Our girls can be more like boys — but for goodness sake, don’t let our boys act like girls. My 4-year-old son loves Legos, rocket ships, and his big sister (not necessarily in that order). He also loves hair bows, sequins, and his sister’s dresses. This love of so-called girls’ clothing is not new. He’s been […]
Some people assume all individuals born boys will grow up to be men who are attracted to women. However, we just need to observe other life on earth to find fascinating exceptions to those binary and linear assumptions. Gender isn’t binary with humans. With identities such as gender-fluid, genderqueer, and gender-nonconforming, we as humans need […]
It is part of being a parent that we give a huge slice of ourselves away. It is part of being in a partnership that we bend and adapt. I have done both with great love. But now I am returning to an ownership of my own identity. Over the years I have grown my […]
Dear Dana is a bi-weekly advice column for humans who engage in romantic relationships. Please send your dilemmas, issues, conundrums, assumptions, conflicts, anxieties, worriments, obstacles, complications, predicaments, queries, questions, and any other synonyms for “problems” to deardana@rolereboot.org. Dear Dana, My daughter just informed me that her teacher told her that only girls wear lipstick. I immediately […]
The medical viability of uterine transplantation is challenging long-held notions about our bodies. In 2017, the United States passed a medical milestone: the first baby in the nation born through a transplanted uterus. Reports on the specific number of successful births via transplanted uterus vary, but all place the count at fewer than 30 births. […]
As a psychologist with a strong commitment to promoting gender equality, I’ve found myself re-thinking traditional parenting habits and imagining how these innovative conversations will affect the way we look at parenting. Between “gender neutral parenting” and “the Google manifesto,” there’s a recent ongoing conversation about defying traditional gender roles we can’t ignore. With powerful influencers as role models, […]
The way languages incorporate gender can have a powerful impact on the expression of identity. Over the last few years, we’ve progressed significantly in our acceptance of gender fluidity: One seminal 2015 poll found that half of millennials in the United States believe gender isn’t limited to male and female, a meaningful change from previous generations. Today, […]
We should give room to folks to follow their journey however it comes to them (as long as it doesn’t stop others from following theirs). That is queerness, after all. For a while, I thought I was gay. And maybe I was for some of that time – there’s nothing wrong with being gay. But […]
When self-proclaimed feminists decry ‘female erasure’ in pregnancy-related care, they endanger many. Last month, The Colorado Doula Project (CDP), a grassroots organization that provides “free emotional, physical, and informational support through the spectrum of reproductive experiences,” held the first formal abortion doula training in the state of Colorado. Nearly 50 women and non-binary people gathered to learn how […]
Chipping away at the problem of bisexual erasure starts with living truth out loud. Last June, in honor of Pride Month, actress Evan Rachel Wood filmed a YouTube video to clear up some common misconceptions about bisexuality and to discuss her personal process of coming out. Her honesty and activism earned her the Human Rights […]
We can look to queer novels and memoir as a way of exploring how writing can help all of us move forward in more authentic, transgressive ways. As those of us in the U.S. move uneasily forward into a future under the administration of Donald Trump, so many of the folks I know in social […]
Boy versus girl may not matter to Bobby, but finding someone to hold his hand in a crowded environment does. So he differentiates people based on their behavior and his sense of their personality. My son Bobby’s teacher recently told me that he can’t identify people by whether they are a boy or girl. I […]
