Keeping a kid's gender secret...

[AFK]

I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep...

Being opposed to this kind of twisted parental manipulation is not the same as being opposed to allowing your child to be gender ambiguous or supporting your child in gender role exploration.

Exactly.  My whole thing is that the child isn't in on this.  It is being decided FOR the child.  Because a 4-month child obviously can't make an informed decision on this matter. 

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep...

Being opposed to this kind of twisted parental manipulation is not the same as being opposed to allowing your child to be gender ambiguous or supporting your child in gender role exploration.

Exactly.  My whole thing is that the child isn't in on this.  It is being decided FOR the child.  Because a 4-month child obviously can't make an informed decision on this matter. 

But the only thing they decided was not to tell people the kids gender...

[AFK]

I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep...

Being opposed to this kind of twisted parental manipulation is not the same as being opposed to allowing your child to be gender ambiguous or supporting your child in gender role exploration.

Exactly.  My whole thing is that the child isn't in on this.  It is being decided FOR the child.  Because a 4-month child obviously can't make an informed decision on this matter. 

But the only thing they decided was not to tell people the kids gender...

And the 4-month old agreed to this? 

[BabylonHoruv]

Well, at least the kids are gonna get a best-selling memoir out of this one day.

The kids will probably be fine, just as a large percentage of my entire generation, raised by fucking hippies, is fine.

It's not like this has never been done before. At least these stupid hippies aren't trying to do communal childrearing, which is almost always just an excuse for parents not to take responsibility and bond with their children as nature intended.

Fucking stupid hippies.

Depends on how it's done.  Extended family is traditional and has tended to work well.  Something similar in a commune setting can also work well.  IE This is mom and dad, these are your many aunts and uncles.  No mom and dad, or a crapload of them sounds pretty awful.

[hooplala]

I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep...

Being opposed to this kind of twisted parental manipulation is not the same as being opposed to allowing your child to be gender ambiguous or supporting your child in gender role exploration.

Exactly.  My whole thing is that the child isn't in on this.  It is being decided FOR the child.  Because a 4-month child obviously can't make an informed decision on this matter. 

But the only thing they decided was not to tell people the kids gender...

Which really only serves to draw attention to the gender, doesn't it?

Isn't it counterproductive?

[hooplala]

I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep...

Being opposed to this kind of twisted parental manipulation is not the same as being opposed to allowing your child to be gender ambiguous or supporting your child in gender role exploration.

Exactly.  My whole thing is that the child isn't in on this.  It is being decided FOR the child.  Because a 4-month child obviously can't make an informed decision on this matter. 

But the only thing they decided was not to tell people the kids gender...

And the 4-month old agreed to this? 

Trust me, if that kid has a winkie, he will be talking about it soon enough.  They all do.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep...

Being opposed to this kind of twisted parental manipulation is not the same as being opposed to allowing your child to be gender ambiguous or supporting your child in gender role exploration.

Exactly.  My whole thing is that the child isn't in on this.  It is being decided FOR the child.  Because a 4-month child obviously can't make an informed decision on this matter. 

But the only thing they decided was not to tell people the kids gender...

It's not the treatment of the 4-month-old that is so telling, it's the older children. A baby doesn't have a gender, it has a sex and gender roles don't exist for infants aside from those imposed by family and society. I am not opposed to concealing an infant's sex from onlookers. But they are giving the message to their older kids that their approval is based partly or largely on gender role defiance and/or ambiguity, and so, naturally, the kids are going to do what kids do, which is seek approval from their parents by acting out the roles that have been defined for them, in this case creating a dissonance between what the oldest child wants (social recognition of being a boy) and what the parents want (a child who defies gender roles).

Is it really so hard to see what they're doing wrong?

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep...

Being opposed to this kind of twisted parental manipulation is not the same as being opposed to allowing your child to be gender ambiguous or supporting your child in gender role exploration.

Exactly.  My whole thing is that the child isn't in on this.  It is being decided FOR the child.  Because a 4-month child obviously can't make an informed decision on this matter. 

But the only thing they decided was not to tell people the kids gender...

Which really only serves to draw attention to the gender, doesn't it?

Isn't it counterproductive?

YES.

And, in addition, they are seeking publicity. Bad move.

[BabylonHoruv]

I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep...

Being opposed to this kind of twisted parental manipulation is not the same as being opposed to allowing your child to be gender ambiguous or supporting your child in gender role exploration.

Exactly.  My whole thing is that the child isn't in on this.  It is being decided FOR the child.  Because a 4-month child obviously can't make an informed decision on this matter. 

But the only thing they decided was not to tell people the kids gender...

It's not the treatment of the 4-month-old that is so telling, it's the older children. A baby doesn't have a gender, it has a sex and gender roles don't exist for infants aside from those imposed by family and society. I am not opposed to concealing an infant's sex from onlookers. But they are giving the message to their older kids that their approval is based partly or largely on gender role defiance and/or ambiguity, and so, naturally, the kids are going to do what kids do, which is seek approval from their parents by acting out the roles that have been defined for them, in this case creating a dissonance between what the oldest child wants (social recognition of being a boy) and what the parents want (a child who defies gender roles).

Is it really so hard to see what they're doing wrong?

Sounds like what they are doing is actually a mirror image of what they are trying to point out as wrong.

