For this entry to make sense, you have to read this article on raising a genderless child first. It's about raising the child without external cues of his/her own gender, not about raising a child with a biologically ambiguous gender. It's posted on my FB so some of you have probably already read it.
I also suspect that some friends who read it from my page were so outraged or disturbed by the premise that they didn't even bother to comment with their disagreement. It seems like a polarizing idea. Kevin, my co-blogger here, voiced his vehement disagreement with what these parents are doing to their children. I am going to defend it here (at least, why I think it's a deeply loving intention, if not a practical or effective one).
So, these parents want to raise their youngest child without outward cues to his/her gender. They haven't told anyone that it's a girl or a boy. The child's name is Storm, and Storm's clothing, grooming, and toys are not gender-bound. I think the question that comes to mind is, "Why would you conduct this gender experiment on your own child, not knowing what sort of identity-related or social harm could come to him/her as a result, when you should just get over yourselves and allow the child to learn his/her gender in the conventional, usual way?" And I think there is an underlying assumption that the vast majority of children socialized typically are well-adjusted in their gender. Sure, there may be an occasional guy who has to defend his cheerleading or girl who has to prove her technological prowess, but overall these are healthy people.
But that's the flaw. I think this is an erroneous assumption. The usual way is NOT harmless. I will use myself as an example, because that's the only thing I'm an expert at. I'm female, and was raised as such, but I don't remember much pressure to conform to that role too terribly. I played soccer in 1st grade, refused to join Girl Scouts because I didn't want to "sell cookies" while boys were off starting fires, wore pants all the time, was forbidden to wear makeup until high school (and even then, it was restricted to really neutral colors), and hated New Kids on the Block (like, a LOT). I don't remember my parents ever saying things to me about my gender and what would be best according to it, in any area of my life. Neither my mom or my dad has ever wistfully daydreamed aloud or dropped hints to me about getting married or having kids.
And yet, as neutral and supportive as my upbringing was, as proud as I feel to have both masculine and feminine traits, I still bear some ugly marks of internalized sexism. I GOT THE MESSAGE, even though no one was saying it to me explicitly. I LIVE THE MESSAGE, even though I don't rationally consider it valid.
Example: I wear high heels. Not all the time, and not super-ridiculous ones (usually). But I do enjoy wearing pretty, interesting high heels. I probably wouldn't think of going to a wedding or a nightclub wearing flats. Why? Oh, high heels are sexy. To whom? I have a boyfriend; why am I trying to look sexy? Because for women, looking sexy is considered a virtue--something that can get you anything from better treatment by strangers to free tires (just ask Sam, my clasmate). Well, they're also fashionable. Who defined fashion and why do I give a shit? I'd probably hate those people if I knew them! Or maybe they give me confidence. Again, why would shoes that squeeze my feet and increase the difficulty of walking (I mean, I can do it but I wouldn't do a 5K in heels) lend me extra confidence?
The point I'm making is, we are not as well-adjusted about gender as we think we are. The damage is there, but it's invisible. We're used to it. Sometimes I think about rejecting all these gender norms: I'll quit wearing makeup, stop doing my hair (which I do hate to do), and let my eyebrows get scraggly. But in the end, I just don't want to give these things up--not because I like them so much, but because I know that they give me a social currency that I'm afraid to go without. Ironically, I am far from the super-feminine ideal, but even I struggle with relinquishing a strong feminine identity, even if it means I am presenting myself to the world more as an individual and less as a generic female.
And it's not just physical appearance. There are things I learned from the media or society about how to talk to a man, how to act on a date, what guys like, what you can do that will earn cool points with guys. I am still trying to undo that damage. In fact, I have some habits and routines that I picked up so long ago (i.e. in childhood) that I have no idea whether I actually prefer them or not, because I've basically brainwashed myself into thinking they are good. Those parts of my identity are permanently gone. Even when I try to re-evaluate them, I know that I'm biased from a lifetime of wanting the approval of society and strategizing to obtain it.
This hasn't been devastating in a dramatic way to my psyche. Obviously, I get along fine and I have been able to undo some of the gender programming that I picked up throughout my life. And indeed, some of that programming makes society flow more smoothly and gives people direction when they are confused. But I think it's faulty to assume that being raised with a prescribed gender role is essentially harmless, and being raised without one is dangerous. There is plenty of harm (and perhaps plenty of good) in receiving strong gender messages from birth onward. When we are socialized so early to our gender, we are sent down a path that becomes more and more treacherous; it becomes less about Barbies and Hot Wheels, and more about drowning out your own voice in favor of the voices of others, which sets the stage for self-rejection and self-doubt. I think these parents are hoping to avoid *some* of that harm. Whether their alternative is detrimental to Storm by some other fashion, I don't know. But I don't think their reasoning is as wacky as it might seem on the surface.
And now, Kevin will offer a rebuttal. (At least, that's what I'm hoping he'll do after reading this.)
