Gender Roles & Parenting

Quote :

When many couples have a baby, they send out an email to family and friends that fills them in on the key details: name, gender, birth weight, that sort of thing. (You know the drill: "Both Mom and little Ethan are doing great!")

But the email sent recently by Kathy Witterick and David Stocker of Toronto, Canada to announce the birth of their baby, Storm, was missing one important piece of information. "We've decided not to share Storm's sex for now--a tribute to freedom and choice in place of limitation, a stand up to what the world could become in Storm's lifetime (a more progressive place? ...)," it said.

That's right. They're not saying whether Storm is a boy or a girl.

There's nothing ambiguous about the baby's genitals. But as Stocker puts it: "If you really want to get to know someone, you don't ask what's between their legs." So only the parents, their two other children (both boys), a close friend, and the two midwives who helped deliver the now 4-month-old baby know its gender. Even the grandparents have been left in the dark.

Stocker and Witterick say the decision gives Storm the freedom to choose who he or she wants to be. "What we noticed is that parents make so many choices for their children. It's obnoxious," adds Stocker, a teacher at an alternative school.

They say that kids receive messages from society that encourage them to fit into existing boxes, including with regard to gender. "We thought that if we delayed sharing that information, in this case hopefully, we might knock off a couple million of those messages by the time that Storm decides Storm would like to share," says Witterick.
"In fact, in not telling the gender of my precious baby, I am saying to the world, 'Please can you just let Storm discover for him/herself what s (he) wants to be?!." she wrote in an email.

How did Stocker and Witterick decide to keep Storm's gender under wraps? During Witterick's pregnancy, her son Jazz was having "intense" experiences with his own gender. "I was feeling like I needed some good parenting skills to support him through that," Witterick said.

Stocker came across a book from 1978, titled X: A Fabulous Child's Story by Lois Gould. X is raised as neither a boy or girl, and grows up to be a happy and well-adjusted child.

"It became so compelling it was almost like, How could we not?" Witterick said.

The couple's other two children, Jazz and Kio, haven't escaped their parents' unconventional approach to parenting. Though they're only 5 and 2, they're allowed to pick out their own clothes in the boys and girls sections of stores and decide whether to cut their hair or let it grow.

Both boys are "unschooled," a version of homeschooling, which promotes putting a child's curiosity at the center of his or her education. As Witterick puts it, it's "not something that happens by rote from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. weekdays in a building with a group of same-age people, planned, implemented and assessed by someone else."

Because Jazz and Kio wear pink and have long hair, they're frequently assumed to be girls, according to Stocker. He said he and Witterick don't correct people--they leave it to the kids to do it if they want to.

But Stocker and Witterick's choices haven't always made life easy for their kids. Though Jazz likes dressing as a girl, he doesn't seem to want to be mistaken for one. He recently asked his mother to let the leaders of a nature center know that he's a boy. And he chose not to attend a conventional school because of the questions about his gender. Asked whether that upsets him, Jazz nodded.

As for his mother, she's not giving up the crusade against the tyranny of assigned gender roles. "Everyone keeps asking us, 'When will this end?'" she said. "And we always turn the question back. Yeah, when will this end? When will we live in a world where people can make choices to be whoever they are?"

I have some mixed thoughts about this.

I've seen a number of kids that have had very few boundaries when growing up. It's rarely turned out to be a benefit.

I can understand a little bit of the theory behind what these "new-age" parents are attempting, but I struggle with the reality of where it's going.

Is there really anything wrong with a boy being a boy, and a girl being a girl?
Is that something to be ashamed of? Something to hide? Something that needs to be kept secret?

I get that there are possibly some potential "negative" aspects of gender identification, but aren't most of those things controllable on a very direct level by what the parents do, and how they do it?

The kinds of toys the kid gets, the colors of clothes, the activities and interactions are all completely controllable things for at least the first 4 or 5 years of the kids life.

What exactly is so potentially harmful in telling family and close friends what sex the baby is?

Maybe the kid is some kind of freak. A hermie!

motokid wrote:

What exactly is so potentially harmful in telling family and close friends what sex the baby is?

There isn't any. Those parents are jackass'.

I do seriously question if the "theory" behind their actions is actually more harmful than helpful to those kids.

