Box Turtle Bulletin
News and commentary about the anti-gay lobby“Now you must raise your children up in a world where that union of man and box turtle is on the same legal footing as man and wife…”
News and commentary about the anti-gay lobbySeptember 23rd, 2013
Childhood gender non-conformity has long been known to be one of the most associated predictors of adult non-traditional sexuality. Many of our LGBT readers will recall play, fantasy, and behavior that seemed to separate them from other children of their own sex and we have all experienced children who elicit that inner “un-huh” which tells us that when the child was older they will find their way to our community.
I don’t recall being extremely effeminate as a child. I was a cry-baby and not good at sports, but I don’t recall adopting many mannerisms or likes and dislikes associated more with girls. I remember playing with cars and building tree forts and riding bikes and going to football games with my Dad and lots and lots and lots of reading.
But that, of course, is the way that my memories and recollections are stored, which may have very little to do with reality. And irrespective of effeminacy, I am certain that I was not a typical or easy kid.
I wonder what was it like to be the parent of a boy who didn’t fit the mold of his football and wrestling champ brothers and who would far rather read than try out for little league (or, at least, not after the first disastrous year). How early did they know that their faith position on the issue of homosexuality would be challenged so closely in the family? Is that why my father preached every other sin from the pulpit, but never got much fired up about this one?
How did my brothers feel? Were they embarrassed about a kid brother who would cry when in conflict rather than fight? Did their own religious convictions build walls between us – even more than was natural for a severely dysfunctional family? Did they wonder why I acted the way I did or why I made the choices I made, in a time when most people thought in terms of ‘homosexual acts’ and a ‘chosen lifestyle’?
My family dynamic is one such that I’ll never know the answer to these questions. And, really, the mists of time would shroud the truth even if the subject is ever broached. The best that I could hope for is some foggy image based on the memories that each of us have chosen to keep.
Which is one of the things that I find so refreshing, so joyful, so liberating, and so revealing about Lori Duron’s book, Raising My Rainbow. I may never know what my parents thought, but Lori gives us a front seat view into the thoughts of her and her husband Matt – right now – as they raise CJ, a little boy who much prefers ‘girl things’.
A little more than two years ago I introduced you to the website of the same name. Lori was new to blogging (and still anonymous) and was telling her thoughts and concerns as we all shared in her experience of raising her son who had developed a love of Barbie Dolls. And the color pink. And toys from the ‘girl aisle’.
If you stayed with Raising My Rainbow site, you have had a place on the rollercoaster that is her life. It’s had some rough patches and there have been times when I doubted the wisdom of some of her decisions. But it has been, throughout, a lesson in honesty, love and acceptance. And these are the themes of her book.
Because I read the site, most of the stories in the book are familiar – though now flushed out in greater detail and with names instead of pseudonyms. And though, as one of her website readers, there were few surprises for me in her book, at no point did the story feel stale or repetitive.
Lori doesn’t try to impart a Very Important Message to her readers. She isn’t telling us how children Should Be Raised or quoting a host of facts, figures or statistics. She not teaching or preaching or lecturing to her readers; she’s just telling her story of her family in her words.
And that makes the book delightful. You can just flow with the rapidly paced story, you needn’t stop to think. But, if you are like me, you most definitely will think – long after you have finished the book and passed it on to a friend. You may even come to see your family though new eyes.
If you ever were perhaps a bit not all-boy or maybe not the girliest girl in town, then I think that you will enjoy and benefit from reading Raising My Rainbow (which you can pick up here in pretty much any format)
I have only one warning, don’t start reading unless you have a chunk of free time; it’s very hard to put down.
Latest Posts
Featured Reports
In this original BTB Investigation, we unveil the tragic story of Kirk Murphy, a four-year-old boy who was treated for “cross-gender disturbance” in 1970 by a young grad student by the name of George Rekers. This story is a stark reminder that there are severe and damaging consequences when therapists try to ensure that boys will be boys.