I don't think I have enough thoughts to offer a full-length rebuttal, mostly because we seem to agree that rigidly defined gender roles are usually harmful, and that people should be free to create their own identities. My concerns are primarily with the unintended consequences of their approach. The main problem is that people cannot create gender-neutral identities from scratch. Identity development is something that happens within our relationships, since it emerges from the ways we compare ourselves with other people. This process requires that we have an understanding for the basic components of our identity, e.g. differences in societal expectations that are based on physical manifestations of gender, as well as knowledge of how "normal" people think about their own stock gender roles. We intuitively know that it's unreasonable to expect a child to have a coherent answer to the question "What's your gender identity?," and this is precisely because identity is largely created implicitly and passively through our interactions with others, as you point out. In other words, I am not worried about these children having a non-normative gender identity per se, but rather about their lack of socialization to normal gender identities, which they will inevitably confront on a daily basis. A clear sign of this lack of socialization is their child's anxiety (and I would assume befuddlement) about interacting with "normal" children at school. In other words, we can encourage an open and individually directed exploration of identity in our children, but we cannot expect the world to conform to this ideal. Children need to be prepared for interacting with groups as much as they need to be encouraged to individuate from those groups.
ReplyDeleteAnother objection to their approach might be that in reacting against the "helicopter parenting" method, many strategies like unschooling often go to the opposite extreme of leaving education or socialization to the child. Children need guidance in making nearly every decision, since they are cognitively incapable of questioning and navigating their identities until early adolescence. Parents need to be comfortable with at least some authoritative tactics during these years.
I still think that they will get plenty of socialization through society and media. Surely they will start to notice that the toys they pick have different color schemes and have certain gender children on the packaging. I also heard some radio DJ (yeah, real intellectual discourse I know) complaining that they are having a gender-neutral upbringing, and I don't think that's true. They are allowed to pick what they want (as evidenced that they wear dresses...dresses aren't gender neutral). So they're getting both sides, just not being pushed to choose only one.
ReplyDeleteAnd the kid's comment about not wanting to go to school...I feel that could be indicative of a number of things. But maybe you're right...maybe they're already suffering for this lifestyle.
I'm still bummed out that you didn't write a full entry. :)
I guess my concern was not that the children are having a gender-neutral orientation imposed on them by their parents, but that their parents falsely assume that a gender-neutral approach is possible. There are real differences between males and females, both biologically and in terms of implicit societal expectations. I just worry that the parents may interact with their children as if they don't exist, but since I haven't met them I can't be sure. Here's another scenario that illustrates my concern: white parents who adopt a black child but pretend that they do not notice any differences between the black child and their biological white children and also fail to engage this child in discussions about the very real social strains that such an arrangement would entail.
ReplyDeleteIf I wrote a whole post, I'd be agreeing with you most of the way through it. That, and there are so many nuances with this situation, so my limited experience/expertise with gender identity might not add anything of import.
And for some reason I can sign into my Google account from home but not from my work computer. Lame technology.
ReplyDeleteI'm worried about social interactions and pronouns. Can you imagine little Bobby trying to reference Storm?
ReplyDelete"Mom, Storm took my shovel. Make him give it back."
"Oh, little Bobby, Storm's not a 'he'."
"Then make her give it back!"
"Storm's not a 'she' either."
"Make it give it back!"
:/
I feel compelled to strongly side with the thesis that this way of raising a child is both ethical and responsible.
ReplyDeleteWhen I was very young, I loved to wear dresses, I loved to wear makeup, and I loved to dress up in general. I certainly didn't think of myself as a girl, because clearly I was a bit different from girls, but I certainly didn't think of myself as a boy, either. In fact, I didn't think of it much at all. My parents are very sweet people, and in my life, they have been supportive of all my choices, but I am definitely their son, and although they accepted my 'eccentricities', and I'm sure would have learned to love me had I been gay, I know my dad is constantly relieved when he finds out I am romantically involved with women.
We've never, not once in my life, talked about the fact that I was not a normal child, because ever since I was challenged to choose - out on my own and in the dark, whether I was a boy or a girl, I have felt the need to not only prove I am a boy/man, but that the only way to prove that is to be the best man ever. My parents I'm sure would have supported me had they known, but they didn't, and I'm sure they just considered it a 'phase'. The first time I remember being challenged about my gender identity was when another child asked me whether I was a boy or a girl (I am fairly androgynous now, but before I went through the horrors of puberty, I could have easily passed for a girl, and I have a sex-neutral European name, to boot), and I felt compelled to choose boy, even though from that point on there was an ever present sense of shame that I was somehow not a real boy, and that there was something wrong (or at least not normal) about not being a real boy.
I pretty much ran away from my female tendencies. I let my dad give me a buzz-cut like he had, I stopped wearing dresses and capes and started wearing jeans (even though they chafed horribly), and I stopped talking to girls (because no boys liked being friends with icky girls), even though I LOVED girls (and I still do!).
Now I find myself in my mid-twenties with the realization that up until a month or so ago, I had never once in my entire life been honest about who I am as a person, and that even with the people who have shared with me everything about their lives, I've had this one thing I have never been able to talk about, and it's one of if not THE most important part of the puzzle of who I am as a person.
