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| Gender-neutral nursery [source] |
From Salon:
...Obstetricians, doctors, and midwives commit this procedure on infants every single day, in every single country. In reality, this treatment is performed almost universally without even asking for the parents' consent, making this practice all the more insidious. It's called infant gender assignment: When the doctor holds your child up to the harsh light of the delivery room, looks between its legs, and declares his opinion: It's a boy or a girl, based on nothing more than a cursory assessment of your offspring's genitals.Lest one thinks that only Slate is engaging in this ultimate madness, one must consider that Facebook, one of the most popular of the social sites on the web, offers fifty-one gender options.
We tell our children, “You can be anything you want to be.” We say, “A girl can be a doctor, a boy can be a nurse,” but why in the first place must this person be a boy and that person be a girl? Your infant is an infant.... As a newborn, your child's potential is limitless. The world is full of possibilities that every person deserves to be able to explore freely, receiving equal respect and human dignity while maximizing happiness through individual expression.
With infant gender assignment, in a single moment your baby's life is instantly and brutally reduced from such infinite potentials down to one concrete set of expectations and stereotypes, and any behavioral deviation from that will be severely punished—both intentionally through bigotry, and unintentionally through ignorance.....
...As a newborn, your child’s potential is limitless. The world is full of possibilities that every person deserves to be able to explore freely, receiving equal respect and human dignity while maximizing happiness through individual expression...
Society in the 21st Century has become a farce! Or perhaps it is the human species itself that has become a farce.
"Hermaphroditic our culture's becoming,"
ReplyDeleteSaid Leslie to Marion chatting at tea.
"Unisex costumes, ambiguous hairstyles
Are very confusing," said BOTH MEN to me!
~ FreeThinke (1968)
Not to worry. This too shall pass.
ReplyDeleteFreedom of Choice has its inherent limitations after all.
Please take note:
A certain poor fellow called Tom
Felt he wanted to be someone's Mom,
But he failed in every nation
To achieve this operation,
So he blew himself up with a bomb!
A POLITICALLY-CORRECT VARIANT:
DeleteThere once was a fellow named Tom,
Who wanted to be somone's Mom.
Despite earnest coition
Nothing came to fruition,
So he adopted a child without qualm.
An inspection obstetrical cursory
ReplyDeleteOnce consigned a girl to a blue nursery
And all of her toys
Were intended for boys.
Could you ever imagine a worse story?
A prominent, popular thespian
ReplyDeleteNamed "Rock" really wanted to be "Leslie Anne"
So he went through much strife
Going under the knife,
But he thinks now that he's a Male Lesbian!
The late Christine Jorgensen (né George Jorgensen) made headlines in the early1950's as the first individual to make her 'transexual" status known to the public.
ReplyDeleteNaturally Christine, who'd done a stint in the Army while she was still "George," was the butt of many crude jokes, and the source of many snide remarks that passed for "humor" on late night TV. But Christine turned out to be a good sport as well as something of an exhibitionist.
I remember Christine's notable appearance on Ed Murrow's Person to Person [and Boy does that date me! ;-] and two things remain in memory. First she seemed very touched when Ed asked her if she were happy. She said something in response like "How kind of you to care!" because, of course, many were too busy deriding her as a 'freak" or condemning her as a "pervert" ever to wonder how SHE felt about her situation.
The thing that won me over, however, was her wonderful sense of humor. She made a point of telling Murrow that of all the public jokes made about her one just about tickled her to death. You could tell from her tone of voice that she really loved it.
It was a cartoon showing a drawing of Fort Meade, or wherever it was "George" had been stationed (I've forgotten to be hnest). The caption read, "NOW she tells us!
"There are more things in heaven and earth that are included in your philosophy, Horatio."
"Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.
Blessed are te meek, for they shall inherit the earth."
"Judge not lest ye be judged."
"There's a wideness in God's mercy like the wideness of the sea.
There's a kindness in His judgment that transfigures you and me. ..."
FT,
ReplyDeleteCertainly there is much humor to be found in almost any situation involving human sexuality. And those limericks are hilarious.
But 51 gender options offered for Facebook profiles?
Failing to list biological gender on a birth certificate?
Will BOLO's (Be On The Lookout alerts) issued by law enforcement be required to admit gender in the BOLO's?
Biological gender is a fact of nature! How one practices that gender is another matter.
