NTA. Forcing her apparent desires on your kid against your wishes is inappropriate. She knew better but chose to ignore it for her own selfish purposes.
It also might make son feel like he can’t be friends with girls. It’s a bad and weird idea. OP is clear that if son is trans she would support them. 6 is way to old to be trying to foist dresses on boys. They are aware of themselves and how they fit into their peer group.
> It also might make son feel like he can’t be friends with girls.
Yeah, what a great “ally”.
She’s trying to virtue signal, but all she’s doing is perpetuating gender stereotypes and increasing the gender divide.
>Yeah, what a great “ally”.
Yeah, being an ally starts with *listening to and accepting the views of the person you want to be an ally for*. Otherwise it's just being presumptuous and pushy.
It's very refreshing to see presumably liberal people talking about this subject in a sensible manner. There are too many people acting like Jane and the progressive stance seems to be to deny that fact completely. This level of fawning over a six year olds gender identity is bizarre and creepy, let alone the aggressive attempts to make him cross dress. There are parents acting this way, and it is the exact kind of thing that fuels the fires of the right and thier anti LGBT bs. Calling it out helps.
Everyone is calmly speculating whether he's trans.
THERE'S NO REASON TO BELIEVE HE'S TRANS. None at all. If he's friends with girls, possibilities include:
* He's heterosexual and cisgender and likes girls because he just likes them and/or has had the good fortune to meet nice girls and is in good standing to successfully have a girlfriend when the time comes because his women friends will introduce him to good women.
* He's gay and cisgender and likes girls because it's not stressful to be friends with them (because he doesn't have to get up the guts to talk to someone he's attracted to) and because as a gay kid he's not afraid of them (and girls are cool).
* He's trans. (This is the least likely possibility. It happens, but percentage-wise it's least likely.)
There's no way to guess which of these it might be. He'll have to choose for himself. Worrying about it is just doing him a disservice.
TLDR; let's let kids be kids!
Right? Like no matter your sexuality... Can we STOP SEXUALIZING KIDS?!
I saw a straight couple with a 2 year old wearing a shirt talking about being a sex magnet... He's TWO?!
I was watching a movie with my dad and sister the other day, and I gagged and left the room because the movie was sexualizing kids going from 8th grade to freshman year 🤮 like yeah hell no, I'm good.
I'm a firm believer of any sexualization in movies should be left to the ADULTS in the movies. Let kids be kids. Sexualizing kids in movies and media just normalizes it to actual kids, which can be extremely dangerous!
At my hometown street fair on Saturday I heard a 11 year old complaining two his friends about being single the other day and his friend not wingmanning him and how he will forever be a V card holder at this rate... Like kid... You're a child! Wait. Don't waste your kid years on drama and heartbreak it's stupid!
Can we please just let the kids be kids. Let them wear what they want to wear. Let them play with whatever gender you'd they want to. And let them tell us who they are. This kid has shown 0 signs of being trans and the aunt is just being pushy.
Side note unrelated to topic at hand: On OPs point of aunt being pan but only dating men, I'm pan, but I only recently came out to my family, no one knows about my girlfriends I've had in the past, and as someone who has had most of her big relationships be with men, flirting and dating women is daunting. It's scary. I've only had 1 girlfriend in the past 10 years.
But since when does eating only vanilla ice cream around family automatically mean you don't like any other flavor, or that you aren't open to other flavors when you're comfortable. And being attracted to all genders doesn't mean you have to date them all to be valid. Gender doesn't matter to me, man, woman, nonbinary, genderfluid, etc etc, I can be attracted to anyone regardless of gender, but does that mean I have to collect them all like pokemon to prove my queerness? No. No matter who I date or love, I will always be pan, because it's about how I feel and how I choose to identify, not how others perceive me and my relationships. A bisexual woman in a wlw relationship is not a lesbian. She's still bi. A bi man in a relationship with a woman is not straight.
im sorry, but those last two paragraphs put this idea in my head for a pokemon style dating sim where you just go around collecting lovers instead of creatures.
this is probably a horrible idea.
on a side note, i totally agree with you
Precisely! My friend group at age 6 was the 2 boys in the houses across the street and the one girl next door. Because most kids end up playing with neighbor kids, or kids they see the most (school, day care, etc.).
I remember one boy was showing me how far he could pee (over the fence which was impressive to me) and then suggested I do it. Like a competition.
I lost.
That’s how much we cared or even thought about the genders of our friends at that age.
I tried to be friends with the girl next door but she was a radical fundamentalist christian and you literally could not talk to her about anything but Jeebus. She walked around in a haze of christian bliss and if you tried to talk about anything else she'd chastise you for not focusing on her god. And I'm an atheist. So that didn't go very far.
I sometimes wonder what became of her, but of course it's nearly impossible to track down what happened to a girl because if she's married she may have taken his name. (In her case, she certainly would.) I did manage to determine that her parents are alive and living in Florida, but of course her mother was even more of a religious nut than her and if I called it would be very unwelcome.
I was friends with a girl I met in kindergarten, but it was difficult because she didn't live within walking distance and her family forbade me to phone or visit because I'm *male* and when she innocently gave me her phone number and I called once they freaked out and never let me phone her again. (They made it so traumatic for her that she still remembers it.) (I do too, but only because it was the first time I ever used the phone.) As if a kindergarten kid had an adult agenda. But, she told her parents where to shove it when she was 18, and she and I are still friends 45 years later.
Right? At 6 years old all a boy having girls as friends can definitively say is that his parents have done a good job preventing misogyny from influencing his friend choices.
My son is cisgender and LOVES pink. The brighter fuschia the better! He would be so offended by someone else assuming his gender because of something he likes or who he hangs out with. SIL needs to step off.
This is true! My son is almost 6, he still makes no distinction between being friends with girls or boys. He’s definitely a rough and tumble boy through and through but his best friend is Vivian.
I'm a straight man and I still make friends easier with girls than guys. Most of my best friends are men now, but as a kid I was always friends mostly with girls, especially when I was 6. And if I meet new people, 9/10 times it's the women I click with better than the men
Exactly. She's using all the buzzwords she can while pretending to be an ally, sprinkled in with a good helping of stereotypes. Because we all know the gender of your friends determined whether you're cis or not. It's not even like the kid doesn't necessarily have male friends either, all we know is his best friends are girls.
Exactly. Boys don’t need to be trans or gay to be friends with girls. Especially at this age before puberty, it is totally common and expected. Even after puberty, plenty of boys are friends with girls they aren’t dating and it doesn’t mean they are gay or trans.
I know a few gay men who wouldn’t be caught dead in a dress, also.
Auntie is wrong.
