The Toronto Star used a male pronoun to describe a transgendered girl child

takeitslowly wrote:

I think it is quite offensive that posters like Mr.Tea and theLeftyInvestors continue to make comments like "bobby only likes girl stuff, that doesn't make him a girl"

That truly isn't what I said. Not in the least. I said Bobby says "I like girl things", but does Bobby want to socially and at some point physically transition? I quoted the child's own words and then asked a question. Is it not reasonable to phrase that as a question when the article does not really speak to Bobby's identity?

Anyway, I think we can all agree the desired endgame is a happy, loved child who grows into a healthy adult.

My trans family member and the spouse thereof and I have had some productive conversations about what they'd do if they raise a child who could be trans. The gist of it was to give the child autonomy with respect to gender, but also not to be so quick to make decisions on behalf of the child's formative identity in either direction.

Gender is taught.

We learn gender as infants, toddlers, children, teens, young adults and adults. We learn it's natural, even though it's anything but. We learn there are ony two, even though that isn't true either.

We learn there are certain aspects/ characteristics/ qualifications that are masculine. We learn there are certain aspects/ characteristics/ qualifications that are feminine. And never the twain shall meet.

Because this is a patriarchy, girls who like to do so-called boy things are given more freedom from "concern" than boys who want to do so-called girl things. Put a pink toy beside a boy baby and see what the parents do, for example.

Gender is continually taught to us, throughout our lives, including what we learn when we see what happens to those who transgress gender binaries/ boundaries.

In other words, this child is only newsworthy because this child is resisting the gender characteristics that have been assigned to hir.

What is your Gender Aptitude? Adapted from My Gender Workbook by Kate Bornstein

How to be a Trans Ally Fairly basic stuff, but it's helpful.

Mr. Tea, your two children aren't representative of all boys and girls.  Our girls played with cars, action figures, dolls and gender-neutral toys.  The boys I babysat loved to cuddle and nurture their stuffed toys and dolls, and the youngest was also really into anything with wheels (as was my eldest daughter).  Yes, there are non-learned differences between boys and girls, men and women, but they are few.  Most of our ideas pertaining to what is masculine and what is feminine are imposed on us by limited socially acceptable norms -- heterosexual gender duality.

Agreed. And as a parent, and I'm sure this is true for other parents, but when you're planning to have kids and then expecting kids, you often fantasize about what they'll be like and hope that they'll be a certain way, usually similar to you so that you can share things together. You love baseball so you hope that your kid will because you look forward to throwing the ball around at the park or whatever. Then, as soon as you actually have kids, all you really want is for them to be healthy and happy and be the best person they can be and to develop their own interests, passions, etc. whether they're ones they share with you or not.

takeitslowly wrote:

Rebecca West wrote:

This is a 7 year old child.  She/he has the right to be a child, and not a pawn in a political debate about gender identification.  This child needs to be supported in his/her choices, and encouraged to explore his/her sexuality and gender identification as she/he grows more aware and has a more mature and nuanced understanding of who she/he is.
Children let you know what and how much information they are ready for by the way they shape their questions.  Forcing sophisticated adult concepts on a child can lead to more confusion, not less.  Bobby needs understanding and a positive and supportive environment that encourages her/him to be who he/she is (a self-concept that is fluid and changing throughout life).
Our language of the masculine and the feminine, as evinced in the dual pronouns, does not yet fully recognize the complexity and diversity of multiple genders.  It's still very much entrenched in the masculine/feminine dialectic.  I envision a future where we can all freely occupy the full spectrum of gender identification without being hung up on labels, classifications, definitions.  Until then, lets not impose our limitations upon children.

 
Once again, the only one who is imposing labels on this child is the Toronto star who chooses to use the word "son" to gender the child based on their sex biological sex.
 I think I have every right to register my opposition to having a transgender child being gendered, because I know personally that can be an negative experience. I don't represent all transgender/transsexual, but I am trans, so I am going to say that the Toronto star title is offensive to me because it robs the child's choice of not being gendered with a male reference.
Its not right of you to tell me my feeliing is wrong or that I am using this as a political purpose, i am speaking from MY experience as a trans person that this offends me.

