Monday, May 23, 2011

Canadian baby must choose its own sex

Remember Pop? Pop is the Swedish child whose parents refused to reveal his/her sex. Well, he/she now has a Canadian friend, Storm. Storm's parents are also keeping his/her sex a secret.

Why would parents not want to tell the world if their baby is a boy or a girl? Regular readers of this site won't be surprised by the parents' answer:

When Storm was born, the couple sent an email to friends and family: “We've decided not to share Storm's sex for now — a tribute to freedom and choice in place of limitation, a stand up to what the world could become in Storm's lifetime (a more progressive place? ...).”

Witterick and Stocker believe they are giving their children the freedom to choose who they want to be, unconstrained by social norms about males and females.

“In fact, in not telling the gender of my precious baby, I am saying to the world, ‘Please can you just let Storm discover for him/herself what s(he) wants to be?!.” Witterick writes in an email.

“Everyone keeps asking us, ‘When will this end?’” says Witterick. “And we always turn the question back. Yeah, when will this end? When will we live in a world where people can make choices to be whoever they are?”

That is surely and unmistakably liberal autonomy theory. The theory runs: we are made human by the fact that we self-determine our existence; our sex is not something that is self-determined but is predetermined; therefore our sex is a limitation or restriction that we need to be liberated from; therefore our sex should be made not to matter in society.

Storm's parents use just the terminology you would expect from liberals: they describe sex as a limitation and a constraint and they believe that by making it not matter there will be an increase in freedom with individuals being able to determine their own self, to "choose who they want to be".

This is how the parents' background is described:

Both come from liberal families. Stocker grew up listening to Free to Be ... You and Me, a 1972 record with a central message of gender neutrality.

The message of Free to Be ... You and Me has been described by Judith Stadtman Tucker as follows:

its principal strategy is portraying traditional gender roles as limiting, hurtful and old-fashioned...

the creators of F2BY&M seem intent on discouraging the formation of romantic illusions in little girls and imparting the value of female autonomy.

As an example of the lyrics of the songs on the record, here are the words to "Girl Land":

They're closing down 'Girl Land'
Some say it's a shame
It used to be busy
Then nobody came

... And soon in the park
That was 'Girl Land' before
You'll do as you like
And be who you are.

The parents of Storm have two older children, both boys. They are being raised with the belief that boys should be more like girls and vice versa. The older boy, 5-year-old Jazz, is described as grabbing:

a handmade portfolio filled with his drawings and poems. In its pages is a booklet written under his pseudonym, the “Gender Explorer.” In purple and pink lettering, adorned with butterflies, it reads: “Help girls do boy things. Help boys do girl things. Let your kid be whoever they are!”

And the boys have taken the message to heart, choosing to act in an effeminate way and being commonly mistaken for girls:

On a recent trip to High Park, Jazz, wearing pink shorts, patterned pink socks and brightly coloured elastics on his braids, runs and skips across the street.

“That’s a princess!” says a smiling crossing guard, ushering the little boy along. “And that’s a princess, too,” she says again, pointing at Kio with her big red sign.

Jazz doesn’t mind. One of his favourite books is 10,000 Dresses, the story of a boy who loves to dress up. But he doesn’t like being called a girl. Recently, he asked his mom to write a note on his application to the High Park Nature Centre because he likes the group leaders and wants them to know he’s a boy.

Jazz was old enough for school last September, but chose to stay home. “When we would go and visit programs, people — children and adults — would immediately react with Jazz over his gender,” says Witterick, adding the conversation would gravitate to his choice of pink or his hairstyle.

That’s mostly why he doesn’t want to go to school. When asked if it upsets him, he nods, but doesn’t say more.

The parents haven't done such a gender reversal themselves (apart from Mum's punky hair style). Dad works as a teacher, mum is a housewife. Both are recognisably male and female. You have to wonder how things would work out for them if either decided to drop their own orthodox sex identity. Would mum like it if dad was so effeminate that he was commonly mistaken for a woman? And would dad enjoy the relationship if mum were mistaken for a man? How well would a heterosexual marriage go in such a circumstance?

Here's dad playing with son no.2:




And here's mum with her punky hair but otherwise feminine outfit:




And here's young Storm pondering his/her future with two liberal parents:


54 comments:

  1. Very "Rage in Placid Lake", where the parents send their boy to school wearing a dress, to confront the school's gender steryotypes.

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  2. I suppose that if they could raise their child in a truly gender neutral way then I would be interested in the results. However, since the parents do know the gender, I have no doubt they will reinforce the gender behavior that is directly opposite the physical gender.