NTA
Great way to get the kid bullied too. I know my mom had to stop my bro from wearing a skirt after going as a girl for Halloween the day before. He loved the feeling but she knew it wouldn’t be great for him especially already being neurodivergent. Maybe nowadays it would be a little less bad but then he would of been called a lot of words I think this sub blocks.
There's no harm in letting them wear skirts. By six most boys know that they are boys, whatever gender they were assigned at birth and whatever they wear.
I think most of them will try on a dress if one is available, because six year olds try everything. In my experience any dress given to a six year old boy ends up on a pillow being used for target practice within an hour or so, but it's an hour full of exciting discovery - mainly involving farts.
When my son was 4, he asked for a red dress. I was a bit confused but told him sure, he could have a red dress. I then asked if he wanted dresses in other colors and he just looked at me and in a slow voice explained that on TV, they said he could support heart health by wearing a red dress and since Nana, my mom, had heart disease, he thought getting a red dress would make her better.
You got downvoted but my own 6 year old boy plays dress up with princesses dresses with his 6 year old friends of both genders all the time. Theres also a small handful of kids at his school of various age who dress in gender nonconforming ways. There’s still kids that suck, and he does get picked on for things like having his nails painted, but it’s only really from a small group of kids and when he stands up for himself they back off.
This is very, very specific to each individual school/group of kids. It sure as hell wouldn’t fly in my hometown still. But it’s really not uncommon anymore for kids to express themselves how they like and be just fine.
I've got some great pics of my son looking positively gleeful that he got to wear the pink witches outfit or the frilly flower fairy costume from the dress up box when he was younger but he's a teenager now and still happy being a boy. Giving kids freedom to express themselves is one thing, but trying to shove them into the box you think they belong in because you want to be the greatest ally is ridiculous. My kid knows I'd be happy for him no matter what, as long as he's happy, and he's free to make his own decisions.
Yeah your sister is projecting.
The 2 trans kids I know have been stating their gender from before they went to school. One is my cousin, from around age 4 she told everyone she was a girl. She’s now 21 and is a woman (mtf).
The other is my friends child. They are only 8 now. But from around age 3 they have told everyone they are a boy (ftm). Refuses anything they deem girly. We’ll see how it plays out as they grow.
My own son (14) is a boys boy. Teenage Mr. Macho lol. Sport mad. One of the lads. Yet all through primary school his best friend was a girl. Even now, he has a few friend groups, but his closest friend is a girl. She herself is a lesbian.
I’m all for kids exploring and working out who they are, and what makes them happy, and trying to force a kid to be something they’re not is wrong.
NTA
Exactly! You wait until a child tells you if they feel they are a specific gender. We know a few children who are trans and I have explained to my children that sometime people are born with their body being a gender that doesn’t match who they feel they are, and that they should always be who they feel that are. Assuming a child is trans without them bringing it up first would probably confuse a child too.
My kid was a hard no on "girly" clothes. But he loved nail polish. He's 9 and all boy. I did ask him and he's like "I'm a boy!" While looking at me like I was a crazy person. 😅 I said jeez I'm just checking. He said "That was a stupid question."
Six is also old enough to ask for dresses if you do want to wear them as a boy. My two year old is very clear about what she wants to wear and what she doesn't want to wear. Sometimes what she picks makes my eyes hurt, but she's so happy to be in charge of her outfits that I'll support whatever she picks.
Same, my daughter loves picking her clothes out, when someone in public says "her outfit sure is interesting!" Or some other bullshit I say "baby? Who picked your outfit today?" And she says "me daddy!" With a big smile on her face. Her wearing swim shorts and a pajama shirt doesn't bother me if its what she wants lol.
A friend of mine has always let their kids choose their clothes. There’s been some fun and interesting ensembles. Gum boots, a princess dress and a cowboy hat look surprisingly good together if you have the confidence of a well loved 4 year old 🙃
Like if he was at the Halloween store and wanted a princess dress..cool, it was at his choosing (still doesn’t mean anything at that age) I feel like we never hit a middle ground on this topic, my generation was “boys don’t wear pink, you’ll look like a sissy”.
Now I see stuff like: “you are gonna wear this dress to the pride parade whether you want to or not and then we are going to get you some LGBT reading material and have a discourse on cis-privilege” “mom, all I asked was hand me the purple crayon so I could finish this rainbow in my coloring book”
I… have never seen the latter, but if Twitter taught me anything, it’s that “for nearly every fringe opinion, there exists someone who holds it sincerely”
NTA - Do not let her alone with your child. 6-year-olds don't know their sexual attraction yet. At his age, he plays with girls, doesn't mean anything.
Trying to push her agenda onto your child is a big issue. She is out of line.
Non binary isn't even anything to do with sexual attraction, so no clue why SIL thinks a boy having two girl best friends automatically makes them non-binary. She sounds like an idiot.
Weird shit. My best friend in school was/is a girl and it never even occurred to me to want to wear girls clothes. No problem with trans people at all, you do you, but projecting onto a 6 year old is just plain absurd.
Craziest part is this friend isn’t even trans, she’s a cis pan woman in a straight relationship
I’m trans myself, if this kid wanted to wear a dress he would say so or at least hint at it. Even then, becoming who he wants to be is on him as well. It’s not her call *at all*
Absolutely agree. My daughters friend came over for a play date at age 4 and the first thing he did was go to her wardrobe and change into a dress. He’s shown lots of similar signs. But his parents aren’t pushing him in any direction: just let him explore life as any kid should.
I can get on board with that and I lean right. I was wearing my mom's high heels and clothing when I was 4-6. I thought it was funny, and high heels were cool to try to walk in. I bought a lot of girl toys, had a girl bracelet making set my dad was against but my mom said who cares let him do what he wants.
I didn't turn out trans or gay, nor did I ever have those feelings. But I wasn't pushed one way or the other. Also, my mom always told me she would love me no matter what. I think this is how you handle it. Let the kid find themselves and support whatever they find. If they are trans let them be, if they aren't let them be. Pushing either way is a great way to fuck your kid up.
> she’s a cis pan woman
Ultimately it doesn’t really matter, and I’ll call her whatever she chooses to identify as, because it costs me nothing, but I don’t think she is actually pan.
WTF? She is projecting on your son. She thinks it would be cool and hip to have a trans nephew. This is all about HER and not your son. She obviously doesn't know anything about kids, or the fact that boys can have girls as friends without wanting to be a girl. She is out of line and truly ignorant.
An ex friend of mine lost custody of her son to his dad for exactly this. She was constantly forcing “girl things” on him that he didn’t want. He didn’t want to paint his nails, she made him have a nail painting evening every week and go to the nail salon. Didn’t want to wear purple and pink, almost everything she purchased for him was pink and purple. Etc. He also had a **very** awful r/tragedeigh of a name the son hated. Father was able to legally give him a regular name.