The issue has been raised of the possible discomfort and social maladjustment that a child who clearly identifies as male or female might experience. This is a valid concern, but I would ask you to consider what that social maladjustment means. What norms will the child be maladjusted to? I think the answer is that the child will find themselves full of children who are not absolutely certain of their parents' unconditional love, and will be perplexed by the bizarre complexes that arise out of that environment (say, loveless heterosexual monogamy?). Is that really so tough - to be faced with having to explain your identity to others, but knowing that whichever identity you decide, that your parents have got your back? You may have to fight more battles, but you will know that they are righteous battles, and you will always have allies.
I often think about the person I might have been had I not had to repress myself since I was six years old. I will never get back all those years of feeling deeply, deeply sad and crushingly alone, and at times suicidal. I have finally arrived at a place where I am confident about speaking about who I am, and I think I am a stronger, more complete person for having survived a lot non-parental (but not contradicted by parents either) attempted religious brainwashing, but I don't think kids should have to fight alone, and in the dark, to be something they have no hope of understanding on their own.
ReplyDeleteWe no longer assume (in civilized society, anyway) that all little boys will grow up to want women, and not too long ago it was nearly unthinkable that you might raise a child without that assumption. You hoped your kid was straight, and if it turned out they weren't, then either you let go of your shit and accepted your kid, or you excised your child from your life. Now teens are more and more allowed to be gay or lesbian, and are told from an early age that no matter what their parents are accepting of that. But genderqueer kids just don't fit that picture. In that situation (the 'just so you know, it's fine if you're gay' situation), genderqueer kids may feel they have to form an identity that is a rejection of queer culture, because they 'aint attracted to members of their biological sex. It is just as wrong to assume that all little boys are actually little boys as it is to assume that all little girls will grow up wanting to land a husband and pump out 1.4 kids.
This is an issue that makes people queasy, and rightly so. It challenges very core notions of who we are, and how we define ourselves, and it would be easier not to have to do that, and it seems almost alright not to, given the extremely low proportion of genderqueer folks (though I suspect the number is much much larger than most would) in the population at large. For anyone with this argument I would challenge you to ask yourself if the comfort of the majority justifies a lifetime of intense unhappiness and metaphysical, existential angst for a few of us unlucky enough to be born into the 'wrong' body.
I hope I am not being overly dramatic here, but I ask myself, if we can't count on the vocal support of the people who are informed and open-minded enough to know about these issues - then who can we count on. I hope the answer is not 'no one but ourselves'.
As for the linguistic challenges raised - I know the grievance is meant slightly in jest, but it is a bit of a microcosm of this entire struggle. No, there isn't really a bullet-proof way of referring to someone when you aren't sure of their sex - but that will change. Language has always adapted to fit changing cultural norms. In fact, the sense that we can't change language is itself a very recent change in how we think about language. Upon coming to the New World, there was an intense need among colonists to feel they could walk on equal ground as the aristocracy back in Europe, so they adopted rigid conformity to the way the British upper crust spelled words. It was actually an issue very much involved with American Independence, and the argument that words should be spelled phonetically was a revolutionary idea (literally!). Do we have a grammatically correct gender neutral pronoun? No, not really, though I would nominate 'they' as the least jarring option, as in 'Storm was playing with their Barbie and toy dump-truck'. It's not perfect, but it's certainly better than arbitrarily assigning someone as male or female regardless of their gender (see, it works!). I get the joke, put I don't think it's funny, and I think the genderqueer are finally starting to get fed up with being the butts of skeazy jokes. We aren't 'he's' and we aren't 'she's', and we certainly aren't 'it's', so let's get to it and figure out something that works.
So, I guess what I'm trying to say, is please PLEASE don't place avoiding some potential social difficulties on a higher plane than the long-overdue peace, happiness, and confidence of a few alienated, lonely, confused, hopefully not suicidal kids. Everyone deserves to be who they are. I apologize for the lack of brevity, but all the negative response I’ve seen to this story is really getting my goat. I’m tired of people arguing that this just isn’t an important enough issue to warrant making people uncomfortable, so I just wanted to loudly proclaim “BULLSHIT – I am very supportive of this couple and what they are helping to do”. Thanks for the soapbox.
ReplyDeleteKagemeister, thanks so much for sharing your personal experience with this issue. I agree with you that children who don't conform to standard gender roles typically have a long and painful road to self-accepting adulthood, and we as a society really need to question those roles more aggressively than we do now. I'm glad that you have come to be comfortable with your identity as an adult.
ReplyDeleteThanks for your kind words. I apologize if I came off kind of confrontational - I guess I was really responding to the reaction to this that I've seen in a lot of places that are usually quite hip (BoingBoing, for example) about accepting diversity, treat parents wanting to be genderqueer-conscious like "hippie bullshit" (to paraphrase). I too share K's concerns for this child because I KNOW how hard it is to answer those questions as a child, when all you know is who you are, not what you're not. I guess a lot of this also stems from my personal belief that given parents like Storm's, there would be a whole lot more openly genderqueer people around today, and things wouldn't be so hard for us, and maybe that's what scares people. They've accepting gayness, or lesbianism, because they can say "well that's just how those people are, and I'm not like that, so end of story", but ANYONE can be genderqueer, and I think everyone is at least a little, and I think that freaks people the fuck out.
ReplyDelete