My wife wants a homosexual child
We are planning to have our first child in about a year. My wife is very much into raising them genderless (or "post-gender" style) while my take on it is that we should raise them in a non-stereotypical manner, keeping an open mind for all there is. I even have problems defining how raising a child "genderless" should look.
However, my wife has many homosexual friends (men and women alike) and really wants at least one of our kids to also be homosexual, which is the real issue.
We live in a modern city and I really don't have any problems with our kids becoming homosexual, but not on purpose! I mean, if we somehow force it, it could go horribly wrong (effects on psyche etc.).
How can I deal with this situation? Is my wife overreacting or am I wrong here? How can I approach that topic with my wife?
It seems to me that this is some kind of extreme take on raising a child genderless (by essentially willingly flipping its sexuality around)...
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Is my wife overreacting or am I wrong here?
I don't think you're wrong. It seems reasonable - even admirable - to raise a child encouraging any beneficial interests they have regardless of gender-stereotype. (I say beneficial because some interests are not, e.g. an interest in experimenting with drugs during early adolescence.)
If your wife truly wants a homosexual child, that's different, to say the least. It doesn't seem to be loving the child for who they are. It's akin to always wanting a daughter, and, having only sons, trying to raise one as a daughter.
How can I deal with this situation?... How can I approach that topic with my wife?
If you can't discuss this with your wife in a way that reaches a satisfactory compromise of some kind, it's time for a therapist. She might be more open to a gay therapist, or at least a therapist who deals with adolescent gender issues. You might have to really ask around a lot before finding the ideal therapist, but it seems a fairly critical issue if your assessment is correct.
You need to work this out before you have a child. Consider that if you "get a hell of a verbal beating" every time you act even slightly gender-specific towards her or others, your children may get the same treatment as well. You can protect yourself, and comfort yourself with reasoning and maybe even distance. A child cannot.
I'm going to take a slightly stronger position than most of the other people here. I'm keeping in mind the policy to be nice and simply objectively describing the seriousness of the situation.
There are two enormous red flags that it could be extremely unwise to have a child with this person (at least while she has these desires). You need more info about her beliefs before you should be willing to get her pregnant as it sounds like she may behave in a manner than is very psychologically damaging to her children.
Raising a child how you're describing, by accepting them for who they are, not pushing them into gender roles, and loving them no matter their orientation are laudable. This is exactly how you should raise your kids.
The "post-gender" comment on its own is not too worrisome as it's easy to reasonably interpret that as allowing them to be who they are without regard to gender stereotypes. But in the context of wanting to make a kid have a particular orientation too? It sounds like this may be a sign that your wife would not be accepting of a kid who largely conformed to gender norms, even if that's merely their preference (which often will be the case).
I don't think I need to go into why it's bad to force people into a particular orientation. I'm pretty sure we take that for a given after seeing the disaster of gay conversion therapy.
The bottom line is you need to understand what your wife actually believes and wants; it sounds like her current beliefs are such that she should not have any children and could cause great psychological harm if she did. I strongly agree with the suggestion that you go to a marriage or family therapist before starting a family. You should appreciate the gravity of this situation as it may lead to either the end of a marriage or bringing a child into a home with an extremely psychologically abusive mother. Don't sell out your future children's wellbeing for marital harmony. Don't jump to conclusions though: first understand if this is a problem and, if it is, do not compromise on this being a completely unacceptable way to raise your kids.
I think this is a very horrible idea. Even set of ideas.
Gender-less/Post Gender
This is just silly. Now I'm not saying that everyone has to be confined by the stereotypes that exist, BUT, they are stereotypes for a reason. Boys and Girls are different. You can't force them into a generic one size fits all mold. You shouldn't forge them in to any mold. But the entire concept of gender-less is just plain wrong. Let me explain, if your Boy likes to cook, then by all means nurture that. If he hates cooking, then maybe you have to show him how to make hot pockets for when he's single. But you should not be forcing him into ANY role so that you can achieve a goal of "gender less". In fact, it may be dangerous to do so. We boys go though phases of aggression and dominance that we need to learn how to express and control in socially acceptable ways.