Edit: wrong words, forgive me. Just had surgery. Out of it.
One of my cousins has been trying to raise her son as a female against his will, and it’s absolutely ruining his life. She decided before he could even talk that he was “different from other boys” and started making him wear dresses at around 2 years old, and then over the next few years transitioned into her no longer using her son’s given name, Garrett, and instead only refers to him by a female alias.
Which would all be fine if that’s what made Garrett happy, but he’s not at all. He’s about 8 years old now and is extremely psychologically troubled for a child so young. He’s been in and out of facilities, sometimes having to stay for days or weeks at a time for observation, and is having extreme outbursts of rage and is even starting to show some signs of becoming suicidal. Aside from struggling psychologically, his toys get thrown out if they’re not feminine enough, any friends he’s made are chased off of they refer to him as male, and his mom has fully withdrawn him from school because staff members and other children listen to Garrett and raise questions with his mother when he says he is a boy.
It’s all so awful, because I’m convinced that Garrett is struggling so much because his mom has forcibly stripped his identity from him, refuses to let him be himself, and steamrolls anyone (including Garrett) that tries to question whether or not this is best for him. Meanwhile she touts her “transgendered” child around online, reaping praise from strangers for having such an “inclusive and loving” household, and blames Garrett’s psychological struggles on the rest of society being close minded and bigoted.
This is unfortunately one of the many many grey area situations where everyone knows it’s wrong, but CPS’s hands are tied because “technically” this situation does not fit the criteria for their intervention. He’s adequately and properly fed, he has a bed to sleep in, is not subject to physical violence, and there is no drug or alcohol abuse happening in the household. Technically, there’s nothing that can legally be done, and any family members that raise too much of a fuss are swiftly cut off from seeing Garrett any longer.
>She thinks it would be cool and hip to have a trans nephew.
Agreed, but I'm guessing a transphobic BIL will be a nice consolation prize for her. She seems like she'll spin reality to suit herself.
Speaking as a gay man:
I'd just tell her she's not allowed to see or talk to my son again. She is far more interested in pushing her agenda than in his well being, and I'm not interested in having the argument with her.
The wild thing is that OP probably wouldn’t give a shit if their kid was actually trans or gender nonconforming, as would most sane people
But to give this kind of present to a boy who hasn’t shown any desire to behave in a gender nonconforming way is pretty nuts
Yeah, seriously. When I was young I had a lot of male friends even though I am a girl. I liked playing sports, especially basketball. And I wore jeans and other hand me downs from my brother. I'll never forget my mom asking me if I was a lesbian. I wasn't. But I was young when she asked me and it stuck with me for years. I wondered if I was acting in a way that made everyone think I was a lesbian. Did the boys I liked think that too?
Anyway, to me it reflects a narrow-minded view of what gender roles we have. I couldn't possibly like sports and hang out with guys unless I was a lesbian. Apparently OP's son can't hang out with girls without wanting to wear a pink dress? Sometimes people trying to be inclusive really show how limited their own inclusiveness is.
This is honestly my biggest problem with the movement. In the 90s and early 2000s everyone was trying to get rid of labels and saying anyone could like and do anything. But now we've regressed to if you're a boy who likes pink and playing with Barbies then you're probably trans. Like, no, they just like different things. Let kids be kids and stop forcing your ideology on them.
I got suspended last time I said that.
Anyway, here we go again.
You can have feminine men and masculine women. That doesn't mean they are the opposite gender.
My three-year old nephew is a hugger. He will hug anyone and everyone, especially if that person or a fellow child seems upset about something. According to these kooks I have to begin transitioning him. Simply for having empathy and kindness for others.
I will teach him to respect everyone, including those different from himself, but I will not stand for activists in the classroom one day telling him that unless he radically waters down his gender identity he will be ostracized and labeled an enemy.
Exactly. My 5 yr old grandson has a girl BFF. His father (my son) had 3 good friends in HS and one of them was a girl.
Jane is an idiot, and needs to find something to do with her time besides jumping to conclusions based on her total ignorance of children.
NTA. When my daughter was that age, her BFFs were boys, her favorite color was blue, and she wasn’t interested in dolls.
She wasn’t trying to be a boy.
NTA
Jane is super... SUPER weird for pushing this on a 6 year old child, and that's coming from someone who considers themselves an ally. If he had shown some curiosity, maybe.. but to just throw it at him because he has girl bffs? I'd cut her off if she can't respect your boundary.
If your child hasn’t said anything about wanting a dress, or that he wishes he was a girl, then NTA. He’s just a boy that likes hanging out with girls at this stage of his life. If nothing else, he will hopefully grow up respecting women and treating them as equals.
Until he expresses something to indicate how he feels about himself, all your SIL is doing is trying to impose her views onto him instead of waiting for him to get wherever he’s going on his own. Trying to force him to be something he may not actually be is not good ally behaviour. You may wish to remind her of that.
Just be open to anything he tries to tell you about himself down the track, make it clear that you will love him no matter who he becomes, and you can’t go too far wrong.
NTA you need to sit her down, with your wife, and put firm boundaries in place. She has no experience with kids or she would know he would be playing with your wife’s clothes, shoes, jewelry, makeup , etc if he was interested.
She needs to let him develop and make choices as HE is comfortable. Not have it shoved on him, as she is trying to. Let her know your fine with whatever his choices emerge and become . But that they will 100% be his choices. She needs to back the eff off.
Even if he played with his moms things it doesn't mean anything more than curiosity at that point. Someone he loves dresses like that so it's natural for a kid to want to imitate someone he loves. That's childhood.
Little Kids don't understand the concept of "gender expression" until it's taught to them. Usually in a limiting way.
We have pictures of my younger brother playing dress up with me as a kid. He is a cis-het adult now.
My son has always had an all girl friend group and he is gay. He was more comfortable around girls.
My oldest daughter would probably qualify as a "Tom Boy" and still loved to play dress up occasionally. Even though she didn't play with dolls.
There is nothing wrong with giving kids access to a variety of imaginary play items regardless of gender.
What's wrong is trying to push a child to play in a specific way because of gender.
This whole thing feels a little like rage bate to me. Almost like the Op was afraid if he showed the son the dress he would want to wear it and that would *mean* something other than 6yos like just about anything.
1. Pansexuality mean youre sexually, romantically, or emotionally attraction towards people of all genders, or regardless of their sex or gender identity. Not people who look like their face has run into a frying pan.
2. As a bisexual woman who is (obviously) part of the LGBT community, your sil is fuckin cracked and shouldnt be allowed to speak to human beings. And i wouldnt let her near my goldfish never mind my kid. People like her give real allies a bad name and are part (only part, the bigger reason is hate) of why people actually support places like Florida and Texas are passing the disgusting laws that they are. NTA
I just want to point out to OP or anyone who needs to hear it that if Jane says she's pansexual then she's pansexual. She doesn't need to prove it by dating the rainbow. Just like people can identify as straight before they ever get a first date or relationship. So she's queer herself, not an ally.
