(PM.) The trailer for an upcoming episode of 60 Minutes Australia featuring families who are raising genderless “they-bie” children has gone viral on social media.
The show, airing Sunday, takes a look at the latest trend of gender-neutral parenting in which parents use they/them pronouns for their child and keep the young one’s sex a secret from everyone in their community. This is done with the intention of allowing the child to choose their own gender.
“We didn’t assign a gender at birth,” explains one mother in the trailer who is later shown reading a book to her child that imparts the wisdom that “you can’t tell what your gender is by looking at your body.”
😱Theybies: babies that are being raised in a gender-neutral environment to defend against gender socialization. The purpose of this parenting strategy is to not push children into gender stereotypes or roles and let them choose what to become.
We’re in pic.twitter.com/chSjffScU6…
— Scarlett Johnson (@scarlett4kids) March 30, 2023
“I’m letting this little person be who they want to be,” says another mother about her child. When asked what some of the biggest challenges are to being a “gender creative parent,” the mother responds that it is interactions with strangers.
“Strangers in the street have had quite a strong response, Why are you so obsessed? Why do you need to know?” the mother replies.
For theybie parents(who by all appearances are socially awkward & suffer from mental illness) society’s gender troubles cannot be solved by giving all children dolls and trucks to play with or dressing them all in the color beige; the gender binary must not simply be smudged but… pic.twitter.com/y3q57eob8Z
— Scarlett Johnson (@scarlett4kids) March 30, 2023
“It is an experiment. What they’re doing is unprecedented,” says an expert in the preview.
While the experiment may now just be gaining popularity, the concept of the genderless child has been around for over a decade.
In 2011, a Canadian family hit the headlines after going public about the decision to raise their third child, Storm, genderless.
Kathy Witterick and David Stocker refused to tell even their closest friends the sex of their baby, reported the Toronto Star at the time.
“We’ve decided not to share Storm’s sex for now – a tribute to freedom and choice in a place of limitation, a stand up to what the world could become in Storm’s lifetime (a more progressive place?…)” read the email sent out to friends and family shortly after Storm was born.
Their story was met with backlash from both those close to them and strangers, who accused the couple of imposing their own political and ideological beliefs on a newborn.
Dr. Ken Zucker, who was at the time considered a leading expert on child gender identity issues, called the parents’ choice a “social experiment of nurture,” arguing that by not making a choice about the child’s gender, the parents have still made a choice, and one that can impact the child.
When asked if any psychological harm could come from keeping the sex of a child secret, Zucker replied: “One will find out.”
Zucker’s Toronto gender clinic was shut down in 2015 after being targeted by trans activists who accused him of conversion therapy for his approach of using psychotherapy and watchful waiting for children who suffer from gender dysphoria.