It's simple. They have two boys already. My hunch is that the 3rd is also a boy, much to the disappointment of one or both of the parents. They wanted a girl. Their ambiguity toward gender will allow the youngest to choose "his" gender later, hopefully fulfilling the warped wishes of the parent(s).

Freaks.

The most important tasks i life. Parenting and to be in politics needs no education witch is sad

My sister tried this and was blown away by the choices her children made. The one who, it turns out is female, was attracted to the same things as other girls, even though no one "knew". The other child who, it turns out is male, even at 2 wanted firetrucks and guns. She tried to convince the second child to consider other choices but the child was adamant. Blew her away. Other children will obviously be different.

The parents are people who obviously think outside the box and I'll give them the kudos for doing so. In a world where people have come to rely on the government schools to raise their children and places kids into cookie cutter programs that rewards the kids when they think the way the program developers deem correct, I'm glad a few more individuals are being raised to be free thinkers. My wife and I raised four kids in a way that they were allowed to explore ideas and to become independent and confident in them selves. We home schooled our kids. The parents here are a little more out there than we were although I would not say they were that far off. In setting no boundaries on the childrens ideas of self they will grow up more confident in who they really are because of their being self defined. I see this as a long term experiment that has a thus-far a positive track record.
As far as their championing a sexual orientation free childhood for their child...OK, so what? I...Don't...Care... If they are happy with who they are then who am I to complain.
I could go on.. and on... believe me

What's going on between the child's legs is a plain and simple fact. Just like hair color and eye color. It is what it is.

What goes on inside the head of the child is what counts.

You can raise a girl to know that she can do anything she wants. There are girl race car drivers, girl astronauts, girl doctors, girl engineers and girl construction workers.

You can raise a boy to be a ballet dancer, an artist, a model, or a nurse.

Gender identity is almost completely in control of the parents regardless of what's between the legs of the child.

Which also means it shouldn't matter if the grandparents or closest friends know what sex the child is.

Part of what confuses me though is this: If the parents really wanted it to be private, why talk to the media about it? How did somebody outside the family discover this plan of theirs and who contacted the media?

Why didn't that parents simply turn a quiet back on any media inquiries, and refuse to discuss their private family decisions?

Imagine the horror of the parents when, for the kid's 2nd birthday, they throw a party and someone unaware of their philosophy brings a gender specific birthday gift.

In this case do you offer an equal variety of gender specific things, and let the kid decide what he/she is interested in?

Or do you attempt to remove all gender specific things out of their lives, and go with all gender neutral stuff?


If they get a tonka truck do you also make sure they get a barbie doll and then let the kid decide?

Or do you not allow either of those and go with a box of crayons and blank paper to color on?

kids are not lab rats,do not play with them as your experiment.

dtx wrote:

kids are not lab rats,do not play with them as your experiment.

I wish the government schools and the medical professionals wouldn't play the experiment game with the kids.

OMFG Indy don't even get me started on that one....

well, like it or not, most, if not all kids are someones lab rats.
those parents have unconventional ideas,that they feel worthy to impose on their offspring.
if they imposed conventional ideas, like religion, there would be little controversy.
I can only hope that most parents would educate their offspring to seek the truth...instead of accepting someone elses truth, without question.

mucker wrote:

I can only hope that most parents would educate their offspring to seek the truth...instead of accepting someone elses truth, without question.

+1 ... that's what we tried to instill in our kids..

I don't have a problem with alternative thinking and doing things vastly different than the masses.

I think my biggest issue is that if what "you" are doing means that you have to protect your kids from the majority of the rest of the world BECAUSE of what you're doing,
you're creating quite a problem. What are these kids missing out on because of what the parents are doing? They can't go places because of the parents ideologies.

There's going to be some rather intense socialization issues with these children as they get older and are forced into the wide-open world.

In many ways, these parents are keeping they're kids from being simply kids are they not?

I'm not saying every kid needs to be able to blend in and act like all the others.
I'm not saying every kid needs to go to conventional school.

Home school works wonders for many kids.

However, social skills, and socialization is highly important isn't it?

Interaction with peers and outside inputs are part of growing up and deciding who or what you want to be.

Instead of allowing for greater choices - are these parents are limiting their kids choices too much?

motokid wrote:

Quote :

When many couples have a baby, they send out an email to family and friends that fills them in on the key details: name, gender, birth weight, that sort of thing. (You know the drill: "Both Mom and little Ethan are doing great!")