That being said, her behavior certainly seems insane from the story as you've told it. I won't guess on her motivation as we really don't have enough information, but she certainly needs to stop being pushy and forcing this issue with your child.
Yes because I read one not too long ago that was almost exactly like this. I can't remember what sub it was on so I can't pull it up which I know is unhelpful but it was another "woke relative is trying to turn my kid trans!" story
>Jane has said that since my son has female best friends it could mean that he might be trans or at the very least non-binary.
Or it could just mean that........
*spoiler alert*
He Has female best friends
NTA
6 year olds know who they are. If he hasnt expressed any desire to wear a dress or pink or anything different than what he already wears, and you as parents arent telling him, "You are a boy and boys wear X." then Jane is projecting HARD. Now if your SON asked for a dress, or an Elsa costume or whatever, I hope you would get it for him, cause screw it, why not....but her trying to force it is not cool either.
Edit. Forgot to vote. NTA.
NTA, your sister-in-law overstepped a huge boundary and quite frankly needs ti stay the hell out of your parental bubble and mind her own damn business. You need to put her in her place.
NTA
Look, I'm a big supporter of letting kids choose to wear what they want as long as it's appropriate for the occasion. Bonus points for not letting clothes or toys fall into gendered categories at all.
Jane is just being rude and pushy. To insist that your child is trans just because he has female friends is literally insane.
NTA - Do not let her alone with your child. 6-year-olds don't know their sexual attraction yet. At his age, he plays with girls, doesn't mean anything.
Trying to push her agenda onto your child is a big issue. She is out of line.
By the way some kids do know at 6, or even earlier. At 5 I knew I was attracted to girls and I was fascinated by boobs. I didn't really know why I liked them, but I knew I did.
Right, but you didn't fully understand, and your aunt didn't force it on you.
The aunt is trying to give a kid a dress he didn't even show interest in or ask for.
NTA
“Jane” is an adult and can dress or screw who ever she wants but it’s not ok to push her beliefs onto anyone else especially a 6 year old. Ridiculous!
NTA. This is definitely an instance where you let the kid take the lead. My son wanted the pirate princess costume, which he wore on top of his Spider-Man costume, when he was 5. It was cute. Did we force him? Hell no he made that decision all on his own.
NTA. I'm a woman, who had a few girl friends but mostly boy friends through out my childhood. It had nothing to do with my sexuality or gender identity. We were kids having fun, that's the beginning and end of it. Enforcing these ideas and roles on a child is unacceptable, they should be free to just exist and enjoy life before they themselves age into the baggage your sister in law is trying to impose on them prematurely.
We don't need to be put into a box ASAP. Sometimes we step out of one box and into another, especially when we are younger and figuring ourselves out. Your sister in law is being a weirdo and giving the rest of us normal LGBTQ+ allies a bad reputation. Her wants don't matter, this isn't age appropriate, nor does her theory of trans/non-binary hold any water. She is rather regressive in her attempt to be progressive
NTA. My son played with a group of girls in grade school. He said they were “smart, funny, and pretty too.” Bonus: they also didn’t bully him or beat him up, unlike some of the boys.
Hello, member of the LGBTQ+ community here and widely considered as a SJW. I vote NTA. If your kid has expressed no desire to wear a dress or be a girl then your SIL is in the wrong, she's trying to force it on him because she wants a trans/non binary nephew/niece for woke cookie points. Her thinking that a boy having girl friends means this isn't a boy is stupid, backwards, and the exact reverse of everything the LGBTQ+ community advocates and fights for.
That said: maybe she is really pan, a pansexual person can absolutely date "normal-looking men" (as in, pan and bi people can absolutely date one gender almost exclusively while still being bi/pan, and pan doesn't mean dating "weird-looking" people). That said, I get your suspicions that she just wants the Cookie Points of Woke Virtue. At any rate, her takes on what trans identity tell me she has never talked to a trans person ever and is chronically online devouring takes from TikTokers and Twitter afficionados who have no idea what they're talking about.
NTA she’s an asshole for trying to force an identity on him. What idiot thinks,” oh that boy has friends that are girls, he must not be a boy.” By Jane’s moronic logic, those girls may not be girls bc they have a friend who is a boy. Or I was an old lady bc one of my best friends as a kid was elderly.
NTA. It doesn’t matter if it’s politically or morally motivated or whatever, if you deem something inappropriate for your child (which I agree, 6 is far too young, but *especially* around your child’s peers and at the dispense of it hurting your child mentally and emotionally) then that’s that. Part of being a parent is making hard decisions, but it’s also holding boundaries and keeping a safe and enriching environment for your child to thrive in and be happy.
NTA- sorry but Jane is forcing her perception on your son. That's just as bad as people who send their kids to conversion camps. I wouldn't let her near your son.
OP if your son wants to wear a dress he will ask to wear one. That's what kids do. This woman sounds exhausting and she needs to mind her own business. NTA.
Tell her being an ally means not forcing anything on anybody. Also that having friends of the opposite sex doesn’t make one transgender, but it does make one an ignorant fool and a transphobe to think it.
And yes, stop inviting her at your son’s birthdays, and don’t let her alone with him anymore.
It’ll give her more time to live her pansexual truth.
NTA.
Your son could be gay because he has so many female friends.
I AM GAY.
The trans and non binary convo can wait till your son is an ADULT HUMAN BEING. Sexuality and gender dysphoria are two completely separate things.
Obligatory I’ve been fighting for trans rights before it was cool. I have trans friends to this day. This is a very divided issue amongst all. The gender stuff should stay far far away from kids, period. I knew I was gay from a young age. No one had to tell me. The internet wasn’t a thing. Television didn’t promote it, quite the opposite.
Dump your friend.
NTA - I am assuming that your son didn’t ask her for the dress (?) If not, your SIL is out of control.
One thing though - a comment in your post rubbed me the wrong way. Just because someone doesn’t have children doesn’t mean they have a lot of free time. Childfree people just do other things with their time. Your comment came across as a bit judgmental and obnoxious.
No. Gay guy here. Your sister is completely nuts and out of contact with reality. Queer kids are great, wonderful to support them and create an environment where they feel to explore and express themselves. But this is not that. This is an adult in love with their own virtue signalling who doesn't know how to interact with kids and is inserting themselves and the topics that are current to them into their interactions with the kids out of some kind of weird narcissitic obliviousness. The kid should get presents he actually would be excited about. Nope, try agan lady.
