I'm kinda okay with that. I don't think it's a battle the parents can win, but why not spare the kid a little of it if they can? It's so ridiculous at this point anyway.
Okay. To do in the next hour: shower, dress, staple brochures, pack all the CRASH Japan stuff, feed self, dog, and spouse, check on spouse, Walgreens on the way for Advil, Nyquil, kleenexes, something I misremember, get to rehearsal.
Oh, and water the plants. I forgot to water the plants even after telling you guys. Doing it now.
The problem I have with making kids stuff "gender neutral" is that in practice, it almost always just means getting rid of all the girly stuff. It's not "gender neutral," it's "boy-by-default."
I imagine once you want to enroll your child in public school, they're going to insist on knowing the child's gender, too.
It's also an interesting look at how much gender can mean or not mean, to the parent as well the individual. I had Sara in something with flowers on it (but not excessively pink) before she had much hair, and someone in the supermarket remarked on how adorable *he* was. And it hurt, stupidly, because to me Sara was a girl -- it was already part of her identity for me, whatever that means.
It would all be easier if English has a gender-neutral pronoun that wasn't plural. I don't mind saying "they" when I'm talking about unspecified persons, but when talking about someone - a baby - right in front of me, it doesn't sound right. If we could look at a baby and coo, "oh, isn't ** cute!" without having to say he or she or IT, knowing the baby's gender might not seem quite so important.
I had Sara in something with flowers on it (but not excessively pink) before she had much hair, and someone in the supermarket remarked on how adorable *he* was.
That happened to a friend of mine. Her daughter was in a light blue shirt with flowers embroidered on the front and ruffly sleeves, and someone commented on how cute the little boy was. She said, "She's a girl," and the woman commenting said, "Then why is she wearing blue?"
billytea: Hi everyone. Um... No earthquakes here. (Is that a spoiler? Should I be whitefonting?)
Erin: Worrying about the Rapture is on my list of shit to be concerned about. It's right under item 20,306: Worrying about corkboards becoming animate and eating me.
You guys make the Apocalypse fun!
Wow. Speaking of perception, Ben has a friend over. Apparently he's also in eighth grade, but this kid has to be six feet tall, and could probably throw me across the room. No way I'd think *middle-schooler* if I saw him on the street.
It would all be easier if English has a gender-neutral pronoun that wasn't plural. I don't mind saying "they" when I'm talking about unspecified persons, but when talking about someone - a baby - right in front of me, it doesn't sound right. If we could look at a baby and coo, "oh, isn't ** cute!" without having to say he or she or IT, knowing the baby's gender might not seem quite so important.
In older books (I noticed this most recently in Wuthering Heights, but I've seen it in other stuff from that era), it seems like people refer to children as "it" all the time, even when the gender is known.
My grandmother persisted in referring to me as "it" even when I was right there, until I was about ten years old. This may be why I dislike referring to children as "it".
Didn't people (at some point in the past) dress small children v. similarly up until an ages (not sure what age it would be) - i.e., long hair, clothing more like gowns?