The point is that the stereotypes for boys and girls exist as a social evolution from our past and should not be ignored, BUT, you shouldn't force the issue either. If you don't believe in traditional gender roles, then show that through example. But, boys and girls are different, trying to pretend there not is going to leave your child unable to cope with situations as they get older.
I'm not I am spelling this out right, but essentially "post gender" is not a goal worth pursuing. Instead try for happy, health, safe, and confident.
Homosexual Kid
Ok, wow, just wow. Stop the plan to have kids now! I'm not joking, I'm not playing, I am not saying it for shock value. STOP. Get into therapy, maybe some parenting classes. Again, if a kid ends up homosexual, then that's one thing. I would never suggest that you try to change sexual orientation one way or another. You have to decide your values and what you want to pass on to your kids, but forcing them one way (hetero or homo) it damn near abusive, and probably should be considered abuse. You're essentially planning to have a kid so that you can abuse it.
You need to get you and your partner into counseling. You should talk with a professional about this. You need to take some parenting classes (every one should takes some).
Bottom Line
I know it's fun to look at the future and go, "Oh that would be nice." but you're not having a poodle, you're having a kid. For the first, I don't know, 2 days, they might do exactly what you think they're going to do, but from then on, for the rest of their life, they are going to do what they are going to do, and you get the joy of just hanging on for the ride. Sure maybe you can suggest a hair cut for the first 8 years, but I can assure you that by day two or three you're going to be changing a diaper and they are going to poop in the new diaper. Then you'll change it, and they will poop again. By day four you will swear they're doing it on purpose.
You can't make your kids do anything. That the secret. You can suggest and persuade, but from that first day till forever, you have no control over them. You can't make them one thing or another. You just have to accept them.
Perhaps I have some expertise on this, as someone who has raised one straight and two queer children...
You don't get to decide that. She doesn't either. Yes, you can indeed try not to overly gender your kids as you are raising them. But that has little if any impact on who they are. Their personality and identity will assert itself very early. For strong obvious traits (eg: handedness, or my middle INTJ child insisting on getting the same deal as her siblings), you will likely see it while they are still pretty much asexual toddlers. Less obvious traits like identity and sexuality can take a while to notice, but all indications are they are there from birth too.
For example, my two daughters from an early age expressed very different gender identities. The older one was always more interested in aping her brother, and today only wears dresses when forced. She identifies as bi-female, but rejects the clothing and social roles that are expected to go with it (eg: She wears a tie and blazer to church). Her younger sister always was more interested in her mother. She now wears dresses, is really into makeup, and identifies as pan-sexual female. Their older brother is completely hetro-normal. All three were raised the same.
To get back to your situation, not wanting to raise them gendered is laudable (and frankly quite common these days). Don't raise them to be ashamed of who they are! If your child wants dolls, buy them dolls. If your child wants toy weapons, buy them (unrealistic!) toy weapons. If you don't, they will just make them with household items anyway. They will be who they will be.
But this also means you can't purposely raise a het-norm kid to be queer. They can be an ally, but they will be who they are. If you really, really want to raise a queer child, I can't urge you strongly enough to consider adoption (or fostering). Queer children are thrown out of their homes every year in the thousands. If you honestly have the inclination, you could really do some good by adopting one.
Children are not computers that the parents get to program. Raising them is more like planting a random seed some guy with a big white beard handed you. You can plant it and nurture it, give it the best most fertile soil you know how to provide, but what it grows up into isn't for you to decide. It could end up being a flower, or a tree for all you know. Just do your best, love it, and prepare to be amazed by whatever blooms.
There is simply no guarentee on what you get for children. If people go into child making with the idea that they want x, y or z then they are simply going to get a, b or c.
You raise your children as best as you can, knowing full well that neither the child nor the parents are ever going to be perfect but for the rest you are either left to the mercy of fate or chance (depending on your viewpoint).
Just fyi Madeleign Murray O,Hare raised a baptist minister for a son, just to put it all in perspective.
As has already been stated you can not make a child be homosexual. This is as harmful as trying to make a homosexual child be heterosexual. You can't decide a child's sexuality and trying to will only cause emotional harm to the child. If you want to raise a homosexual child adopt one! There are many in need of homes from supportive families, it's not hard to adopt a child and it will help them.
