Would you ever keep your child's gender a secret?
Categories: Toddlers, Development, Weird stories
When my daughter was a baby, I made a point of avoiding dressing her in girly pink. She clearly had 100 miles of personality from birth, and I didn't want her looking like some stereotypical little princess.
But when we were out and about, people kept mistaking her for a boy, fooled by her red coat and blue trousers. An older couple in a café one day even had a loud argument over the fact that she couldn't be a girl, because her blanket had blue in it (it also had pink, which they somehow missed). At first I wasn't bothered, but then it began to bug me because the outside world was mistaking a vital part of her identity.
So I can understand not being too obvious about your child's gender, but keeping it a complete secret? That's what one family in Sweden have done:
The child in question is a two and a half year old toddler known as Pop. Apart from the parents and few others, nobody knows if the child they call Pop is a boy or a girl. Pop's parents are feminists who believe that the idea of gender is an unnecessary and potentially harmful social construction. They believe that by keeping Pop's gender a secret from the world, their child will be able to grow up without preconceived notions of how he or she should be treated based on his or her gender.
Pop is allowed to choose what to wear from a collection of both girls' and boys' clothing and has ever-changing hairstyles. The parents say that Pop understands the physical differences between boys and girls but they avoid using gender specific personal pronouns when referring to their child. Pop is just Pop.
"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."
But what happens when Pop gets older and has ideas of his or her own? What if ~ perish the thought ~ s/he wants to go through a princess phase? I would love to be a fly on the wall for that conversation.
Source [ParentDishUS]
What do you think? Can you understand why a parent would do this?
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Sally Fort 7-07-2009 @ 10:55AM
Oh crikey! While I can understand their point of view theoretically and do admire their attempts to make a difference to the status quo of the future, I can't help but think - how will Pop negotiate the world as it is now?
Gender constructions may not be that great and they may quash individuality and imagination, and reinforce all sorts of other problems society has. However they do also provide a framework by which people can find their own points of reference. I wonder really how healthy is it to be possibly the only person you'll ever come across with an entirely unrelated set of social reference points to everyone else.
I'm not sure Pop will thank them for their approach as he or she grows up and finds out that everyone else in the world has an extra part of their identity that s/he hasn't been supported in being able to develop.
And anyway thinking about it I'm not sure it's very constructive to pretend gender doesn't exist, isn't it more valuable to find ways of working with the fact that it does, than to try and deny it completely?
Gosh what a lot to think about!
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Joanne Mallon 7-07-2009 @ 11:00AM
I know! I think it's the sort of thing that somebody without kids might think was a good idea, but once you have them, you know it's never going to fly.
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Linda 7-07-2009 @ 11:00AM
Totally ridiculous. My daughters liked pink and they loved playing with dolls, doesn't mean they aren't being brought up to be ambitious, capable, confident and caring. If I ever heard that their school was in any way pigeonholing them or saying they couldn't do something because they were girls I would be up there quicker than you can say 'Germaine Greer' but to me, the thought of imposing your own beliefs in such an untried and uneccessary fashion is pretty reckless. Of course it matters what sex the child is, but it matters more that they are loved and happy and I'm not sure they are bound to be if brought up as some sort of social experiment.
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Diane 7-14-2009 @ 8:25AM
I totally agree with the rationale behind what they are doing, and am all for not encouraging or endorsing traditional gender roles, but I don't think it's practical in today's world to have a child without a gender - apart from anything else, Pop is going to be singled out because of this, which hardly seems fair. As much as we might want to live in a world that has progressed beyond a binary view of sex and gender, we haven't.
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Elizabeth Varley 7-14-2009 @ 10:46AM
"But what happens when Pop gets older and has ideas of his or her own? What if ~ perish the thought ~ s/he wants to go through a princess phase? I would love to be a fly on the wall for that conversation."
I think this is precisely the point the parents of Pop are making. That if the child is female a 'princess phase' would be perfectly socially acceptable, whereas if the child is male, it wouldn't be.
While I think it's an extreme but interesting experiment, they are offering their child the opportunity to go through any sort of phase (royalty included!), without judgement of it based on their gender. And as an experience for a child, wouldn't that be great?
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nixdminx 7-21-2009 @ 3:04PM
poor kid - that's not a feminist idea it's a social experiment and that child will probably end up deeply scarred by this - I take it Pop is an acronym for Peculiar Odd Parents? Nincompoops I say.
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janfairburn 7-25-2009 @ 9:50AM
Oh well their choice even if I think a tad extreme? If you watch Dr Winston on BBC and all the experiments he does most is nature not nuture and whatever choices they are given boys WILL be boys and girls WILL be girls.
I have one of each, the eldest is a girl so my son was exposed to all the girly things in the world. He loved his sisters Barbie dolls so one Christmas he was given one in his Christmas Stocking. As a toddler he loved his baby doll and would push it about when collecting his elder sister from school. He also adored her pink handbag! I have photos of him dressed up with her and her friends as a "bride"
I don't remind him of that often as he is now a 12 year old "man-boy" He would curl up and die of shame ;o) He then went thru the lego, cars, action man and dinosaur phase. Some which resurface. He plays rugby now, is learning karate and I thnk apart from inheriting some of his mothers lunacy is a well rounded being.....
I wonder if these other parents will call subsequent kids Snap and Crackle??
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