Crossdressing as a form of humor

This post is inspired by criticisms of a new sitcom (here), that I am actually not going to talk about at all, but figured that I would mention...

Yesterday, when I arrived at daycare to pick up my kids, two boys (about 10 years old) were dressed up as girls, wearing sleeveless dresses and high heeled shoes from the dress up bin.

This, in and of itself, is not a problem. I love when kids play dress up, I have a wide array of dress up clothes in a dress up toy box at home and there are no gender rules when it comes to who can wear what costumes. The problem that I had was with regards to how they were wearing the clothes, the way this was seen as humorous by the other kids, and the reasons behind this humour.

At first, I tried to tell myself that it was the element of it being unexpected that was funny to the kids... like when I make used to make my kids laugh, as toddlers, by putting one of their toys on my head like a hat or by using a shoe like a telephone and pretending to be confused when it didn't work. But I think this is more than that... little girls at the daycare dress up in men's clothing all the time, wearing suit jackets and ties or a variety of other outfits that are gendered as masculine. I have yet to witness this being seen as funny. But as soon as these boys came out of the change room in dresses and heels, the daycare exploded in laughter.

If femininity was equal to masculinity within society, this would not be funny. It becomes funny for boys to wear strapless dresses, high heeled shoes, and to walk with exaggerated hip motions because femininity has less value than masculinity, and the children at daycare know it.

I'm not saying that drag is misogynist, I love drag for a variety of reasons that I am not going to get into in this post, but I am mentioning this to differentiate someone who is gendered as male dressing in ways designated for females as a joke and those who do it for reasons related to gender identity, expression, or to expose problems with the gender binary (among other reasons).

I believe that for someone who is gendered as a male to dress in female clothing for humor (with some exceptions)is not unlike a white person wearing blackface; it is someone from a dominant group making fun of an oppressed or marginalized group.

I'm not entirely sure what the solution this specific issue would be... I don't think it would be appropriate or helpful for daycare workers to enforce gendered dress up rules; gender policing would make things worse, not better. But I do think that education could help, try to teach children why it isn't funny. I also think that the only real solution would be to end patriarchal social relations that lead to this being funny in the first place.

Liberal feminist princess storybook not quite good enough

I bought my daughter a book from the Women's bookstore in Toronto called "Don't Kiss the Frog; Princess Stories with Attitude" figuring that it would be a feminist book about princesses (if one should ever exist). Overall, it is pretty good... the princess does not always end up with the prince, and takes a rather active role in most of the stories.

I feel like I'm being extremely picky here, all things considered, but one part of story entitled "The Princess and the P.E" really bothered me.

A frog, using a whistle, helped a princess who was worried about her athletic skills learn how to jump really high and run really fast (this appeared to all happen in the span of a few minutes, because we don't need to work hard to improve our athletic skills or anything, we just need someone to blow a whistle at just the right moment). Anyway, afterwards, he said

"I'll be your best friend... just kiss me"

and the story goes

So Wendy bent down and kissed the frog. She didn't really want to, but after all, he had been very kind to her -- and he didn't really have more warts on his face than princess Viola.

At which point the frog turned into a prince, offered to be her handsome prince, but he was wearing gym clothes and was all muddy, so when he went to hug her, she ran away.

I can't stand that this book had her kiss the frog when she didn't want to because he had been so nice to her. I am trying to read it in a more progressive way, like she realized that she shouldn't have kissed him and that's why she ran away or something or that this will teach girls not to kiss the boy if they don't want to, I don't know.

Still, boy is nice to girl, asks for a kiss, girl feels obligated to oblige even though she states that she doesn't want to. Not the message I want my child reading.

Also, would she have ran from the hug if he had been a handsome prince, instead of a smelly prince covered in mud and wearing gym clothes? Does that even matter?

Either way, it all reads so date-rape-y to me. As I was reading it, I was so disgusted by it that we paused twice to talk about enthusiastic consent and what the effects of having this storyline in a supposedly empowering book could be. I'm concerned that reading this uncritically will make it seem normal to my children... and I think that the media does a good enough job getting that message across.

Overall, the book is a very liberal feminist piece of work. The princesses do not need a prince to rescue them, because girls can defeat the dragon and win jousting competitions, and only sometimes end up falling in love with the prince. But, this happens just because they try hard enough - it seems like pure luck or something (or a frog blew a whistle).

Even the back cover of the book is very "modern liberated woman"

For the princesses in this book, the old rules no longer apply. They might still wear tiaras, but they do things their own way!

Take the role formerly had by the prince (wining sports trophies, saving people from dragons, etc), throw in a bit of you-are-still-not-as-good-as-men, (the previously described frog-kissing scene) and make sure to maintain the need to differentiate yourself from others by wearing your tiara, a symbol of femininity and class, and convince girls that everything is ok!

