Gender-creative parenting is the most stupid idea yet.

Saying that “gender-creative parenting is the most stupid idea yet” may cause you to raise your eyebrows. You’re probably thinking I’m crazy to even speak to this topic since the argument is so divisive in nature, but I think this subject is one of the most important of recent years, and it’s fast gaining traction, so I’m going to go for it. This blog is going to lay out the whole argument, and you owe it to your kids if you’re even considering this approach to read this first.

Let’s first note that in the world of discussion, there are facts, opinions, and beliefs. Facts speak for themselves; they are reality. When presented with facts, you can usually change your opinion about a topic, unless, of course, you’re in belief territory, which is where many people these days hang out. The difference between opinion and belief is that if a particular opinion becomes a belief, the holder of that belief gets very upset and emotional when challenged by the facts.

Let’s start by focusing on something we can probably all agree on, which is that gender creative parenting is a fairly recent phenomenon that is now gaining traction. Sure, they were talking about the idea behind it—gender being distinct from biology in obscure academic institutions for some time, but this idea has only recently shown up on most people’s radar. 

Are sex and biology really different?

Sex, they tell us, is biology. Gender is how you identify.  Apparently, the two are different. According to this viewpoint, you can be anywhere on the gender spectrum, or you can even be outside of it. This has now been enshrined by our institutions as truth. We are told you can be a girl trapped in a boy’s body and vice versa, and what you feel inside is your truest self. That means, from a logical standpoint, that your sex and all the pieces of anatomy and physiology that define your sex can theoretically be wrong.

Up until now, there has always been a neutral space for those who are really suffering from body dysmorphia, but the numbers have always been tiny. Until today. Suddenly queer theory and trans activism that peddles this view have roared into view, and you only need to look at your closest school or library to see how quickly this idea has spread.

And suddenly, our kids are being exposed to something completely different. Parents are told that “gender creative parenting promotes gender equality and the freedom to express however you feel without being tied down by gender stereotypes.” Dr. Christia Spears Brown, a developmental psychologist and author of two books on the subject says “Let (kids) know gender is diverse, beyond binary.” 

So are we talking about the simple concept here of being totally fine with girly boys or tomboyish girls playing with whatever toy they feel like, something that most people would have no issue with, or is there something else at work here? Let’s answer that question by taking a look at the sex and gender question—the elephant in the room, as it were.

Gender-creative parenting is the most stupid idea yet:  Where did this start?

Right now, we are told that it’s a fact that there is a difference between sex and gender. That you can ‘choose’ your identity, and if it doesn’t fit in with the one you’re born with, no worries, just change it. But is this ‘fact’  based on reality, on science, or is it a belief?

Well, firstly, you might like to know where the idea that you can change someone’s gender to make it distinct from their birth sex originated. John Money was the originator of the terms “gender identity” and “gender role.” He used these terms to describe the “inner experience of sexuality and the social expectations of male and female behaviour” and argued that it was not nature but nurture that determined a child’s sexual identity.

Gender-creative parenting is the most stupid idea yet: Here comes John Money

So who was this man? Well, he was a psychologist and sexologist who came up with some of his more contentious ideas in the sixties, seventies, and eighties. He was also a sexual deviant. Now I don’t say that lightly, so here are the links so you can look up his deviancy for yourself: here, here, and here, but suffice to say he had absolutely no problem with pedophilia and even promoted the idea, arguing that children are innately sexual beings and should be free to practice their sexuality anytime they wanted with whomever they wanted. I’m sure you’d agree that that’s every parent’s dream.

John Money and his perverse ideas could have, or, I would argue, should have, passed into historical ignominy, but unfortunately, his ideas were only taken up by the scientific community. He was seen as a frontrunner, a pioneer, which is extremely odd, even if you don’t consider the case of David Reimer, a poor man whose life he completely ruined with this ideology. A boy whose parents turned to him to cure David of the medical issue of a mutilated penis by raising him (one of twins) as a girl. Suffice to say, it didn’t work and caused the poor man irreparable harm, so much so that he committed suicide after trying to come to terms with the truth.

What’s worth noting from this tragic tale is that no amount of female hormones, mutilation of his body, or any other intervention stopped David from feeling his masculinity. He was introduced to becoming another sex in infancy, and it never took.

This idea that gender is different and unique from our sex and that we can change it easily lives on and is behind the trans activism we see today, and it’s also behind the idea of gender creative parenting. To explain, I’ll use the words of a large Canadian group in favour of this approach, “Gender Creative Kids.” On their website, they declare, “We take a trans-affirmative approach that encourages a healthy and safe exploration of gender for children, enabling trans and non-binary youth to express their identities in creative ways.”

Now trans activists would look at what I’ve written about and no doubt say that David’s case is different from the dysphoria that trans people feel, identifying as they do with a different gender identity than the one they were born with.  So let’s look more closely at the idea of what choosing a different gender ‘identity’ to your biological sex is all about.

Gender-creative parenting is the most stupid idea yet:  Can you choose your gender identity?

