Nitwit Mom Thinks Parenting Is About Making "A Political Stance"
Stephanie Kaloi writes at The Good Men Project about the girly way she's been dressing her 4-year-old son:
I have spent most of my son's nearly four years on the planet scouring thrift stores and online shops for fun, colorful, and bright clothing. It's been easy to meander back and forth between boy's and girl's departments as, for the most part, a lot of the clothes could work on a boy or girl.Granted, my son has worn his fair share of puff sleeves and rainbows, but MOST of his clothing has been boy-leaning, with a dash of glitter on a sleeve.
...My desire to dress my son in bright colors that could work for a boy or girl is half a political stance and half a frustration with how despondently boring I find most boy's clothing.
Truly horrifying is the pink sweatshirt with big hearts all over it (in a photo at the link) that she thought would be a great political experiment for her son to wear.
The kid is now apparently trying to wear little boy clothes:
Right now, my kid is wearing an Angry Birds pajama shirt and owl-covered tights under plaid pants, and that outfit is awesome. It's colorful and fun, but it's also a little more boy-friendly than clothing he's donned in the past.I suppose this is all part of realizing my kid is getting older, but there's a real part of me that mourns the loss of freedom in clothing, however temporary it may be.
Whose "freedom" would that be?
Notice the absence of any mention of Daddy?
As a father of three adorable girls, I can speak on this subject with a reasonable amount of knowledge. However, the ideology at play here is not subject to knowledge of parenting, but knowledge of how flawed humans operate. The people who crop up now and then who do this are using their children to underline their agendas. Period, do-f**king-com.
Freedom, my ass.
Joe at February 2, 2013 9:38 AM
I am DISGUSTED by this woman. Raising a child is not about you, narcissist!
I'm not a parent, but I have considered what it would really mean. The challenge is to raise the child you have, not try to project how I wish I'd been raised on to this little person. The job is to turn them into an independent, functional human being, not a political statement. Yuck.
Tyler at February 2, 2013 9:41 AM
Did she have a child or a doll?
Conan the Grammarian at February 2, 2013 9:50 AM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2013/02/02/nitwit_mom_thin.html#comment-3590491">comment from Conan the GrammarianGreat question, Conan.
Amy Alkon at February 2, 2013 10:31 AM
She is overly concerned with her toddler's gender identity, as expressed by HER through his clothing. That doesn't seem healthy to me.
She is so emotionally invested in this that she finds typical boys' clothing "despondently boring" and "mourns" when she feels she must stop dressing her son in girls' clothing. I have more respect for people who save their despondency and mourning for real tragedies.
Sue at February 2, 2013 11:06 AM
This chick is a whack job. I feel sorry for her kid.
I think this comment on the article pretty much sums her up: "Yet another 20 something hipster parent who is more concerned about their own wants and needs than their child’s."
Daghain at February 2, 2013 11:11 AM
Her real problem is that she wishes she had girl instead of boy. My dd never liked pink or frilly. I found plenty of clothes for her to that were more neutral because she loves blue without having to dress her as a boy. I dressed her like a kid. She also liked dinosaurs and rocks. I on the other hand, loved all those little pink frills and dolls, but it's not about me. At the end of the day, they just want to play and fun. This crazy nut really just wanted a girly girl and can't admit it to herself. Ugh... These people make me sick. Your child is not a lab rat lady! Raising children is about helping them be who they want to be and not what you think they should be.
Sheep mommy at February 2, 2013 12:06 PM
Conan said exactly what I am thinking - this lady should have bought a doll or at least a dog that would tolerate her playing "dress up."
Charles at February 2, 2013 12:19 PM
Ugh, The Good Men Project.
A Project by feminists to tell men who are assumed to be bad how to be good as measured by feminists.
Seriously Amy, it's not a hate site but you can see hate sites from there.
jerry at February 2, 2013 1:19 PM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2013/02/02/nitwit_mom_thin.html#comment-3590578">comment from jerryIt's actually a site by a guy named Tom Matlack whom I met when our books were featured on the same panel (with one other author) at LA Times Festival of Books.
I think he's a good guy and means well, but he wouldn't know how to identify good science if it crawled up his ass and yodeled (as I've recently started liking to say). He also is one of those people who seems to overvalue people's opinions -- apparently thinking that every voice should be heard. (This can sometimes be in service of getting traffic.)
When I see their tweets, I sometimes read their stuff, and in the past, suggested they try to do better on science. The thing is, if you haven't spent a lot of time and effort getting to know scientific thinking and methodology, you probably can't identify what's good and what's shit.