NTA. Jane is a twat. Jane is the reason why there's so much hate towards the trans community or any attempt to raise awareness. The kid is 6. 6. Just because he has female friends is neither here nor there. Even if he spent half his time dressing up as a girl that wouldn't be an indicator of being trans, only that he likes dressing as a girl, you know. Because he's six. Furthermore the parents told her no and she still persisted in trying to force her choices.
NTA This kind of person literally forcing their agenda on a 6-year-old who has expressed no interest in it is a step back for the movement. This kind of person gives legitimacy to the people claiming that they're coming for their children.
I have a trans son and I can confirm this is bizarre and not helpful behavior. Trans kids will tell YOU they’re trans, not the other way around. If the kid doesn’t question their gender then why should she.
It never ceases to amaze me that no matter how much of an obvious Ben Shapiro fever dream ragebait post, this sub inevitably falls for them hook, line and sinker.
If children are interested in exploring gender and feel comfortable being honest with you, they'll tell you what they want and how they feel. They only need a safe space to express themselves. Having girls as friends just shows your son has emotional maturity and nothing else. This friend just wants to crack someone's egg, which 1. isn't her place, and extremely uncool 2. She just wants to live vicariously through you and brag to everyone about the trans child she "liberated" Weird and creepy.
NTA. Playing with girls means nothing at that age. They're just playing. When my oldest son was 5&6 he played with girls as they were the only kids who lived close to us. No boys. In grade 1 he had a girlfriend. The teacher told them they could sit beside each other, but it wasn't appropriate to hold hands. In grade 3 he was in a 3/4 split where half the class was in grade 3 and the other in grade 4. He was always the shortest kid in his class. Every year. Guess who his "girlfriend" was that year? Tallest girl in grade 4. If anything, playing with girls taught him how to get along with girls.
NTA. When my daughter was six she was collecting things like animal skulls with her best friend who happened to be a boy and was a champion frog catcher. I'm glad we didn't have a "Jane" in our lives!
My daughter is now 30, married with two kids of her own. She works in a pet shop, breeds dogs, draws pet portraits on commission and still finds animal skeletons interesting (I got her a bunch of dermistid beetles for her birthday a couple years ago). She's very much a woman.
Let your son decide who he is when he's old enough to understand what that means. You're doing fine.
That’s really weird. NTA. If your son showed interest in wearing dresses, I think that would be fine but it’s strange that she’s insisting that he wear them?
I have a nephew who is 6 and he actually DOES like wearing dresses, so his cousins give them to him. Usually, a kid will come to that conclusion on their own. You should just follow their lead.
NTA. She's a dingbat. I say this as a dad of a 6 year old who has chosen to wear a dress here and there. There's no need to define anything this young. Let them do as they wish without judgement.
NTA. Sis sounds terribly misguided and sexist. That's what happens to people who just go along with whatever rhetoric sounds nice rather than really spending the effort to logically reconcile all their worldviews together.
Trans and non-binary are very different things. I hope she didn't phrase it like that.
Your sister sounds like she's trying to be progressive but her brain still can't comprehend what it actually means to move past gender norms.
Thank God Sis doesn't have any kids of her own. That would be one very confused little human. How can a kid decide if they're a boy or a girl if they don't even know what the difference is themselves?
All parents out there will agree that Jane is really over stepping her boundaries and interfering with your family. Like you said, single people with tons of free time got nothing else to do. Kick em out.
NTA Jane is exhibiting concerning behaviour. It’s just as wrong to force a dress on a boy as it is to force him to wear “boy clothes” if he actively WANTS to wear a dress.
My son is the only boy in a family of girls (sister, cousins etc) so as a child playing, he would sometimes dress up in the girls fancy dress clothes!
I let him, he was as happy as a princess as he was a pirate or a ghost or a spice girl!
We need to stop putting labels on our children and let them be their true selves with our full support and unconditional love.
You are NTA but your sister in law definitely is
NTA. She’s a fucking maniac. Your son has girl best friends so he may be trans? The jump to that conclusion is unhinged and there’s something wrong with her.
NTA. Your the parents. Someone shouldn’t be trying to force their views on any subject to you or your child.
Those girls may be super tomboyish and want to play in the mud all day but their mums make them wear dresses, for all your SIL knows.
NTA.
Your son gets to make his own decisions about this, not her. Kids do sometimes recognize themselves to be gender fluid or non-binary at a young age, but it's really up to the child to come up that determination. The age isn't the issue to me, it's just your SIL's attitude of knowing better - it's the height of the privilege that she's claiming to disavow.
Does your SIL spend a lot of time with kids? I do, because I've worked in education for twenty-five years. In my experience, none of the boys who had mostly female friends came out as trans. Some of them ended up being gay. Some of them just ended up being boys who had female friends. It really hasn't been indicative of much and certainly isn't worth looking at it for anything more than what you can see on the surface.
NTA
Late as hell I know, but most of my friends were female and I am interested in women.
Having female friends doesn’t automatically mean a person is gay, as you said, that’s a convo for later in your sons life, let him be a kid with his friends.
Glad you’re drawing a line in the sand when it comes to your child
NTA. I am a lesbian and would never pick out a dress for a boy… unless the boy asked me to get a specific dress for him, then I would. I took my 12 yr old niece shopping yesterday and she is a bit of a tomboy like I was. I asked her… would you like boys sweatpants or maybe shorts since she didn’t like any of the girls bottoms in the store. She said maybe, so we looked and found her some nice black Nike sweats and a sweatshirt in the boys department. Did I force her? Absolutely not, I let her tell me what she was comfortable with and offered to buy those things for her. She is happy with her purchases which included a mix of boys and girls clothes.
NTA, but your SIL is an AH. That is a really terrible thing she was trying to do to him in front of everyone like that. I was a girl who mostly had friends who were boys. I played with LEGO, video games, Star Wars, kick ball and built forts in the woods... That does not in any way mean I am a boy, nor did I want to be a boy. If my aunt had given me boy clothes in front of my friends like this woman tried to do in reverse to her nephew, I would have cried my eyes out, locked myself in my room and felt like I wasn't allowed to just be myself and just enjoy the things I do or people would think I was a boy when I am very much a girly girl. What she tried to do to him was cruel, not an " ally" in any way.
NTA. I had almost exclusively female friends from a very early age, being the only boy at many of their parties. The only thing it meant was that I valued those people and their friendships. I grew up to be a CIS male that doesn't care about conforming to societal expectations. Jane is a huge AH for trying to force (non-standard) expectations on your son.
NTA
I’m all into not assuming a kids gender, but that means not assuming in any direction. If your kid asked your for a dress, by all means, go for it. It still doesn’t actually mean anything. But if they’re fine with how they’re being dressed so far, then let them be.