When we first reported on three American anti-gay activists traveling to Kampala for a three-day conference, we had no idea that it would be the first report of a long string of events leading to a proposal to institute the death penalty for LGBT people. But that is exactly what happened. In this report, we review our collection of more than 500 posts to tell the story of one nation’s embrace of hatred toward gay people. This report will be updated continuously as events continue to unfold. Check here for the latest updates.
In 2005, the Southern Poverty Law Center wrote that “[Paul] Cameron’s ‘science’ echoes Nazi Germany.” What the SPLC didn”t know was Cameron doesn’t just “echo” Nazi Germany. He quoted extensively from one of the Final Solution’s architects. This puts his fascination with quarantines, mandatory tattoos, and extermination being a “plausible idea” in a whole new and deeply disturbing light.
On February 10, I attended an all-day “Love Won Out” ex-gay conference in Phoenix, put on by Focus on the Family and Exodus International. In this series of reports, I talk about what I learned there: the people who go to these conferences, the things that they hear, and what this all means for them, their families and for the rest of us.
Prologue: Why I Went To “Love Won Out”
Part 1: What’s Love Got To Do With It?
Part 2: Parents Struggle With “No Exceptions”
Part 3: A Whole New Dialect
Part 4: It Depends On How The Meaning of the Word "Change" Changes
Part 5: A Candid Explanation For "Change"
At last, the truth can now be told.
Using the same research methods employed by most anti-gay political pressure groups, we examine the statistics and the case studies that dispel many of the myths about heterosexuality. Download your copy today!
And don‘t miss our companion report, How To Write An Anti-Gay Tract In Fifteen Easy Steps.
Anti-gay activists often charge that gay men and women pose a threat to children. In this report, we explore the supposed connection between homosexuality and child sexual abuse, the conclusions reached by the most knowledgeable professionals in the field, and how anti-gay activists continue to ignore their findings. This has tremendous consequences, not just for gay men and women, but more importantly for the safety of all our children.
Anti-gay activists often cite the “Dutch Study” to claim that gay unions last only about 1½ years and that the these men have an average of eight additional partners per year outside of their steady relationship. In this report, we will take you step by step into the study to see whether the claims are true.
Tony Perkins’ Family Research Council submitted an Amicus Brief to the Maryland Court of Appeals as that court prepared to consider the issue of gay marriage. We examine just one small section of that brief to reveal the junk science and fraudulent claims of the Family “Research” Council.
The FBI’s annual Hate Crime Statistics aren’t as complete as they ought to be, and their report for 2004 was no exception. In fact, their most recent report has quite a few glaring holes. Holes big enough for Daniel Fetty to fall through.
“Google” is a trademark of Google Inc.
© Box Turtle Bulletin. All Rights Reserved.
Posts 
Posts via daily email:
Josh
September 23rd, 2013
I’ve always wondered how many gay guys were in some sense overtly effeminate, say as prepubescent boys. That seems to be the stereotype, yet I don’t fit it, which makes me wonder how true it is. As for me, I didn’t shy away from fights, I was typically good at physical activities, I was never interested in girls’ toys or clothes, people never seemed to want to pick on me, etc.
It wasn’t until puberty that I can think of anything that hinted that I’d turn out gay, and that was just the one main thing–being attracted to and aroused by the guys and not the girls.
It always strikes me as funny when I see old quotes saying gay men are all effeminate or women trapped in men’s bodies or some such nonsense. It makes me wish they could have met me.
JCF
September 23rd, 2013
I get the impression you dislike effeminacy in males, Josh.
Which makes me wonder if you’d WANT to see it in yourself (and hence, wonder if you’re an unbiased self-observer!).
Jay
September 23rd, 2013
Josh, there are always exceptions, but the correlation between gender nonconformity and homosexuality is very well established. Not all sissy boys grow up to be gay, and not all lesbians were tomboys. But effeminacy in prepubescent males and stereotypically masculine traits in prepubescent females are predictors of adult homosexuality. Many of us learn to conform to gender expectations. While I became conventionally masculine by the time I hit adolescence, I remember distinctly a time when I was not. Like Timothy, I wonder what my parents thought of all this. I am glad that parents like Lori Duron are recording their experiences as parents of non-conforming children.
