Thursday, July 9, 2009

Gender-no, baby

A couple in Sweden has decided to raise their child gender free. The child, whom the article refers to as Pop, has "normal" sex organs, but the parents have decided not to reveal this information to the public. They say so long as they keep Pop’s gender a secret, he or she will be able to avoid preconceived notions of how people should be treated if male or female. Yes, but...

This experiment in and of itself is interesting on a number of levels. Even more fascinating is peoples responses to it. Slate's new spin-off site Double X made mention of this story here with a follow up post here (and a nice and much more interesting personal antidote with follow up comments here.) The Slate articles make some interesting points but the follow up comments are a great read. People seem to be getting very hung up on the
nature vs. nurture debate that's been raging for years. As a trans person I have a very definite and final answer to the question "Is gender biological or socially determined?" The answer is most decidedly yes.


More interesting and relevant, I think, is not what this will ultimately do to Pop's gender once it is reveled but what it means for the idea of a genderless society. This is a point of contention within the transexual and transgendered community. Some want to transition and assimilate into their chosen gender and some want to get rid of gender altogether. Either way, living genderless in a gendered society brings up obvious real-life issues: using the bathroom, medical care and all those little things that are so much bigger than trucks vs. dolls. These are all the things that non-trans people don't have to think about but become huge when you're transitioning.

Although I think the Utopian ideal of a genderless society is perhaps interesting, I don't think it sounds like a society I'd like to live in. I like gender, I just don't like the amount of meaning we attach to it. What if gender carried no more meaning than color. What if I wore masculinity today in the same way I wore the color green. Gender is a wonderful, amazing, colorful world and worth exploring and exploding--much too interesting to get rid of altogether.

One day perhaps we'll be able to let children choose their gender. We'll be able to raise boys, girls and everyone else the exact same way. I applaud Pop's parents and think perhaps their experiment will push us in the right direction. Will Pop experience some awkward situations? Of course. We all do as children. I only hope that if Pop decides that Pop is a totally gender conforming girl or boy that Pop's parents will be OK. Sometimes parents get to struggle and push boundaries and sometimes parents have to settle for the fact that their children are decidedly and painfully normal and love them in spite of it.

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