As to the gender-neutral parenting, it sounds wonderful in theory, in practice not so much. A child should never be raised with an expectation to fit a gender norm, they should be encourage to play with whatever they want to play with, be it dolls or cars or something else that doesn't fit the gender norm, and to enjoy whatever colors they enjoy, be it pink or blue. A boy should be raised to be aware of his emotions and free to express them, just as a girl should be raised to not be afraid to get dirty or be physically active. Children should be encouraged to be whoever they are without regard to their physical sex and freely exposed to activities and options associated with both gender norms.
However, trying to hide your child's physical sex will do far more harm then good! I get the concept, in theory it would be great to prevent anyone from applying gender roles to the child, but in reality it just doesn't work.
For starters your child will know his/her physical sex, and will see that media and society expect something from a child of that sex, so they will likely still be exposed to almost as much societal stereotypes. children raised gender neutral usually end up with the same gender role as their physical sex and quite sterotypical. How much of that is biological (there are very real biological factors to gender identity that play a significant role in how one's gender develops) and how much is due to their internalizing societal roles by seeing them applied to other's of the same gender is unclear, but the end result is that they usually grow up with the same gender identity after all that work.
However, they go through far more difficulty getting there. Childern raised gender-neutral are more likely to feel conflicted about gender roles, more likely to feel they don't fit either role or even express concern that they are 'wrong' for confirming with the gender role of their sex despite the efforts of raising them gender-neutral.
All that time spent telling a child they shouldn't reveal their physical sex works to make their sex a guilty secret. They can't develop a proper gender identity because they are told it's 'wrong' to confirm to one. The intent is good, but it just causes the child to feel something is wrong with their sex/gender because they can't reveal it despite people asking for it, and this leads to confusion later.
While I wish society was different, the fact is raising a gender-neutral child also means facing bullying, for both you and your child. I will say flat out that this shouldn't happen, not in a a proper and idealized society, but reality isn't that society. Raising a child gender-neutral means more bullying for that child when he is young, and for you. It means him/her having to go through discussions as to why they can't reveal their identity. It means extra drama and emotional difficulty caused by society that isn't supportive of what is being attempted. This could be worth it, if the benefit for the child was enough, but I don't see much actual benefit done to justify it.
in the end what is the best case scenario of raising a child gender-neutral? If they happen to be transgendered anyways it would no doubt help them with their transition to the opposite gender, but only a tiny fraction of children will be transgendered, so the vast majority of the time this won't be relevant. If the child isn't transgendered then what do they gain for all this difficulty? In theory it's that they feel more comfortable demonstrating non gender-normative traits that they may otherwise have felt bad expressing, but if you simply encourage a child to demonstrate their traits without hiding their physical sex you gain this same benefit without all the difficulty of gender-nutral lifestyle, and all the risk of confusing the child.
In short there is just too much risk of making the child unsure or guilty about their sex/gender and too little benefit for the majority of children to make it worth doing.
As to why your wife wants this, if I had to guess I would suspect that she wants to show she is 'supportive' of alternative lifestyles and genders, which is fine. It's good to be supportive of these. However, the fact is that the majority of children will not grow up to have a non-traditional gender/sexuality/lifestyle. Trying to create an enviroment where a child can express any non-traditional inclination freely is good, trying to expect or force it when it's unlikely to come up is potentially harmful if not done very carefully because it can make the child fill guilty for being traditional.
I suggest a few things to do to work this out with your wife, in addition to what is already mentioned. First, discuss how you can support your child's ability to express non-traditional predisposition without needing to go to extremes. Set plans for how to encourage your child to not feel pressured by gender norms without resorting to gender-neutral extreme. For example you could set plans like these:
Originally buying toys traditionally intended for both genders so the child is exposed and to and feels free to play with either; though you should transition to buying the toys the child enjoys as the child grows old enough to express this.
Make plans to expose the child to people with non-traditional lifestyles, including different sexuality or gender then is traditional, to demonstrate that these are acceptable options for your child.
Make plans for how to speak with the child to avoid imposing stereotypes in your talk, such as including both sexes when you talk about theoretical person they may be interested in dating when they get older.