The message seems to be that girls can be independent and still attract a prince. And that as long as you continue to be strong and independent, you will have a happy ending... and maybe this is too much to ask for from a children's book, but at least some of the Disney-type princess stories seem to have evidence of structural barriers (Mulan, for example, cannot join the army because she is a girl). This book seems to send the message that everything is ok just the way things are. And if you don't get a happily ever after, maybe you just aren't independent enough.

Still, this is far better than most princess stories the kids have read, and this rather harsh critique feels like I'm being overly picky in a lot of ways, but these attitudes camouflaged as feminism scare me far more than overt sexism, as my 9 year old can describe the sexism or class issues in Disney, but the reviews for this book seem to suggest that pretty much everyone is reading it as empowering towards girls. I'm just not sure this liberal brand of empowerment is what we should be striving for.

Gender in Disney films

This topic has been covered a lot, by a lot of people, but I came across two good pieces this week that I wanted to post. First was this image (found here);



This image emphasizes the importance of women being pretty and reliance on men within Disney films, in some of the characters that little girls idolize most.

This film (found here) shows masculinity in disney films.



My favorite piece from it was this quote.

It's much more a question in creating a certain environment of images that we grow up in and become used to and after a while those images will begin to shape what we know and what we understand about the world... it's a slow accumulative affect and it's much more subtle.

I don't blame Disney for sexism by any means, but I think this quote is very true. These images become seen as normal and gendered practices that exist throughout the media become entrenched in our thinking as naturally gendered behaviours based on real biological differences, when in fact, many (if not all) of these differences are social constructs.

What concerns me most is when I watch television programming that is currently geared towards young children... the gender stereotyping on the Disney channel, which airs sitcom-like television programs for kids is way more blatant than in any of these movies, in my opinion.

Inclusiveness sign at an elementary school

I was at a fun fair at my kids' school, and I saw this on the wall in a classroom.

In case it is hard to read, the caption at the bottom reads "Includes Everybody"

Upon further investigation, I realized that it was in every classroom, usually posted in an obvious place, like right next to the main doorway. In at least one classroom it was hidden near a corner at the top of a chalkboard, but that did not seem to be the norm.

The cell phone picture is so blurry that I can't make out a few of the symbols and don't remember what they were, but notice the one on the top left, which represents Pride. This never would have been allowed when I was in grade school. I like how this goes against the notion that children must be protected from knowledge that non-heterosexuality exists... what I would like even more is if all relationships were just seen as normal this type of sign wasn't necessary, but I'll take what I can get.

I'm not sure how well the school itself follows these ideas, or how well they actually teach inclusiveness, but I am told that the new VP is very concerned about such things, which I find fantastic.

The F-word: My 8 year old daughter's thoughts on "Fat"

I have been rather happy with my weight for some time now. I have struggled most of my pre-teen and teen years; not with my weight, but with my body image. I don't post numbers- not weight, dress size, comparison's to others (when not necessary for a point)- because I don't want to trigger other people and because I don't think it is necessary to talk about in most conversations, but suffice to say, no one would be likely to think that I had any reason to lose weight. No one, that is, except for my 8 year old daughter.

This week, she told me that if she were as big as I am, she would go on herbal magic. When I tell this story to people who know me, they seem to find it funny... possibly because I am so small that the comment seems ridiculous, but I don't find it funny at all.

We talked quite a bit about it afterward. I even showed her "photoshop disasters" (I use quotes because I could argue that merely using photoshop is disastrous) in order to explain how images that she sees in the media are not real. The bodies that she sees every day on tv and print ads, the ones that she is supposed to aspire to look like, are heavily edited.

But still, she thinks that all girls need to be as skinny as they can.

Now, normally in my posts I try to use polite language, to let my message get the point across, but not this time. This time, I am really pissed off.

Fuck you teletoon for showing my daughter weight loss commercials that tell her that fat people are miserable until they get skinny.
Fuck you media more generally for showing her so few variations of the female body; for presenting her with a very specific acceptable female body type.
And fuck you patriarchal capitalist social relations for teaching my 8 year old that her worth as a human being is forever linked to the numbers on the scale or the size of her dress.

Hearing her say things things hurts in a way that I can't even begin to describe. It doesn't hurt my feelings that she calls me fat... I'm rather thick skinned. It gives me a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach to think about what this is doing to her, what she is learning, how easily she internalizes these messages about what girls are and what they are supposed to be.

But what can I do about it? Talking to her probably helps, but it doesn't seem to be working. No matter how loudly I tell her that it doesn't matter, there are thousands of voices telling her that it does. They are louder; she doesn't believe me when so much goes against what I say. She is starting to believe that she is not good enough, but then, how can she be? How can anyone be good enough when the images aren't real?

