Children play differently, and choose different toys, depending on whether they are male or female. Even monkeys show these preferences – male monkeys in one study preferred to play with a toy truck while female monkeys chose a doll. Children who have had higher or lower than normal exposure to the hormone androgen in the pre-natal environment show a change in their play choices consistent with the hormonal abnormality – i.e. children with male “bits” but a low exposure to androgen show more feminine play choices, while children with girl “bits” but high androgen exposure show more masculine choices. Boys and girls are actually different. Why are we so worried about this?

‘This kid is going to be socially awkward, ostracized his entire life, and relentlessly bullied. Great job wonder parents.’ – Can you provide me with one piece of evidence that this will be the case? Or are you just regurgitating the tired cliches of people who are so concerned with abiding by the norms that these people are highlighting that they resort to screaming ignorant and ungrounded statements filled with fear and outrage?
As shocking as it may be to you, not everybody who doesn’t conform to norms or who has had a life that differs from what is (unrealistically) considered normal, has an awful life full of lonliness and rejection.
Quite apart from which, it’s a sign of how little self worth you actually have that you consider the chance that other people may react badly to a person to be grounds for that person to change how they act when in fact it is the people who are blindly following the outdated social norms that they have been forced to abide by and acting hatefully to others who do not do so who need to change the way they act.

ANNA, humans are not the only animals to have culture and social structure. Other animals are influenced by the gender roles they are brought up in. The fact that monkeys display differing behaviours based upon gender is not surprising nor does it indicate that those differences are solid and biologically based. If gender was purely a product of biology then we would see identical gender roles in every single human culture, something which could not be further from reality.

That’s enough banging my head against brick walls for me today as i’m sure neither of you will want to stray into the scary territory of exposing your thoughts to proper scrutiny.

@Edward – sorry, but I take the party line: let us make man in our image, after our likeness… God created man in his image; in the divine image he created him; male and female he created them. Gen 1:26,27. I appreciate the intelligence of your discussion, but it is just another example of man trying to do whatever they want to do and call it freedom – instead of doing what they ought to do. Look, by its very nature the institution of marriage and married love is ordered to the procreation and education of the offspring and it is in them that it finds it’s crowning glory. That is the purpose of marriage. And we are to have children, and raise them up to do the same. But we have to get weird and do things differently, and that is why everything is in a mess! We
Live in an age of skepticism, when everything is held under suspicion, and even engage. Couples make exit strategies! Our faith in God must not be influenced by the spirit of our age. With God there is not risk of betrayal. Be well.

Sick, sick parents. Poor kid wearing that half girl/half boy school uniform. We all know how cruel other kids can be in school. Imagine what they’ll be saying to him & how they’ll be beating him up!

“God created man in his image; in the divine image he created him; male and female he created them. Gen 1:26,27.” Blah, blah, blah. If you can’t come up with an argument that doesn’t revolve around projecting your own magical thinking on to rational people, please just don’t even bother.

I think it’s a little extreme. But I also think that it’s going to take some extreme measures to have a real societal conversation about gender. So for their pioneering efforts, I applaud these parents. I’m also trusting that they mean what they say about wanting their child to have an honest CHOICE. Prepubescent kids are often more conservative than adults – they want to fit in, they want to uphold the status quo, they want rules to follow. I imagine their son will soon CHOOSE to conform to male gender norms, for good reasons (he truly wants to play with that truck) and bad (he’s bullied out of the play kitchen). The real test of their parenting will be whether or not they respect that, and how they address gender roles within his choices. And the real test of this experiment of theirs will be how their son behaves in his adolescent and adult relationships, including and especially when he has his own children. It will be very interesting to see.

I get the reasoning behind wanting to hide their son’s gender, but honestly, they could have raised him in a similar fashion w/o keeping it a secret. They still could have chosen to let him wear what he wanted, played w/whatever toys fancied him, ect and he still would have been exposed to the same values they were trying to instil in him. The only difference is that they didn’t get the drama usually associated w/others who would have questioned/challenged thier choices, but that’s only gonna be temporary b/c they are gonna deal w/those issues and then some now that he’s going to school. I’m not saying what they did was wrong, BUT I question whether or not their choices will hurt thier child later on. It just seems like it will be such a burden on him b/c while he’s lived this gender neutral life, his classmates didn’t and naturally this might expose him to being bullied or having feelings of insecurity. It’s one thing for an older child or young adult to take on the responsibility to live their lives as gender neutral but to put that on a child from birth might not always be the best option. I wish them all the best.

I think it is bizarre and disturbing. Honestly, males and females are wired differently and have different brains, right from birth. They tend to be have different strengths and weaknesses and see the world in different ways. Rather than see those differences as a threat in some way, I think that we should celebrate what being a boy or being a girl means. I think children should be proud of their gender, as it is a part of them and should be a part of their identity. I also think this could be quite confusing for a child. I am completely comfortable exposing my sons to a variety of toys, including baby dolls, and my daughter (who has 2 big brothers) will undoubtedly play with lots of trucks and other “boy” toys once she is old enough. My older son also has mostly girl friends, mostly because we have many girls in our neighborhood and in his class. I think it is healthy for kids to be exposed to and comfortable with things that are both “boy” and “girl” while at the same time be able encouraged to be proud of their gender, whether boy or girl. If one of my boys decides to play with mostly “girl” things, then fine, but to do what these parents have done seems to teach the child to be ashamed of their gender from the beginning.

I feel like there has to be a middle ground. I wholeheartedly agree that the toy and clothing industries box our children into stereotypical gender roles (blue trucks for boys, pink princesses for girls) and I take issue with the fact that identical toys are color-coded for its user depending on gender, but I do think that these parents chose to take a pretty extreme approach. I have one 2 year-old son, who plays with baby dolls, trucks, books, and whatever else he fancies. His favorite dress-up clothes are dresses and tutus and we plan to give him a dollhouse for his third birthday because he loves playing with my old dollhouse at my parents’ house. But he also loves balls and sports and trucks (as did I when I was his age), and I encourage the use of both equally. Extremes on either end can be equally damaging, and I think we all need to try and take things a little less seriously.

I think it’s all silly. For generations people have turned out just fine and now you want to start a revolution by sending your child into the world dressed as half boy, half girl? I understand wanting to prevent society from defining who your child will become but keeping his gender a secret??? Doesn’t that open up a door to “not being proud of who you are?” Way to go for trying to be creative, but shame on you for using your child to try and get a point across! You’re asking for your child to be target!

As a transgender m2f I really don’t thing this is bad. i get judged and thought of as a freak everyday of my life. A man is a man and a woman is a woman is something that is out dated. These parents are only trying to let their children be whoever they want to be and there is nothing wrong with a person being happy with whom they are and no one should tell them any different. Maybe we as a society need to show Compassion and understanding but the “BIBLE” says different! The bible was made by man NOT GOD!!!!!! The bible is also Interpreted from different languages and edited also so who are we to judge anyone are you God? No!!!! I’m not God either! Maybe if we all stopped worrying about what either people are doing and Concentrated on our own person the world just might be a better place.