Of corse you're right, AOW, but I see no reason to belabor the point. No matter how we'd like it to be so, human beings are jus NOT rational creatures, and we never will be.
DeleteSO, I resort to laughter when there's nothing I can do to change what happens to be in vogue to suit my preferences. One could easily go raving mad trying to change the things that cannot be changed.
As I've said many times, "This too shall pass."
And, as our rebarbative POTUS-in-WAITING undoubtedly would say,
"At this point WHAT DIFFERENCE DOES IT MAKE?" ;-)
FT,
DeleteI'm a fighter, I guess.
Often attributed to Edmund Burke: All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.
Also see , particularly this one:
There is, however, a limit at which forbearance ceases to be a virtue.
But there's nothing "evil" in this, AOW. It's merely NONSENSICAL, although I agree with Ducky that human sexual identity is not so cut and dried as we've generally supposed. I'll spare everyone my private thoughts on the subject, because I have no desire to start a riot, and well do I know -- after twelve long years posting on the net -- that NO ONE is EVER sufficiently moved by the observations of another -- no matter how well-phrased, carefully thought out, eloquently and considerately delivered -- to change his mind abut ANYTHING. There's hardly a person alive who isn't madly in love with his prejudices -- i.e. the things that make him feel comfortably at home in a fundamentally hostile world. 99.44% percent of humanity is impervious to reasoned discourse.
DeletePlease don't take this as an ENDORSEMENT of the cockamamie notions you've featured here today. I agree most of it is ABSURD, and I have always despised agend-driven "mind-bending" campaigns ever since I recognized what the enemedia was doing to us.
HOWEVER, I have great deal of faith in both Truth and Principle (synonyms for God). I don't think Truth can be suppressed or Principle violated forever, and certainly neither can be killed, so I refuse to take stuff like this too seriously. God WILL sort it all out in His own good time.
Also, we'd do well to consider these words:
"We can never be sure that the opinion we wish to stifle is a false opinion; and if we were sure, stifling it would be an evil still."
~ John Stuart Mill (1806-1873)
FT,
DeleteBut there's nothing "evil" in this, AOW.
In my view, that depends upon how far this absurdity goes.
Although some gender identity appears to be innate, studies do show that science doesn't "know" how much of gender identity is environmental.
IMO, there is no point in confusing young people even further.
I love FreeThinke and the great sense of humor. Because this is indeed a nonsensical discussion.
ReplyDeleteIt reminds me of the time a (poor, Hispanic) woman told me her husband was mad because she had given him two beautiful daughters, but no son. I had to explain the basics of sperm, XY chromosomes, and the very real fact that her husband should be mad at himself for not providing the "Y". Enlightenment is a beautiful thing! What _Salon_ has put on the page is primitive darkness. We need to call it for what it is: Primitivism
_Salon_ must hire writers who like to etch out their thoughts on cave walls. My guess is they probably thing that fire comes from the fire god.
And on that note, let me keep the limericks going:
There once was a baby named "It"
Whose parents were so full of "sh-t"
Without name or gender
And a mind like a blender
With personality all in small bits
Tammy
Tammy,
DeleteLOL!
PS: And after only one cup of coffee, too!
DeleteWrite one too, Grammar Queen. Oh wait! It is a brutal thing to note that you are a woman.
ReplyDeleteYou know, the more I think about it, if any person denied that I was a woman, denied I was feminine, I just might have to bite their head off.
Possibly the _Salon_ journalist suffers from an intense sense of self-hatred which is misdirected to a gender issue? Hmmm
I'm not good at writing verse.
DeleteBut Mr. AOW might be able to come up with a good limerick related to this blog post. Whether or not his limerick would be printable is unknown.
I wouldn't say that it is terrifying.
DeleteBut to deny that biological gender is a fact is madness, IMO -- and ludicrous.
Is a definition of gender imposed? To a certain extent, yes! See Silverfiddle's comment to this thread.
Duck
DeleteYou asked, "Who's next?"
Answer that question yourself, please.
@ AOW: "But to deny that biological gender is a fact is madness, IMO -- and ludicrous."
DeleteAnd this lunacy comes from the self-proclaimed party of science.
Pardon my guffawing
Silverfiddle,
DeleteAnd this lunacy comes from the self-proclaimed party of science.
Excellent point!
What next? Hard to say. We continue to learn about human gender and sexuality.
