{"items": [{"author": "Ari", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104855645282", "anchor": "fb-10100104855645282", "service": "fb", "text": "As a parent, you give children names, ethnicities, religions, languages, and a bunch more identity ingredients. All those are subject to change by the child, but you still have given them defaults they are likely to keep. So why not pronouns too?", "timestamp": "1564937841"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104855645282&reply_comment_id=10100104860071412", "anchor": "fb-10100104855645282_10100104860071412", "service": "fb", "text": "→ I was going to say that these are pretty different because the pain of being raised with one assigned gender when you actually experience something different is much worse than your other examples, but I'm not sure how true that is. I know people who have had very painful deconversion experiences.", "timestamp": "1564941180"}, {"author": "David Chudzicki", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104855745082", "anchor": "fb-10100104855745082", "service": "fb", "text": "> I don't believe any children raised with \"they\" are old enough to talk about their experience with it yet.
That seems very unlikely. Maybe you mean you don't know any such children who are old enough?", "timestamp": "1564937911"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104855745082&reply_comment_id=10100104856917732", "anchor": "fb-10100104855745082_10100104856917732", "service": "fb", "text": "→ David I thought this was a pretty new thing, and the oldest children raised with \"they\" weren't in elementary school yet. Is it older than that?", "timestamp": "1564938814"}, {"author": "David Chudzicki", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104855745082&reply_comment_id=10100104857416732", "anchor": "fb-10100104855745082_10100104857416732", "service": "fb", "text": "→ I dunno, a decade ago 'they' was a reasonably common pronoun for non-binary folks, right? (My sense of circles I'm in is that now it's by far the most common, and back then its frequency was similar to some other popular choices, maybe a bit less common.)
So I don't know any such children, but I'd be surprised if there weren't *any*.", "timestamp": "1564938984"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104855745082&reply_comment_id=10100104858040482", "anchor": "fb-10100104855745082_10100104858040482", "service": "fb", "text": "→ David I guess I'd also be surprised if there were zero, but in reading online I don't see anything public about ones born before ~2013?", "timestamp": "1564939478"}, {"author": "Howie", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104855745082&reply_comment_id=10100104866323882", "anchor": "fb-10100104855745082_10100104866323882", "service": "fb", "text": "→ When I was in college (Wesleyan from 2004-2008), I didn't know of anybody using 'they.' Ze/hir predominated but I think it might've been very localized.", "timestamp": "1564944241"}, {"author": "David Chudzicki", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104855745082&reply_comment_id=10100104919013292", "anchor": "fb-10100104855745082_10100104919013292", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Jeff I was just saying was I'd be surprised by zero. Sorry if that's a nitpick! If you'd also be surprised by zero we're not really disagreeing.", "timestamp": "1564962784"}, {"author": "David Chudzicki", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104855745082&reply_comment_id=10100104919138042", "anchor": "fb-10100104855745082_10100104919138042", "service": "fb", "text": "→ But also kids born in 2013 should be able to talk a bit about the experience already.", "timestamp": "1564962889"}, {"author": "Andrew", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104856004562", "anchor": "fb-10100104856004562", "service": "fb", "text": "Him/her. Most will grow up and choose their biological gender.", "timestamp": "1564938151"}, {"author": "David Chudzicki", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104856159252", "anchor": "fb-10100104856159252", "service": "fb", "text": "Sort of an aside, but:
Even parents who choose gendered pronouns have the option of not emphasizing gender as much as is sometimes done, e.g. when you have the choice between saying \"the kids\" or \"the girls\".", "timestamp": "1564938351"}, {"author": "Gianna", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104856159252&reply_comment_id=10100104858195172", "anchor": "fb-10100104856159252_10100104858195172", "service": "fb", "text": "→ This. I can't put my finger on it at the moment, but I believe there's research indicating that purposely avoiding gendered language in groups is related to the kids in those groups conforming less rigidly to gender norms.", "timestamp": "1564939606"}, {"author": "Julia", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104856159252&reply_comment_id=10100104882571322", "anchor": "fb-10100104856159252_10100104882571322", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Maybe this? https://qz.com/.../swedens-gender-neutral-preschools.../
