Genderless Child

My first hunting trip, age 3

In my last post I confessed we are pretty excited to find out the gender of our fetus. This brings up a topic that I have thought quite a lot about. A year or two ago I read an article that had caused quite a stir in the news media. It was about one Toronto couple's choice to keep the gender of their new born baby a secret. They decided to raise a genderless child. (Go Canada?)
To read the article I'm referring to, CLICK HERE .

This would entail only 6 people knowing the gender of the new baby. The mother, father, two young siblings and the two midwives that were there for the birth. They would not tell other friends, family members or passersby and they would not be decorating in pink or blue. The idea would be not to force any assumptions on the child and let them decide what colors they like and what toys they want to play with completely on their own without any outside influences.

Could this even work? And if so, what will this accomplish? Wouldn't it be better to let the child know the name of their genitals and still have freedom to decide what they like and dislike? Wouldn't it be good to let the child understand that our society has stereotypes. Stereotypes for different races, classes and genders and that even though there are stereotypes there are many exceptions? What happened to the age old saying "You can be anything you want to be."? Why withhold information from the child about his/her own body? Children will usually figure out what they like regardless of what you try to put in front of them.

Age 4, working on the car with Dad

There were times when I was a child that I thought I had been ripped off. I was sure I was a boy and everyone else was wrong. I remember looking in the mirror at my dirt smeared face and short bowl cut hairdo. I thought about how I liked hanging out with dad and working on cars. I liked going fishing and I didn't mind gutting those fish and ripping out their insides, I actually liked the slimy cold feeling. No one in my family ever told me I couldn't do that. They never told me to wash my face and put on a dress. (Well, sometimes I had to wash my face, but you get what I mean.) They encouraged my interest in cars and the outdoors, and they didn't discourage it if the next day I wanted to play house or dress up a doll. Regardless of my preference in play, they also told me I was, in fact, a girl. I had a pee-she and boys have a tallywacker. Sorry. These are the cards I was dealt. That is how I was born. These are just my reproductive organs, and those shouldn't even matter to a child besides learning if it's easier to sit down or stand up to pee. You can do anything you want to. You can be anything you want to be. Most importantly, you should just be a kid and try on as many hats as you want.

When I say I am interested in knowing my child's gender, it is not because I want to fit them into a stereotype of what a male or female should be. It is just that, a gender. I am not strict or religious. I do not believe the woman should necessarily stay home raising kids in the kitchen in a long dress. I also don't believe that the man should have to... I don't know, whatever men do. Bread winner, macho so and so. Everyone is different. What I do want to work for is a child who is happy and comfortable with themselves. Someone who knows, understands and accepts that people are always changing. Someone who is okay with learning and expanding their minds by trying different things, finding what they like and not pigeonholing themselves. When we decide our path at a young age, if we are not flexible we may miss many cool and interesting opportunity's along the way if they do not fit into our original idea. We should all be open minded enough to let new information change what we have believed before.

You wouldn't ask a 3 year old what they want to be when they grow up and then hold them to that decision for life. If that was the case I would be a city bus driver, because I was pretty sure the driver got to keep all that change in the front of the bus. At ten cents a passenger (in 1987) any kid knows, that's a shitload of money.

I've also recently read a story about a couple that adopted a child, only after realizing that child was born with both sex organs and their birth parents and doctor made the decision to keep the girlie parts and chop off the boy parts. As the child developed everyone realized they had more male characteristics than female. Choosing a gender at birth would not be my choice if I would have to decide. I understand that everyone just wanted that baby to live a normal life and be a normal baby, but that baby was not normal. They are unique. They were born with two sets of genitals, that is unusual. To then decide the sex of your child is setting yourself up for future disappointment. What if the girl you chose ends up clearly being more male when they develop? Or what if that boy you chose grows breasts? It that normal now? No. Why not leave them different downstairs as God or whoever intended and let that child decide when they are old enough to know what they want for themselves? Every pubescent human feels awkward. That is part of the human experience.

So much to think about. Anybody reading this? Anybody have any thoughts? Leave a comment!