All right, so I’m sure you’ve already heard about young Storm.

If you haven’t, the brief explanation is that (basically) the parents of Storm are refusing to tell anyone the gender of their infant.  Even the grandparents.

Apparently, they would like to raise Storm free of the gender expectations that society imposes upon people, and let “Storm decide who Storm wants to be.”

They have so far raised two young sons in a non-conforming gender type of way, as one of them, Jazz, loves pink, having his long hair in braids, and nail polish.

I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that the experiences they are having with their older son and his non-conforming preferences are coloring their view of what they would like society to be, and how they are hoping to somehow avoid that with Storm. 

 According to the article, they have been getting some outside pressures regarding Jazz and his preferences.  I’m sure this upsets them, and him, and they are pushing back against a society that says a boy must act this way and a girl must act that way.  Although to be fair, girls are pretty much encouraged to do all kinds of “boy” things, while boys are often frowned upon for doing girl things, but that’s another post entirely.

My personal thinking is that they should be a bit more aggressive in defending Jazz and his decisions.  They “unschool” their children, and it almost seems as if they are trying to shield Jazz from teasing and such, which as a parent I totally understand.  But there is a difference between wanting the world to be a certain way and facing the reality of how the world actually is.

How entrenched is gender?  Is it completely innate?  Is it learned? 

If gender is never brought up, does it never become an issue? 

But how could it not?

I’m not sure I would be comfortable conducting that experiment upon my child.