Hard to separate \"their teachers were trained on how to do this, and presumably why the school decided to operate that way\" from the effects on the kids. I worked in two daycares and many of the teachers there actively enforced gender norms and homophobia on the kids. If a school has a policy of not enforcing gender norms and hires teachers who are on board with that, I'd expect some of the effects on the kids to come from selection of school and teachers rather than a pronoun thing alone.", "timestamp": "1564949681"}, {"author": "Jen", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104856857852", "anchor": "fb-10100104856857852", "service": "fb", "text": "Thank you for this! It's something i've thought a lot about too", "timestamp": "1564938755"}, {"author": "Heather", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104857840882", "anchor": "fb-10100104857840882", "service": "fb", "text": "I\u2019m certainly not an expert, but my understanding is that gender identity is something that children become aware of over time. Most children start noticing the differences between male and female bodies as well as societal norms around the age of two, will start to express identification of their own gender identity around age 3 and then that is often fixed around age 4. So would argue that it probably makes sense to do the things to support your child developmentally with a wide variety of experiences and toys that aren\u2019t necessarily gendered, and see how they start to express themselves as they grow, and then support them (with pronouns and otherwise) from there. But I would be very curious to hear the early experiences of my transgender/non-binary friends as to how they feel about this...", "timestamp": "1564939354"}, {"author": "Hannah", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104858359842", "anchor": "fb-10100104858359842", "service": "fb", "text": "Hmm, I think choosing they/them pronouns for your child is meant to be more challenging for the parents than the child. Once the child is old enough to notice any negative attitudes from other people, I think they would also be old enough to express what their gender is and their pronouns could change (or not) accordingly. Right now I don't feel that raising your child with either a binary or nonbinary pronoun is more correct, but definitely open to hearing more from the trans/nb community and parents who have chosen nonbinary pronouns for their children.", "timestamp": "1564939684"}, {"author": "Julia", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104858359842&reply_comment_id=10100104881887692", "anchor": "fb-10100104858359842_10100104881887692", "service": "fb", "text": "→ I expect some of it depends on what environment the kid is in. If they're cared for by people who are on board (parents or another provider who will consistently use \"they\") I'd expect it to be no problem for the kid in the early years. If not (e.g. they're in daycare), I don't expect that either caregivers or other children will be consistent in using \"they.\" I imagine a lot of kids won't be too bothered by being ungendered at home and gendered at daycare, but it seems like it could also lead to some confusion/frustration. Rather like bilingual kids quickly pick up on what the dominant language is where they live, and often refuse to speak the non-dominant language with their families even though they understand it.", "timestamp": "1564949454"}, {"author": "Kitty", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104859407742", "anchor": "fb-10100104859407742", "service": "fb", "text": "These are some great thoughts on the matter. We chose to use a gendered pronoun but we also talk about pronouns and who uses what and that it's ok to choose a different pronoun if you're uncomfortable with the one that's being used currently. It's a bit of a mash up of the two methods. We also often use they in books we read even if there is a gender to help normalize it.", "timestamp": "1564940870"}, {"author": "Denise", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104860804942", "anchor": "fb-10100104860804942", "service": "fb", "text": "With both my kids when they were small, I just referred to them as \u2018the baby\u2019 and \u2018it\u2019. Though using \u2018it\u2019 seems to be weirder in English than in German.", "timestamp": "1564941626"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104860804942&reply_comment_id=10100104863674192", "anchor": "fb-10100104860804942_10100104863674192", "service": "fb", "text": "→ There's a point when they're too old for \"the baby\" or \"it\" but not old enough to express gender identity yet, though, no?", "timestamp": "1564943172"}, {"author": "Susi", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104860804942&reply_comment_id=10100104866368792", "anchor": "fb-10100104860804942_10100104866368792", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Jeff Kaufman, in German the word \"Kind\" (child) is grammatically neuter, so you will have sentences like \"the child... It...\" I actually still find it hard to navigate (after ~13 years in English speaking countries) to not fall back to that when referring to someone's offspring as it, if I don't explicitly know which pronoun to use and have gotten some evil looks for it...