Trans and genderqueer children get forced into gender roles that don't fit them through basically exactly this process.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I was a very tomboy when I was a kid, and my mom found it pleasing when people assumed I was a boy because it satisfied her egotistical requirement to be noticed as a parent who "wasn't reinforcing gender roles". But I didn't want to be assumed to be a boy, because I wasn't. I wanted to wear pretty princess clothes, and ruin them in trees and dirt. My mom was reinforcing gender role stereotypes by making me be perceived as a boy rather than allowing me to be a girl who played in trees and dirt.

Attaching a sex (male or female) to behavior (playing in trees and dirt or playing with pretty clothes and dollhouses) reinforces gender role stereotyping. It doesn't break it down. Sex is biologically determined. Behavior is not, and enforcing sex-linked behavior expectation is stupid.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep...

Being opposed to this kind of twisted parental manipulation is not the same as being opposed to allowing your child to be gender ambiguous or supporting your child in gender role exploration.

Exactly.  My whole thing is that the child isn't in on this.  It is being decided FOR the child.  Because a 4-month child obviously can't make an informed decision on this matter. 

But the only thing they decided was not to tell people the kids gender...

It's not the treatment of the 4-month-old that is so telling, it's the older children. A baby doesn't have a gender, it has a sex and gender roles don't exist for infants aside from those imposed by family and society. I am not opposed to concealing an infant's sex from onlookers. But they are giving the message to their older kids that their approval is based partly or largely on gender role defiance and/or ambiguity, and so, naturally, the kids are going to do what kids do, which is seek approval from their parents by acting out the roles that have been defined for them, in this case creating a dissonance between what the oldest child wants (social recognition of being a boy) and what the parents want (a child who defies gender roles).

Is it really so hard to see what they're doing wrong?

Sounds like what they are doing is actually a mirror image of what they are trying to point out as wrong.

Trans and genderqueer children get forced into gender roles that don't fit them through basically exactly this process.

YES, YES, YES.

[Kai]

I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep...

Being opposed to this kind of twisted parental manipulation is not the same as being opposed to allowing your child to be gender ambiguous or supporting your child in gender role exploration.

Exactly.  My whole thing is that the child isn't in on this.  It is being decided FOR the child.  Because a 4-month child obviously can't make an informed decision on this matter. 

But the only thing they decided was not to tell people the kids gender...

It's not the treatment of the 4-month-old that is so telling, it's the older children. A baby doesn't have a gender, it has a sex and gender roles don't exist for infants aside from those imposed by family and society. I am not opposed to concealing an infant's sex from onlookers. But they are giving the message to their older kids that their approval is based partly or largely on gender role defiance and/or ambiguity, and so, naturally, the kids are going to do what kids do, which is seek approval from their parents by acting out the roles that have been defined for them, in this case creating a dissonance between what the oldest child wants (social recognition of being a boy) and what the parents want (a child who defies gender roles).

Is it really so hard to see what they're doing wrong?

Sounds like what they are doing is actually a mirror image of what they are trying to point out as wrong.

Trans and genderqueer children get forced into gender roles that don't fit them through basically exactly this process.

YES, YES, YES.

Okay, yes, I definitely agree with this. I just didn't want this to turn into a drama shitstorm with me screaming "fuck your gender bullshit". Because I have done that before, and probably will again at some point.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Also, the very existence of the terms "trans" and "genderqueer" are based on the existence of sex-linked gender roles, which these parents are reinforcing.

[Adios]

I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep my mouth shut. I will keep...

Being opposed to this kind of twisted parental manipulation is not the same as being opposed to allowing your child to be gender ambiguous or supporting your child in gender role exploration.

Exactly.  My whole thing is that the child isn't in on this.  It is being decided FOR the child.  Because a 4-month child obviously can't make an informed decision on this matter. 

But the only thing they decided was not to tell people the kids gender...

It's not the treatment of the 4-month-old that is so telling, it's the older children. A baby doesn't have a gender, it has a sex and gender roles don't exist for infants aside from those imposed by family and society. I am not opposed to concealing an infant's sex from onlookers. But they are giving the message to their older kids that their approval is based partly or largely on gender role defiance and/or ambiguity, and so, naturally, the kids are going to do what kids do, which is seek approval from their parents by acting out the roles that have been defined for them, in this case creating a dissonance between what the oldest child wants (social recognition of being a boy) and what the parents want (a child who defies gender roles).

Is it really so hard to see what they're doing wrong?

Sounds like what they are doing is actually a mirror image of what they are trying to point out as wrong.

Trans and genderqueer children get forced into gender roles that don't fit them through basically exactly this process.

YES, YES, YES.

Okay, yes, I definitely agree with this. I just didn't want this to turn into a drama shitstorm with me screaming "fuck your gender bullshit". Because I have done that before, and probably will again at some point.

As long as the choice, or lack of choice, is left up to each individual no one should have any issues with it. When it is forced on children, regardless of what gender it is, then that is our issue.

[BabylonHoruv]

Also, the very existence of the terms "trans" and "genderqueer" are based on the existence of sex-linked gender roles, which these parents are reinforcing.

Transexualism is actually a physical condition.  Trans people have hormone receptors in their brains that match the other sex.  They don't just identify as the other gender, they actually have the brain of the other sex (in many cases, not all)