National Geographic Magazine Puts Young Transgender Girl On Cover
Logo reports that the January 2017 issue of National Geographic, focusing on “the gender revolution,” features a 9-year-old transgender girl, believed to be the first trans person on the 128-year-old publication’s cover (or at least one version of the cover).
Because everyone knows nine years old is the perfect age to make life-changing sexual decisions.
When my 6 year old son asked me if he could play with my makeup or try on my nail polish, I simply said, “No, baby. This is for girls and women. You’re a boy. Boys and men, like daddy, don’t use this stuff.” And literally, that was it. I honestly think that parents with children like this just never said no. There are people who genuinely do suffer from mental illness and/or problems like gender dysphoria. But a lot of this can be prevented from a parental standpoint.
Ah yes, a child being transgender is exactly the same as your son wanting to play with makeup/sarcasm. When I was little, my dad let my sister and I put shaving cream on our faces and pretend to “shave” with the plastic razor caps. Kids are curious and like to imitate their parents. Letting a boy play with makeup or a girl pay with shaving cream has no effect on their gender identity development any more than letting a boy play with dolls is going to “make him gay.” These types of arguments are homo/transphobic because they claim that our identities are something chosen or “made up” by parenting.
Gender roles are not the same as gender identity. I sincerely hope you never have a trans kid bc I shudder to think the kind of harm you would do to them given how obsessed you seem with forcing gender roles onto a six year old.
The American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry calls for a set of guidelines for dealing with trans youth that basically amounts to the idea that affirming a child’s gender identity is the only healthy and safe option. Basically the idea is that the goal of psychologists/psychiatrists with trans, nonbinary, or gender questioning patients should be to help them figure out the best course of action to affirm their gender identity, not to cure them of it.
The idea that trans kids should be “cured” of their gender identity amounts in the abusive and torturous practice of conversion “therapy.” This is what ideas like “parent’s just need to say no” end in. Torturing kids. We are finally seeing a push by child psychologists/psychiatrists to end this pattern in favor of actually helping trans, nonbinary, and gender questioning kids.
Nothing about a nine year old trans girl presenting as a girl is a “life-changing sexual decision.” Cis people have this absurd idea that once someone discovers they are trans/nonbinary, we immediately start hormones and go out and get “the surgeries.” In reality, physical transition is a slow process, the course of which (and the choice of which) every trasn/nb person has to decide for themselves.
The most anyone is going to safely give a pre-pubescent trans kid is puberty blockers, the use of which are supported by a 2014 Dutch study and which are reversible. Puberty blockers give trans/nb and gender questioning kids the time to decide on how and if they want to pursue a medical/physical transition and also helps them figure out their gender identity without exacerbating any existing dysphoria they may have. (here’s another ARTICLE on the matter)
As for a nine year old being too young to know they are trans, kids decide to kill themselves that young so I see absolutely no harm in letting a child present in a way that makes them feel comfortable with themselves. People need to stop assuming that children are empty shells with no knowledge of their minds or bodies. If we trust a cis girl when she says she is a girl, if we respect that she is aware enough of her gender identity to know that, then we must extend that same trust and respect to a trans girl.
I am reblogging this one so that you can read so-many-miles-to-go’s excellent comment on the identities of transgender kids.
Also holy fuck I know so many dumb cis people like this lady who think trans peoples’ parents just “never said no.” Uh-uh, most all of our parents definitely did say no, many times, and when that didnt work the yelled and hit and did whatever violence they could to keep us in line. This kind of ignorance makes me sick.
The first comments may have made my eye twitch a little, because they hit way too close to home.
I love my mom to death. She’s an amazing, loving, and incredibly strong woman, but she has such antiquated views on things like this.
My adorable little brother, for instance, loves legos and ninjas and robots, but he also loves pretty things, like flowers and dolls and the color pink. When he wants to try on my makeup or perfume or jewelry, I let him, and don’t tell him there’s anything wrong with it.
My mom’s yelled at me a lot of times for this, and has claimed that “we let boys be boys in this house, and you should be on board with that.” And I wanted so badly to snap back that she’s not “letting” him do anything: she’s inadvertently teaching him that femininity is degrading, and attempting to keep him from doing the things he enjoys.
Gender roles are arbitrary, and always changing. Pink used to be considered a boy’s color. Men used to wear high heels. Little boys used to wear dresses.
Whether your kids are cis or trans, please let them enjoy what they like. My little siblings shouldn’t have to hide what they like from their well-meaning parents, and they shouldn’t already be learning that it’s shameful.
Let your kids be themselves.