Plan to dress the child gender-neturally. This means avoiding blue/pink (or putting them in the non-traditional color), but also includes using gender-neutral hair cut and controlling what jewelry/ear-ring they wear etc. If a stranger is unsure what sex the child is they are unlikely to impose gender stereotypes on the child. However, this doesn't risk the same harm as gender-neutral parenting because you don't force the child to hide their sex like it's a secret. Your keeping strangers guessing without the child realizing that your doing it, but at no point are you expressing to the child that their sex is a dirty secret that should not be revealed if asked.
The point of these examples is to show all the ways you can raise the child in a way that doesn't impose gender stereotypes without having to go so far as to hide the child's sex, which can make the child feel guilty about that sex. These can all be positive optoins for your child anyways; However, you must go in with the understanding that your child will start to express their own identity early and you should transition to support that identity, including letting them pick how they should look and what toys they will play with, as soon as the child starts to express a preference!!
By discussing these sort of goals early you can help demonstrate to your wife how she can meet her goals of encouraging the child without going to such an extreme as to cause potential harm by accidentally trying to force some non-traditional inclination that doesn't exist in the child.
In my experience people who express these wishes also sometimes do it because they want to be seen as open to other sexuality/genders. In other words it may not just be about supporting the child, but being seen openly as doing it so friends will know how very supportive your wife is. That may sound harsh when said like that, let me stress it is not meant as such; this is not an uncommon motivation for actions even if we don't usually admit it. Thus finding ways to openly support people with non-traditional stereotypes/genders other then trying to push your child towards it could be useful. This means things like going to gay pride or volunteering with gay/lesbian/trans charities. volunteermatch.org is a good place to look to find such organizations. This can give your wife a great way to demonstrate her support, and further demonstrate to your child(ren) how supportive you are as they grow older and see the work your doing.
I would strongly suggest some couple therapy before you bring a child into this situation. I worked in a therapy clinic and saw the outcome of overbearing/unreasonable mothering (and fathering). Your wife needs to confront her own issues before she tries re-wiring a child to fit her agenda.
Of course forcing a child to be gay is as harmful as forcing them to be straight (and I hope you fight as ardently when you see adults trying to do that to children, because it's awful and extremely common).
However, I'm really struggling to understand your post. "Genderless" doesn't mean much to me. Is your wife proposing allowing the child to choose toys and clothes that may not conform to gender norms, or something more extreme? Either way, these things will not have an influence on your child's orientation, which is a different thing. However your child is wired--attracted to males, females, both, or neither, is not something you're going to be able to affect. All you can do is provide a loving environment where your child will be comfortable to figure out who they are and know that you and your wife will accept them either way.
I would smile and nodd.
Your wife does not yet know a lot about kids.
If she were to provide the perfect coffee environment for a cup of tea, by pouring it into a coffee cup, it would still be tea.
And somehow, your wife thinks that something as simple as changing tea into coffee, will work on something as infinitely complex as a person.
She can no more change a person into something it isn't by giving it the correct colored clothing, than she can change tea into coffee by pouring it into a coffee cup.
Just have the child. She can not change it and she can not do harm.
She'll quickly see that a child is a unique personality, far deeper that the toys that are provided to it.
Smile and nod.
Oh dear, this is going to end up in tears.
First you need understanding, then you can argue.
I would suggest to discuss with your wife the mass of documentation (articles, social media posts, surveys, etc.) about how parents have tried (and failed) to force "normal" sexuality on their homosexual offspring.
Please understand: I don't intend for you to point and say "see, it doesn't work"; but ask her about her opinions on this matter: How does she feel about seeking to impose that level of control? How does she interpret the results? And especially: If that frequently doesn't seem to "work" (or is "the Christian thing to do", or "wrong" or whatever the motivation may be), why would the opposite differ? How would the opposite differ?
No really, don't phrase it as "that would never work" but as a genuine question.
Why is this so important to her? How would she feel if your child became heterosexual? At the very least, she should prepare herself for the risk of (in her perspective) failure.
Caveat: I also have no idea what "post gender" means in a reality where we have not (yet) transformed into an actual gender-less life form. I too have many(?) non-hetero friends and strive to teach my children to regard sexuality the same way as left- or right-handedness: most are that, some are that, either way it's natural and not a big deal.
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