My post, a quoted above, has nothing to do with you personally, how you feel, or the position you take. Keep in mind that most of us, when responding to a particular poster, quote them (as you have done). This is something that I do as well.

I am responding to the Star article you have kindly shared with us.

I'm not surprised The Star is being cissexist. This is the same paper that has had Michelle Landsberg write for them, yes?

Maysie: I know you're trying to be an ally and I don't know if it's a typo, but do me a favour and respect the girl's pronouns, would ya?

To those who are asking: But maybe they just like girl-things... that's a constant derail I get when I hold my nose and post on the Michfest boards... one poster said, "I thought I must be a boy because I liked sports, videogames, and girls."

To be sure, that's what I told myself as well at sixteen, all the while trying to bury my frustration in sports and cardio and public policy. There are butch trans women, there are trans lesbians, (about 29% according to NGLTF, which makes sense since female identity and attraction to women are both correlated with estrogen exposure during gestation) there are gay trans men... (About 13% there according to the same study.) there are bisexual and pansexual and asexual trans people too... We generally, like cis people, come in all flavours.

And yes, there's a lot of bullshit ephemera around gender, but gender/subconsious-sex exists without said ephemera. How do I know? Because I'd sooner give up my right arm than my spironolactone, and I wear the same clothes and like the same music and use the same terribly pretentious leftist-classical-conservative vernacular I wore before I took milligram one of HRT.

PS: Style guide time! Trans is an adjective. It goes well with a space where you would normally put a space between another adjective and a noun, eg. poorwoman blackperson, these sound... well, wrong. Try to remember that when you refer to trans men, trans women, and otherwise-identified trans people, generally.

No, but that is. ;)

Maysie wrote:

Fineberg.

Yes, but you don't deliberately throw third-gender pronouns at someone who has preferred pronouns. It's degendering and falls into the subversivist trope that non-binary gender identities are inherently better. They, like identifying as one of the two modal genders, simply are, and ought to be accorded equal respect... it's especially troubling since you don't have any problem using female pronouns for a cis woman:

Quote:

M, played by Judy Dench, in the James Bond reboot, Casino Royale, when Bond, who's broken into her apartment and computer, is about to say what the letter M stands for:

"Utter one more syllable and I'll have you killed."

(Emphasis mine)

Yes, not every trans person is binary identified, and all of us inherently have to go to war with cisnormativity (and we 77% of trans women who aren't singularly attracted to men go to war with heteronormativity as well, whee.) But third-gendering trans people is saying that you believe their identified sex to be less valid than a cis person's identified sex... it's why I'm generally horrifed when I see groups that are Women and Trans groups... what, there's some special original sin that is inherent to maledom that trans men don't have and trans women are barely tolerated for renouncing? It's patronizing at best.

If you'll read the other things I've written in this thread, you'll find that I've been taking on problematic voices in this thread generally.

And you know what? Dame Judy Dench hasn't gone out of her way to specify her preferred pronouns either. That doesn't give you the right to degender her. She identifies as a woman and you use female pronouns for her...

http://www.lgbtqnation.com/2011/10/boy-who-identifies-as-girl-may-be-all...

Bobby identifies as a girl and, due to her birth assignment, you feel it's fine to use whatever pronouns you please. It gets really frustrating when well-meaning cis people force trans folk to fit their theories of social evolution or gender power structures instead of, y'know, listening to us.

You want to use third-gender pronouns, you should go comment on Ozymandias' writings on NSWATM. Zie prefers gender neutral pronouns. Know how I know? Because zie has said so in zir writing. If you don't know someone's preferred pronouns, but know their identified gender, it's not cool to use pronouns that aren't typically used by that gender. It's just as offensive as referring to Bobby with him/his, as her mother does.