It’s going around
Jun 15, 2005 Parenting
So if you’re straight, what are you doing to let your kids know that it’s ok if they’re gay? Because that’s important and necessary and possibly life-saving.
I thought about this pre-kids and knew that I could never totally protect my possibly gay children from our heterosexist culture and that I would surely be perpetuating heterosexism because, heck, it’s easy to do. It’s easy to default to straight. I have to consciously find ways to say forcefully — “Being gay is a lovely way to be.” How to do it? Here are my tips, what are yours?
1. Say it: “Being gay is a lovely way to be.”
2. Find gay role models in real life.
3. Find gay role models outside of real life (a love of Broadway showtunes makes this infinitely easier. Harvey Fierstein, we love you. RENT soundtrack, we love you, too.)
4. Be sure your religious community is openly gay-friendly.
5. Stock your bookshelves with books like And Tango Makes Three.
6. Say things like, “When you grow up and fall in love with a man or a woman…”
7. Use a book like this one for explaining the birds & the bees.
I really would like more tips from the gay and straight among you. (If you’re gay, what could your parents have done to make it easier? If you’re straight, what are you doing to make it easier?) Also, what other picture books are gay-friendly? We’d like to expand our library.
On that note, there’s a nice board book (Everywhere Babies) that happily shows diverse families — all colors, transracial, and gay — in a casual, no-big-deal way, which we love.
June 15th, 2005 at 9:28 am
I think that we all lead by example. I work for a company with a predominately gay staff. I have tons of gay and lesbian friends. I think that by showing our child that all people have value, that we love all people regardless of their religious beliefs, their skin color and who they love, our child will (hopefully) know in their hearts that we would love him if he is gay or chose not to be Jewish.
June 15th, 2005 at 9:44 am
This is timely post for me. last weekend, someone commented on my blog asking for help in supporting her 14 year old daughter who had just come out. I pointed her to PFLAG, the San Diego LGBT Community Center, San Diego Pride and MCC (gay church). I got a beautiful letter back from her as did Carol. Desite being a fundamentalist Christian who was taught it is wrong to be gay, she is choosing to be totally supportive of her child. I think I’ll ask her if I can post our correspondence.
I love that you are exploring this now. It gives me hope that there are people out there reflecting on this before it becomes an issue.
June 15th, 2005 at 9:47 am
I love all of your suggestions, Dawn. And I recently read on an internet forum of a father who was telling his four year old son “Some men fall in love with women, some fall in love with other men. Just as some women fall in love with men, and some fall in love with other women. And all of that is o.k.”
June 15th, 2005 at 9:57 am
The book It’s Perfectly Normal, written by the same people as It’s So Amazing is also a fabulous resource.
I teach Children’s Religious Education at our church, which is Unitarian Universalist and we have a brilliant curriculum that is not religious (at all) in nature called OWL - Our Whole Lives and is available in versions for preschool through to adult and discusses all the different relationships that humans could find themselves a part of.
Not being afraid to discuss it and not always waiting for the child to bring it up first.
That pertains to everything in life, I guess, not just gay and lesbian etc. Being as comfortable as possible about your own sexuality is a good start too.
June 15th, 2005 at 9:59 am
I agree totally. Lead by example. I have three children (19, 16, 11), and five stepchildren (10 - 17). To be honest, I hadn’t given it a lot of thought, until one day, I overheard a conversation in which my youngest said something about having been at a commitment ceremony of two women, friends of her father’s. One of my stepdaughters said something about “gays being disgusting”.
She was only ten at the time, and I’m afraid, in my shock, I came down on her a bit harshly. Her dad dealt with her more kindly, while still upholding our shared values, a bit later. (Evil stepmother raises her ugly head…)
My steps have all been raised by a homophobic mother, in a homophobic church, and they reflect what they’ve been raised in, the example that’s led them. Since they’ve also been taught that daddy’s way of life is sinful, they believe what their church teaches them over what their father tries to teach them. (sigh)
I took great pleasure in seeing that my three children all found their stepsister’s comment as shocking as I did. They all see homosexuality as a perfectly normal way of being. My eldest has had one gay relationship.
I am also quite pleased to see that in the high school my children attend, gay kids seem to experience no negative responses from their peers. No one even bothers to mention that so-and-so’s gay. It’ll come up even more naturally, like this:
“Who was at the party?”
