Yes I’m sure women who’ve just given birth will REALLY appreciate that question.
https://twitter.com/binarythis/status/1082503987331457024
Yes I’m sure women who’ve just given birth will REALLY appreciate that question.
https://twitter.com/binarythis/status/1082503987331457024
Comments
13 responses to “The form of your child”
I would have no idea how to answer that question.
My reply would be ‘are you asking “girl or boy”?’
It’s a parody account, isn’t it.
TELL ME IT’S A PARODY ACCOUNT.
That makes the child sound like a product. I hate that.
Apparently, this was a joke. Sort of. But you have to be a Queer Theorist to be in on it: https://twitter.com/binarythis/status/1084962645877219328
When the logic professor was asked “girl or boy?” the reply was “yes”.
Chris @5, I don’t 100% disagree with her. I am so sick of gender reveal parties, and everyone thinking it’s important whether your baby is a boy or girl. I had my son 35 years ago, and did not know the sex in advance. Most people asked me, but how can you prepare? How will you paint the room the right color? What if you have the wrong clothes? My answer, I wish had been Fuck off. Instead I mostly said “That isn’t particularly important in deciding what color to paint the room (it was actually done in soft tan and Winnie the Pooh) or what clothes to put the baby in. I don’t plan to force my child to play the part of a particular gender before it’s even born (or after, for that matter, though I had a huge battle on that account with grandparents, aunts, and uncles who were absolutely sure he needed to do “boy” things and play with “boy” toys).
How can you not like gender reveal parties?:
https://www.cnn.com/videos/us/2018/11/27/arizona-gender-reveal-wildfire-orig-video.cnn
Here’s a recent piece by the Hannah McCann:
https://binarythis.com/2018/04/08/why-trans-exclusionary-feminism-is-anti-feminist/
So she was clearly kidding on the square at most.
How to really ask a newborn baby’s sex? I’ll ponder that question the day the parents don’t excitedly volunteer that information along with the name, length, weight, and time of birth. It hasn’t happened yet (I guess I just don’t know cool people that choose to raise their baby as non-binary “so they can decide for themselves”).
If you want to ask about newborns without involving gender, you could just ask about them without involving gender. Is your baby well? How much do they weigh? Was the birth relatively untraumatic? Are they sleeping much? Have you decided on a name? How is your support network for the first few months – do you have baby’s grandparents, or parent friends of yours, you can lean on for advice or some practical help, while you’re getting used to the parenting thing?
If the parents choose to reveal the gender via pronouns or an unambiguously gendered name, you’ll also find out their “cultural interpretation” too. If the parents manage not to reveal the baby’s gender over the course of a 5-minute conversation about it, they’re probably trying to make it a non-issue, and would appreciate you not delving any further.
That ‘cultural interpretation committee’ must work mighty quickly.
Skeletor – and there are the endless pictures, more pictures of a rather ordinary looking baby than most movie stars keep in their portfolios. Of course, you can often tell sex from a picture because the parents will carefully dress them to assure that, since a baby’s sex isn’t often readily apparent when it is fully dressed (they all sort of look alike, at least to me, but I’m not a baby person).
I have been the unwilling recipient of many hours of baby picture staring, seeing babies with pink bows in their non-existent hair (glued on? Who knows?), blue onesies with cutesy football or dragon designs, blankets carefully colored for the proper sexual upbringing, and t-shirts festooned with all sort of princess or macho slogans to make sure no one ever thinks their child is the opposite sex.
And then we insist that gender is essential? Oh, please!
iknklast, I call that ‘babies with pink bows in their non-existent hair‘ thing the Yorkshire Terrier look.
AoS: I’m not that taken with babies, so I’d have to say that’s an insult to Yorkshire terriers.
And I don’t even like Yorkshire terrier that much (number one on my list of Dogs That Have Bitten Me)