I need some advice about other things I can do to try and get this message across... any good books or videos appropriate for an 8 year old girl?

Kids comments on gender and beauty

We were watching an old episode of So You Think You Can Dance on television, which is a show that I'm not sure whether or not I like my kids watching... I love dance, but here is the issue...

After 3 performances where women took off at least one layer of clothing, my son (5 years old) said "the girls can never keep their clothes on"

My daughter's (8 years old) response was "That's because they want to look good."

I changed channels immediately... we are going to have a discussion about gender and hegemonic beauty standards this morning, and I am going to find some dancing shows that are a bit more appropriate for them. Still, I feel as though I can talk to them about this stuff forever, but regardless of what I say to them, the media still gets through at least as strongly as I do.

Children and body image

This morning, my 5 year old son was upset that my 8 year old daughter was not playing by the right rules in a game (did you know that there are right rules and wrong rules?) so he called her names. He called her fat.

We typically don't use that word in our house. My daughter is very small for her age, and she already spends a lot of time looking at herself in the mirror (usually dancing, sometimes in her underwear, trying to copy the moves that she thinks female rock stars are supposed to do- I am not sure if her babysitter is amused or disturbed by this). She occasionally talks about her fear of gaining weight, which I try to address mostly in two ways; first, by talking about health, and not body size, as the standard that is best to be internalized, and second, by talking to her about the objectification of women's bodies and unrealistic standards of beauty that she sees in the media (in a way that I believe is age appropriate).

Anyway, the point is that a 5 year old child, who still hasn't figured out that Santa doesn't exist and has trouble differentiating between cartoons and real life, has somehow figured out that the worst thing you can call a female is fat.

Mother blaming and conceptions of normal child behavior

I really haven't had much time for posting lately, which means I have missed some really important events (like the Ontario court decision to strike down laws that are harmful to sex workers). In this post, I will be discussing one of the many reasons why I haven't had time to post (other than grad school, union work, teaching, and all of the other work involved with being
a single mother with two children).

My son has always been a bit different in comparison to other kids his age, but I just thought that was his personality. I thought he was just shy when he wouldn't come out of a closet at a new daycare for a couple hours, or when he went more than 2 weeks without speaking to daycare workers and still won't make eye contact with them. I thought he was just a mama's boy when, at the age of 5, he still wants me to carry him a lot and will cry if he doesn't sit beside me in a restaurant. And I thought he was just really interested in art and building when he spent hours working on puzzles, coloring, or playing with lego without breaking concentration. I never really saw it as a sign that something might be wrong. Actually, I find him to be very intelligent, artistic, affectionate (with me, anyway), and even funny (like when he tells his only joke over and over again- knock knock, who's there, why'd the chicken cross the road- laughter).

But, after a few problems at school, I went to a referral agency to be connected to free services in the area that might help with parenting strategies, and after a few lengthy tests, they want me to have him assessed for Aspergers.

Now, I don't know much about Aspergers other than reading a few websites and watching a season of the TV show Parenthood, where one of the children has it and I've heard the writers and actor are quite realistic with this portrayal. I don't know what a diagnosis would mean about things like the possibility of discrimination within the school system. As a sociology major, I don't like labels and I am uneasy about the idea of giving a label to my child (yes, I know many sociologists are all about labels and categories, but that is not how I do sociology). But as a parent who has been raising him alone for years without understanding why I can't get him to listen to simple rules, this seems to offer an explanation and new strategies to deal with his behavior.

But I have been having some trouble figuring out how I feel about it. My first instinct is relief. Relief that it is not my fault that he is acting up. Relief that my family and his teachers and behavioral therapists will no longer look at me as though I am not a capable parent, that I am too strict or too lenient, that I am just not good enough. Relief that I will not be told that I need to drop out of school to control my kid (yes, that was suggested by a behavioral therapist). Relief that I am not to blame when he acts up. Then I feel guilt. Guilty that part of me hopes that this is what is going on with him, because it is not something that is likely to go away the way shyness could. That being said, the limited knowledge that I have suggests that Aspergers would have a better prognosis than the previous suggestion that he might have Oppositional Defiant Disorder along with Obsessive Compulsive tendencies. Have I mentioned that I really despise labels?

So, what I am now trying to figure out is how can I move beyond always feeling guilty about parenting. His father doesn't feel guilty about only seeing him for 1-2 hours a week. His father doesn't feel like his lack of parenting has contributed to the problems he's been having at school and daycare. His father thinks it is because I am not a good enough parent. This is a sentiment that, although changing, I still hear echoed throughout pop culture and from teachers and family members. I feel the same way about mother blaming as I do about labels. And yet, I still always blame myself.

