Question

think about our earlier discussions related to gendering children. How does this continue into adulthood? How does it play out in terms of education, jobs, healthcare, family roles, social class?

Answer 1

Gendering children is a concept where children are constantly reminded of their gender in relation to their physical make-up. Parents do this in order to make sure a girl grows up like a women with all the feminine characteristics and a boy grows into a man with all the masculine characteristics. Anything apart from these two gender choices do not bring happiness to the parents but it somehow suppresses the feelings and gender choice of the children.

When children who want to identify themselves with the other gender keep suppressing their gender identity, they get into a cognitive dissonance where they have a different reality. They grow confused with their gender identity. This will reflect in going through the education as a normal child because others will make fun of them and as the result they develop low self-confidence. Getting a job would be very tough for them as they need to enter their gender but most of the companies turn their faces to people with different gender orientations. They will be treated as outclass in the society as they won’t be fitting in any category and their role as a parent will be more confusing as they won’t be able to become a biological parent completely. They will have difficulty expressing their gender to their children if at all they marry and they also will have embarrassing moment with their partner.