Little Boxes on the Hilltop

So this semester I'm taking a Communication, Gender, and Sex class. As part of the class we have to create a blog and talk about the things we cover in class as well as anything external to the class that relates to it. This is the first post as you can see, but as far as the class goes we're a month in. Posts are going to be made weekly this first one may be a little more broad considering all of the topics we've covered up until this point. Anyway, enough is enough lets get down to it.

     The first thing I'd like to bring up is one of these articles that we read for class that really intrigued me. "X: A Fabulous Child's Story" by Louis Gould is a story about a child raised genderless. The parents do not reveal to anyone what the sex of the child is which upsets a lot of people. What happens is people wind up not knowing how to deal with the child. Instead of saying "oh what a handsome boy" or "oh what a cute little girl" they become practically speechless. So why is this important? Because gender is a social construction. As a society we judge each other based on our sex. By doing this we wind up limiting ourselves. We set boundaries for how we're supposed to look and act.
    To me it's important to be aware of these boxes that we put each other in. For the majority of my life I have been judging people based on the way I was raised. Even though I want to treat all people equally, the social constructs are son engrained into me that it can be difficult to escape. That is why I say being aware is what will really help make progress. It's one thing to make a mistake and it's another to know when you're making it.
     So even though I constantly am putting people into these boxes, I have to be aware of it and understand that not all people want to be put in them. Back to the baby x example, there is actually a family in Toronto who is doing just what was in the story (click here for a related article). They are not revealing the sex of the baby. It has become a huge story in the area and nationwide but it's making me ask why? In all reality it does not seem like a big deal but to the news it is. People do not know how to react to not knowing whether a person is male or female. It's certainly not something you encouter everyday. In fact I never have. I have encountered people of which I was unsure of their sex however. They may have looked genderless and to me I was unable to tell if it was male or female. Looking back, I can't say that I had any difficulty conversing with them. All people deserve to be treated equal and you don't have to use gendered language to communicate with them. Let's look at these boxes that we've been putting people in and see how they aren't meant for everyone.

Since taking this class, I've found that a couple of the people we read about often cite themselves as being raised on a television program entitled "Free to be You and Me". I started watching some of them on YouTube and have really enjoyed them. It's hard to believe that they were producing these kind of videos back in the 70's. Check this one out below, it's one of the ones I've enjoyed most.