I think if you wanted to avoid gendering your child that early, you'd also have to avoid an easily identifiable (in gender terms) name.", "timestamp": "1564944254"}, {"author": "Jillian", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104860804942&reply_comment_id=10100104901338712", "anchor": "fb-10100104860804942_10100104901338712", "service": "fb", "text": "→ I've read that children don't understand that race is fixed until they're six or seven, and I wonder if something similar is true for gender. I've certainly seen five and six year olds really struggle to use consistent pronouns for people I thought had pretty obvious gender markers.", "timestamp": "1564957240"}, {"author": "Louis", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104867271982", "anchor": "fb-10100104867271982", "service": "fb", "text": "How would you distinguish the world you describe seeing from a world ready to transition to using \"they\" for very young children?", "timestamp": "1564944530"}, {"author": "Alyssa", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104880191092", "anchor": "fb-10100104880191092", "service": "fb", "text": "Jeff Kaufman I would use the default gendered pronouns for a young child. Since virtually everyone does this, *not* doing it has the paradoxical effect of making gender as a concept be more salient than it might be otherwise.", "timestamp": "1564948917"}, {"author": "Kitty", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104880191092&reply_comment_id=10100104926163962", "anchor": "fb-10100104880191092_10100104926163962", "service": "fb", "text": "→ I feel like this kind of thinking (while i understand it and admittedly do use a gendered pronoun for my young child) makes change impossible.", "timestamp": "1564966030"}, {"author": "Todd", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104886613222", "anchor": "fb-10100104886613222", "service": "fb", "text": "This is a side note, but as long as singular they is being discussed... can we make third person plural th'all as a y'all analogue?", "timestamp": "1564950835"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104886613222&reply_comment_id=10100104910964422", "anchor": "fb-10100104886613222_10100104910964422", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Todd saying \"they all\" to disambiguate as needed makes sense, and I think over time as that becomes normal \"th'all\" starts sounding right to people?", "timestamp": "1564961560"}, {"author": "Christopher", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104889048342", "anchor": "fb-10100104889048342", "service": "fb", "text": "what does \"strong agreement\" mean to you? I think of at least 70% of people. And I would be surprised if support for choosing a gender different from biological sex even broke 50% in the US. I'm in China now so can't really look it up to see but there probably has been a poll on this.", "timestamp": "1564951741"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104889048342&reply_comment_id=10100104896882642", "anchor": "fb-10100104889048342_10100104896882642", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Christopher sorry, \"my part of the world\" wasn't great phrasing. I mean something like \"the people I interact with\". Among that group I think it's 95%+", "timestamp": "1564955003"}, {"author": "Roger", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104920071172", "anchor": "fb-10100104920071172", "service": "fb", "text": "Jeff Kaufman isn\u2019t dealing with gender pronouns before you\u2019ve dealt with gender stereotypes like putting the cart before the horse? And, what\u2019s the point of even going down the pronoun road with your children if your not prepared to do he same with stereotypes?
https://www.npr.org/.../can-a-child-be-raised-free-of...", "timestamp": "1564963550"}, {"author": "David Chudzicki", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104920071172&reply_comment_id=10100104925824642", "anchor": "fb-10100104920071172_10100104925824642", "service": "fb", "text": "→ I don't think it's putting the cart before the horse, because I'm skeptical that gender can exist at all without \"gender stereotypes\".", "timestamp": "1564965788"}, {"author": "Roger", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104920071172&reply_comment_id=10100104926772742", "anchor": "fb-10100104920071172_10100104926772742", "service": "fb", "text": "→ David I\u2019m honestly not sure what you mean so could you elaborate?", "timestamp": "1564966352"}, {"author": "David Chudzicki", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104920071172&reply_comment_id=10100104928833612", "anchor": "fb-10100104920071172_10100104928833612", "service": "fb", "text": "→ If there are going to be genders, then they're going to mean something, e.g. some collection of characteristics that make up what it means to be a \"man\" or \"woman\".
Sure those words will have very fuzzy meanings, and there may be no particular specific feature of someone you can infer from their gender. But they still mean something.
So I don't think you can still have gender and completely get rid of gender \"stereotypes\".
At least that's my rough understanding right now - gender is confusing and I could be wrong.", "timestamp": "1564967354"}, {"author": "Roger", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104920071172&reply_comment_id=10100104930395482", "anchor": "fb-10100104920071172_10100104930395482", "service": "fb", "text": "→ David I\u2019m still not really understanding what your getting at in reference to my question. Perhaps Jeff can help us out since he liked your comment and the question was originally addressed to him.", "timestamp": "1564968168"}, {"author": "Xuan", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104964492152", "anchor": "fb-10100104964492152", "service": "fb", "text": "This was a thoughtful post, thank you for sharing! One thing I'm confused about though -- you wrote that: \"I also see it as unfair to subject a child to the unfair treatment nonbinary people often receive today.\" But I'm curious, do you expect children to receive much unfair treatment while they're still pre-verbal, or before they begin to identify with a particular gender --- i.e., between 0 to 3 years old? Because my intuition about this was that during those ages, any teasing they would receive from their (also pre-verbal) peers would be minimal, and that the most direct harassment they might experience is from acquaintances of parents who might disagree with using gender-neutral pronouns.