    Liberals can be annoying that way.

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  3. A minor point perhaps, but they are actually Canadian. The famliy lives in Toronto (article mentions High Park Nature Centre.)

    A movie of 'Free to be you and me" was shown to us in school every year in the 1970s. It is the expected array of skits about radical autonomy as the ultimate goal in life. I did not absorb these ame values however. Nature over nurture I guess.

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  4. “Everyone keeps asking us, ‘When will this end?’” says Witterick. “And we always turn the question back. Yeah, when will this end? When will we live in a world where people can make choices to be whoever they are?”

    In hell.

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  5. This is child abuse. Someone report them to child protection.

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  6. "When will we live in a world where people can make choices to be whoever they are?”


    If you're talking about making the choice of what sex they are, the answer is never.

    Before you're born, it's written onto every cell in your body. That isn't a "choice". I know it isn't fair to gay people or people suffering from mental illness as regards their sex, but that's life.

    God hates you, you sick pathetic freaks.

    Go ahead, dress your son up in a tutu,indulge your delusions, and when the years of psychological abuse finally catch up to him and he downs a bottle of scotch and greets you at your door cradling a 38 special you can just chant your feel good gender mantras while the twisted murderer you've created gets his due from you.

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  7. As Liesel said, these morons live in Toronto, city of the Slutwalk and now of possibly the stupidest and dangerous parents on the face of the planet.

    It brings to mind the disaster inflicted upon David Reimer by his parents and doctor.

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  8. Liesel, Davout, thanks for pointing out the error. I've emended the post.

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  9. I was at my son's baseball practice. He's nine, and is playing in the local city's recreational system (laid back compared to Little League).

    So there's this girl on the team. Only, he's not a girl. He has a soft, pretty, girlish face, girlish locks, and throws like a girl. I know that in younger age backets girls are allowed, but had forgotten that at this bracket: no girls.

    One of the mothers was sitting next to me at practice, and sheepishly asked, "Is AndrongynousName a boy or a girl?" That it was even in doubt troubled me, because I really thought it was a girl. After some discussion we agreed it is a boy, and I added, "his parents ought to do him a favor and cut his hair short." It turns out her son, and my children, and my wife all thought he was a girl. And he has the androngynous name. (If you want your child's sex to be indeterminate, I believe it really means you're not happy with what sex you got.)

    After I informed my wife the other day, her jaw dropped and eyes popped. "He's a boy??!"

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  10. As much as I have criticized you for way overplaying the 'radical autonomy' concept, this is clearly a glaring example of it.

    And it can only end in tears for someone. Because one logical conclusion of this disturbing experiment is "storm" winds up a very confused individual, extremely likely to self medicate with a whole long list of drugs starting with alcohol.

    There is another solution, of course; a kinder, gentler police state that mandates everyone must celebrate everyone else's choices, no matter how obnoxious or dangerous they may be. A legal regime that criminalizes any dissension from such "choices".

    Of course, we could always wind up with both.

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  11. Agree with George - this is child abuse.

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  12. Hey, good luck to them. Though the fact this is a worldwide media story suggests another common trait of liberals - whatever they do, they do LOUDLY, making sure as many people notice it as possible - no matter how nonsensical it is.

    (Qualifier: I'm sure I'd agree with Storm's parents to a certain extent - some supposed indications of gender are pretty stupid, ie, rules like 'boys have short hair, girls have long hair', and 'girls wear pink, boys don't'. Really, these examples and so many other supposed gender indications are recent phenomena, gender symbols that developed in the 20th century, influenced by mass entertainment, etc, and the best way of treating them is to laugh at them, I think.)

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  13. "some supposed indications of gender are pretty stupid, ie, rules like 'boys have short hair, girls have long hair',... Really, these examples and so many other supposed gender indications are recent phenomena..."

    Excuse me, New Testament was written about 2000 years ago and that's what it says: "Doth not even nature itself teach you, that, if a man have long hair, it is a shame unto him?
    But if a woman have long hair it is a glory to her for her hair is given her for a covering." (1Cor11)

    Distinction in hair lenth is hardly a recent invention.

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  14. Hair styles change a lot over a little time anon. For instance, when the Persians ran into the 300 Spartans at Thermopylae, they found 'the Spartans were indulging in calisthenics and combing their long hair...'

    Those Spartans have gone down in history for that act of sacrifice and courage in defending the pass as some of the manliest men ever!

