I came across an article and it reminded me of the Newsweek article “Rethinking Gender” that we read last week. The Newsweek article focused mostly on adults who changed genders, but this article is about a child. Born a boy, Jack decided to become a girl when he was just 10 years old.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/08/31/transgender-10-year-old-j_n_943654.html?1314816454&icid=maing-grid7%7Cmain5%7Cdl2%7Csec1_lnk1%7C91654
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The boy’s parents were openly accepting of his decision to live as a girl; in fact, when they meet new people, they refer to him as their daughter. While the parents are accepting of this change, the boy’s grandfather is not. He questions how a child can make this important life decision at such a young age.
I don’t really understand how a child can make that kind of decision either. Kids usually act crazy and and have really creative imaginations. They change their minds and opinions almost daily. It doesn’t seem appropriate to let a kid make such a big decision on his own.
Is there a certain age when it should be appropriate to let a person make this kind of decision? At a certain point does it become acceptable or non-controversial to want to change genders? It is interesting to think about whether the fact that changing genders has become more common among adults has influenced the rising population of children who want to change genders. Do you think the child’s parents have influence over the child’s decision? I am struggling with trying to understand how a child can make this type of decision, or even how a child’s parents can let the child make this type of decision. Since there are more and more cases everyday in which children decide to change genders at a young age, will it become less shocking, or more socially acceptable at some point to do so? Does anyone have any ideas about this?
"I don’t really understand how a child can make that kind of decision either." Can we understand how a parent/society/"the culture" can make that kind of decision FOR a child before he/she is even born? It's interesting how we often think of a child as not-yet-ready to commit to his/her desire and we tend to find it completely okay for someone else to impose Desire on the child (babies with penile genitalia will like blue, play with trucks and be sexually attracted to girls; babies with vaginal genitalia will be princesses, take ballet and dream of marrying a male)? Perhaps it isn't the switching from one gender to another that is the "issue" but the fact that "being" is structured with these two very narrow and constricting polarities. Queer Theory has a lot to say about this, one might want to start with Judith Butler's "Undoing Gender", for instance: http://www.amazon.com/Undoing-Gender-Judith-Butler/dp/0415969239/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1314854734&sr=8-1
ReplyDeleteDiego
ReplyDeleteI actually have a family friend who is 9 years old and now refers to himself as a girl. The transformation was slow as he began by wearing girls clothing but still referred to himself as a boy, and used the boy's bathroom etc. Then as time went on, he began to want to be called a girl, use the girl's bathroom and now even goes by the name "Pinky" instead of "Aiden". He lives in Berkeley and goes to a private school that is very accepting of this decision, however it is still a very interesting choice for a 9 year old to make. I have watched her go through this transformation, but my family and I still have to catch ourselves when we accidentally call her a "boy" or "Aiden" instead of "Pinky." My younger sister has been good friends with Pinky for a while, but it is also a concept that is hard for my 9 year old sister to grasp, as well as the other kids exposed to Pinky.
ReplyDeleteAt my sister's coed birthday party in May, the girls were allowed to stay over for a sleepover, but the boys had to go home after cake. Pinky slept over with the girls, but I observed some of the other 9 year olds questioning this, and questioning Pinky's gender. All of the other girls didn’t go to school with Pinky, and her gender wasn’t really explained to any of them. I know I was never exposed to this kind of thing as a child and I can imagine it to be something very troubling for a young child who has only known girls as girls and boys as boys.
I think it is ingrained in us from birth that our "sex" determines our "gender" (as Diego mentioned) and society imposes this in other ways to children through television shows and books that maintain these established gender roles. Therefore, I believe there has to be something that is really inside of these children to expose their real gender at such a young age. The world around us wants us so much to be the "norm," so a young child challenging this must really be sure of how they feel. I think parents should be accepting of these decisions and allow this to be part of the process of growing up and help their children find themselves. Plently of people experiment with sexuality, why should it be so different to experiment with gender?
I am very interested to watch Pinky as she grows up and see what kind of decisions she makes about her lifestyle, especially during her teenage years, but I do hope that she sticks to her beliefs and how she really feels inside, because the sooner we become accepting of these types of decisions, the sooner everyone will be able to feel comfortable in their own skin.
"Plently of people experiment with sexuality, why should it be so different to experiment with gender?" I like this.
ReplyDelete^^ I really like that statement Diego! I think my favorite thing about this class so far is learning about how children can identify themselves with a different gender so early on. I think it's really interesting how kids can be so sure.
ReplyDeleteJacqueline I just read what you said about Pinky and I found it so interesting!
ReplyDeletei think there is nothing wrong to let kids themselves decide what they want to be. Maybe their decisions are not rational and right, but once they experience the difficulties after the decision they made, they will reconsider it. for example, if he decides to live like a girl, its okay, however once he encounters some problems, like others laugh at her, or bully her. i think he will reconsider that, even though he is just kid. I just think, curiosity of human being can't stop him thinking to act as a girl, unless some day he tried it, and find out there are so many problems to act as a girl, he will stop thinking by himself.
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