I guess the big question that I am facing right now is whether it is in his best interest to try and get a diagnosis. I am hesitant because I have trouble conceptualizing what Aspergers really is. I mean, it isn't something that simply shows up on an x-ray or some other physical test, but a name that covers a group of behaviors that differ from how "normal" children are "supposed to" behave. I understand that categories and classifications can be useful, but I am still trying to locate information on the benefits of not getting an official diagnosis as well.

And, to bring in a bit of a class analysis, I would like to point out that if I had a few thousand dollars to throw around, I could get the diagnosis rather quickly. I could also get all kinds of help without a diagnosis, if I wanted to pay for it. However, as a student who is surviving on a scholarship meant to support a single person and not a family, he might need an official diagnosis before I could access many of the support programs available.

Another post on enthusiastic consent

Last week I wrote about the concept of enthusiastic consent as it relates to sexual acts between adults. This same basic idea can be used not only for sexual acts, but for many different aspects of everyday life, including children playing with each other and standards relating to everyday touch and physical contact.

When I was a child, one thing that I remember vividly is distant relatives and friends of my mothers hugging me without my consent, and being powerless to stop them because saying so would be rude. I remember the prickly stubble on the face of a man who kissed me on the cheek when I was 5 or 6 years old and really not liking it. These people were almost strangers to me, and you don't go up to a stranger in the mall and give them a hug because that would be inappropriate, but when you are a child and the adult knows your parents then it is considered fine because children are property of their parents. It is well accepted under normal circumstances that a boss should not be able to touch an employee (such as to give them a hug) because of the power relations involved, but when the recipient of that touch is a child it is fine as long as it is not sexual.

I think we need to move beyond this 'good touch, bad touch' dichotomy (with bad meaning sexual and everything else being acceptable) to teach our children to be empowered about their rights to their body. How can we tell a little girl that she is not supposed to make a fuss when grandma gives an unwanted hug and kiss, but she must yell, scream, and fight a decade later when her date tries to touch her or it is her fault if he doesn't stop when she wants him to? I have long been confused by these mixed messages. Although I do not see these two situations as identical, they are very similar in certain ways when you think about it in that they both involve a non-consensual touch. This does not only apply to children, every person should have the right to decide who touches them at any time and who does not, I just find it most obvious with children.

When people infringe on our space and touch us without our consent, it hurts... it makes us feel bad, regardless of whether it is a person that we like and might want to be touched by at other times and in other circumstances. The problem is, and I have faced this myself recently, informing them that you do not want to be touched hurts their feelings (even though it shouldn't). So, we are left with the choice of dealing with it or risking hurting another persons feelings. Being a parent or even a spouse does not give you entitlement to touch another person's body. Sometimes they might want to be touched, tickled, hugged, or kissed and sometimes they might not. And they have to be able to express that without worrying about hurting someone's feelings. The right to not be touched seems so simple to me that I am often surprised that it needs to be articulated, but it really does because it is so commonly infringed on and it is not considered to be a big deal.

It also translates into many different areas of people's lives... For example, children and play. Instead of waiting for a child to tell the other kids to stop wrestling or stop playing in a specific way, I try to teach my children to stop when it appears as though one person is no longer having fun (sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, but it is worth working on). This is hard for them to do because they can get really caught up in a game, and as children, I believe they have less capacity to be aware of others' feelings than adults do (although I am not sure of this). I am hoping that this teaches them to learn how to be in tune with the people that they interact with. This skill is likely impossible to fully master, but think of the possibilities that will come later if it is learned in childhood as a principle guiding play.

There are times when children do not have a say over who touches them. For example, if a child is hurting themselves or another person, it might be necessary to move them whether they want to be touched or not. But it is important to start from the premise of enthusiastic consent and then come up with a few specific exceptions from there.

Some people like being touched casually... they sit and stand close to others, they make physical contact in ordinary conversation and they are quick to hug friends when they see them. I, however, am not like that, and neither are a lot of people that I know. Today, for example, the person serving me at Tim Hortons touched my hand when he took my money and it made me extremely uncomfortable. I don't like when family members insist on hugs... never have been comfortable with that. That's not to say that I never like to be touched... I just like to feel that I have a sense of control over the circumstances upon which it happens and I beleive that I am fully entitled to that control, as are my children and every person that I come in contact with.

Explaining privilege to children

Today, I realized that I have to try harder to explain the concept of privilege to my 5 and 7 year old children and I'm not entirely sure how to go about doing this. My 7 year old just came up to me with her shirt up, rubbing her stomach, crying, and said "I'm starving."

