Reply to Rude to ask if someone is a boy or a girl?

Forum Index » Elementary School-Aged Kids

Reply to "Rude to ask if someone is a boy or a girl?"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous]DS 7 comes home from camp and tells me he doesn't know if XX is a boy or a girl.  "Did you see XX?  He sounds like a boy and acts like a boy but when we went swimming he put on a bikini so I guess he's a girl?"  XX has an androgynous name.  I told DS it doesn't matter if XX is a boy or a girl.  Sometimes people who seem like boys are really girls and sometimes boys like to wear girl's clothing.  Just play with them if you like them.  DS 7:  Ok, but I'm going to ask XX if he's a boy or a girl.  Me: No, don't do that.  DS7: Why not?  Me:  It's rude.  DS7:  But how will I know whether to call them a boy or a girl?  Me: ummm....Just call them XX.  DS7: (doubtfully) ok....

In preschool, there was a child who presented as a male one year and then as a female the next year.  The teachers told the kids that this child is a girl now even though last year it seemed like she was a boy.  My DS asked me about that too and I was able to say that he should refer to this child by the female name we were told and treat her as a girl.  I was impressed at how little concern the kids had over it (the parents were a bit ruffled, but kids were fine).  In that instance, I had been told what to do so it was easy.

Here, I wasn't sure whether DS should ask whether XX is boy or girl (is that like asking about which pronoun a person prefers?) or whether DS should kind of ignore the whole thing as being personal (like asking someone's race would be inappropriate?) and focus only on whether he likes playing XX or not.  I also wasn't sure if I should raise the option that XX doesn't identify as boy or girl?

DCUM, educate me, please in case this comes up again.[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics