I have a gender creative son. His name is Cian and he's 5 years old.
My son identifies as a boy and he loves to wear dresses. You read that correctly. He's a BOY and he wears dresses. My son is not confused. He is not Gay or Transgender. I do not force this on him. It has and always will be HIS choice. He is happy, healthy, well adjusted and confident.
I discuss this further in my other Bored Panda Blog post that went viral here.
I've learned a lot in the last month. I've had many conversations and have met many amazing people.
Something that has come to my attention is a recent article about a fellow Canadian who is determined to have it documented that their child be gender-less.
Given the situation with my son, I've found this story interesting.
I can see WHY there is a desire for this. I can also see all of the positive things with wanting to have an option of no gender on official records.
I get it. I really do.
But....
There IS a need to tell us apart biologically. Mainly for health issues and for purposes of reproduction. Here is where a lot of people start confusing your SEX with your GENDER.
Yes, in the past those two things went hand in hand and there wasn't a difference. Well, we, as a society, have evolved very far from that.
I support this Canadian family in their ideals that their child's gender should be something that is defined by the child as they grow and develop. But, I also firmly believe that children and other members of society NEED to have their sex as a part of their identity.
Why? We are biologically made differently. Yes, granted, with hormone treatments/blockers/surgeries etc etc some of those things can be changed, but at the end of the day, there will ALWAYS be a "male" and a "female" counterpart for reproduction purposes.
I will add that as technology evolves, this idea may become dated lol. I'm aware of that. But, as it stands, a "male" cannot carry a child in their body and a "female" cannot ejaculate sperm. All of this has to do with our SEX.
Not our GENDERS. So, a Woman can indeed have a "male" reproductive sex and a Man can have a "female" reproductive sex. And this is OK!!! We also function differently and need different medical care. So, in an emergency or at the hospital, people NEED to know what sex you are.
How we look or how we present ourselves to the world should have nothing to do with our reproductive sex.
Moving forward as a society, I think there needs to perhaps be more of a focus on separating our SEX from our GENDER. On official documents it should have SEX: Male or Female (considerations are already made for people who are hermaphrodites) and then have GENDER: the examples here can be endless or simply have Man, Woman, Irrelevant.
My son knows he's a boy because he has a male SEX.
He also identifies his GENDER as being a boy (currently... no one can know what the future holds), but he knows that his gender doesn't define him. He can be whoever he wants to be.
He currently is fascinated with the fantasy that one day he'll be able to carry a baby in his belly like his mummy carried him.... as stated above, who knows what the future holds.