“Oh, Tom, Jennifer and her boyfriend, Matt and his boyfriend, Suzie, and Mihao.”
Pretty cool, huh?
June 15th, 2005 at 10:10 am
i love the fact that you’re thinking about this. it makes me hopeful.
i’m a lesbian who has had an extremely difficult time coming out to my family. while i know, in my heart of hearts, they would never stop loving me and never try to distance themselves from me, i never got the message from them, growing up, that being gay is okay. both of them made vague homophobic comments to me as a child, and they continue it now.
i never knew anyone who was gay, or, if i did, i was never introduced to that part of their identity.
i think i would feel safer coming out to them and being who i am if they had made an effort to introduce me to gay role models, or talked to me about homophobia, or addressed the issue at all. they didn’t. i think that your ideas are excellent ones. i especially like number six. my mother has started to say things like “the person you end up with” rather than “the man you end up with,” which i truly appreciate.
i didn’t mean to write you a novel here. i just wanted to say thank you, and that i think you’re on the right track. noah and madison are lucky children.
June 15th, 2005 at 10:24 am
I think in addition to promoting a gay-positive message at home it’s important to avoid situations or experiences in which being gay is not okay. For us, that means no boy scouts, and limiting time with some of our more outspoken relatives, even the ones we really love. There are lots of other examples too, but these leap to mind as it becomes apparent that although the loved ones adore Elliott, brown skin and all, gay is not so easy to love, so for them love is indeed conditional. What a great message for any kid to grow up with–especially adopted kids who may already doubt their position in the family.
As an aside, we have an amazing picture of Elliott at the Chicago PRIDE parade back in 2001. It made the Chicago Sun-Times and is hands-down adorable (says the boastful mama). We’ll be going to the local parade next weekend–let me know if you want to meet for it.
June 15th, 2005 at 10:25 am
Mallory’s godparents are gay. We have always talked as Jessica (above) does. Some people love boys, some people love girls, etc. We have a handful of gay or lesbian families at their school. We have talked about gay marriage. I encouraged them to watch all the stories about gay weddings in San Francisco last winter, and we celebrated. I frequently still make comments that let them know I don’t assume their sexuality. I one day told Mallory I wasn’t comfortable with her seeing movies with boys alone right now. Then I said,” wait, if you are a lesbian, you can’t go with girls either.” We both laughed. I pretty much know my oldest two are straight. I have no idea about the last two. I just hope they all love good people.
June 15th, 2005 at 12:59 pm
I’m hoping acceptance will just be part of my daughter’s life. My brother — i.e., her uncle — is gay. I have gay friends. One of the first people to hold her after she was born was a friend of mine who happens to be lesbian.
Hmmm. Ought I to think more about this…?
June 15th, 2005 at 1:04 pm
Actually, I’d like to take this conversation one step further.
How will you handle it if your child grows up to be transgender? How can we let children know that their gender identity - however strong and however trans - is accepted?
I know several transgender people, and, as a result, studied it in college. And I still don’t quite know how I would answer it.
Best, Kay
June 15th, 2005 at 2:48 pm
Well, I haven’t broached the transgender issue yet (although I had a transgendered roommate at one point, so I can always bring that up).
We always say things like “the man or woman that you end up with”, and reinforce that it is normal for people to love folks of their own gender, as well as the opposite gender. There is a boy in my daughter’s class who has two moms, and they are quite open, which helps too (although I know from talking to her about it that one of them has not felt supported by other moms in the school).
I also want my daughter to know that it’s okay if she doesn’t end up with anyone–that it’s okay for a woman to live by herself, to have her own career & money, etc. Not that I wish her a life without love, but I want her to know that independence is good, too.
June 15th, 2005 at 5:41 pm
Very interesting. I hadn’t even given it a thought, because we do or have done all of those things you mentioned without even being aware of it (except being part of a religious community). What can I say? We live in New York City, my mom’s openly gay and lives with her partner who is simply one of the family, and I, well, I am with my husband now, but had a few significant relationships with women in my life. We’re down with the gay thing.
Not that any of that went into our China adoption application!
But I agree with Kaete - this is an extremely important conversation to have now, so we can raise our children without these biases, and with the knowledge that they will have our unconditional acceptance of their sexuality, whatever it may be. Goodness, especially now, when PBS is defunded for showing a depiction of a two-mom family!