    At any rate I suspect Paul would be a little concerned to find that his letter about God was being used for hair-style tips for the 20th century. He might, indeed, find that rather to have missed the point.

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  15. This is child abuse. Someone report them to child protection.


    It obviously is, but modern ideology will tell you that it's actually a good, healthy thing.

    On the other hand, they'll tell you that teaching your kids a solid catechism and raising them in the Christian faith is an offense.

    This world is upside down. It literally is crazy.

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  16. TimT I greatly disagree with your assertions. You strike me as a liberal who says "I'm a 'conservative' but I believe in these liberal things...".

    Its not far off like the liberals Mark Richardson has mentioned in this article who say they are liberal but live conservative lives, you are perhaps a conservative who says he is a conservative but lives a liberal lifestyle or believes in liberal things.

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  17. On the other hand, they'll tell you that teaching your kids a solid catechism and raising them in the Christian faith is an offense.

    100% spot on. In our 'modern' world right is wrong, wrong is right and that is while there is no such thing as right and wrong.

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  18. It's interesting how liberals always try to ignore clear biblical commands. Tim,you stated that the hair length distinction between sexes was stupid and a modern invention. The verse proves you wrong, doesn't it? Paul appeals to Natural Law to make his argument: "Doth not even nature itself teach you..."

    As for Spartans, they also engaged in homosexuality. Not exactly an example one would like to follow.

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  19. Let's hope "Storm" is a boy, 'cause he'd make an ugly girl.

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  20. When I looked at the Daily Mail version of this story, I was firstly thoroughly disturbed by the picture of the boy "Jazz" who looks like a girl (braids).

    But if you look at the second picture down, and read the story, I think what is going on is more clear -- and it is not primarily a story of "radical autonomy". This is primarily a story of the homosexuality (or at minimum, the extreme gender confusion) of the parents, especially the mother, and the mother's determination to force her homosexuality (or extreme gender confusion) on her sons.

    Just look at her -- she is mannish and domineering, and her husband is an effeminate little putz. They are obviously gay in my opinion. This explains why the lesbian mother, who like all lesbians, detests men and maleness, is trying to suppress the maleness of her sons. She's not "letting them choose" -- she is FORCING them to act and dress like girls. The story notes, "most people believe the boy are girls" -- and that is the absolutely intended effect that the man-hating lesbian mother wishes to achieve.

    If the parents were TRULY letting the children choose their gender, then you would think that at least ONE of the two older sons would have chosen to be a boy. But they both "chose" to look girly. This is because they did not choose -- the mother chose for them. Why did she do this? Not because she believes in autonomy, but because she is a lesbian and hates men.

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  21. One other thing -- did you notice that the children all have the MOTHER'S surname (Witterick)? Yet another sign the mother is mannish, domineering, and man-hating (not to mention another sign that the man is weak and effeminate).

    These kids will not grow up to be "gender free" -- they will grow up to be gender confused (if they don't cast aside this foolishness in a fit of teenage rebellion). That these parents are inflicting this on their kids is cruel, insane, and abusive.

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  22. 5-year-old Jazz?!

    his(??) pseudonym - Gender Explorer?!

    Let your kid be whoever they are?!


    These parents are not letting their kids "be whoever they are". They are indoctrinating them from the time they emerge from the womb.

    Living in a community grown on their principles would be ghastly. Nothing but "pretty", saccherine drones.

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  23. Attacked by the Anons! Apparently I'm not a real conservative. Well you guys probably care more about that than I do. Apparently I've been proved wrong by St Paul - well I'd suggest you just didn't read my comment - all of it, and do the same with St Paul. (There are other historical examples too.) Hey, if you really want to engage with me about this, why not reveal your online identities? Email me, I'd be happy to have a chat

    timhtrain at yahoo.com.au

    Have a nice night people. :)

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  24. Should have edited that comment a bit, but I'm happy to stand by it.

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  25. TimT yep you're not a genuine conservative. You're just the 'conservative' version of the people Mark Richardson has written in this post. You say you don't care but if you didn't care about this conservation you wouldn't have even written here and wouldn't have a remark akin to this: "I believe in gender roles but I think gender roles don't really exist..."

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  26. Even what Mark calls "Moral liberals" laugh at this.

    The chatty leftie blonde on the 7pm project mentioned this story and blurted immediately:

    "I'm sorry but that is just weird".

    Until a moral liberal has been told that they must believe something absurd lest they be "offensive" they are repulsed just as real people are.