My sense was that most of the difficulty faced for those initial 3 years would not be by the children themselves, but by parents having to repeatedly assert and explain to everyone else why they use 'they/them' pronouns for their child. And that by 3 years old, once the child starts to understand gender and starts to identify with certain gender labels, the problem dissolves because you can take the lead from the child. Either they continue to prefer 'they/them' pronouns --- in which case their parents could reasonably assume that it is worth defending their choice and supporting them in face of people who don't respect those pronouns --- *or* they might choose to use other pronouns. At worst, the child might have a particularly bad experience with being judged or teased for 'they/them' pronouns, then decide to switch to gendered pronouns instead, and their parents could support and counsel them through that process.
Another small comment in response to this:
\"It's also possible that a child raised with \"they\" wouldn't experience it as \"the people around me are avoiding gendering me\" but instead as \"the people around me are gendering me as nonbinary.\"\"
^My intuition is that, even setting aside that children are unlikely to have a strong internal sense of gender from 0-3 years old, this would be highly unlikely, especially if parents raise the child to understand 'they/them' as gender neutral pronouns. There are plenty of languages without gendered pronouns (Mandarin, Malay, etc.), and to my knowledge, that lack of gendering does not result in gender dysphoria in children raised with those languages.", "timestamp": "1564997856"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104964492152&reply_comment_id=10100104971428252", "anchor": "fb-10100104964492152_10100104971428252", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Xuan I think you're right and I was overestimating some how much harassment a very young child would receive. But I think it's probably not 0-3, and maybe more like 0-6? Something like, while at 3 or 4 many kids start to get a sense of gender, defaults from how your parents treat you are also pretty strong, and even if parents are attentive and try to figure out if you're expressing something most of the time it will take longer?
But that is very much an empirical question, and I would be really interested in how this actually goes for children raised with neutral pronouns in societies that normally use gendered pronouns.
\"There are plenty of languages without gendered pronouns (Mandarin, Malay, etc.), and to my knowledge, that lack of gendering does not result in gender dysphoria in children raised with those languages.\"
Sorry, I wasn't clear! I agree that if we switched entirely away from gendered third person pronouns in English, which I think we should do, that this wouldn't give gender dysphoria or otherwise confuse kids. I'm trying to talk specifically about being raised with \"they\" in a house and society where pretty much everyone else you interact with goes by he/she. Growing up with \"my pronoun is they, unlike everyone else\".", "timestamp": "1565005746"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100104964492152&reply_comment_id=10100104971652802", "anchor": "fb-10100104964492152_10100104971652802", "service": "fb", "text": "→ (with the second point, Alyssa's comment above gets to this some as well)", "timestamp": "1565005805"}, {"author": "Anna", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100105157420522", "anchor": "fb-10100105157420522", "service": "fb", "text": "Basically as David described above, we are using \u201che/him\u201d pronouns for our kid so far, but I try to use nongendered language for him and other kids when possible: I try to remember to call him my kid instead of my son, use \u201ckid\u201d instead of \u201cboy,\u201d refer to grownups as \u201cthat grownup\u201d or \u201cthat person\u201d instead of \u201cthat woman\u201d or \u201cthat man,\u201d and refer to some of the characters in his books and some of his toys and stuffed animals using \u201cthey\u201d pronouns.", "timestamp": "1565098694"}, {"author": "Anna", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100105157420522&reply_comment_id=10100105158278802", "anchor": "fb-10100105157420522_10100105158278802", "service": "fb", "text": "→ We went with he/him pronouns because we thought that those were statistically more likely to be his preferred pronouns later, but maybe those statistics will change a lot for his generation, I don\u2019t know.", "timestamp": "1565099041"}, {"author": "Gianna", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/10100104854986602?comment_id=10100105345638332", "anchor": "fb-10100105345638332", "service": "fb", "text": "NPR just did a story on singular \"they.\" https://www.npr.org/.../even-a-grammar-geezer-like-me-can...", "timestamp": "1565204170"}]}