DeleteThe article is extreme, to be sure, and choice of nursery decoration as an issue is a stretch but there is a kernel in the article.
Sometimes gender is not so easily determined and we don't have either the social systems or language to deal with it very well. That is likely to change over time.
Unfortunately, conservatism will resist it.
Duck,
DeleteSometimes gender is not so easily determined
Biological or psychological?
As for what's next, I have to wonder if it's possible that, sometime in the near future, some will strongly advocate for not denying pedophiles their "rights."
Before you say, "You're crazy!" let us remember that, early on in the gay rights movement, we were assured that marriage would never be an issue. Clearly, same-sex marriage has become an issue now.
As far as pedophile "rights" are concerned, you must be referring to NAMBLA or the Roman Catholic Church.
DeleteI don't believe NAMBLA still exists and the Church is going through the painful process of admitting its grave sin.
As for gay marriage, it's all over but the shouting. It's settled and you'd be hard pressed to show me any damage giving gays full access to a civil contract has caused.
Reason will often trump dogma and we have to be prepared to adjust.
NAMBLA may or may not still exist formally after this happened.
DeleteNote the definition of pedophilia, which refers to more than man-boy sexual relations.
Then, there is also the matter of child pornography.
The past few years, there seem to be more stories about pedophilia and child porn -- particularly with regard to teachers who have been arrested, charged, and convicted.
Is it unreasonable to worry that the definition of "normal" will be expanded to cover the above?
You mentioned: the Church is going through the painful process of admitting its grave sin.
But why should it be deemed "sin" if gender identity and sexual practices are an individual's right?
Also, if the church deems those practices as "sin," should the illegality of them be discontinued?
You seem to be pretty close to calling child porn, pedophilia and homosexuality equivalent.
DeleteWanna know why people rob banks, ducky? It's where the money is.
Duck,
DeleteYou seem to be pretty close to calling child porn, pedophilia and homosexuality equivalent.
I neither said nor implied that.
You're the one who asked "Who's next?" Not what is next, but who is next. I offered a few possibilities -- that's all.
Activism is always pushing for yet another cause for which to agitate. Agitation without end!
And absurdity ad infinitum!
DeleteWhat might be next:
DeleteA judge in Australia has been criticised after incest may no longer be a taboo and that the community may now accept consensual sex between adult siblings.
Judge Garry Neilson, from the district court in the state of New South Wales, likened incest to homosexuality, which was once regarded as criminal and "unnatural" but is now widely accepted.
He said incest was now only a crime because it may lead to abnormalities in offspring but this rationale was increasingly irrelevant because of the availability of contraception and abortion. ...
I wish this was funny to me. I am trying, but......
ReplyDeleteDr. Michael Savage is right:
ReplyDeleteLiberalism is a mental disorder.
They hate nature in all her simplicity: If it's an innie, she's a girl. If it's an outie, he's a boy.
I seem to remember, from Biology, that [asexual] reproduction is a common characteristic in worms and various forms of fungi.
ReplyDeleteGender bias? Michelle Obama Employs Only 2 Men; Pays Men 46% More Than Women On Staff
ReplyDeleteFor the record:
ReplyDeleteMy very first thought on seeing tis post early this morning before I read the text was to think, "What a lovely room! It looks so calm, peaceful and harmonious. The color scheme is elegant, subtle and so restful."
The pink or blue bit is such a cliché, and cornier than Kansas in August. Not that I'd take exception to anyone's adherence to traditionla after all I am one of the great champions of Freedom of Choice, but at the same time I see nothing wrong with the room in today's illustration.
FT,
DeleteI, too, see nothing inherently bad about the room.
However, my point is that there are now retailers promoting gender-neutral nurseries. Yet another absurd label, IMO.
Also, a baby's developing eyes may well need more visual input than the room pictured.
DeleteA mixed up young woman named Groom
ReplyDeleteTook a lesbian up to her room,
But they spent the whole night
In a terrible fight
As to who should do what and to whom!
~ Not original. It comes from a very old naughty book called Over Sexteen discovered at the top of a neighbor's master bedroom closet by their daughter when she and I were nine years old. And no they never found out that we'd seen it. Such was the state of "Sex Education" when I was a youngster.;-)
Here's another bit of whimsy conjured up to commemorate the Centenary of Lady Liberty's appearance in New York Harbor. The Lady has always struck me as desperately unattractive -- cold -- formidable -- grim -- rather intimidating as a matter of fact -- anything but warmly welcoming, as she's cracked up to be. Hence the following:
ReplyDeleteThe statue of Liberty's gender
'S not clear. I fear she's a pretender.
