who call my daughter "princess" in the grocery store or who give me the "boys will be boys" line when my son is running around. We address those comments with the people who make them and with our children if needed. I really feel we're making the more practical and responsible choice.
We're not hiding their sex and giving them the impression that they should be afraid to reveal their biological sex. I would imagine this experiment will have the affect of creating a hyper-focus on Pop's sex and gender rather than making it go away.
As a parent, I also think about how much our children do that is sex-proscribed, such as going to the bathroom at school. I don't know how the Swedish system is set up. Perhaps they have unisex bathrooms and no single-gender sports teams and the like. In the US, I cannot imagine how you would navigate those issues or things like sleepovers in elementary school when some (overprotective, imo) parents won't allow opposite sex children to stay. Does Pop always end up left out of the social scene because of Pop's parents' choice? If so, how is that useful?
I think this is very interesting, i can understand why they would like to keep the child's sex a secret when trying to raise them in a gender-neutral fashion since studies have shown that adults do treat a baby different if they are told it belongs to a certain sex. (I'm kind of wondering what they are doing about day-care though).
I think it would be stupid if they tried to keep the knowledge from the child themself but they aren't so i don't really see the problem. They also say explicitly in the article that they will keep it up until Popself wants to reveal Pop's sex.
I like that they are offering both traditionally feminine and masculine toys and clothing to the children, all to often it seems like gender-neutral means masculine and i'm not really comfortable with that.
I know Pop isn't the child's real name but i still feel like chiming in and saying that as a Swede the name does sound gender-neutral to me, my first reaction was "like pop-music? that's a bit silly", pappa may derive from the same root but it's pronounced completely differently.
The fundamental meaning, the answer to the big SO WHAT question, to this article and Pop's parents is this: the child has a CHOICE to be whatever gender zi wants to be.
I get a feeling that if we had a choice with a lot more things we would all be drastically different people.
A lot of the comments here seem to be arguing the semantics about the destruction of gender. Some people are saying, "Well, what's the point? The kid's going to be gendered anyway!" The point is having a gender is actually cool! So long as the child gets the choice to decide which gender it wants to be.
There is nothing wrong with having a gender. But there is something wrong with imposing a gender and enforcing specific ways to act a gender. I get the feeling that the parents aren't trying to raise their child gender-free. They just don't want to be the cause of any trouble for a child who may have a lot of quips with hir's supposed sex/gender. Just assuming a gender can closet all types of people, as we can see here on this blog.
My question to all of you would be this: How would YOU raise your child outside of imposing gendered roles??!
This whole thing sounds interesting and the idea behind it sounds unique, but as several commenters have noted, I don't think it would be good in practice.
One of the things that I think this process kinds of leaves out is the child's ability not to learn HOW to be one gender or the other, but instead how to learn how to deal with the challenges associated with being categorized as one gender or the other. As a feminist and a child of feminists, my sex was acknowledged as female but I was always encouraged to explore anything I wanted, wear whatever I wanted (I had a bowl hair cut for most of my childhood), and "be" who ever I wanted. Clearly it is impossible to be without the gender enforced "norms" of society, which say what girls should be or how they should look but my parents used those moments as teachable moments. In an ideal world, society wouldn't categorize us in to the binary of female or male and tell us what is feminine or masculine and try to categorize us into these little boxes. But we don't live in an ideal world, and if I have a female sexed child, I will be open about the fact that society will judge her as female (because at some point at it is likely that she will have a period, and develop breasts and look physically different than males), but I will also be sure to let her know that while sex can be biological, gender is learned. Still as someone who is biologically female (or male), Pop will end up being categorized by society (which seems to be the parents concerns, since both the parents and Pop know their physical gender).
At some point, as noted in the article, Pop will choose a gender, but while they may not feel constrained by societies gender roles, they will not have the history of learning how to deal with how society deals with them in their chosen gender. Maybe they will have the expereince of having society treat them as both female or male, but more likely they will learn how society treats androgyny (the questions that hover behind peoples eyes "is it a he or a she?") Society isn't gender neutral, I think it be better to challenge the binary by teaching your child that both genders can do whatever they want - by saying "you are a boy and you can play with dolls if you want" (but acknowledging that others might not feel the same, and using those experiences as teachable moments), rather than trying to make sure that society sees your child as gender neutral.