And even solid researchers I have on my show will sometimes write about methodologically flawed studies as if they are solid, valid and reliable. Because I don't have a Ph.D., perhaps, I'm more nervous about always checking things. The shaky bridge study, with a sample size of 23, is an example -- and no, they weren't doing fMRIs.
Amy Alkon at February 2, 2013 1:25 PM
FWIW: She separated from her guy last November. What is strange is that her column from January 2013 talks about them buying a sofa together.
Her idea of "gender neutral" clothing is fascinating, if it includes pink shirts covered with hearts. That said, she is accepting her son's wishes on how he wants to dress. She had her fun while he was to young to care, now he cares and she's not pushing the issue.
Really, there's no problem here aside from her being a bit full of herself. Comes with being young. According to the sofa article, she is 28 and having a sofa makes her feel all grown up.
Which, meandering randomly, brings up math. This means she got married at 22, and had her child at 24. Draw what conclusions from that you will; seems kinda young to be getting hitched and start a family...
a_random_guy at February 2, 2013 2:06 PM
I refuse to engage on websites where everything has to be moderated before a post will appear.
I prefer Amys method of not banning or blocking anything or anyone unless it is quite clearly spam.
I lost interest in that website a few years ago when it became obvious they were blocking comments, the fact that this story made it up without an editorail comment by the site as something deserving of ridicule only confims my suspicions
lujlp at February 2, 2013 2:15 PM
When my son got into size 2T, I did notice that suddenly most of the boys' clothes were navy, gray, brown, or olive and I wished for brighter, livelier colors for still such a young child. But I certainly never wished to dress him in a pink shirt covered with purple hearts! What a whack job woman. Poor kid.
Lizzie at February 2, 2013 3:08 PM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2013/02/02/nitwit_mom_thin.html#comment-3590635">comment from LizzieJust wrote this to a friend who emailed me about how depressing this mom's behavior is:
Amy Alkon at February 2, 2013 3:22 PM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2013/02/02/nitwit_mom_thin.html#comment-3590640">comment from lujlpI refuse to engage on websites where everything has to be moderated before a post will appear. I prefer Amys method of not banning or blocking anything or anyone unless it is quite clearly spam.
Thanks, luj -- it's really important to me to have a free speech site. It is pretty hard to get banned here unless you're coming over from another website as a mob bent on destroying speech in this comments section, as happened a few years back.
Justice Brandeis, I think, said that sunshine is the best disinfectant. I agree.
PS I haven't had time to go after the DHS nitwit who was sockpuppeting here from their computers, but it is at the top of my list. Making great headway on this chapter -- just did a civil liberties section that I'm really liking. Just have to make sure I make my book deadline. If worse comes to worse, I'll go after the guy (and the others I uncovered from DHS) on June 1. (Book is due May 31.) It's never too late to cook a power-abusing government goose, though sooner is always preferable to later.
Amy Alkon at February 2, 2013 3:29 PM
I think the mom is nuts! There is no reason at all to dress your son up in girl clothes and be so stupid as to claim they are gender neutral i really think she wanted a girl and dressed him accordingly as long as she could get away with it. That, or she wanted to totally fuck with his head. It reminds me of that stupid family in Canada that decided to raise their children genderless and gave it a generic name and won't tell anyone if the kid is a boy or a girl and dress it in both boy and girl clothes. They did this same approach with clothing on the older two and took the oldest out of kindergarten because his classmates were "insensitive" to his "creativity" in wearing dresses, yet stressed that he was very well adjusted and wasn't bothered that people made comments about him wearing girl clothes. Yeah, sounds like it!
I really want a girl but have two boys so far. I don't dress any of them in girl clothes. The closest to girly they own is a light pink polo shirt from Land's End that matches daddy's. Daddy has a few lighter pastel button shirts and polo shirts he wears for work and this way the kids can look like him. Beyond that, nothing that could be considered the least bit girly.
BunnyGirl at February 2, 2013 6:32 PM
"I cannot imagine a dad in the house who would not understand what a wounding, terrible thing this is for a kid"
You need to stretch your imagination. Here's an article on the genderless boy in Toronto that BunnyGirl mentioned:
http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2011/12/26/the_genderless_baby_who_caused_a_storm_of_controversy_in_2011.html
This dad didn't just passively go along with his wife's insanity - he was in on it right from the beginning. And he's not the only one in the city.