    Just a reminder that near all left-liberal ideas once seemed crazy until generations of university students got brought up to believe them to be 100% true.

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  27. James,

    Well observed. The most committed moral liberals I know are middle-aged, middle-class female English teachers. They are all married with children. They all loved the royal wedding. They all come across as feminine, motherly types. I doubt if any of them have ever opened up a politics book in their lives.

    These women all assume that certain traditional goods will carry on as before, even as they subject the students to a constant blast of corrosive moral liberalism.

    I have no doubt that they would be discomfited by the Storm story. You have to be a political liberal to go against prevailing norms to push liberal principles forward in such a direction.

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  28. What tosh!

    If they are not subtly pushing homosexuality on their boys, they could easily have chosen neutral colored baby clothes and nursery colors,and offered the babies a mixed range of toys of both gender types to play with and experience.

    Food ,rest and medications etc are not gender based,and they could do the modern thing on names in place of "Mum and Dad"

    The child would gradually show its gender, just as left handedness tends to show out with constant use of grabbing, cutting, pointing etc one handed exercises and in play.

    That way the child would not be subjected to so much ridicule.

    Foolish people are enforcing a path for each child that is setting them at odds with others in society, before they are mature enough to cope and before they have had experience of other ways in order to understand and make their own choice--the parents are doing what they condemn ,in a mirror image of what they say they are avoiding,and are too selfcentred to see it!

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  29. ""I have no doubt that they would be discomfited by the Storm story.""

    Wait for the next gen of teachers Mark; most of them will be versed in Gender theory to the exclusion of academic skills.

    About the only way to stop the march of liberal insanity is a reform of the higher ed system. A good start would be to make it purely vocational. Get rid of the wank courses and have people learn skills instead of ideology.

    Anyone who tried this from the right would smack the entire establishment in their home, which is why no lib would ever do it. The left is far too culturally strong.

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  30. It seems so limiting that Storm is considered a child and a baby. This is incredibly suppressive of these narrow-minded backward parents. No way are they progressive. And what's this whole false dichotomy of being alive or dead. Incredibly backward, total social regressives. (/sarc)

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  31. The standard riposte from conservatives to liberals should be similar to that of Plistoanax the Spartan when an Athenian orator accused his people of being ignorant and having no learning:

    "You say true, Sir; we alone of all the Greeks have learned none of your bad qualities."

    or;

    "What you say is true. We have learned none of your evil ways."

    Recorded by Plutarch in "Lycurgus".

    I love the Spartan one-liners.

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  32. You guys are all so right. The world needs more hate. It's a good thing you're here.

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  33. And to think, in the same city as these idiots, someone reported me to Children's Aid for letting my 7-year-old (at the time) walk to school by herself.

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  34. Graham,

    What does hate have to do with any of this? From either side?

    It's an issue of whether our sex is something oppressive to be cast aside in favour of something self-determined, or whether our sex is a positive aspect of our identity which expresses a significant good in life.

    Your knee jerk response of calling us "haters" because we don't go along with liberal PC, says something about the assumptions that liberals make - it has more to do with liberal psychology than the reality of the debate that is being engaged in here.

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  35. Hell! I used to walk home from school by myself when I was five -- for a distance of a mile, with a couple of semi-major streets to be crossed. I was in morning Kindergarten, so there were older neighbor kids to walk to school with, but wlaking home was solo.

    =========
    "Liberals" hate reality and truth ... so, of course, they hate those who point to truth about reality, and must psychologically project their own hatred upon them.

    It'a all rather pathetic, isn't it?

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  36. Graham's response simply confirms the reality that all liberals can rely on is shaming tactics.

    The liberal Emperor has no clothes and we will surround him with mirrors until he realises the truth.

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  37. Jazza,

    they could easily have chosen neutral colored baby clothes and nursery colors,and offered the babies a mixed range of toys of both gender types to play with and experience.

    Uh huh. Except they didn't. They are dressing their boys as girls and that was always the mom's agenda.

    they could do the modern thing on names in place of "Mum and Dad"

    But why? It is stupid, counterproductive, and immoral to let your kid call you by your first name instead of "mum" or "dad". Undercutting your authority as a parent does neither of you any favors.

    The child would gradually show its gender, just as left handedness tends to show out with constant use of grabbing, cutting, pointing etc one handed exercises and in play.

    You obviously have NO children. I do, of both genders, and NONE of them "gradually showed their gender". Their behaviors were distinctly male and female from the beginning.

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  38. "You obviously have NO children. I do, of both genders, ..."