Robert
September 23rd, 2013
I saw Lori and Matt interviewed recently and have nothing but Kudos for them and their family. Their story is awesome, their struggle terrifying and brave. Their determination is as strong as their love for each other. I began to share this story with some friends who quickly jumped in prejudging the family and CJ and a whole bunch of other crap. I urged them to watch the interview, listen to the family’s story…well, the opinions changed. We are all cheering now and closely following Lori and her family. May they each be kept safe and secure always. Thanks for posting this story.
Priya Lynn
September 23rd, 2013
I’d like to second what Josh said, there are some gay guys who aren’t effeminate in any way as children. I have a friend I’ve known since childhood who is gay. Although he wasn’t good at sports or interested in fighting with other boys he had no effeminate mannerisms, no interest in feminine things of any sort, liked guns and blowing things up. We never discussed sexuality as teenagers but the only thing that made me think he might be gay is that while me and another friend would discuss how hot this or that girl was he never brought up a girl he thought was hot. Other than him never mentioning a girl he was lusting over there was no clue he was gay.
Marcus
September 23rd, 2013
Jay, that’s true, but it’s also important to remind people that correlations aren’t equivalent to majorities. If (hypothetically) 10% of straight boys and 20% of gay and bi boys are gender-nonconforming, that would indicate a strong correlation between sexual orientation and gender nonconformity, but the majority of gay/bi boys would be gender conforming and the majority of the nonconforming boys would be straight.
Soren456
September 23rd, 2013
I haven’t read the book or the blog, so maybe this is answered in one of them.
It will be interesting to learn on whom CJ crushes. That is a far clearer signal of his (eventual) sexual orientation than is his choice of toys and colors.
I was a jock as a boy; I have the trophies and some scars to prove it. Yet, my parents tell me that as early as kindergarten, I got crushes on other boys.
And they are right: I remember some of them. I was essentially in love (or fascination) with one boy or another through all of elementary school. Around grade six or seven, when puberty hit, sexual longing arrived.
My point is that my unquestionable “masculinity” as a boy CJ’s age, and later, was no predictor of my sexual orientation, and that in fact, the two can be seen as separate threads — perhaps distinctly separate threads.
If I were CJ’s mom, I would not yet stock up on two-groom figures for his wedding cake; CJ still has lots more to say about who he is.
carol
September 23rd, 2013
This is about parents who see their child is probably gay (50 years of research, 85+ studies – scientific american is your child a pre-homosexual) and want to respond in a positive affirming way. But now we have to hear criticism from every straight acting gay man – how dare you call me effeminate! AND the trans-kid lobby who will tell you this has NOTHING to do with being gay and we should immediately transition our children or risk their suicide. Can you give us parents a break – we are trying to happily raise the next generation of gay men.
Gay men who had these childhoods – speak now or there will be no more of you.
tristram
September 23rd, 2013
So Timothy’s article starts off saying that ‘gender nonconforming kids’ are more likely than ‘gender conforming kids’ to grow up to be lgbt. It does not say that all (or even most) gay men started out as “nellie” boys. People need to chill.
Josh
September 23rd, 2013
@JCF: I’d be interested to hear what specifically from my post makes you think I dislike effeminacy in males. I’m not quite sure how to respond. It’s certainly true that I find effeminacy a turnoff and masculinity a turn on. I have found a few traits I’d label as effeminate in myself over the years–eg. a seemingly large amount of empathy; an interest in reality TV featuring wedding dresses (that one was surprising). I might be biased against seeing effeminacy in myself, though I don’t think so.
To be clear, when I said, “That seems to be the stereotype, yet I don’t fit it, which makes me wonder how true it is”, I meant it literally. I’m sure there’s truth to the stereotype, I just wonder about the magnitude.
@Priya: When I came out, I made a point of asking a number of people (like close family) if they suspected. My experience was the same as yours with your friend–the only sign seemed to be a lack of interest in women.