But the email sent recently by Kathy Witterick and David Stocker of Toronto, Canada to announce the birth of their baby, Storm, was missing one important piece of information. "We've decided not to share Storm's sex for now--a tribute to freedom and choice in place of limitation, a stand up to what the world could become in Storm's lifetime (a more progressive place? ...)," it said.

That's right. They're not saying whether Storm is a boy or a girl.

There's nothing ambiguous about the baby's genitals. But as Stocker puts it: "If you really want to get to know someone, you don't ask what's between their legs." So only the parents, their two other children (both boys), a close friend, and the two midwives who helped deliver the now 4-month-old baby know its gender. Even the grandparents have been left in the dark.

Stocker and Witterick say the decision gives Storm the freedom to choose who he or she wants to be. "What we noticed is that parents make so many choices for their children. It's obnoxious," adds Stocker, a teacher at an alternative school.

They say that kids receive messages from society that encourage them to fit into existing boxes, including with regard to gender. "We thought that if we delayed sharing that information, in this case hopefully, we might knock off a couple million of those messages by the time that Storm decides Storm would like to share," says Witterick.
"In fact, in not telling the gender of my precious baby, I am saying to the world, 'Please can you just let Storm discover for him/herself what s (he) wants to be?!." she wrote in an email.

How did Stocker and Witterick decide to keep Storm's gender under wraps? During Witterick's pregnancy, her son Jazz was having "intense" experiences with his own gender. "I was feeling like I needed some good parenting skills to support him through that," Witterick said.

Stocker came across a book from 1978, titled X: A Fabulous Child's Story by Lois Gould. X is raised as neither a boy or girl, and grows up to be a happy and well-adjusted child.

"It became so compelling it was almost like, How could we not?" Witterick said.

The couple's other two children, Jazz and Kio, haven't escaped their parents' unconventional approach to parenting. Though they're only 5 and 2, they're allowed to pick out their own clothes in the boys and girls sections of stores and decide whether to cut their hair or let it grow.

Both boys are "unschooled," a version of homeschooling, which promotes putting a child's curiosity at the center of his or her education. As Witterick puts it, it's "not something that happens by rote from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. weekdays in a building with a group of same-age people, planned, implemented and assessed by someone else."

Because Jazz and Kio wear pink and have long hair, they're frequently assumed to be girls, according to Stocker. He said he and Witterick don't correct people--they leave it to the kids to do it if they want to.

But Stocker and Witterick's choices haven't always made life easy for their kids. Though Jazz likes dressing as a girl, he doesn't seem to want to be mistaken for one. He recently asked his mother to let the leaders of a nature center know that he's a boy. And he chose not to attend a conventional school because of the questions about his gender. Asked whether that upsets him, Jazz nodded.

As for his mother, she's not giving up the crusade against the tyranny of assigned gender roles. "Everyone keeps asking us, 'When will this end?'" she said. "And we always turn the question back. Yeah, when will this end? When will we live in a world where people can make choices to be whoever they are?"

I have some mixed thoughts about this.

I've seen a number of kids that have had very few boundaries when growing up. It's rarely turned out to be a benefit.

I can understand a little bit of the theory behind what these "new-age" parents are attempting, but I struggle with the reality of where it's going.

Is there really anything wrong with a boy being a boy, and a girl being a girl?
Is that something to be ashamed of? Something to hide? Something that needs to be kept secret?

I get that there are possibly some potential "negative" aspects of gender identification, but aren't most of those things controllable on a very direct level by what the parents do, and how they do it?

The kinds of toys the kid gets, the colors of clothes, the activities and interactions are all completely controllable things for at least the first 4 or 5 years of the kids life.

What exactly is so potentially harmful in telling family and close friends what sex the baby is?

This is so disgusting to me, i honestly cant understand how people can be so stupid:suspect: : if hes a boy, hes a boy; if its a girls then she is a girl. nothing hard about that! I thank God that he gave me a functional brain....

Farmer17 wrote:

I thank God that he gave me a functional brain....

That thought process can be argued as well.

trav72 wrote:

Farmer17 wrote:

I thank God that he gave me a functional brain....

That thought process can be argued as well.

well you wouldnt catch me pulling some stupid bs like that

The flip side of this story might be something like this:

click me

Parents that refused to accept child for what he was.