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How would you raise your children?


Cupcake_Master

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Cupcake_Master

If you don't already have any children. If you do,how did you,or how are you?

To follow their hearts,to follow gender roles,or to not listen to gender roles?

I always say,when I adopt a son I'm going to teach him to cook,like nature,like stuffed animals and like pink.

But that's more so because I would like to teach him to cook,nature is beautiful,I really like stuffed animals and because pink is a very gender neutral color.

I'll let him do what he wants..

Now,with my future daughters,I plan on adopting two when I'm an adult,I'm unsure.

All I know is that I want to teach them to play sports,and teach them and there brother how to lace flowers..Because flower necklaces are awesome.

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I'd let them do whatever they want as long as it doesn't harm anyone. I'd let a little boy wear dresses or play with trucks, whatever he wants, I'd let a little girl wear overalls or play with dolls, whatever she wants. No matter what their sex is, I'd teach them to cook, clean, and how to be respectable beings while still being themselves.

I would constantly worry about schoolmates and how they were being treated.

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Cupcake_Master
I would constantly worry about schoolmates and how they were being treated.

Why would their school friends bother them? Kids aren't all that annoying.

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Do you remember the murder of the middle schooler Larry King?

Children who don't fit their gender roles are constantly harassed in school settings. Kids are cruel. They will harass you if you're a few pounds overweight or even if you do well in class.

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Do you remember the murder of the middle schooler Larry King?

Children who don't fit their gender roles are constantly harassed in school settings. Kids are cruel. They will harass you if you're a few pounds overweight or even if you do well in class.

Kids can be very cruel. If you haven't experienced that, you were lucky to have had a very happy childhood.

I would try not to direct my children to gender roles, but let them decide. But if I had a girl, I would point out that the pay and conditions are a lot better in science and engineering, than in childcare and hairdressing.

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I plan on raising my children as gender-neutral as possible within reason. I'm not going to stop people from buying, for example, either pink clothing for my daughter or blue clothing for my son (whichever I end up having) -- I'll probably even do so myself -- but when they are old enough to voice their own preferences, I certainly won't deny them of whatever they want. My parents bought me boys' clothes when I was a little kid because I hated dresses and skirts after a certain age. They didn't stop me from watching Power Rangers even though only a couple other girls my age watched it (one of whom has been my best friend for fifteen years). It was obvious I had more in common with boys in my class than with girls, but no one ever tried to stifle or change that. That's how I'm raising my kids.

In constrast, my cousin has a 17-month-old daughter. The poor girl's room is crammed with pink things, and she has, I kid you not, pretty much every single item that has the word 'princess' on it that exists on this planet. It actually disturbs me, because it looks to me like she's forcing the girl into this female stereotype of liking pretty things and pink and becoming spoiled and thinking the world owes her something and I can see it happening and uuughh...

I also hate when parents have their baby daughter's ears pierced (said mother of 17-month-old had the baby's done quite awhile ago). Who says they want their ears pierced? Who are you to make that decision? Bleh. Thank god my parents didn't do that to me or my sister. (My sister chose to get her ears pierced when she was in elementary school. I've never wanted them done.)

I would constantly worry about schoolmates and how they were being treated.

Why would their school friends bother them? Kids aren't all that annoying.

I already know I'm going to worry about how my children's peers treat them regardless of what I do. I've met my share of nasty children in my lifetime. I was that kid that my entire class singled out to be picked on until high school (and I still have no idea why)... I certainly don't want my own kids to go through what I did.

"Aren't all that annoying"... what an understatement. The kids I went to school with were downright abusive...

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mad_scientist
I always say,when I adopt a son I'm going to teach him to cook,like nature,like stuffed animals and like pink.

No way in hell I'd teach my kid to like anything (unless good work ethic or healthy food count). Id let them develop their own tastes and preferences, with as few limitations as possible not directly related to their welfare.

Obviously, allowing damaging behaviours such as bullying or allowing a child to slack off so much as to fail school are another issue.

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As with anything, I will teach her (I hope to adopt a girl someday, as I mentioned in another thread) my values but let her find her own preferences. In this case, I will teach her female culture (which is the only culture I know--I'd teach the same stuff to a boy if I had one), but if she has more masculine interests, I will allow her all the space she needs.

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ChaliceFlame

I would like them to make to be able to make choices. However I know society will heavily influence them to act traditionally masculine or feminine. So..I guess I would let them know this is society chooses, but you don't have to be like this if you don't want., you have choices. At least this how I'd hope it'd turn out.

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I hate pink. I dislike it for both boys and girls. In the (extremely improbable) case that I raised children, I would give them and education that enables them to live life-long single in such a way that mating were not a need for them due to education.

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mad_scientist
I will teach them science. And fighting.

I would make a horrible parent, because I simply wouldn't know what to do with a child who didn't like science. Science is the greatest thing ever.