@Soren: I find your crushes pre-puberty interesting. I didn’t have any until puberty struck. I suppose a handful of the kids around me had (hetero) ones, but I was never clear on how much they were simply emulating the world around them.
@Carol: “But now we have to hear criticism from every straight acting gay man.” I hope that’s not directed at me. I didn’t mean any criticism; I haven’t paid much attention to this actual story, but superficially Lori sounds like a great parent and CJ sounds like a very interesting kid.
chiMaxx
September 23rd, 2013
It’s nice there’s a book, now. I recall reading her website a couple of years ago. I remember she didn’t want to necessarily commit to her son’s sexual orientation (while being clear that she was open to him ending up gay), but was unequivocal about supporting her son, as he was, in all his native gender nonconformity. Which is wonderful.
ebohlman
September 23rd, 2013
Marcus, Tristram: You’re spot on. People who haven’t seriously studied probability often get very confused about conditional probabilities (the probability that a particular event will occur, given that another event has been known to occur). It’s not that they can’t handle the math (which is really just fractions), it’s that we all take mental shortcuts in calculating probabilities and though those shortcuts actually work much of the time (when we’re dealing with very frequent everyday events), they often give wrong answers.
Let’s call E the event that “a man was effeminate as a boy” and G the event that “a man is gay as an adult”. Then P(E) is the probability that any man, gay or straight, was an effeminate boy, and P(G) is the probability than any boy, effeminate or not, grows up to be gay. In this case, you can think of probabilities as “percentages of the general population”.
P(E) and P(G) are called unconditional probabilities because they’re the ones that apply if you don’t know any other relevant information about the person in question. Most of the time, though, we want to know whether, and if so, how, those probabilities change when we do know relevant information.
Thus we want to talk about how likely it that an effeminate boy will grow up to be gay, and how likely it is that a gay man was effeminate as a boy. We call these conditional probabilities, and we write them as “P(G|E)” and “P(E|G)” respectively, reading them as “the probability of G given E” and “the probability of E given G”. The fact that we write the two conditional probabilities differently should clue you in that they do not refer to the same thing (with a particular population, they might be numerically the same purely by coincidence, but they are not conceptually the same).
Back in the eighteenth century an English Presbyterian minister named Thomas Bayes figured out how conditional probabilities are mathematically related to each other and to their underlying unconditional probabilities. Bayes’s Theorem, in its simplest form as applied to our example, is:
p(G|E) = P(E|G) * P(G) / P(E)
which also implies that
p(E|G) = P(G|E) * P(E) / P(G)
In both expressions, the numerator works out to the unconditional probability that a man is a gay man who was effeminate as a boy. The denominators, however, are different. For two fractions with the same numerator to be equal, the denominators also have to be equal, so the two probabilites will only be equal if the percentage of effeminate boys in the general population is equal to the percentage of gay men in the general population.
In this kind of discussion, we commonly refer to the unconditional probabilities as “base rates”. A common probabilistic fallacy is to ignore base rates. About 25 years ago, there was a breathless gee-whiz news story claiming that high school football was more dangerous than Formula 1 racing, citing the fact that more people were killed playing HS football than F1 racing.
The fallacy in this argument is that at the time there were about 300,000 HS football players and only about 200 F1 racers. For HS football to be more dangerous, you’d need to have at least 1500 times more deaths. The author ignored base rates. As one wag put it “a one-in-a-million event happens ten times a day in New York City”.
Enough of my rant on a particular pet peeve of mine.
Ray
September 23rd, 2013
I would recommend that people read “The Sissy Boy Syndrome” because it’s not *merely* stereotypical effeminate behavior that is used to identify gender non-conforming children.
I wasn’t effeminate. But I had a decided preference for playing with girls. I didn’t prefer to play with dolls but I would and did slip easily into the role of mommy or daddy when engaging in role-playing games. I didn’t like to engage in rough sports but I led my Pee Wee and Midget baseball league in batting average. I did not like aggressive sports but I was a starting center on two state championship basketball teams. I had a completely different view of sports than anyone I knew but I played because I was competent.