"sex can be biological, gender is learned"
both are socially constructed... but gender identity is not learned. If it were, trans people like me would not transition - why on earth would I have paid the high price when I was perfectly invisible as a woman with a male body, performing masculine gender.
"challenge the binary by teaching your child that both genders can do whatever they want"
yeah right. It's almost impossible as a man to just turn up at work wearing a business skirt suit and heels for example if you have that kind of job, and plenty of blue collar jobs are almost female free. How would it be turning up on a building site having transtioned from Joe to Josephine? Cis privilege makes the dissonance of being trans invisible. It's not just who does the cooking or looks after the babies - the social construction of gender goes very deep. (Another example of a social construct that goes deep? Money. Try doing "whatever you want" with no money and see where it gets you. )
When you have deconstructed the gender binary - let me know.
This is so interesting!
I don't necessarily think that it will work completely, but at the very least, the child shouls learn that this whole "gender labelling" business is not really necessary.
I wonder if the parents will allow Pop to watch television, because if there is something that teaches and enforces gender labelling, it's television.
I am so remarkably uncomfortable with this experiment on Pop. As a strong feminist, I believe that gender roles, especially for children, need to be broken down and opened up and redefined. My concerns about this situation are twofold:
1. Since when did it become acceptable for people to turn humans into guinea pigs? Feminism fights for social justice and this entire story feels unjust for Pop. Is it not objectifying to play untested games with child-raising and then publish articles about it? Many feminists have argued against using non-consenting women, children and animals in research studies that have such unknown consequences. Yet, so many commenters have mentioned how "awesome" this is. I find that hypocritical. We're okay with experimenting with young children as long as the people running the experiment are feminists?
2. My other major concern about this story is that it in no means stretches the gender boundaries imposed on young people. Yes, Pop will most likely find out soon enough that boys and girls are different and Pop may choose to identify with one or the other. But once Pop identifies, there still remains no challenge to the idea that girls like pink and boys like blue. Then Pop just becomes another gendered individual. I think it's healthier to raise our children with parents who challenge traditional gender roles, not pretending that they don't exist.
I have issues with this as well, but for different reasons. As for number 1, I'm against using people as guinea pigs, but how do we know that's what this family is trying to do? Maybe they just believe the most ethical way to raise a child is with as few gender constraints as possible. Just because no one else does it doesn't mean it's not the right thing.
If the parents really are just experimenting on their kid, that is unforgivable. But if they see the gender binary as a deeply harmful construct that they want to enable their child to resist/subvert, I don't really think you can boil it all down to just experimenting on the kid. It doesn't seem fair to conflate raising a kid in the way you believe is right despite being controversial, and using kids as guinea pigs.
"The brains of males and females differ, as do hormones and other bioligical processes. Besides, even if the child identifies as male or female, when puberty comes around, it will be obvious what the sex is, if not the gender. As far as the gender matching sex, it usually does."
Yes, sex and gender usually do match, but sometimes there's people like me. People who develop only halfway (youthful look), have only a shred of a male puberty and who never clearly identified as either sex. I ended up identifying as female when I cleared the fog of confusion that being tormented gave me, and figured it was even a possibility to do so (I didn't know until I was 22).
I don't know how my brain is. Being aspie, intersex, and trans, sort of makes it a hard guess. I can definitely tell you I don't think conventionally as most males and females do. Common sense is lost on me. Conventions for convention/tradition's sake means nothing to me. But is my brain male or female? That's anyone's guess. I'm seen as a cissexual cisgendered female in my day-to-day dealings. My "weirdness" (I'm not speaking of my trans status there) is not readily visible. Nobody knows I'm a hardcore gamer, unless they know me as a friend or from work (I test videogames, its sort of a given).
I've had a truckload of problems from being perceived as male in my younger years, starting in kindergarten, and not stopping at high school graduation even. It stopped once I transitioned, 3 years ago (I was 24).