I don't like when people who are actually just hungry say that they are starving, but I understand that I need to be somewhat forgiving when children speak. Usually, I just correct her and say "no, you are hungry" and get her a snack. Today, something set me off. Maybe it is because she just ate a rather large dinner followed by dessert only an hour before this comment. She also had a larger than usual breakfast and lunch, followed by a trip to the store with her father for a snack. Is it possible that she was having a growth spurt or something and was legitimately hungry? Yes. But more likely, she was just bored and wanted to eat.

The drama really bothers me. Crying and rubbing her stomach as though she hadn't eaten all day. She is often quite dramatic, such as when she gets hurt or when something exciting happens, but this was beyond excessive.

I told her that she is not starving. I told her that there are children all over the world who have not eaten ANYTHING today, or who have eaten very little, many of whom are not putting up the same fuss as she is. I reminded her that there are children who die because they do not have enough food. I told her that she needs to understand how privileged she is to get 3 meals and 2-4 snacks a day. Every day. I told her that she does not know what it means to be hungry... truly hungry. I am vaguely aware of what it means; I have gone days without eating because I did not have the means to get food, and weeks without eating anything more than a bowl of soup with bread a day from the soup kitchen, but I do not understand what it means to be starving.

I would like to find a book, movie, or even a youtube video that is age appropriate for her. The problem is that most of these films are deeply disturbing for a variety of reasons, often just because they can be incredibly ethnocentric. I want her to understand her privilege.

How to be a princess

My mother purchased a book for my daughter when she was on vacation in England and Scotland. It is called "The Usborne Princess Handbook: Your Top Secret guide to becoming a True Princess." I think she does this just to annoy me, as she was carefully watching my reaction as she began reading it.



Some of what it says is so awful that I hope it is meant as a joke, but my 7 year old daughter (who is obsessed with all things pink, sparkly, and "princess-like", definitely does not see it as anything other than explicit how-to instructions. In 6 years of trick-or-treating at halloween, she has dressed as a princess 3 times (and Hannah Montana once, which is basically the same thing). So this is serious stuff for her.

I will just type a few specific sentences and phrases that I have found in the limited reading I have done in this book.

Every girl has an inner princess - you just need to find her.

So this book applies to every girl, no exceptions. Tomboys, you aren't looking hard enough.

...there's more to being a princess than traipsing around in tiaras. You also need to know how to behave like one...

It is not about being born into a royal family of some sort... it is about behaving in specific ways. And since every girl has an inner princess, every girl (and woman, presumably) should behave in these ways.

The first step to becoming a princess is to be helpful... polite... and kind to everyone. A true princess never loses her temper... goes off in a huff... or makes a fuss.

Can you imagine a book telling boys that they have to be helpful and kind to everyone? Me neither... Boys are important. They are allowed to make a fuss on occasion. But a good princess must be groomed into taking orders from her father and husband, and giving orders (kindly) to children and servants.

Remember to keep clean! You can only sparkle if you're spotless.

Another double standard. Boys aren't only allowed to be dirty sometimes, but it is expected of them. Boys play in the mud, they play sports, grass stains on boys are an accepted part of life. Girls, however, must sparkle.

Don't cake yourself in make-up. It can be very unattractive.

But there is a limit on how feminine a girl is allowed to look before it crosses a line. We wouldn't want to be too sparkly, lest the princess be mistaken for a prostitute. The Madonna/whore dichotomy is alive and well in children's literature.

As a true princess, you need to be graceful at all times, from the turn of your head to the sweet of your curtsey. That means no tripping, no falling, no slouching, no plodding.

Great advice! It would be horrible for a princess to slouch on occasion... or trip and fall. That would be so unladylike... And again, advice that would never be given to a boy. Boys can't be graceful... that would be a little...

...try not to eat too much, or too fast.

Eating disorders. Let's start them early. Because there is nothing worse than a fat princess.

...the rule is quite simple: princesses don't run.... After all, you have to give the prince of your dreams a chance to rescue you.

Seriously?!? How are you supposed to play if you can't even run? I guess a good princess doesn't need to play sports or a good game of tag, but what does she do for fun other than kissing random frogs in the hopes that one will someday turn into a prince? And what do princesses need rescuing from, exactly? According to the book, things like hairy spiders and fire breathing dragons.

So, princesses (and by princesses I mean all women and girls out there, cause we all have inner princesses, remember), if you see a spider, don't kill it yourself, wait for a prince to come rescue you. And if you see a fire-breathing dragon, do not run away. If you run, how are you going to meet prince charming? Sure, if he isn't on time, the dragon might burn or eat you, but at least you know you died doing everything you could to meet a prince, right?


Thanks mom! (BTW, your other gifts were wonderful and very appreciated, even the purple tartan tights! Who knew I would ever wear tights?). And no, the book has not been banned in our house, we are reading it critically, and I am trying to turn it into a joke about how ridiculous these standards are, whether or not it was meant that way.