Hordes of kids -- and the press! --
Have been up in her dress,
And found nothing to goose or surrender!
~ FreeThinke (1986)
A world of nothing but infinite shades of grey does not appeal to me. I'm glad my tour of duty in this life will end world still contains colors and black and white.
ReplyDeleteJim,
DeleteHello! You've been absent for quite a while -- for reasons explained at your blog site.
I find shades of grey peaceful -- but only to a point. I do have one grey room in this house, but that room also has splashes of color (shades of blue and red).
My grandmother had this old house almost completely decorated in greys. Depressing! Before moving in, Mr. AOW and changed the color scheme.
Am SO proud to be conservative when I hear Ducky saying Conservatives will 'resist' that a penis comes with a boy and no penis means it's a girl. What they decide to do later is important only to them.
ReplyDeleteI think the neutral bedroom isn't quite such a new thing; remember when we blissfully didn't know what gender a child would be and people painted rooms yellow or green in case they guessed wrong and painted it pink and had a boy? That doesn't bug me at all.
But, really... have we come to not telling what the gender is like that woman somewhere in Norway, I think it was? She never said her child was a girl until the kid was five. I guess the kid had decided that not having a penis made her a girl, too? Bravo to the kid . Takes a big brain to figure that one out.
Of course you feel that way. z. You don't deal well with change.
DeleteFact is that if you look through history you will see that a lot of misconceptions about sexuality and gender have been dispelled and there may yet be more.
Now, as I said, the act of decorating a child;s nursery is hardly an outrage nor is the act of marking a birth certificate according to physiology but what is being so compartmentalized that you don't realize some children may have gender confusion and may need some understanding.
They probably aren't going to get that from certain groups just as those groups will continue to try to subject children to gay conversion therapy.
Carry on the torch of enlightenment.
Z,
DeleteIgnore Duck's insults.
You mentioned: a penis comes with a boy and no penis means it's a girl.
Exactly!
AOW.... Ducky's insults flatter me now. They show such a level of idiocy; does he KNOW how much "gay conversion therapy" goes on? (Answer: 2?) And to even suggest we don't all know that
DeleteSILVERFIDDLE's right...that all of this has been going on since time immemorial but that what's new is exactly what SF spells out is pretty dumb, too.
Just to hurt...and it doesn't hurt.
Sorry, Ducky.
AOW: I missed that retailers are promoting the gender neutral look. If we have to call it that, we have a HUGE problem. I agree with you there!
ReplyDeleteMAN.
Congratulations! It's a, well, uh, well, let's let it figure it out for itself.
ReplyDeleteIf it asks any questions, we won't answer, for fear of biasing it..
No, I don't think it will be confused or have any emotional damage.
Much.
After all, it's just a grown fetus.
It's Lucky you didn't kill it.
Yeah. Call it Lucky.
This whole gender-bender thing is just an occasional fad. I wouldn't worry about it. It's not like anyone other than a tiny minority of upper-middle class silly people engage in this nonsense.
ReplyDeleteJMJ
BRAVO, Jersey!
DeleteSame is true for the new fangled fad diseases such as Anorexia, Bulimia, and ADDHD, etc
Only spoiled brats from the suburbs with neurotic, overprotective mothers seem to suffer from stiff like this. To much Dr.Spock was the cause of it no doubt.
No one has any trouble distinguishing between a hen and a rooster or a bull and a cow, does he?
Guys have dicks and balls, girls have slits and tits. It's as simple as that.
your post title says it all AOW..are we really living through this??!!!!
ReplyDeleteGender free childhood? I want to know how the parents manage to explain adolescence to children unprepared for the biological progression of the XX and XY genome maps.
ReplyDelete*menstruation
*nocturnal emissions
*hair on the chest
*linea negra
*facial hair distribution
*breast buds
*jock itch
This line of reasoning for gender free children is highly unpractical along with being completely primitive in its origins. I think a bacteria probably has more highly evolved thoughts than this group of clowns.
Tammy
The Gore Vidal generation... "Asked whether his first romantic encounter was homosexual or heterosexual, Vidal replied that he had been "too polite to ask".
ReplyDeleteYa got to fight for your rights!
