Why? What obligates you to say ‘when you like a girl’ rather than ‘when you like someone’, which conveys the same thing and covers your bases?
My last post was directed at KellyM
I understand the the basic rules of politeness and respect apply to romantic as well as platonic relationships. But there are differences as well.
I’m not confused about giving my permision to kiss whomever my kids are attracted to. I am confused on how to know how to give advice on these emotions of attraction. Especially at the age when such emotions start. Specifically, in regards to the OP, I am concerned that talking about sexual attraction (without talking about sex) may be difficult if I am talking about atraction to girls vs attraction to boys. I am having difficulty framing the conversation. I realize that at a certain “youngness” if you will, I can’t simply say “the difference between attraction to a friend and attraction to a lover”. Because the idea of a lover may not be sufficiently developed. In most cases, I can simply say “attraction to girls vs. attraction to boys”. But in the case of a homosexual youth, this might have negaive conotations. It is these conotations I am seeking to avoid or limit if I can.
To be honest, when I read that lissener had “come out” at 11, I was kind of hoping that he could provide me with some sort of behavior or way of talking about things that might lead me to a clue as to the sexual orientation of such a young child. If there was a test I could give my kid and KNOW he was gay, I would simply adjust all of my subsequent information regarding romantic relationships. I’d have to do more research, certainly, since I have not experience at intimate homosexual relationships, but I think most of the principles would not change.
Well, primarily I’m not talking about actions that a chid would be allowed to inflict on same sex peers while being restricted from other sex peers. I’m more concerned with assisting my children through puberty. In doing so, I have to discuss attraction (sexual attraction) before the child understands what that is. IOW I have to come up with age appropriate ways to discuss such things. Using the “mommy” and “daddy” uphemisms is perfectly ok until purberty. Very young children will simply understand the more generic love concepts involved. But around the time of puberty, the body begins to dispense hormones which cause changes physically and mentally which can manifest themselves as romantic attraction. This is qualitatively different than platonic attraction. It is most definately a different experience. And refering to it in that transitional stage from child to youth (which seems to last for years in many regards) must take this difference into account.
I’m sorry, If I gave you that impression. I did not mean to imply that all mixed sex relationships were necessarily sexual. Only that an unspoken sexual potential exists.
Perhaps I can restate my confusion. If you were trying to help a child through puberty, and wanted to help explain “liking someone in that certain way”, how would you define “that certain way”? Remember that the sexual attraction experienced by the youth may not be linked in his mind to sex. So we have to find a way to express it terms he will understand. Traditionally something like “when you like a girl, or when you are attracted to a girl”. If you can propose another way to talk about this I am most interested.
What’s wrong with “when you are attracted to someone”? I’m still not understanding why you feel you must be gender-specific.
Because you can be attracted to someone without being romantically or sexually attracted to someone.
Now try and say that without using the words romatic or sexual. Specifically try and talk about the emotional differences between romantic attraction and platonic attraction without those two words. Or explain those words in a way that an early pubescent might understand.
This seems like a general parenting question (one I am not equipped to address, lacking the parenting instincts God gave a rutabega), and I don’t see how it’s any more a conundrum when a child is gay than it is when a child is straight, nor, again, do I see why the existence of such a conundrum compells you to address the matter in language that assumes heterosexuality.
Because that is the language I can relate to. When I simplify the romantic or sexual relationship to its most basic form, I think of “boy meets girl”. Very simple words with more conotations than we have hard drive space to write about. I’m certain that others might think of “boy meets boy”, or “girl meets girl” in the same context. But most of us think of the first example.
I have another thought I’d like your opinions on. I have been spent the day running errands with my son and he likes to listen to the country station while we are in the car. Every other song is a love song, and of course, I have this thread running through my head. I start to realize that many of the emotions talked about many of the experiences of love, lost love, etc. etc. are not necessarily gender directed. What I noticed is that when talking bout ones own experience the most common words are I and you. As in I love you. I feel X because of you.
So my question is if I were to talk about relationship issues and experiences not as “you might feel X”, but “I felt X when…” would that alleviate the issues that might arrise if the child in question turned out to be homosexual?
I know that sentence is worded awkwardly. Let me try another wording.