Experiences of single motherhood and children-as-a-burden

I am a single parent, and I am trying to get to a point where I can experience being the primary caregiver for two children as just a normal part of everyday life as opposed to a burden on me... for some reason, I feel the need to note that I love my children, I love being a parent, and I enjoy their company- I am writing about the specific times where things come up that children cannot go to (or are not "supposed" to participate in)-things that children on TV sitcoms magically disappear for.

Generally speaking, it is not difficult for me to enjoy having children around as part of my everyday life- they can make a weekend more exciting and open up a wide range of activities that I can do, such as going to various parks and playgrounds, and I love a good game of tag or follow the leader on the climbing structures when they aren't too full. However, as much as I try to get away from the children-are-(sometimes)-a-burden framework that used to dominate my thinking right after my divorce, I find that various circumstances are pushing it back into my life- two main examples right now being the university and my position as a union executive.

I begin grad school this fall, and it is a small program at a small university. Two years ago, there were fewer students and 2 more course options. This year, there are basically no electives being offered due to a severe prof shortage. Anyway, the part that is relevant to parenting is my schedule. My earliest course is at 4:30pm, and I will be in class at least two nights a week until 10pm. So, I help the kids get on the bus to school in the morning and do thesis work and readings through the day (things that I could easily do at home in the evening), then the kids have to go to daycare all evening while I attend classes.

I am really struggling with whether it is ok for me to spend that much time away from them. It is important to note that their father does not feel guilty about only seeing them for a couple of hours every other week, so why do I have to feel guilty about leaving them at daycare until 10pm 2 nights a week? I think it has something to do with my youngest's "behavioral issues" that developed at school last year when i was in class until 6:00 twice a week. He stopped listening to his kindergarten teacher and refused to go to bed for me at night, and when we consulted a specific agency about the behaviors, they suggested that it was because I wasn't spending enough time at home (with no suggestion that an absent father could be partially to blame).

Combining this class schedule with mother-blaming, I've gone as far as to debate whether I should actually get a graduate degree because it might not be fair to the children... but, on the other hand, would it be any more fair to them for me to take whatever type of job I can find with my current degree (insert liberal arts joke here) instead of following my own dream and my passion to continue my education and get the job that I see myself doing for the rest of my life?


The other issue I have been having related to my children is about working on a union executive. Our union has been having regular meetings and conferences 4 hours away (driving- 1 hour flight- 7 hours by train) to combat wage restraint legislation. My university needs to be represented, and, until we find more members to step in this fall, I seem to be the only one who is willing/able to do this. My union has a policy where children are welcome- daycare is provided at the meetings and speakers often talk about how happy they are to have entire families able to attend. However, there are activities that are planned at night, which means I cannot fully participate in the activities that are taking place as "good" parents put children to bed at a "reasonable" hour. Most participants have a spouse to stay with the children while they go out, but, for the single parents (in my experience, all of the attending single parents have been mothers) who attend, things like games night and camp fires are cut quite short. I have even had to miss evening meetings where important document wording was being debated in detail.

I'm not saying that I think there should be daycare all night at these events so I can go play games night and then go drinking with my peers, I am just saying that having children has stopped me from doing things that I might otherwise be able to do. So, I now need to try and reframe this discussion and get to a place where I can get around some of these experiences where having children sometimes feels like a burden... keeping in mind that when my children are together, they are not really capable of being quiet enough for non-child-friendly situations.


So, I guess my point is that as hard as I try to not see my children as a burden, I feel like this view is being pushed back on me- and my experience is that they are my burden, not their father's.

Odd conversation...

I had this weird conversation with my 5-year-old son yesterday.

J- (pointing at a picture) He's a bad guy
Me- really?
J- Yes, because his eyes are green. Bad guys have green eyes.
Me- I have green eyes.
J- Oh. But not really green eyes.

This may seem innocuous, even cute, but it parallels multiple conversations that I have been a part of or overheard that have perpetuated racist, sexist, heterosexist and various other stereotypes. It is also an example of how these beliefs continue, even with contradicting evidence.

Another Montessouri ad

I just saw another bench today that compares to the one I previously posted advertising for Montessouri Schools. I am going to skip details about the school, but I do have a class analysis at the previous link, which was further discussed here.


Sorry about the image quality, but it was taken from a cell phone camera in a moving vehicle. The ad reads

1 to 8 VS. 1 to 30.
You do the Math. Our students can.

This refers to class size and student teacher ratios... Of course, it doesn't mention that they can afford to have extra teachers because parents are paying for their children to attend these schools, where as the government has been cutting funds to public schools.