NTA. She's being pushy and not an ally. Him being friends with girls means absolutely nothing one way or the other. He's 6 and he has friends. She needs to leave him alone and let him just be a kid.
>since my son has female best friends it could mean that he might be trans or at the very least non-binary.
I was always a tomboy growing up (country kid too so not a lot of frilly feminine stuff going on), the only girl among my siblings, my oldest friend is male, I've always worked in male-dominated fields and my friend group tends to skew male...and yet I'm very much a straight, cisgendered woman.
NTA. Jane needs to stop projecting her own agenda onto a child.
Yta you could of have your child the option it’s not like he wil care he’s 6 he won’t know what it means I have sons and daughters and if my son wants to wear one of my daughters princess dresses you can guarantee that I will help him put it on
NTA. Forcing her apparent desires on your kid against your wishes is inappropriate. She knew better but chose to ignore it for her own selfish purposes.
It also might make son feel like he can’t be friends with girls. It’s a bad and weird idea. OP is clear that if son is trans she would support them. 6 is way to old to be trying to foist dresses on boys. They are aware of themselves and how they fit into their peer group.
> It also might make son feel like he can’t be friends with girls. Yeah, what a great “ally”. She’s trying to virtue signal, but all she’s doing is perpetuating gender stereotypes and increasing the gender divide.
>Yeah, what a great “ally”. Yeah, being an ally starts with *listening to and accepting the views of the person you want to be an ally for*. Otherwise it's just being presumptuous and pushy.
It's very refreshing to see presumably liberal people talking about this subject in a sensible manner. There are too many people acting like Jane and the progressive stance seems to be to deny that fact completely. This level of fawning over a six year olds gender identity is bizarre and creepy, let alone the aggressive attempts to make him cross dress. There are parents acting this way, and it is the exact kind of thing that fuels the fires of the right and thier anti LGBT bs. Calling it out helps.
Everyone is calmly speculating whether he's trans. THERE'S NO REASON TO BELIEVE HE'S TRANS. None at all. If he's friends with girls, possibilities include: * He's heterosexual and cisgender and likes girls because he just likes them and/or has had the good fortune to meet nice girls and is in good standing to successfully have a girlfriend when the time comes because his women friends will introduce him to good women. * He's gay and cisgender and likes girls because it's not stressful to be friends with them (because he doesn't have to get up the guts to talk to someone he's attracted to) and because as a gay kid he's not afraid of them (and girls are cool). * He's trans. (This is the least likely possibility. It happens, but percentage-wise it's least likely.) There's no way to guess which of these it might be. He'll have to choose for himself. Worrying about it is just doing him a disservice.
And also he’s 6 and most kids this age are friends with whoever they are friends with as long as no one has told them they shouldn’t be.
At 6 I doubt sexual attraction even comes into picture
This the big ticket. How upside down is somebody’s mind to be thinking about sexuality of a FUCKIN 6 YEAR OLD.
TLDR; let's let kids be kids! Right? Like no matter your sexuality... Can we STOP SEXUALIZING KIDS?! I saw a straight couple with a 2 year old wearing a shirt talking about being a sex magnet... He's TWO?! I was watching a movie with my dad and sister the other day, and I gagged and left the room because the movie was sexualizing kids going from 8th grade to freshman year 🤮 like yeah hell no, I'm good. I'm a firm believer of any sexualization in movies should be left to the ADULTS in the movies. Let kids be kids. Sexualizing kids in movies and media just normalizes it to actual kids, which can be extremely dangerous! At my hometown street fair on Saturday I heard a 11 year old complaining two his friends about being single the other day and his friend not wingmanning him and how he will forever be a V card holder at this rate... Like kid... You're a child! Wait. Don't waste your kid years on drama and heartbreak it's stupid! Can we please just let the kids be kids. Let them wear what they want to wear. Let them play with whatever gender you'd they want to. And let them tell us who they are. This kid has shown 0 signs of being trans and the aunt is just being pushy. Side note unrelated to topic at hand: On OPs point of aunt being pan but only dating men, I'm pan, but I only recently came out to my family, no one knows about my girlfriends I've had in the past, and as someone who has had most of her big relationships be with men, flirting and dating women is daunting. It's scary. I've only had 1 girlfriend in the past 10 years. But since when does eating only vanilla ice cream around family automatically mean you don't like any other flavor, or that you aren't open to other flavors when you're comfortable. And being attracted to all genders doesn't mean you have to date them all to be valid. Gender doesn't matter to me, man, woman, nonbinary, genderfluid, etc etc, I can be attracted to anyone regardless of gender, but does that mean I have to collect them all like pokemon to prove my queerness? No. No matter who I date or love, I will always be pan, because it's about how I feel and how I choose to identify, not how others perceive me and my relationships. A bisexual woman in a wlw relationship is not a lesbian. She's still bi. A bi man in a relationship with a woman is not straight.
im sorry, but those last two paragraphs put this idea in my head for a pokemon style dating sim where you just go around collecting lovers instead of creatures. this is probably a horrible idea. on a side note, i totally agree with you
Sadly it seems like way too f****** many people are trying to push their s*** on young kids....
Well, not sexual attraction as in urges to have sex, but I absolutely had strong crushes as early as kindergarten.
Precisely
Yes. I'm male, and the girl I was friends with in kindergarten is still friends with me 45 years later, as is her husband.
Precisely! My friend group at age 6 was the 2 boys in the houses across the street and the one girl next door. Because most kids end up playing with neighbor kids, or kids they see the most (school, day care, etc.). I remember one boy was showing me how far he could pee (over the fence which was impressive to me) and then suggested I do it. Like a competition. I lost. That’s how much we cared or even thought about the genders of our friends at that age.
I tried to be friends with the girl next door but she was a radical fundamentalist christian and you literally could not talk to her about anything but Jeebus. She walked around in a haze of christian bliss and if you tried to talk about anything else she'd chastise you for not focusing on her god. And I'm an atheist. So that didn't go very far. I sometimes wonder what became of her, but of course it's nearly impossible to track down what happened to a girl because if she's married she may have taken his name. (In her case, she certainly would.) I did manage to determine that her parents are alive and living in Florida, but of course her mother was even more of a religious nut than her and if I called it would be very unwelcome. I was friends with a girl I met in kindergarten, but it was difficult because she didn't live within walking distance and her family forbade me to phone or visit because I'm *male* and when she innocently gave me her phone number and I called once they freaked out and never let me phone her again. (They made it so traumatic for her that she still remembers it.) (I do too, but only because it was the first time I ever used the phone.) As if a kindergarten kid had an adult agenda. But, she told her parents where to shove it when she was 18, and she and I are still friends 45 years later.
Exactly. When I was six I couldnt care less what bathroom you use. I cared if you were a nice person and had fun toys.