My puberty was not obvious, not to me, not to my family, not to school people, and I didn't have friends to speak of. Chances of this happening to Pop may be slim, but its still a possibility, I'd say raising Pop as both and neither gives Pop possibilities to do whatever they wish later on, without too many preconceived notions.
I've lost my childhood not wanting to do too many waves (I was docile and obedient, didn't want to question things too much, not til I understood them - gender seemed arbitrary to me back then, so I dared not question it). Pop may yet have a chance to have that childhood, while a child. It will be hard yes, but I'd pay 1 billion $ to go back to childhood, however hard it may be, to be myself then. If I knew what I know now, I'd be my own kind of girl, but definitely a girl, genitals be damned.
I'm my own kind of girl now, but I've missed so much. Pop yet has a chance to be their own kind of girl, or boy, or neither, from the start. Having no sisters, dresses never were an option here, and now as an adult, they are less practical than they would be as a carefree child.
Sorry if its a bit of a rant. I'd have loved if my parents raised me that way. I would probably have come off as female without knowing what it meant, without having to wait two decades, without being tormented those two decades without knowing exactly why. I'd have understood myself a lot faster. Identity is something that comes naturally, trying to fit people into molds just gives mental issues.
"Is it not objectifying to play untested games with child-raising and then publish articles about it?"
Psychology is so vague and unprecise (as compared to say, biology, or mathematics) that everything can be said to be 'untested', because most everything needs to be tailored to the individual.
You're trying to get person A out of depression? Besides anti-depressant, which don't cure it, but simply allow for roughly normal day-to-day functioning, how would you go about it?
Answer: Depends on the person. Sure, you might have strategies to go about it, but its still custom-tailored to the individual, not one-size-fits-all.
It might work on Pop, but not on hir neighbor who do the exact same. It might work on me, but none of my brothers. The key is to listen and be flexible.
Children thrive in homes
where they are loved. I think Pop
will turn out just fine.
Yeah, I think using your child as social experiment/political statement is just wrong.
Aren't all parents doing that by virtue of raising a child at all?
You give them values, notions etc that they are more or less force-fed without a chance to first digest them. Children can't give "informed consent" to being part of a religion, going to a certain school, or wearing whatever is bought for them. I don't think this "experiment" is any worse than my own childhood.
I have to say: this is one of the best, most succinct replies I've seen made to the naysayers.
I'll just add one thing. Unless the child clearly self-identifies as female at a young age, and outside a pretty understanding enlightened community, there will be problems with feminine expression. Girls can be tomboys until beyond puberty, boys don't survive being "sissies", not without big problems down the road.
You'd think there'd be less forums, orgs etc to be themselves, in complete secret, if they were allowed expression in real life.
I simply had female mannerism (body language), no dresses, nothing that could be deemed feminine save my small size, and I had loads of problems. I just hope pop is lucky.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Reimer
any of you heard of this guy ^^^^
he was born a boy, had his penis destroyed in an accident at 8 months. he was raised as a girl by his parents.
he couldn't conform to the change and killed himself at the age of 38.
can anyone provide evidence of a case where a child was successfully raised gender neutral?
@ bukowski
David Reimer's parents *forced* him to be a specific kind girl and were always policing his gender. They wouldn't even let Reimer as a girl wear pants--how many parents do that? The kid (as a girl) came up always thinking what she was doing was wrong because her parents brought her up that way--she was never feminine enough; she was never the right kind of girl. If they would have raised Reimer as a girl, but allowed her to have more freedom in expressing what that means maybe she would have turned out differently. We'll never know... I'm not saying they should have tried to raise their kid as a girl in the first place, but I hope people do realize that it wasn't simply that their child didn't like wearing dresses. This kid went through a lot of abuse from his parents and doctors--and on top of it saw that her/his brother wasn't being treated the same way. How could the kid *not* end up thinking there was something wrong?
Pop's parents are completely different: the child is allowed to choose when to reveal his/her sex when ready and choose a gender and how to do that gender (I love Judith Butler, can you tell?)
The article says the parents told the kid that there is a difference between boys and girls. I wonder if they told him that some girls have vaginas, some have penises, some have neither, and some have both and same w/ boys... That way, the child understands not to gender anyone's body, not just his/her own. I guess they'd have to wait until the kid is older for that talk...