Gender creative parenting encourages you to explore your gender, or you could choose to stick with the one you got at birth, but tell me, when looking at this chart, what colour would you pick if you were a child? You could be boring, you know, just grey and cisgender, or you could be attached to one of those other wonderful colours (colourful options are growing all the time), a member of the rainbow community, which just seems SO much more fun! Oh, and then you might get a whole day, week, month, no sorry, season to celebrate YOU in all your wonderfulness. Not only that, but when you come out, look at the reaction you could get.

Ok, so here’s where it gets personal. I am a coward, or at least I have been. Not anymore. I can no longer stay quiet about what’s happening in our schools, libraries, and across our social lives in general. This doesn’t have anything to do with politics, as I’m neither left nor right. I like to think of myself as a decent person. I don’t discriminate based on race, sex, colour, religion, or anything else. I expect the best from everyone and give them all due respect until they prove to me they no longer deserve it. But now a line has been crossed.

I’ve always felt that anyone who finds themselves trapped in the wrong body is, of course, deserving of respect and help, though I imagine the number of people for whom that is truly the case is inordinately small. Suddenly trans and non-binary identities morphed into a movement, and ordinary gay and lesbian people seemed to just disappear, replaced by a wave of LGBTQ activism mostly of the trans and non-binary sort, which adhered to the idea that no matter what “sex” you are born with, it does not identify your gender and that you can choose to be on a huge list of non-binary “in betweens” that range from 30 to as many as 100.

Gender-creative parenting is the most stupid idea yet:  It’s about changing who you are.

Frankly, let me start this off by saying I really don’t care what “gender” you happen to be. You do “you” and enjoy yourself. Where I have a problem with it is the increasingly urgent need to turn your children and other people’s children into gender-confused people themselves. That’s what gender-creative parenting leads to. It’s not the freedom to be who you are; it’s the subtle pressure to change who you are, to introduce the idea that the way you are may not even be right, this during a time in your life when you rarely know up from down and left from right.

The activism that hides behind gender creative parenting isn’t doing anyone any good, and it’s got to the point where the ideology behind it and the activists that support it have become one big, loud, ideological mob that has up until now frightened me and most otherwise sensible people. It’s hidden the truth about puberty blockers, hormones and health effects.  It has silenced the growing group of people called “detransitioners” because of the danger to the whole-scale adoption of the ideology they represent. Why silence or marginalize those people? Why stop discussion of this important issue by labelling anyone who disagrees as a bigot and a transphobe? Because once the mob finds we have reservations about a whole-scale dive into a radical ideology whose effects are likely to be long-lasting and severe, they want to shut us up. They have managed to penetrate our institutions and our governments, and people cower in fear of being silenced. But I won’t be silenced because this is about the health of our children and their mental well-being, and negatively affecting that is something that we should all stand against.

Gender-creative parenting is the most stupid idea yet:  But shouldn’t you be progressive?

Perhaps you’ve heard that gender-creative parenting is the way to go. You like to think of yourself as a progressive parent, so why not involve the kids in activities that display all the various different kinds of people? What harm could there be in that? Perhaps you think it’s a great way of teaching your kids about tolerance, understanding, and love and showing them that nobody needs to worry about staying within the sexual binary.

Gender-creative parenting is the most stupid idea yet:  Drag Queen Story Hour

So you decide to take the kids to Drag Queen Story Hour at the library. Ok, let’s look at that idea. Vancouver’s Connie Smudge spoke just a few months ago, but you can find drag queen story hours all over the place. On the surface, Connie looks like a kind old granny, and it’s clear “she” likes kids when she entertains them at the Vancouver Library Story Time. She’s a good reader too, so why would I have a problem with this? Well, because of one thing. The word “Drag Queen.” A drag queen is, and should remain, adult entertainment. Like many drag queens, Connie is entertaining and could easily be mistaken for an eccentric woman. If she were to read ‘Story Time” under those auspices, I wouldn’t have a problem, but the moment it becomes “Drag Queen Story Time,” it becomes about endorsing what should be adult entertainment to children in the public sphere. To be sure, when it comes to drag shows and kids, Connie’s entertainment is fairly benign, but it has an undercurrent of subtle sexual pressure because she is a drag queen. Therefore, it’s not about the story but what the story represents. Take her video series of children’s stories under the auspices of the North Vancouver City Library’s YouTube channel. This one is called “The Hips on the Drag Queen Go Swish, Swish, Swish,” and it’s written by “Little Hot Mess. 

Hmm, let’s take that apart. First, swishing is just a part of dancing, but when it’s specifically a drag queen doing the dancing, it’s sexualized by its very inherent nature. This isn’t a regular person dancing; it’s a parody of a woman’s dancing, done by a man dressed as a woman, exaggerating the feminine hip moves of a woman. Similarly, the stomp, stomp, stomp of high heels is a parody of the look and feel of a woman walking in high heels. I’m all for a laugh, and seeing this at some evening performance surrounded by adults is fine, but around children, it’s not. Why?  Because three- and four-year-old children have no idea what a drag queen is, nor should they. They are just kids. Pointing out or putting focus on the sexualized nature of gender and how people can switch gender and forcing that on small children before they have the maturity to understand the issue is just plain wrong, and there’s tons of evidence that it’s leading us to insane levels of body dysmorphia and sexual confusion in children. I’m sure Connie would say none of this is sexual, but the book she’s reading is by “Little Hot Mess.” Unless she’s saying it’s written by a kettle or a pot, then the sexual message is clear.