I say, bring on the lesbians! I also love Everywhere Babies, and The White Swan Express has a lesbian family too. There are not that many kids books with gay and lesbian parents (unless they are dreary “issue” books), and given the political climate, I doubt many will be published by big name publishers any time soon. Perhaps we should write our own . . . ?
June 15th, 2005 at 5:52 pm
If your religious community isn’t 100% openly gay friendly work on it from the inside. Most aren’t–not 100% anyway.
I will read the rest of this stuff soon and perhaps have something more thoughtful to say then.
Baby crying now!!!
June 15th, 2005 at 7:05 pm
I like what landismom said - that she hopes her daughter knows it’s ok to be a woman who lives by herself, has her own career, house, money, etc. I think that that’s important too. Not that I wouldn’t be heartbroken if I didn’t have grandkids ::sob::. My best friend is single, by choice - not that she doesn’t like a dinner date or drinks and a movie from time to time, but she’s very career oriented, and likes it that way.
With all of the stuff in the news for the last year on gay marriage, etc. it’s actually been a great opportunity to discuss it with my oldest son - including why, even though I was raised Catholic and still cherish parts of my faith and heritage - that I can’t go to that church anymore, because their teachings on homosexuality and pro-choice issues are against what I believe as a member of the human race. As for my youngest daughter(4) - she tells me she’s going to marry her best friend at preschool - Gabriella. Hey - why not??!
June 15th, 2005 at 10:22 pm
And anyway, how CUTE is that new penguin book???
June 16th, 2005 at 12:04 am
I’m having a little bit of trouble grasping all of this. I know, I know, I should just shut up and leave. I will probably make an enemy or two. But I guess I don’t see the harm in saying “when you grow up and fall in love with a man” to my daughter when that is what is LIKELY to happen. If she happens to discover that she is gay, that’s all right with me, but sheer odds say that she’s not LIKELY to be. If my kids ask me about homosexuality I will do my best to explain it to them as lovingly and truthfully as possible, but I see no need to bring it up while they are children unless it’s already a part of their life (a good friend or family member who is gay and has a visible partner, for example).
I wish I could think of a good analogy for this but I am brain-dead right now.
Running away to hide.
June 16th, 2005 at 1:01 pm
When I was 5 years old there were two women who lived next door to us. I thought they were the cats pajamas just cuz they liked kids and didn’t run us out of the yard if we went into it after a stray ball like another neighbor would. When they busted out the sparklers on the 4th of July I was thrilled.
I remember it was this couple being run through the gossip mill in an unkindly fashion at our kitchen table. I didn’t know what words like lesbian and queer meant at the time but apparently the woman having coffee with my mom had something against these two women. I heard her clearly say something along the lines of how they were good people and what business was it of hers, the nature of their relationship. They WERE good people. I cried when they moved out.
My point is … hearing my mother validate those women next door made it a little easier for me to realize who I was. Made it a little bit easier to come out to her. Society “norms” are so hetero oriented that even without the hate remarks and bad queer oriented jokes it’s impossible to get the “it’s OK” message across without actually saying so.
I didn’t realize they were lesbians when I was 5, but I sure put it all together when I was coming out. Moments after coming out to my mother I asked her about P and J next door when I was 5. She was incredulous that I’d figured out they were gay. I still can’t explain gaydar to her, not for lack of trying. I also asked her about an “Aunt” who was around at family gatherings until I was 10 or so. She grew up with my mother in the same foster home. Bingo another lesbian who was great with kids. Again Mom was incredulous. *shrug*
I could bitch moan and gripe for days about how my mom screwed up.. but then I must remind myself that she did get some things right.
June 17th, 2005 at 1:51 am
Thank you for this great entry. I have to say while my parents would never have thought about one of us being gay, they did a lot to let me know it was ok ( even if they didn’t realise it). I never heard “when you grow up to marry a woman” I was told ” When you find someone you love and want to spend your life together, then you’ll get married”. They also made sure we knew, no matter what we did in life they would love us. I know they didn’t think i would be gay, but it always stuck out in the back of my mind that they would be there.
Just let your kids know you love them and support them in life no matter what. Live your life of tolerance, kindness and compassion. Kids are amazing at filling in the pieces.
June 17th, 2005 at 2:28 am
There’s a storybook called ‘Lucy Goes to the Country’ which my son likes - it’s about a cat called Lucy who lives with two guys (a couple) - the plot is all about Lucy but her Big Guys are there in the background being normal (gay) people.