ReplyDeleteThe left would screw up another generation with gender confusion. Didn't I read a study somewhere showing boys who were denied guns to play with made their own and girls denied dolls did the same?
ReplyDeleteDucky calls this change while the rest of us call it insanity ... wonder why?
ReplyDeleteI am looking for a convenient brick wall to see if I can break it with my head before said head explodes.
ReplyDeleteSexism is everywhere -- according to Slate:
ReplyDeleteYour Hatred of Cupcakes Is a Little Sexist.
The essay is short. Please read it. Spew alert!
Liberals, make up your freakin minds. Either gender doesn't mean anything as far as interests and jobs are concerned (anyone can like pink, be a doctor, etc, etc); or gender doesn't exist. PICK ONE. And since the latter is idiotic, pick the former.
ReplyDeleteLook, gender is biological, period end of sentence. We can argue till the cows come home about how this influences people, but to deny its existence just doesn't make sense. As a girl, I say ESPECIALLY since different genders have different requirements, troubles and needs. It's ridiculous to expect both genders to attempt, say, using the same rest room. That will fail... badly...
I think the blue-pink thing is as stupid as the next person (seriously, who even invented it?), but being anti-cultural isn't a good reason to do ANYTHING. Want a grey room? Paint it grey! Go ahead! Nobody said you HAD to stick to gender code. But why make up your mind based on "I won't do this!"? The opposite of wrong isn't right... and anti-anything isn't a position. It's opposing a position, and has no structural integrity. (And besides that, it sounds absolutely childish).
This will pass, simply because of breeding. Sorry folks, but until we discover how to create and raise test-tube babies, genders do matter... a lot. I am afraid we'll figure it out though and NOTHING will stop the insanity.
-Wildstar
___ To a Room Mate from a Hospital Bed ___
ReplyDeleteYou’re born to fit the mold; for this you think
The Lord has made you righteous, fine, “the best.”
In quiet dignity you watch the rink
Of life; cheer for your kind –– deride the rest.
And yet, your way of life shines like the morn.
Those who cannot join must yearn in pain ––
Anger for the strong who fight with scorn ––
Weeping for the weak who dream in strain.
Anguish for us all, because we hate
Anything that questions what we are.
All we know is what we’re taught by Fate
Keeping us suspicious, wary far
From joining in the glowing Christian Feast ––
As distant as the West is from the East.
~ FreeThinke (1983)
Check out As Nature Made Him: the boy who was raised as a girl. A botched circumcision at 7 months of age led to one of these early quacks in gender reassignment, Dr. John Money, inflicting years of agony on this boy to convert him to a girl. The boy involved KNEW he was not a girl despite well-intentioned parents and a psycho-social-educational system co-conspiratorial to his brainwashing. (Laughably, 'she' kept being admonished in school for standing up to pee in front of the toilet, even though 'she' lacked a penis long before 'she' knew how to use a toilet.) This book explodes gender identity myths fashionable in the 50's and 60's (it happened in 1966), and examines the efforts of sensible researchers and victims of sexual "reassignment" to protect future children from this kind of experimentation.
ReplyDeleteNow we're got deja vu all over again, as this Salon writer shows. What confusion!!
Love that nursery, btw - such beautiful [and in my opinion male] neutral colors.
You can call me Alice, but in Wonderland I am not!
Baysider,
DeleteThank you so much for mentioning As Nature Made Him: the boy who was raised as a girl! I was trying to remember the title of that book, which I cursorily read several years ago.
I am going to read that book again. I just put a reserve on a library copy.
As for the nursery, yes, it is beautiful. But for a baby's eyes to develop properly, bright colors need to be splashed here and there.
And the kicker on the above case was that the Doc was writing glowing journal articles about gender identity being learned and how successful his case was in sexual reassignment. What do you want to bet that Dr. Money's works are being cited by the next generation of frauds?
ReplyDelete"sexual reassignment"
ReplyDeleteIt can't be done. There are so many differences within the body and brain that the mere idea that exposed genitalia is, nothing more than the proverbial 'tip of the iceberg " is insane. The only redeeming factor is that they don't contribute their perversion to the "gene pool", albeit the horrible fact that these perverts can adopt and pervert children! And make no mistake that's what they will do.
Jon,
DeleteHuman biology as it is tied to neurology is very complicated.
Even the best specialists don't know what they don't know. Just ask any neurosurgeon.