This suggests that public school classes are too big and public school teachers are overworked, I agree so far. But rather than actually doing anything about it or trying to get additional funding to public schools, middle to upper class families should merely put their children in a private school and leave the large class sizes for the children whose families cannot afford this "better" education...

Who needs social mobility when the status quo is so much more advantageous to the elite who write our social policy and decide how much funding to put into our schools... all while sending their children to private institutions.

And, to add insult to injury, they need to include a comment implying that public school students cannot do simple math.

Privilege... as taught by Disney

Too true... Disney princesses are not always blond, but they are always conventionally pretty and tend to be white (whiteness is pretty much the basis of Snow White's beauty). Even worse are the Barbie movies that have been coming out in the past 5 years or so, where EVERY female lead has blond hair and blue eyes.

Stripper Pinatas

This video is a news story for adult pinata's that are shaped like strippers, pole and all.



This is a very odd news story to me, because the adults keep talking about how the display is horrible because it can be viewed by children in passing cars.

Does anybody realize that, more problematic than the fact that children can see cartoonish breasts might be that grown men (and women) are beating 4 foot tall replicas of naked women with bats for fun? But then, on the Madonna/whore dichotomy, strippers definitely fall in the "whore" category, and are therefore not "deserving" of being treated with any degree of respect.

I won't embed this next video, because I find it quite disturbing, but if you want to watch people beating at one of these pinatas with a stick and laughing, it is also on youtube.

Maybe the news, and society more generally, needs to reframe their views on such issues when violence against women is so normalized that it isn't even considered in a news story about people beating images of women.

Baby Gaga Telephone video

Here is an interesting video of a preschooler doing Lady Gaga's Telephone video.



I find it telling that an outfit that looks "normal" to us on a grown woman looks so odd on a young girl(wait, did I just say Lady Gaga's outfits looked normal?). I don't mean because of the sexualization of children, as I didn't find most of the little girl's outfits to be too outrageous in that sense. It is normal for women to put so much work into their appearance, but it is not normal for men or children to do so.

When the adult dancers show up, however, I find the little girl looks so scared... I'd like to think that she's thinking "Please, don't let me grow up to be valued only for my ability to dance around in skimpy outfits" but I'm pretty sure it's more of a "who are these people and are they almost done yet" expression.


As a sidenote, Jezebel (a really good blog) has a lot of comments on this video, many of them including posters condemning the child's mother for letting her do the video. Why is the blame placed only on the mother? Assuming someone should be blamed for the video, what about the father or the (male) producer?

Queer Ontario's response to the new sex ed curriculum

A few weeks ago, I posted about Ontario's new sex education curriculum. I thought it was one of the best sex education programs that I have seen. However, conservative and religious groups did not, and the provincial government pulled the program, and plans to consult with these groups in developing a new curriculum plan.

Queer Ontario has just released a statement about the curriculum that I will quote at length

Queer Ontario feels the Elementary Health and Physical Education Curriculum proposed by the McGuinty government back in January of 2010 was a step in the right direction that would have provided Ontario children and youth with up-to-date scientific information on human development, physical health, sex, sexuality, sexual behaviour, and gender identity. So it came as a tremendous disappointment to hear that McGuinty succumbed to the pressures that were created by sex-negative religious fundamentalists, moral conservatives, and misinformed parents, ultimately rescinding the curriculum just 54 hours after he had come out in strong support of it.

Given that the first round of consultations had already taken into consideration the concerns of parent groups and religious organizations like the Institute for Catholic Education – alongside public health organizations, sex educators, school boards, academics, and LGBTQ groups including Queer Ontario’s predecessor, the Coalition for Lesbian and Gay Rights in Ontario (CLGRO), – the new curriculum was in no way under consulted and actually served to bring Ontario’s Health and Physical Education Curriculum in line with those of other, more progressive provinces like British Columbia. The new proposed curriculum is overdue and progressive respecting personal differences and individual uniqueness, much needed concepts that would have begun to be addressed in Ontario’s elementary school systems.

To this end Queer Ontario calls for:

The Province of Ontario to fully implement the proposed Health and Physical Education Curriculum and not to abandon important tenets regarding aspects of sex education dealing with sex, sexual orientation, sexual behaviour, gender and gender identity.

A balanced approach (as with the first rounds) should a second round of consultations be set up, albeit redundantly, by inviting all previously-consulted groups to the table to ensure – once again – that there is an inclusive, well-informed, and comprehensive review of the necessary changes.

The inclusion of Queer Ontario and other LGBT groups in the second round of consultations.

The Premier’s intention, be supported, to implement the new proposed curriculum across both the public and separate Catholic school systems throughout Ontario inclusive of the sex education components.