Martin at February 2, 2013 8:56 PM
More genderless mindlessness, if you can stomach it:
http://www.thestar.com/life/parent/2011/05/21/parents_keep_childs_gender_secret.html
Martin at February 2, 2013 9:06 PM
S'cuse, but there are people who, you are like...."No!".
http://s3-ec.buzzfed.com/static/enhanced/webdr01/2012/11/14/16/enhanced-buzz-19492-1352927201-1.jpg
Feebie at February 2, 2013 9:12 PM
I wonder how many 'gender nutreal' parents skip having the boys circumcised
lujlp at February 2, 2013 11:02 PM
Boys' clothes ARE pretty boring. Shopping for my daughter is fun. Shopping for my son seems more like a necessity.
Sosij at February 3, 2013 12:13 AM
Boys' clothes ARE pretty boring.
That's probably because boys don't care very much what they are wearing. As long as it's functional, and doesn't attract any sort of negative attention from peers, it'll do.
a_random_guy at February 3, 2013 6:08 AM
luj,
I have had essentially no comments on my blog that is not spam. I have even let some of the spam comments through. Don't put every site down just because we don't want our sites to look like garbage. Do you want links to porn and Louis Vitton handbags? I can give them to you.
Jim P. at February 3, 2013 7:53 AM
I hate to think what sort of name she gave the poor kid.
Bill O Rights at February 3, 2013 8:17 AM
I find it scary that this woman didn't feel like a grown-up when she had a baby; it took buying a sofa to feel like one.
Fink-Nottle at February 3, 2013 10:15 AM
I'm all for gender-neutral clothes. Its ridiculous to make parents buy two separate wardrobes if they have kids of 2 different genders. You can't do hand me downs if your clothes are too gendered. Maybe the rest of you are so rich that you think its evil to make kids wear neutral clothes, but I'm all for it.
That's why H and M is so great. Yeah, they have gendered stuff but they generally have plenty of say, plain red t-shirts or whatnot.
NicoleK at February 3, 2013 10:18 AM
Kid's name is Jasper Puna'ikaika Curtis Mayfield Kavanaugh (I don't know what the last name is; those are all middle names). I'm pretty sure she normally calls him Jazz. I read the parenting blog she manages when I'm in a laugh at crazy feminists mood.
http://offbeatfamilies.com/2009/12/premature-baby-changes-plans
Heather at February 3, 2013 10:20 AM
My boys' clothes are tons of fun. Super heros, dinosaurs, monster trucks. Maybe because I shopped for 3 girls before having the boy, it's a nice change.
And Nicole, no one is against gender neutral clothes. They're great-several of my son's Cars tshirts were his sisters first. But Owl-colored TIGHTS and shirts with glitter and rainbows aren't neutral. I don't care, if a kid wants to wear that, of either gender. But when the parent decides FOR them, that pisses me off. And he clearly does have an opinion.
People that want to make statements need to make it themselves, bot use kids to.
momof4 at February 3, 2013 11:22 AM
JimP I'm not saying spam should be deleted, I just hate sites that moderate and reject comments for any number of reasons
One of the mods was posting on that story, said insulting the site, editors, moderators or discussing modreration techniques would have your comment deleted.
She finished off by saying people were encouraged to disagree.
I left a comment ponting out that were werent free to discuss mofderation techniques or point out the stpidity of telling people the were free to post what they pleased while also telling them what never to mention.
Needless to say my comment did not pass moderation
lujlp at February 3, 2013 1:36 PM
I think my boys have fun, cute clothes too. Carter's and Gymboree have a lot of cute stuff, although I usually need to wait until Gymboree has a good sale going because it's too pricey normally. I will also buy some basic primary color onesies and shirts and denim overalls that can work for either gender. My oldest boy would probably be thrilled if I bought him clothes off the girl racks though. He seems to prefer them because his favorite color right now is pink. I've so far managed compromises like polo shirts in those types of colors for him (like daddy wears), but I'm not encouraging any sort of girl gendered clothing with all the ruffles and glitter stuff. Ultimately if he wants to dress that way when he's older that will be his decision, but he's much to young to decide that for himself now. Parents shouldn't force opposite gendered clothing on their little ones. It drives me nuts when girls are in very obviously boy clothes too.
BunnyGirl at February 3, 2013 4:09 PM
Now, why doesn't it surprise me that the crazy mom lives in my city?
BunnyGirl at February 3, 2013 4:12 PM
I think what she really wanted was a little girl...after all, if she had had a girl, would she have dressed her in the "boring" boys clothes?
giraffeher at February 4, 2013 6:10 AM
If we're lucky, when this kid becomes a serial killer, he'll start his spree with Mommy Dearest.
Nolo Contendere at February 4, 2013 4:30 PM
Interestingly, over here boys wear tights. They make manly tights with pictures of cars on them for boys.
NicoleK at February 5, 2013 12:08 PM
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