Why Are Young People Encouraged NOT to Label Anyone?

LilElvis

LilElvis wrote: »

There have been several posts harking back to members' childhoods and the fact that they weren't bothered about gender-specific toys and activities and were simply happy to play in any way that gave them enjoyment. Mine was the same. However, I also recall primary school children frequently used "labels" as terms of abuse - "!!!!!!", "!!!!!" and "poofter" were a few.

Gender-neutrality is an extreme stance to take in parenting, whilst I believe that we should encourage our children to see that gender stereotyping is archaic and has no place in modern society, just as there is, thankfully, no place for the playground name-calling of my childhood.

Gender-neutrality, gender stereotyping and "labelling" people are separate issues in my view.

Interesting that the word that MSE didn't want me to use is the epithet used to describe someone of Romany descent, but was quite happy to let me use words denigrating someone's sexual orientation or disability.

Jagraf

I think sometimes people are so worried about saying something 'politically incorrect' that we don't celebrate differences. There is a danger of stereotyping people to all be the same. This is a real shame.

[Deleted User]

My five year old son had a baby doll he used to cuddle after a baby I carried died soon after birth. It comforted him. A female 'friend' of his called him a poofter because she saw it amongst his toys when she came round to play one day.

I did explain, but it was a bit of a lost battle. I always let him have what toys he wanted to play with, regardless of their gender label.

But I do feel that forcing the boy mentioned in the first post to be 'gender nonspecific' is another case of parents forcing their child to follow their beliefs, rather than letting him form his own. They are basically saying to him that wanting to be either a boy or a girl is wrong!

onomatopoeia99

I don't understand the need to put labels on people, other than the ones that they choose for themselves.

lostinrates

Jagraf wrote: »

I think sometimes people are so worried about saying something 'politically incorrect' that we don't celebrate differences. There is a danger of stereotyping people to all be the same. This is a real shame.

I think there is a truth in this. I think it makes sense to recognise strength in diversity, and strength in unity of difference.

I think this is always interesting to me in threads about marriage etc when people say they could not marry someone with various difference to them, whereas the differences are the things I love perhaps most and fire off from best in my relationships and friendships and friendships, there needs to be some shared common ground....interest, some preparedness to give leeway to others' viewpoints, a sense of humour, but the differences are huge. And I see them, and love them. And in conversation when we discuss things they are contextualised ' as a south American', ' as a black American' as a black gay guy' ' as a white woman married to a black man' ...' But now as a European ' ' but compared to living here' ' but when I look at that compared to how in is in reality statistically I real use my experience is non typical but anecdotally, it doesn't feel like that' etc, etc etc, all these labels mean something to us some how and get brought into things to exemplify a position......a lot of us find labels a useful social and practical experience.

Another example. I have a complex medical problem. I have a few diagnosed problems, and a few floating around Undiagnosed but mooted ones. It would be very much easier to have those labels attached or removed. Floaty perhaps things are confusing beaurocratic ally in a system that struggles with square pegs for round holes.

Loz01

I don't think its that kids shouldn't label people, its that they shouldn't use peoples identities as a reason to bully.

tea_lover

Loz01 wrote: »

I don't think its that kids shouldn't label people, its that they shouldn't use peoples identities as a reason to bully.

Yes. The label in itself isn't the issue, it's the value that's attached to it.

gayleygoo

That "gender neutral child" story does seem a bit odd. Hopefully he won't have been too affected by it and will be allowed to grow up as he likes! I thin it would be wrong to "ban" anything that a child wants to play with, or insist that he wears flowery tops if he didn't want to. A century or two ago it was common for boys and girls to be dressed the same until 5 years old (dresses for all!) although their toys would have been more "gender specific".

I'm expecting my third baby now and haven't found out the sex. There is such pressure from people to find out though, as if it makes a difference to the first weeks of a baby's life. I keep getting asked "How do you know what colour pram/bedding/clothes etc to buy?" Well, it doesn't need to be pink or blue! A baby under one doesn't really need to be identified in such a way, but I'm not going top hide the sex from my family for 5 years :rotfl:

With my daughter I tried to stay away from pink and girly clothing, but when she was old enough to choose (age 2, as it turned out), it was pink and girly dresses all the way! She's nearly 8 now and still refuses to wear jeans. My 5 year old son does occasionally put his sister's dresses on and dance around to show off. I know some Dads who would go pale at that thought, but shaming a child does harm. Children "borrow" identities all the time when playing and dressing up, it's how they learn about difference, similarities, identities, and make sense of the world.

I have rambled a lot, I realise. Labels are not always a bad thing, but some are negative or stereotypical and should be avoided. I don't see "boy" or "girl" as negative labels, so not sure why those parents thought it was an issue.

rach_k

onomatopoeia99 wrote: »

I don't understand the need to put labels on people, other than the ones that they choose for themselves.

I agree with this completely. It is not up to somebody else to determine who I am, whether that's white, female, straight, silly or whatever. If somebody else labels you as something, it may become a self-fulfilling prophecy. If left to decide for themselves, people may turn out entirely differently. I think we should leave it up to people to decide for themselves.

There does seem to be some confusion between the difference between categories/labels that are fixed or factual and labels that aren't. Age 65 is factual but 'old' is not, old is subjective and labelling somebody as old may affect how they feel about themselves. A factual description of somebody is fine and we need those to some degree to get on with normal life e.g. all the 4-5 year olds go in Reception, the 5-6 year olds go in Year 1. When you're talking in a medical sense 'female genitals' may be important to know, but when you're labelling somebody as a girl as if that makes a difference to anything other than what's in their underwear, that's not helpful and best left to the individual concerned to decide.

Skinto_7

Im confused about this labelling thing, and what people actually mean, are people saying that describing someone as a man or woman, white or black, gay or straight is labelling someone?

I was recently talking about a mate of mine to someone else, and they couldnt remember which one of my mates i was meaning, so i said, "its Dan, hes the big tall guy, with blonde hair and slightly camp" is that labelling?

If it is i would have no issues with kids labelling people, i would be more concerned about them bullying and stuff like that!!