“My 15-Year-Old Daughter Told Me She’s Pansexual and Dating a Transgender Boy. I’m Struggling.” (nytimes):
She came out to us as pansexual when she was 11. I was concerned about her labeling herself at such a young age and being bullied. She met a transgender child in summer camp, then a few others, and helped them through some tough times. I was proud of her for her compassion and did not restrict her friendships, though she wasn’t allowed to sleep over at anyone’s house.
This reminds me of The Jean-Paul Sartre Cookbook:
Today I made a Black Forest cake out of five pounds of cherries and a live beaver, challenging the very definition of the word “cake.” I was very pleased. Malraux said he admired it greatly, but could not stay for dessert.
The virtuous Steve Almond, a name that seems to be associated with images of a white-appearing cisgender male, and whom Wikipedia says “lives in Arlington, Massachusetts with his wife and three children”:
it sounds like your underlying anxiety is that your daughter has a sexual identity and desires that aren’t heteronormative. It’s hard enough to move through a world fraught with bigotry as a young Latino woman. It becomes that much harder when you identify as pansexual and have a transgender partner.
Unless he himself is bigoted, how does the white cisgender man know what is difficult or easy for a “young Latino woman”?
Mr. Almond says the important questions to ask are not about sexuality, but rather “Is she happy? Is she doing well in school? Is she kind to those around her?” But why is doing well in school plainly more important than what kind of sex the daughter is having and with whom? Suppose that a high school Student A gets 1600 on the SATs and straight As and has (safe) sex with a different partner every night, in a full assortment of genders and sexual preferences. Student B gets 1000 on the SATs and has a B average and has no sex partners. The parents of Student B should be envious that the parents of Student A have a superior offspring?
The other writer responding to the mom is Cheryl Strayed, who is a “feminist” and has been married to two different men (“Brian” and “Marco”). Ms. Strayed does not seem to have any experience changing her gender, having sex with other women, etc., yet speak confidently about transgender and pansexual issues:
I encourage you to examine the ways that negative assumptions you’ve made about L.G.B.T.Q. people have needlessly stoked your fears. … Why do you put her current romantic interest in a special category because he’s trans? Because our transphobic society has told most of us that trans people are in a special category, that’s why. But they aren’t. They’re just people.
If trans people are “just people”, why hasn’t Ms. Strayed even once chosen one as a partner for long enough to write about?
Unless he himself is bigoted, how does the white cisgender man know what is difficult or easy for a “young Latino woman”?
His assertion is that young Latino women (quotation marks make no sense) suffer from bigotry. You may think that he’s mistaken, but it’s absurd to claim that only a bigot could know such a thing. This whole notion that people who concerned about bigotry is just nonsense.
I hate to bring stats into this BUT: people with gender dysphoria are ~0.5% of the population (to be generous). Nobody know how many ‘pansexsual’ folks are there, but since these are kind of new, I’d say 0.1% or less of the population.
Fair? What are the chances that
A) a kid with a very rare behaviour meets kids (lots of them, apparently) with a rare disorder?
B) that said kids have to play out the neuroses of the parents?
There is another element in play here that didn’t exist as little as 20 years ago: inclusion.
We need to ask our self if we are in effect causing this to our kids by giving them too much freedom at such an early age. It seems to me that we have become a sensitive society and if you are conservative then you don’t belong; i.e.: you are anti “inclusive” and the problem to society.
Here is a very simple example. Back in the 50’s, 60’s or even 80’s, if your neighborhood kid is bullying someone or hurting someone on the street, you could easily interfere and break things up. Today, even a parent cannot take any action if his/her kid is being bullied.
Yes, I would say the straight A, 1600 SAT, sexual active student is superior to the straight B, 1000 SAT, celibate student.
The parent is right to be “struggling”, and should be very concerned. Every year up to 50% of transgender adolescents attempt suicide. This is clearly a mental health emergency that mandates parental intervention.
http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/142/4/e20174218?sso=1&sso_redirect_count=2&nfstatus=401&nftoken=00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000&nfstatusdescription=ERROR%3A%20No%20local%20token&nfstatus=401&nftoken=00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000&nfstatusdescription=ERROR%3a+No+local+token
“But in the end, the heart desires what it desires. That’s the natural order of things.”
No, it is not the natural order for a 15yo girl to want to date a transgender boy. This is sick.
An 11-year-old comes out as “pansexual”? That’s like … 5th grade?
My first instinct would be no more screen time for you and take away the mobile phone. But you might lose the child to child protective services for denying your pre-menarche daughter access to gender information.
I suspect for a lot of these kids, a “gender” is no more substantial than the goth/punk/jock identities of yesteryears, consisting of clothes, hairstyle, and choice of lunch table. Today’s homoromantic transman is tomorrow’s poly pansexual demigirl, and on until the search for self-identify grows too tedious and you realize even your mother doesn’t find you that interesting.