Both: Early childhood socialization and what causes people to become trans

submitted by worried19 from self.GCdebatesQT

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[–]MarkTwainiac 5 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 0 fun6 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

You're still not defining what you mean as "feminine" beyond the most superficial sexist stereotypes of clothing, hair and "gendered things."

so these are the types of gendered things that are evident to preschool age kids. That and whether they want to be either a "mommy" or a "daddy." Very feminine little boys identify with their mothers and little girls their age, instead of the same-sex identification that is considered developmentally normal.

Really? Is this information you have learnt and decided is the gospel truth from studying child development, from teaching or working with kids in another capacity, or from raising your own kids?

I admit it's been decades since I studied child development and my own kids were in preschool, but still what you are saying doesn't comport with what I have read or observed of children myself. Nor does it fit with my own experience as a child.

When I was a a preschooler and small child myself in the 1950s and early 60s, neither I nor the kids I hung out with wanted to be either a "mommy" or a "daddy"- we aspired to be letter carriers, taxi drivers, street sweepers, builders, city planners, train conductors, explorers, car wash operators, police officers, window washers and so on. This was the case with my younger siblings who were born in the 1960s too. Nor do I recall that the many kids that I babysat for in the 60s and 70s and helped out with when I volunteered and visited nursery schools in the 1980s all wanted to be "either a mommy or a daddy."

When my own kids were in preschool in the early 90s, they didn't fit this mold - and the preschool age kids I know today don't fit it, either. What you're saying sounds to me like tales of "Alice in Genderland."

Very feminine little boys identify with their mothers and little girls their age, instead of the same-sex identification that is considered developmentally normal

I have adult sons who identified with me as much as with their father when they were little boys, and who I never looked at and labeled as "feminine" or "masculine." I have known many single mothers and lesbian mothers whose sons did not grow up with a mommy and a daddy in the home, and therefore did not have the options you set forth as the only ones. In my own case, i related more to my father and a favorite uncle all my life than to my mother or other adult females who helped raise me. One of my sons when he was preschool age used to speak about my clothing and possessions as "ours" and would say things like, "mom, we have shoes like those, don't we?" pointing at ladies shoes in a shop window. He used to love clomping around in my shoes, wearing items of my clothing and nicking and wearing my costume jewelry too. I didn't realize that none of this - and none of us - was "developmentally normal."

I'd like to look into the work of the child development experts who say preschool kids are naturally wedded to sex stereotypes, that they all "want to be either a mommy or a daddy" and that it's only "developmentally normal" for kids to have an affinity for and "identify with" parents of the same sex - which assumes that all kids grow up in households where two parents are present, and one is of each sex. Coz this sounds odd and regressive to me. Can you give me their names please? Thanks.

[–]worried19[S] 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

You're still not defining what you mean as "feminine" beyond the most superficial sexist stereotypes of clothing, hair and "gendered things."

That's exactly what I mean. Those superficial gendered things along with the socially approved male and female cultural roles.

I'm not a parent or a researcher. I can only go off what I've read and experienced myself. I can't point to specific studies, but generally I thought it was accepted that boys see themselves growing up to be men and girls see themselves growing up to be women. Most girls do not imagine themselves growing up to become their fathers, I don't think.

[–]MarkTwainiac 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

I'm not a parent or a researcher. I can only go off what I've read and experienced myself. I can't point to specific studies, but generally I thought it was accepted that boys see themselves growing up to be men and girls see themselves growing up to be women. Most girls do not imagine themselves growing up to become their fathers, I don't think.

But you said as if it were a well-established, blanket truth applicable to everyone everywhere in every historical period that all little girls and little boys want to grow up to be "either a 'mommy' or a 'daddy' - not a woman or a man - and that it's "developmentally normal" for children to exclusively "identify with" parents of the same sex, even though not all children grow up with a parent of the same sex in the home.

If your views are based solely on your own experience growing up, what you've read, and what you assume/think is "accepted," then please present them that way instead of making grand statements that suggest you've got expertise in child development that comes from extensive study of the subject and perhaps also plenty of experience teaching and raising children.

[–]worried19[S] 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

I think you're reading way more into my statement than was there.

If you have evidence that so-called "normal" boys see themselves growing up to be women or "normal" girls see themselves growing up to be men, then I'm open to hearing it. But I think it's been well established that the opposite is true. At least once kids understand that biological sex is fixed.