I got the crap beat out of me in elementary school by older boys who could not tolerate seeing me play with the girls. My attackers were *always* bigger, older boys. Those my age I handled myself. My brother handled the older boys.
When I was 10 or 11 our parents innocently asked their five children one day who they wanted to marry when they grew up. I was the first to and and my answer ended the discussion because when I told my dad I wanted to marry the man we rented our farm from, he beat me bloody with his leather belt. Did that beat the gay out of me? No. I just too it underground. Never dated in high school. Never told *anyone* how I felt.
So, aside from “acts effeminate”, the Sissy Boy Syndrom says that GNC boy also avoid rough and tumble play. Check.
Play with girls and not necessarily to play dolls. Check. (I played jacks, jump rope and tether ball and spun circles on the monkey bars. But I sometimes played flag football and climbed trees and built tree houses. I also was obsessed with native American clothing and I made elaborate outfits complete with chaps, loin cloth, head dress, vest, bows and arrows which I saw no other boys doing and considered their lack of interest odd since I was born and raised in the Choctaw Nation in Oklahoma.
So, you don’t have to flame as a child to be gender non-conforming. I simply outgrew (in height) everyone in my entiire community and got tremendous encouragement to play sports. And so I did. And I excelled at it. But there was always that kid who didn’t like fighting and rough play inside of me. It probably cost me a college scholarship. But I was what I was.
On one other topic mentioned: I think I’ve seen maybe a hundred mentions in research on gay sexual orientation, strewn around in various books, where research says that the overwhelming majority of gay men have a decided prejudice against effeminacy in other men. Those citation certainly rang true in my experience. I think that is probably because the stereotype is rubbed into our noses so much, to becomes a cultural attitude even deep into the gay community. When I look at, for example, the profiles of men who are seeking dates/sex/friends/relationship on dating site, one of the most stated personal preferences is, “no fems”. It’s not 100% but it is VERY wide spread. I admit. I’m not attracted to effeminate men as potential partners. Yet my BEST friend in this world is 100% fem. I always believed that was why we made such compatiable friends – because I wasn’t attracted to him (nor he to me). He certainly has a wonderful soul. I understand the shallowness of my preference. If I met the next Nobel Prize winner in Literature and he was effeminate, I’d probably be to distracted by his mannerism to look beyond and he the wonder of a man he is. I do struggle with this prejudice so I have to go along with the citations I’ve seen and say, yeah, it’s real.
Gene in L.A.
September 24th, 2013
Carol, “Gay men who had these childhoods – speak now or there will be no more of you.” I don’t think there’s any danger of that, since little effeminate gay boys don’t act as they act from a role model, but from within. I played hopscotch and jump-rope and jacks with the little girls. There were girls who could bat and throw better than I could and I was the proverbial last one picked to be on a team. I didn’t do it because I saw anyone else do it, but because it’s what I wanted to do and I hadn’t yet been beaten on or ridiculed into the non-gender-specific weakling I became. There was another sissy-boy in the same school. We commiserated all through elementary school. He grew up straight and I came out at 31 years old, having known for years before that but only managing the necessary self-acceptance at that late age. We each have our individual feelings and our individual ways of growing up. I haven’t read anything here that I would call criticism from a straight-acting gay man.
carol
September 24th, 2013
I was saying there will be no more of you because the supportive parent movement has be taken over by the trans-kid extremists who want to prove this has nothing to do with sexuality but these kids are all “born in the wrong body”. Its extremely difficult to be a supportive parent now and find a public support group. The expected attacks that we are making kids gay is one thing but then we have to hear the criticisms from gay men denying any link to childhood GNC and from the trans groups saying we are not supportive enough unless we send our kids down the path of permanently being girls – body and all. Raising my Rainbow is a great book but even in its promotion she has to be so careful to dance around the subject that her child is probably gay. She keeps having to offer up that well he “could be transgender” and he “could start hating his body. ” That is my extreme frustration.
carol
September 24th, 2013
Thank you Ray for sharing your childhood experience and your thoughts.
carol
September 24th, 2013
Im not wanting to criticize anyone here – Im sorry if it sounds that way. Im just trying to explain how extremely frustrating it is to be supportive in raising a gender non-conforming child. If I have a point its that I wish gay men could be more active and involved in this movement. Pre-gay children need gay role models. Parents need to hear from gay men.