The media did not release information pertaining to how many groups were consulted in the development of the new curriculum; they made it seem as though the curriculum were developed privately by the liberal government and released, shocking groups and parents alike. The news stories that I read (and there were a lot of them) also failed to mention that a similar program exists in British Columbia; they made it seem as though this were first of it's kind and extremely radical. I guess we can see the mainstream media's stance on the curriculum in this omission.

If a new curriculum really is developed to replace both the existing and proposed curriculum, I really hope the government at very least includes Queer Ontario and other LGBT groups in Ontario in developing this curriculum. I think "protecting" children from information about same sex couples is a big part of what leads to systemic heterosexism.

Children, Gender, and Beauty Standards

I just had what I think is an interesting observation while I watched my children playing dress up.

My daughter always dresses up as a "pretty princess" or a "beautiful ballerina," whereas my son dresses up as spiderman, batman, a cowboy, or a knight.

It is not enough that a little girl be something (i.e. a ballerina), even as a young child, she must live up to certain beauty expectations while doing so. I am not trying to argue that men do not have pressure to meet certain standards with their appearance as well, but at least a little boy can dress up as a cowboy without having to be a "handsome" or "muscular" cowboy.

Sex Education in Ontario: Beyond abstinence only curriculums

There is a new sex education curriculum in Ontario that is being strongly opposed by "family values" groups.

Some of the highlights are
Grade 1- taught to identify body parts by their proper names, including male and female genitalia
Grade 3- curriculum includes gender identity, sexual orientation, and same-sex marriage
Grade 5- identify reproductive organs and describe puberty changes
Grade 6- taught about masturbation, as well as definitions for terms like "vaginal lubrication"
Grade 7- STIs, AIDS, and unwanted pregnancy prevention, including information about oral and anal sex.
Grade 8- Taught about the importance of abstinence as a positive choice, but not as the only choice. They are also taught about pregnancy prevention and how to find support for issues relating to a healthy sexuality.

Dr. Charles McVety, president of Canada Christian College, claimed that

"Little eight-year-olds, they're going to be taught they look one way on the outside but they may be the opposite on the inside... This is so confusing to an eight-year-old ... these are children in the strongest sense of the word -- they're innocent, they're clean, they're beautiful -- and to corrupt them by imparting a question of gender identity is beyond the pale."

Would talk of gender identity confuse an 8 year-old? Probably not, I think most third graders are more open to these ideas than many adults... and it might help a lot of children accept how they feel about their own bodies.

I am troubled by the perception that children are pure and innocent. Children are in need of protection and nurture from adults in order to survive. Adults are supposed to provide them with the necessities, like food and shelter. In western society, adults must also protect children from "secret" adult knowledge, such as sexual relations, money, violence, illness, death, as well as specific social relations and language. This is not always the case historically or in many other cultures, where children sleep in the same room as parents and it is not uncommon for them to see their parents having sex.

Children are constructed as pure, innocent and in need of protection from adult knowledge, when I believe that they are merely ignorant because of this so-called protection. I have heard it argued that this ignorance can make them more at risk because the concept of innocence can be arousing to abusers, it can stigmatize children who have figured out these secrets, and it makes them more vulnerable to abuse when they don’t have the words to describe what is happening or the knowledge to understand what is acceptable and what is not.

The importance of teaching youth about the dangers of sex is widely debated, but it is much less controversial than the concept of teaching them about the pleasures of sex- which is something that this curriculum does not quite get into, but is bordering on. In order to be successful in most aspects of life, children are taught to practice. They spend countless hours doing homework to practice for a test, training for a sport, or learning a musical instrument. What they are not taught is that sexual pleasure also takes practice; in fact, they are shamed into not practicing. The safest way to practice would be to masturbate, but instead of being encouraged to do so, they are made to feel guilt over autoeroticism and sexuality itself. The importance of having a healthy sex life in adulthood is rarely discussed in school curriculums.

Children, and especially teenagers, know that sex exists and trying to end premarital sex is an effort in futility. Rather than continuing to fight this losing battle, children should be 'protected' by being given complete and accurate information about sex. I hope that teachers get the training necessary to deliver this information to students in a way that does not shame them into avoiding questions and not getting the information that they need.

In a lecture on the problems with abstinence only education, a women's studies professor argued that everyone (even children) deserve to practice with as much information at their disposal as possible.


edited to add: Upon re-reading this, I thought I might end up with comments telling me that it is wrong to push sexuality onto children... Just to make it clear, I am not suggesting that we actively encourage young children to masturbate, or give them step by step instructions on how to do so... I am merely saying that we need to make sure they have all the information they need available to them so that when they do decide to experiment with their body in various ways, they are able to do so without being embarrassed or ashamed of themselves.