A couple that concealed the gender of their child for five years have finally announced the big secret — he’s a boy!
Beck Laxton, 46, and partner Kieran Cooper, 44, kept their child Sasha‘s gender hidden because they wanted his “real” personality to develop, according to The Daily Mail. For five years, they referred to Sasha as “the infant,” only gave him gender-neutral toys, dressed him in boy and girl clothing and didn’t allow a TV in the house!
But when Sasha started primary school, the secret was too hard to keep. “I wanted to avoid all that stereotyping,” Beck said. “Stereotypes seem fundamentally stupid. Why would you want to slot people into boxes?”
Only a handful of close family members knew the child’s gender, while friends and other relatives were left guessing. The secret was almost revealed when Sasha took to running around naked, but Beck encouraged him to play with dolls instead.
At school, Sasha wears a top from the girls’ uniform list and encouraged to wear flowery tops on weekends.
“I just want him to fulfill his potential, and I wouldn’t push him in any direction,” Beck explained. “As long as he has good relationships and good friends, then nothing else matters does it?”
What do YOU think of their decision to raise this child gender-neutral? Are they totally crazy or so smart?
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Kate Cousino
Posted at 4:42 PM on February 20, 2013
What’s ridiculous is thinking that they can help his ‘real’ personality develop by withholding information about anatomy, sexual identity and societal norms from a young child. Children are forever looking to those closest to them for models and feedback on how to behave and how to communicate with the rest of the world – and when a child is ‘encouraged’ in specific clothing and activities, that child will gravitate towards the things that garner approval and positive feedback (whether verbal or unspoken).
Yes, a lot of gender norms are societally arbitrary. There have been plenty of cultures and eras where men wore pink and favored ornamentation, and women have only been able to restrict their labor to child and domestic roles in very wealthy societies. BUT…within a society, conventions of dress and behaviour serve as a kind of language. This child has been raised ‘tone-deaf’ to this language, and that is a disservice. This child has been deprived of the ability to make his own decisions about gender and identity, by being deprived of important information about the society he will have to live and work in.