Jay
September 24th, 2013
I suggest that people interested in this topic read the encyclopdia article on Sissies at glbtq.com: http://www.glbtq.com/social-sciences/sissies.html
I found these paragraphs especially telling: “Although effeminate behavior in childhood is by no means exclusive to men who grow up to become homosexual, and not all gay men were regarded as sissies as children, being perceived as a sissy is nevertheless a common experience among gay males. This suggests some connection between what is typically regarded as “inappropriate” gender expression in childhood and a later expression of homosexuality. Recognizing oneself as a sissy is sometimes the first step in recognizing oneself as a potential or actual homosexual.
Being regarded as a sissy by peers or by family members is most often a painful experience. The insistence on gender-specific behavior is pervasive and overwhelming in most societies, and young men and boys who are effeminate are often severely stigmatized and, sometimes, physically and mentally abused.”
As a child, I realized that my sissy ways were getting me a bad rep, so I very consciously “butched up.” But I always felt that I was suppressing something very real about myself and that in some sense the “butch” image I projected was a lie.
That is why I so admire Carol and her husband in their attempt to create an environment where CJ can be himself.
Timothy Kincaid
September 24th, 2013
carol,
It is a valid criticism that gay men become more involved and active.
However, there is a very good reason that they are not. For many years there has been an association made between gay men and child molesters.
It is not an association based in reality (by far, the molesters of children identify as heterosexual – even in terms of population percentage, this is true). But gay men – knowing the accusations and the fear – have for decades stayed away from kids in any capacity.
Only just now are they beginning to parent and to be a part of the lives of children. It will likely be some time before they venture into the lives of pre-gay children. And when they do, you can be certain that there will be accusations of “grooming” and “indoctrination”.
Regan DuCasse
September 24th, 2013
I’m going to get this book. I think for a lot of years now, other than straight grandmother or Pam Ferguson, there haven’t been but a few straight people contributing a comment on BTB.
When I hear the words, ‘non gender conforming’, that of course would have to mean what culture thinks of gender.
Which is still a very narrow definition to do with the physical of gender.
But virtually NONE of the fact that gender is fluid beyond the physical.
It’s culture that doesn’t respect individual character and talent. And requires us to defer to those ‘norms’ that are about social hierarchy.
Normal, natural gender fluidity is punishable, of course.
Made a matter of morality, and anti social abnormality.
And how can gender be either?
I can ask our prejudiced detractors those questions, and they don’t answer them.
Asking if the qualities of kindness, compassion, courage, intelligence or talent mattering more than the affect of feminine or masculine clothing, seems to confuse them.
After all, those qualities are gender neutral, and having more or less of any of it, is an individual aspect. Not a general one.
There is much lip service given to respecting what’s good in a person, but that still requires good to mean deference to male authority. And that authority taking on the aspects of what’s considered strength and dominance.
It boils down to who is weak and who is strong.
And the constant underestimation and miscalculation of determining that according to gender.
Priya Lynn
September 24th, 2013
Carol said ” The expected attacks that we are making kids gay is one thing but then we have to hear the criticisms from gay men denying any link to childhood GNC and from the trans groups saying we are not supportive enough unless we send our kids down the path of permanently being girls – body and all.”.
Nonsense Carol. No one is trying to talk effeminate boys into changing genders if they haven’t expressed a desire to do so. That is entirely in your strange imagination.
Jay said “As a child, I realized that my sissy ways were getting me a bad rep, so I very consciously “butched up.†But I always felt that I was suppressing something very real about myself and that in some sense the “butch†image I projected was a lie.”.
That was my experience as well.
Marcus
September 24th, 2013
The commonalities between homophobia and transphobia are notable. First labeling trans-supportive parents are “extremists”, then accusations of trans activists wanting to turn children – gee, where have we heard all that before?