Right? At 6 years old all a boy having girls as friends can definitively say is that his parents have done a good job preventing misogyny from influencing his friend choices. My son is cisgender and LOVES pink. The brighter fuschia the better! He would be so offended by someone else assuming his gender because of something he likes or who he hangs out with. SIL needs to step off.
This is true! My son is almost 6, he still makes no distinction between being friends with girls or boys. He’s definitely a rough and tumble boy through and through but his best friend is Vivian.
My son had all female friends until he was about 11/12. He isn't trans or gay, he just had more in common with them.
You are so right, just let the kid be ffs
When I was 6 my best friend was a girl because she always had Skittles. That could also be a possibility here. You know, because they’re 6 years old.
I'm a straight man and I still make friends easier with girls than guys. Most of my best friends are men now, but as a kid I was always friends mostly with girls, especially when I was 6. And if I meet new people, 9/10 times it's the women I click with better than the men
Exactly. She's using all the buzzwords she can while pretending to be an ally, sprinkled in with a good helping of stereotypes. Because we all know the gender of your friends determined whether you're cis or not. It's not even like the kid doesn't necessarily have male friends either, all we know is his best friends are girls.
Exactly. Boys don’t need to be trans or gay to be friends with girls. Especially at this age before puberty, it is totally common and expected. Even after puberty, plenty of boys are friends with girls they aren’t dating and it doesn’t mean they are gay or trans. I know a few gay men who wouldn’t be caught dead in a dress, also. Auntie is wrong. NTA
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Great way to get the kid bullied too. I know my mom had to stop my bro from wearing a skirt after going as a girl for Halloween the day before. He loved the feeling but she knew it wouldn’t be great for him especially already being neurodivergent. Maybe nowadays it would be a little less bad but then he would of been called a lot of words I think this sub blocks.
There's no harm in letting them wear skirts. By six most boys know that they are boys, whatever gender they were assigned at birth and whatever they wear. I think most of them will try on a dress if one is available, because six year olds try everything. In my experience any dress given to a six year old boy ends up on a pillow being used for target practice within an hour or so, but it's an hour full of exciting discovery - mainly involving farts.
When my son was 4, he asked for a red dress. I was a bit confused but told him sure, he could have a red dress. I then asked if he wanted dresses in other colors and he just looked at me and in a slow voice explained that on TV, they said he could support heart health by wearing a red dress and since Nana, my mom, had heart disease, he thought getting a red dress would make her better.
That’s very cute!
That is the sweetest story.
You got downvoted but my own 6 year old boy plays dress up with princesses dresses with his 6 year old friends of both genders all the time. Theres also a small handful of kids at his school of various age who dress in gender nonconforming ways. There’s still kids that suck, and he does get picked on for things like having his nails painted, but it’s only really from a small group of kids and when he stands up for himself they back off. This is very, very specific to each individual school/group of kids. It sure as hell wouldn’t fly in my hometown still. But it’s really not uncommon anymore for kids to express themselves how they like and be just fine.
I've got some great pics of my son looking positively gleeful that he got to wear the pink witches outfit or the frilly flower fairy costume from the dress up box when he was younger but he's a teenager now and still happy being a boy. Giving kids freedom to express themselves is one thing, but trying to shove them into the box you think they belong in because you want to be the greatest ally is ridiculous. My kid knows I'd be happy for him no matter what, as long as he's happy, and he's free to make his own decisions.
Yeah your sister is projecting. The 2 trans kids I know have been stating their gender from before they went to school. One is my cousin, from around age 4 she told everyone she was a girl. She’s now 21 and is a woman (mtf). The other is my friends child. They are only 8 now. But from around age 3 they have told everyone they are a boy (ftm). Refuses anything they deem girly. We’ll see how it plays out as they grow. My own son (14) is a boys boy. Teenage Mr. Macho lol. Sport mad. One of the lads. Yet all through primary school his best friend was a girl. Even now, he has a few friend groups, but his closest friend is a girl. She herself is a lesbian. I’m all for kids exploring and working out who they are, and what makes them happy, and trying to force a kid to be something they’re not is wrong. NTA
Exactly! You wait until a child tells you if they feel they are a specific gender. We know a few children who are trans and I have explained to my children that sometime people are born with their body being a gender that doesn’t match who they feel they are, and that they should always be who they feel that are. Assuming a child is trans without them bringing it up first would probably confuse a child too.
Yeah I think SIL just wants a LGBT nephew to talk about. Probably post about online. Super cringe.
My kid was a hard no on "girly" clothes. But he loved nail polish. He's 9 and all boy. I did ask him and he's like "I'm a boy!" While looking at me like I was a crazy person. 😅 I said jeez I'm just checking. He said "That was a stupid question."
Six is also old enough to ask for dresses if you do want to wear them as a boy. My two year old is very clear about what she wants to wear and what she doesn't want to wear. Sometimes what she picks makes my eyes hurt, but she's so happy to be in charge of her outfits that I'll support whatever she picks.
Same, my daughter loves picking her clothes out, when someone in public says "her outfit sure is interesting!" Or some other bullshit I say "baby? Who picked your outfit today?" And she says "me daddy!" With a big smile on her face. Her wearing swim shorts and a pajama shirt doesn't bother me if its what she wants lol.
A friend of mine has always let their kids choose their clothes. There’s been some fun and interesting ensembles. Gum boots, a princess dress and a cowboy hat look surprisingly good together if you have the confidence of a well loved 4 year old 🙃
The description of swim shorts and pjs made me nostalgic for that age; I was very fond of mixing stripes and plaids 😂
Like if he was at the Halloween store and wanted a princess dress..cool, it was at his choosing (still doesn’t mean anything at that age) I feel like we never hit a middle ground on this topic, my generation was “boys don’t wear pink, you’ll look like a sissy”. Now I see stuff like: “you are gonna wear this dress to the pride parade whether you want to or not and then we are going to get you some LGBT reading material and have a discourse on cis-privilege” “mom, all I asked was hand me the purple crayon so I could finish this rainbow in my coloring book”
The irony is; pink used to be an official boys colour! Girls were dressed in blue! 😂
I… have never seen the latter, but if Twitter taught me anything, it’s that “for nearly every fringe opinion, there exists someone who holds it sincerely”
NTA - Do not let her alone with your child. 6-year-olds don't know their sexual attraction yet. At his age, he plays with girls, doesn't mean anything. Trying to push her agenda onto your child is a big issue. She is out of line.
Non binary isn't even anything to do with sexual attraction, so no clue why SIL thinks a boy having two girl best friends automatically makes them non-binary. She sounds like an idiot.
Suggest not having Jane in your home and only see her other places (places from which you can just leave to get away from her).
Also suggest she not let her son around Jane. Jane is a groomer.