But no matter what you think of Connie, it’s small potatoes when you look at other examples. Here’s the UK, where dancers are dancing in front of small children dressed in bondage gear or stilletos and a thong. This is again the direct sexualization of children, and it needs to stop. But don’t take it from me; hear it from an actual drag queen. This one is telling you the truth about what exposing your children to this actually means, and it may not be what you think.

Gender-creative parenting is the most stupid idea yet:  It’s a trend.

But let’s look at this trend and see where it’s leading us. A full 20% of the Gen Z population in the US is currently identified as non-binary. This is a huge leap from the past, and it tells me and anyone paying attention that this has everything to do with increased levels of body dysmorphia brought on by what is effectively social contagion, most of it through social media. Now that would be one thing if it were just that, scary as that is, but it’s being led and cheerleaded by a whole group of people who can best be described as “having no idea what they’re doing.”

This has become an ideology, a badge of woke honour, a virtue-signalling display of a progressive attitude that brooks no dissenters and is championed at the highest level across our government and civil society. Our doctors, teachers, and lawyers are all largely on board. Hormones are being handed out as if they were candy, and confused teenagers are flooding the social media airwaves, expressing their confusion in ever more bizarre outbursts.

This whole movement also, by its nature, removes the possibility of just being gay, lesbian, or bisexual. Suddenly, a girl can’t be a tomboy; she must be a boy trapped in a woman’s body, or a boy just can’t like to play with dolls; no, he’s a girl. Ironically, research has shown that 80% or more of gender dysphoric kids will simply grow up to be gay if they’re left alone. Many in the gay community are seeing what’s happening and are rallying to stop this ideology from spreading further.

Gender-creative parenting is the most stupid idea yet:  It hurts kids.

Our kids are hurting. They are mutilating their bodies. Some are making decisions to change who they are on a fundamental level because of a trend. These decisions made when young and going through the normal confusion of the teenage years will have enormous consequences. It could ruin their fertility and their ability to breastfeed a child. Children’s chest reconstruction surgery, euphemistically referred to as “top surgery,” is up by 400% in the US in 2019. It’ll be a lot higher now. Sexual relations in the future could be a painful reminder of the normalcy denied them. The rest of their lives they could spend wondering why we stayed silent and let them do it.

The “love” that these trend cheerleaders seem to champion so much cannot be the act of pointing out a disaster that is unfolding. No, love is obedience. To disagree is to be banned, banished, or have your livelihood removed. I was astonished that during one TV interview with Connie Smudge, the interviewer labelled people who didn’t agree with “Drag Queen Story Hour” as “haters.” Hello?  You disagree with the tenets of an ideology, and suddenly you’re a “hater.” No, I’m not a hater. I stand up because I love kids. I love everything about them—their innocence, their unblemished view of the world, and the goodness of people. We have a responsibility for these children. When you truly “love,” you have to stand up for what you believe in and for the people you love, no matter what the consequences.

Gender-creative parenting is the most stupid idea yet:  It doesn’t even work.

Gender-creative parenting is the most stupid idea yet because it’s more than allowing children flexibility in what they enjoy or avoiding conformity of outcome based on gender stereotypes. Instead, it sows confusion about who they are. It makes kids question the very essence of their biology and makes them believe that it is truly possible to change their sex and fully be the other sex with all its inherent social, biological, and physiological characteristics. That is simply not true.

You might like to know that 57% of children with dysphoria had preexisting mental health conditions prior to the onset of dysporia. A depressed girl engaging in self-harm will not suddenly wake up joyfully as a fully realized man. She will not wake up and leave all her mental health issues behind her. Such a dream is a fallacy. What will likely happen instead is that she’ll be put on puberty blockers, then cross-sex hormones, and then, once on the path, endure myriad life-altering surgeries. These major surgeries may have complications. She will endure pain and suffering, lose her breasts, and never be able to breastfeed a child. She will be sterile. If she had been left alone, it’s more than likely she would have simply grown out of it. She may have wanted to be a lesbian. She will never, however, be a fully realized man.

In just the same way a boy undergoing the same procedure will never grow up to feel the whole scope of womanhood. If a young man was depressed before surgery, he’ll more than likely end up depressed in a dress.

You cannot change reality, and sometimes it may seem cruel, but to tell our children that reality can be changed when it can’t is to sell them a lie and create confusion that may well haunt them for a lifetime.  Our job as parents is to protect.

My advice when it comes to gender-creative parenting is: don’t do it.

 

The way we parent, focusing on our traumas often makes our kids less, not more, happy.

Do you know the secret to parenting?

Have you got a child that refuses to help out?

Are you dealing with a child that just won’t stop interrupting? 

Here’s Annie the Nanny on CTV Calgary talking about how to ground your own personal hovering helicopter.