By the way, threatening that “there will be no more of you” doesn’t come across as supportive, or even safe.
Jack
September 24th, 2013
This is a really disturbing post. I think this site, which I used to check daily for its in-depth investigative pieces and rigorous analytical postings, has become intellectually lazy and offensive.
Kincaid, there is no basis for your assertion that “Many of our LGBT readers will recall play, fantasy, and behavior that seemed to separate them from other children of their own sex” You have no evidence regarding, and you can’t possibly know, what “many” of your “LGBT” readers will recall. And the statement as written is drivel, since by definition 100% of the T readers will fit this description but that description may be inapt for any number of your LGB readers, from 0 to 100%.
More disturbing is your insistence that you don’t know and can’t know basic facts about your childhood. You can’t trust your own memories. You couldn’t trust the recollections of your parents and family members if you were to ask. And presumably all photographic and videographic evidence is similarly to be dismissed. In fact, while any one source might be biased, you can get a very good sense of yourself as a child by consulting multiple sources. Either you played with dolls or you didn’t. Either you wore your mother’s clothes or you didn’t. Either your peer group consisted of all girls or it didn’t. These are facts. They can be known. How strange that on this subject alone, you so readily abandon empirical inquiry.
You seem to have a religious or ideological devotion to the idea that you could have been effeminate. And if there is absolutely no evidence to support that contention and if the available evidence, including your own memories, tell you otherwise, then just dismiss the evidence and assert that it is a big, unsolvable mystery.
You want to get to the conclusion – which you had already taken to heart as a matter of ideology – that gay men are inherently “different”. Maybe this helps you justify “queer” ideology or maybe it serves some other need. But you will get there, by God, facts and evidence be damned.
This is how George Rekers would approach his “research.” Too bad you have descended to his level in your transparent attempt to satisfy the PC fad of the day, which bizarrely, is to revive the discredited stereotypes of the 20th century.
Priya Lynn
September 24th, 2013
Jack, there is no incentive to falsely assert that many gay men were effeminate as children. The PC thing to do is to deny this.
carol
September 24th, 2013
I apologize for labeling trans supportive parents as extremists – I can certainly see how that seems offensive. Please understand I am under a lot of stress as are all parents when their child starts GNC behavior. It is an extremely stressful situation when your male child starts expressing a preference for girl things. I read this site all the time for general interest but also for an occasional mention of the research on gender non conformity in males as a predictor of SSA in adults.
What is difficult for me to understand is that right now there are more playgroups, support groups etc that have children who have transitioned and are going down a trans path than there are for boys who want to do dress up. (pre-puberty age) That is not my strange imagination – that is the current reality. I did not say these kids did not want to transition – if I implied that Im sorry. I am here because this a site that has not been dismissive of this body of research and I assume it also has a large gay male audience presumably some of whom had this type of childhood. So I am trying to find gay men who had these childhoods to speak up. Are you happy to be male? Do you wish you had been allowed to transition? Where are you and what do you think?
Priya Lynn
September 24th, 2013
“What is difficult for me to understand is that right now there are more playgroups, support groups etc that have children who have transitioned and are going down a trans path than there are for boys who want to do dress up. (pre-puberty age) That is not my strange imagination – that is the current reality.”.
So, you’re saying you did a nationwide statitically significant random sampling and study of such support groups and playgroups?
I don’t think so – it is your imagination.
“I did not say these kids did not want to transition”.
Really? Then how else to take your previous comment: “then we have to hear the criticisms from gay men denying any link to childhood GNC and from the trans groups saying we are not supportive enough unless we send our kids down the path of permanently being girls”.
I don’t know how else to take that other than you’re saying trans groups don’t accept that you’re being supportive unless parents make their gender non conforming children become girls without any say from the gender non-conforming child.
Timothy Kincaid
September 24th, 2013
Carol,
If you do not yet, please follow Lori’s site RaisingMyRainbow.com.
She regularly addresses issues about GNC kids and while her primary audience is other mothers, she does have a large gay male audience who can provide some of the answers you seek.