If I say something like “When I met your mother, I felt a surge of emotions such as …” and proceeded to talk about the emotions how I experienced them and what I learned about them later in life. Would this kind of discussion have value, or cause the same sort of problems we were talking about for a gay child?
been spent…:smack:
should be been spending obviously.
Pervert: you must accept that you will not know until you know, but that you must nonetheless be prepared.
I’m sorry if that makes it sound difficult. That’s why they call it parenting.
Oh, I do accept that. It is true about every portions of a childs personality. I read somewhere that you can never know what kind of a parent you are until your 30 year old child tells you.
And while it does “make it sound difficult” that’s certainly not your fault. If anything you have provided inspiration to think about some issues I hadn’t before. And to clarify many things I had only vaguely considered. I appreciate your (and others) willingness to talk about what obviously a painful part of your past.
I don’t think the “when you like a girl” bit is nearly as damaging to the gay teen’s psyche as the “homos burn in hell” bit. As long as you make it clear at some point that you’d be accepting of a gay child, you’ll be ahead of the game. You can do that by speaking respectfully of gay people you know or hear about in the news. Or you can be sure to condemn acts of violence and discrimination against gay when they make the news. Something as simple as saying you think it unfair that certain politicians want to ban civil unions makes it clear to the gay teen that you’ll be supportive. The boy or girl word choice is not so important in comparison.
I’m not sure I’m entitled to an opinion here, but it seems to me that one need not use gender-neutral language in discussing this sort of issue with one’s kid. A kid of normal intelligence is aware of majority-default situations and the fact that if one belongs to a minority one can “translate” what is said to the alternative. Far more important to me is inculcating the idea that jut because someone is in a minority, they are not therefore “queer” (in the "odd"sense) or evil. Left-handedness should be the paradigm in both these cases – explaining to a group of kids how one holds easel and paintbrush or stands and holds a bat, you assume the default of righthandedness and, if necessary, tell the southpaws to swap it around for their dominant hand/side. But you come down hard on anyone who teases a leftie, pointing out the famous left-handed baseball players, artists, etc.
And I’m more than a little uncomfortable with the entire idea of drawing lines dividing gay from straight and so on. Too many people fall into the gray area – either bisexual, or with uncategorizable “friendships” (where I fit into this argument), etc. Humanity is too rich and diverse to fit pigeonholes.
Therefore the point to this post: an excerpt from the song which my “son” played for me when we were dealing with trying to define the oddness of our relationship:
If my 22 year old daughter were to tell me she was gay/lesbian. I believe my first reaction would be disbelief, followed closely by shock, anger and horror and then profound hurt.
Now before any one jumps on me with both feet and fists, let me explain.
To my knowledge, my daughter has had a close friendship with one girl for the last 5 years, that’s all it’s ever been was a friendship. So the disbelief would be from thinking she was pulling my leg. The shock, anger and horror would all stem from the fact that in order for her to have found out that she was a lesbian is because she would have had to had hidden a great deal of her life from me. I would be angry, shocked and horrified that 1) she felt the need to hide this from me and 2) she had to go through this emotional upheaval alone without support from her mother or father.
The profound hurt would be self-directed. I would always wonder what I had lacking that my daughter felt that she could not come to me and discuss these issues with me as they arose, so that I could help and/support her.
Would the fact that she had determined/discovered she was gay make me feel less love for her? Absolutely not! I try to love my daughter, as well as others, as I love G-d…absolutely not contingent on any other factors other than themselves. I know I don’t always succeed, but I try.
You obviously haven’t encountered Shodan before. This is how he always is. No good can come from even acknowledging the bilge he writes.
You needn’t feel like she was hiding anything from you, SmoothOperator. Many people don’t understand themselves that they are gay until adulthood. I was in my late 20s before I realized what was different about me and 32 before I came out of the closet. If she comes out to you at 22, then she may have just figured it out herself.
Most kids don’t discuss sexuality with their parents anyway. It’s private and it’s something that you want to do alone. It’s a step into adulthood and most young men and women don’t discuss it with anyone but their closest friends, if anyone at all. I wouldn’t be stressed at all if my son didn’t discuss his sexuality with me ever. But I know that if he wanted to, he knows he can.
I agree with those who say that making your views on homosexual rights is the most important thing you can do for your kids, whether they’re gay or not. Kids need to know what you approve and disapprove of. Hopefully your influence will be stronger than society’s when it comes to gay rights.