    I must quibble ... the proper word isn't 'gender,' it's 'sex.'

    'Gender,' as used like this, is a "liberal" word/concept, meant to win the cultural battle by stealth.

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  39. llion, I was going to say something similar. "Gender" is a grammatical term co-opted by progressives in order to redefine the whole concept of sex, including the bone-headed idea that it's a social construct and that there are more than two sexes and that "gender identity" is not the same as biological sex. It's ridiculous, thus we should not use the word gender unless we're talking about French nouns.

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  40. we should not use the word gender unless we're talking about French nouns.

    I use the word "sex" wherever possible because of this. But I find occasionally that its use would be ambiguous with the other meaning of sex and so substitute the word "gender".

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  41. Their behaviors were distinctly male and female from the beginning.

    Same with my two.

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  42. Andrew Bolt followed you on this Mark.

    http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/but_we_can_judge_the_parents_for_whats_between_their_ears/

    Check out the comments below, even liberal righties who can be as PC as can be on matters of ethnicity revolt at the idea of this.

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  43. http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/but_we_can_judge_the_parents_for_whats_between_their_ears/

    Sorry broken link above.

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  44. When I use "gender" it is in the nonliberal sense, i.e. biologically determined.

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  45. "... But I find occasionally that its use would be ambiguous with the other meaning of sex and so substitute the word "gender"."

    The term for *that* isn't "sex," it's "sexual activity," or "sexual intercourse."

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  46. But, back to (innate) sexual differences ... recall, even these little boys -- intentionally being raised to be sexually confused -- want people to know that they are boys and not girls.

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  47. Storm is a boy. Think mum wanted a girl and lucked out 3 times. Sick woman. How much will these "boys" be picked on at school.

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  48. Sorry, that was certainly an emotional response on my part and not sufficiently expounded. I must also declare that I realize that Conservatives are certainly not all of the same mind on all issues and so I do not think that all conservatives are 'haters,' rather I believe that many of the results of their attitudes result in socially-maladaptive intolerance.

    However, all the same I should point to the comments at 24/05/11 2:01; 24/05/11 3:08; 25/05/11 18:30; 25/05/11 18:45; 25/05/11 18:53/5930/05/11 23:32, which to me all seem as if they can be classed as 'hatred' based on either religious morals or ignorance, as opposed to a careful evaluation of empirically-supportable notions of what good child-rearing is. The former two bases are, at best, contentious sources from which to construct a healthy society.

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  49. Mostly my frustration lies in objection the frequent notion that this upbringing will be bad for the child because he/she will be ridiculed by the 'normal' kids and rejected by society, because he/she is 'at odds' with social norms, and that this will result in a downward spiral of the child's ability to be productive and happy.

    I find that this claim is certainly true in many communities; however it is not /a priori/ true of any community. Rather, it is a result of the prevailing attitudes of any community. A largely intolerant community will likely lead to this child having negative developmental outcomes. I put it to you to argue that in a tolerant community (of which there are many in Toronto, composed of like-minded parents) this child would not grow up perfectly fine. In fact, I conjecture that given the autonomy to make his or her own choices, he or she will develop a greater respect for personal freedom.

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  50. As a further rebuttal (which is from personal experience and comes with the appropriate caveats) I have worked as a special needs consultant within several daycare centres and have noticed that it is actually the children who have learned intolerant behaviours from their parents that are actually the most socially outcast. Instead, the children who show the ability to socially include others whom are different are usually the most popular amongst their peers. Of course, there is the bias that my observations were from within communities in which tolerance of social diversity was important, and so this may not be true in other communities.

    Lastly, I think that it is easy to over-extrapolate the consequences of the parents choice to hide the sex of their child. I think it is pretty clear that as soon as the toddler is able to interact with the world in more ways than gurgling and pooping, he or she will make his or her physical sex known and will choose to take on whatever appropriate gender roles that he/she wants to. I get the feeling that many people think that the parents will try to 'force' gender nonconformity on this child, because they are liberal psychopaths. I would like to point out that this is likely just a knee-jerk, conservative reaction.

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  51. I hope that I am not immediately denounced on partisan grounds for what must seem like an emotional tirade, but I find that there is too little communication and between groups of differing opinions on these matters, resulting in blog 'silos' of opinion which seem to solely function to polarize groups against each other.

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  52. At least the kids aren't in day care so mommy can have her career. Honestly, that fact makes them better than most parents out there, most who are privileged enough to raise their own children but instead they farm it out to poor immigrants or industrial day care centers.

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