I’m not a mental health professional or a specialist in this field. But I do follow the research and can give you some general advice and information.
I know that it can be stressful on a parent who – having dealt with the idea their kid might be gay – now fears that their child will want to transition. I can empathize with that concern.
But it is a fairly low likelihood. Just as LGBT people are a small percentage of the greater community, transgender people are a small percentage of the LBGT community. And should your child be trans, they will still be your child and you will love them.
And while some do find that their internal gender is not reflected in their external appearance and seek to bring the two into agreement, most gay men – including many who did not conform to gender expectations – are happy being men.
carol
September 24th, 2013
Thank you Timothy.
ebohlman
September 24th, 2013
You seem to be under the incorrect impression (as indeed most people are) that human memory works as a direct and reliable recording of one’s sensory input. However, no scientist who researches human memory has believed this for quite some time; it’s now well established that our memories are reconstructive rather than reconstitutive. We actually store only a few key details of any particular experience, and when we recall an experience we’re actually making up a story around those details.
It’s usually a fairly plausible story, but much of what seems to us like perfect detail in those recollections consists of things we learned/experienced after the fact, interpretations based on our attitudes and beliefs (and it should come as no suprise that self-serving interpretations are the most common kind), bits of detail from different experiences (including vicarious ones like fictional stories), and so on.
To make matters worse, it’s now pretty clear that every time we recall a memory, we permanently alter it; when we remember something a second time, we’re really remembering our most recent memory of our original memory, not the original memory itself.
And the memories of those close to us are just as susceptible to influence as our own. About 25 years ago, in the next town over from mine, a deranged woman shot up a school, killing several adults and one kid. Nearly everyone who went to high school with her remembered her as a loner, but written records (school newspaper articles, teachers’ written notes, etc.) from the time indicated that she was a popular, socially connected kid.
Josh
September 25th, 2013
“most gay men – including many who did not conform to gender expectations – are happy being men.”
You reminded me of the time I came out to my mom (who was shocked). One of her statements was, “But we always knew you were a boy…”, with–I think–the implication being that only women can like men, so I must want to be a woman? I smiled and told her I was male and liked being male, and she seemed to realize her idea (whatever it really was) was silly. Still, she seemed to expect gender nonconformity growing up and was taken by surprise at not finding it.
Jay
September 25th, 2013
Thanks to ebohlman for the illuminating post about memory.
I want to reiterate the research that has consistently shown a correlation between gnc behavior in children and adult homosexuality. This correlation is not absolute, but it is significant. We can all think of individuals who were sissies as children and grew up to be straight. (Indeed, the nelliest person I have ever known is a raving heterosexual.) And many gay men or lesbians were not sissies or tomboys as children. But the correlation between gnc behavior as children and adult homosexuality has repeatedly been shown.
However, in addition to the unreliability of our memories is also the fact that most gay adolescents learn to hide their gnc behaviors and feelings and we become experts at conforming to gender expectations.
The range of transgender behavior is very wide, but, as Tim pointed out, most gay people do not want to change their gender. In addition, the desire to change gender often has nothing to do with sexual orientation. Usually, a straight man who undergoes sexual reassignment surgery continues to be attracted to women sexually, and thus becomes a lesbian; while a lesbian who undergoes sexual reassignment surgery continues to be attracted to women, and thus becomes a straight man.
I know a (formerly) lesbian couple who are now a straight couple because one of them had surgery to become a man.
Gender and orientation are complex.
Marcus
September 25th, 2013
@Carol: I appreciate the apology. And may I add that the best thing for your child (any child) is not to make assumptions about who they’ll grow up to be. Don’t assume they’ll be cis, don’t assume they’ll be trans, don’t assume they’ll be straight, don’t assume they’ll be gay, bi or asexual. Let your actions show that it won’t make any difference to you.
@ebohlman, I’ve also enjoyed your apropos posts on probability and memory.
social media
March 3rd, 2015
Ahaa, iits good conversation concerning this post here at this weblog,
I have read all that, so now me also commenting at ths place.
Leave A Comment