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I admit, I have a bias towards daughters. I imagine having a herd of daughters :D To some extent I'll raise them girly (they will probably have dresses, long hair, ribbons and stuff... things I like! lol) but if anyone buys them bears with Princess written on them or whatever *gags*. You can be TOO girly. I admit I never grew out of liking pink and purple so they'll probably get their exposure from me... but I won't pierce their ears or expose them to make-up (I only wear spot concealer and a bit of powder to even out my skin a bit, no eye shadow or anything) so they'll come to stuff like that themselves. Honestly, I'll probably raise them like me. Things I like, I'll involve them in, naturally. If they show an inclination towards something, like dancing or nature or cookery or whatever, I'll encourage them. If one of my daughters decides she likes toy soldiers, war games and death metal or whatever... she can have the soldiers, the games depending on the age rating and... well, I'll throttle her unless she keeps the volume down rofl

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My ex wife and I were both veggies but we continued to feed our daughter a cross mix of food and allowed her to make the choice to be veggie or not, she chose not to in the end but she did it with all choices avaliable to her.

You cannot be a parent without influencing some direction in your childs life but there are some choices that should be allowed to be the childs

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Elliott Ford
You cannot be a parent without influencing some direction in your childs life but there are some choices that should be allowed to be the childs

Agreed.

The first and most important point in raising my child(ren) will be honesty. Honesty about the choices my partner and i made - because they weren't exactly conventional :)

I'm a rather feminine trans man, I'm a Wiccan, I'm polyamorous... And any child of mine is going to have to understand that they too can live their life the way they know is best for them; regardless of whether they turn out anything like what society expects, anything like me or anything else.

I don't believe in bringing up children to follow any set beliefs, not about religion and not about gender. My children will know what their Dad believes and know that one thing he doesn't believe is that he can tell them what to believe.

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I'd probably bring my children up vegetarian because I don't know how to prepare meat. On the gender side, I will try to bring them up like my parents brought me up... annoyed at Argos' classification of toys into boys and girls.

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My sons are 30 and 29 - yes, I tried (from when they could first talk) to understand that women were not sex objects for men's gratification, fighting achieves nothing, talked to them about things that interested me because it was natural....they grew up to be themselves. They went through the porno magazines became football fanatics (I detest football and wouldn't have it on), John loves cricket (hate it, hate it)

They were typical children - you can try to influence their behaviour as much as you like - but at the end of the day they will become their own adults...the best parents can hope for is that they will become useful members of society...thing is you may dislike who they become but it's highly unlikely that you will ever stop loving them.

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I'm gonna let them be themselves as much as possible, and anticipate more than a few trips to the school to make sure that they won't be mistreated if they're a bit different. I had a nasty school experience, no physical violence or anything, but constantly teased from k-6, and I don't expect that to be avoided just through talking to the teachers, but I'd like to make sure the teacher doesn't add to that. Or stick their hands up the kids' shorts. My kindergarten teacher did that because I prefer standing while I write to sitting and somehow thought it was okay to do a panty check. I don't remember anything else about that year and I haven't been able to go commando since. Unrelated, but, seriously, my problems in school weren't entirely due to gender- it was more due to being an outcast freak because I completely ignore peer pressure and don't care baout what anyone else cared about.

Yeah, I'll probably groan if they end up filled to the top with machismo or spending thousands on clothes they'll never wear just because that top is totally cute. But if that's who they are, who am I to scold them and say "no, you must change your entire personality! Now! Go on, get on with it"? IT's not liek they're hurting anyone. Athough if they are hurting anything, then I'll have a lot to say about it.

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Cupcake_Master
No way in hell I'd teach my kid to like anything (unless good work ethic or healthy food count). Id let them develop their own tastes and preferences, with as few limitations as possible not directly related to their welfare.

Why not? Not, teaching them per say, but keeping them around them.

I meant, I'm going to try to teach them to be gender neutral, or at best try to teach them that gender means nothing, as in females are equal to males, etc.

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Why not? Not, teaching them per say, but keeping them around them.

I meant, I'm going to try to teach them to be gender neutral, or at best try to teach them that gender means nothing, as in females are equal to males, etc.

Your wording made it seem like you'd try to push it on them in the same way most parents push baseball on their sons and ballet on their daughters. If that's the case, it's not any better except that, maybe, it'll balance out the societal pressure rather than pushing the pressure to the other side. To use a rather awful example, there was a Will & Grace where Jack's son tried to become a cheerleader just to get his father to pay attention to him. It was an extremely embarassing, possibly degrading and not at all emotionally healthy situation because he was trying to force himself to be something he wasn't just to live up to his parent's expectation. It's not worse than joining the football team to please a straight father, but it certainly isn't better.

It is good to make it clear that all genders, male female or otherwise, are equal and a girl can do anything a guy can do anything a whatever else can do, and that biological sex doesn't determine gender. It's also good to make it clear that, whatever their gender/sex and whatever their expression you'll love them so they shouldn't feel pressure to be normal, but you also shouldn't pressure them to be different, either.

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