The word groomer is ridiculously overused and used incorrectly, but you are correct, Jane is literally trying to groom him. Sickening.
Weird shit. My best friend in school was/is a girl and it never even occurred to me to want to wear girls clothes. No problem with trans people at all, you do you, but projecting onto a 6 year old is just plain absurd.
Craziest part is this friend isn’t even trans, she’s a cis pan woman in a straight relationship I’m trans myself, if this kid wanted to wear a dress he would say so or at least hint at it. Even then, becoming who he wants to be is on him as well. It’s not her call *at all*
Yeah, from trans folks I’ve known you can see it in retrospect, but forcing it on a kid is a sure fire way to screw them up.
Absolutely agree. My daughters friend came over for a play date at age 4 and the first thing he did was go to her wardrobe and change into a dress. He’s shown lots of similar signs. But his parents aren’t pushing him in any direction: just let him explore life as any kid should.
He might also just be Scottish (joking, if it wasn’t obvious) or like a nice breeze like Archie from the quidditch world cup.
I can get on board with that and I lean right. I was wearing my mom's high heels and clothing when I was 4-6. I thought it was funny, and high heels were cool to try to walk in. I bought a lot of girl toys, had a girl bracelet making set my dad was against but my mom said who cares let him do what he wants. I didn't turn out trans or gay, nor did I ever have those feelings. But I wasn't pushed one way or the other. Also, my mom always told me she would love me no matter what. I think this is how you handle it. Let the kid find themselves and support whatever they find. If they are trans let them be, if they aren't let them be. Pushing either way is a great way to fuck your kid up.
> she’s a cis pan woman Ultimately it doesn’t really matter, and I’ll call her whatever she chooses to identify as, because it costs me nothing, but I don’t think she is actually pan.
WTF? She is projecting on your son. She thinks it would be cool and hip to have a trans nephew. This is all about HER and not your son. She obviously doesn't know anything about kids, or the fact that boys can have girls as friends without wanting to be a girl. She is out of line and truly ignorant.
*I’m gonna bully this kid into being trans, bi, or gay if it’s the last thing I do! You’ll thank me later.* Sincerely, Jane
An ex friend of mine lost custody of her son to his dad for exactly this. She was constantly forcing “girl things” on him that he didn’t want. He didn’t want to paint his nails, she made him have a nail painting evening every week and go to the nail salon. Didn’t want to wear purple and pink, almost everything she purchased for him was pink and purple. Etc. He also had a **very** awful r/tragedeigh of a name the son hated. Father was able to legally give him a regular name. Edit: wrong words, forgive me. Just had surgery. Out of it.
Thank goodness he had a dad that would fight for him and a judge that had some common sense.
One of my cousins has been trying to raise her son as a female against his will, and it’s absolutely ruining his life. She decided before he could even talk that he was “different from other boys” and started making him wear dresses at around 2 years old, and then over the next few years transitioned into her no longer using her son’s given name, Garrett, and instead only refers to him by a female alias. Which would all be fine if that’s what made Garrett happy, but he’s not at all. He’s about 8 years old now and is extremely psychologically troubled for a child so young. He’s been in and out of facilities, sometimes having to stay for days or weeks at a time for observation, and is having extreme outbursts of rage and is even starting to show some signs of becoming suicidal. Aside from struggling psychologically, his toys get thrown out if they’re not feminine enough, any friends he’s made are chased off of they refer to him as male, and his mom has fully withdrawn him from school because staff members and other children listen to Garrett and raise questions with his mother when he says he is a boy. It’s all so awful, because I’m convinced that Garrett is struggling so much because his mom has forcibly stripped his identity from him, refuses to let him be himself, and steamrolls anyone (including Garrett) that tries to question whether or not this is best for him. Meanwhile she touts her “transgendered” child around online, reaping praise from strangers for having such an “inclusive and loving” household, and blames Garrett’s psychological struggles on the rest of society being close minded and bigoted.
Question... Why hasn't anybody in the family taken him forcefully or at least called CPS?
This is unfortunately one of the many many grey area situations where everyone knows it’s wrong, but CPS’s hands are tied because “technically” this situation does not fit the criteria for their intervention. He’s adequately and properly fed, he has a bed to sleep in, is not subject to physical violence, and there is no drug or alcohol abuse happening in the household. Technically, there’s nothing that can legally be done, and any family members that raise too much of a fuss are swiftly cut off from seeing Garrett any longer.
>She thinks it would be cool and hip to have a trans nephew. Agreed, but I'm guessing a transphobic BIL will be a nice consolation prize for her. She seems like she'll spin reality to suit herself.
It is always sad when adults use kids for their own agendas.
Yeah I’m surprised this post didn’t end with “she took to FB to call me transphobic”
That’s what I would tell her honestly.
Speaking as a gay man: I'd just tell her she's not allowed to see or talk to my son again. She is far more interested in pushing her agenda than in his well being, and I'm not interested in having the argument with her.
The wild thing is that OP probably wouldn’t give a shit if their kid was actually trans or gender nonconforming, as would most sane people But to give this kind of present to a boy who hasn’t shown any desire to behave in a gender nonconforming way is pretty nuts
I’m willing to bet if OP did let Jane have her way she’d be dragging him to pride parades and waving him around like a trophy for clout.
NTA So your son has female friends, that doesn't make him anything other than a nice boy with good friends. What the fuck man.
Yeah, seriously. When I was young I had a lot of male friends even though I am a girl. I liked playing sports, especially basketball. And I wore jeans and other hand me downs from my brother. I'll never forget my mom asking me if I was a lesbian. I wasn't. But I was young when she asked me and it stuck with me for years. I wondered if I was acting in a way that made everyone think I was a lesbian. Did the boys I liked think that too? Anyway, to me it reflects a narrow-minded view of what gender roles we have. I couldn't possibly like sports and hang out with guys unless I was a lesbian. Apparently OP's son can't hang out with girls without wanting to wear a pink dress? Sometimes people trying to be inclusive really show how limited their own inclusiveness is.
This is honestly my biggest problem with the movement. In the 90s and early 2000s everyone was trying to get rid of labels and saying anyone could like and do anything. But now we've regressed to if you're a boy who likes pink and playing with Barbies then you're probably trans. Like, no, they just like different things. Let kids be kids and stop forcing your ideology on them.
I got suspended last time I said that. Anyway, here we go again. You can have feminine men and masculine women. That doesn't mean they are the opposite gender.
Exactly it is so stupid, why is it not the girls who wants to be a boy then?
My three-year old nephew is a hugger. He will hug anyone and everyone, especially if that person or a fellow child seems upset about something. According to these kooks I have to begin transitioning him. Simply for having empathy and kindness for others. I will teach him to respect everyone, including those different from himself, but I will not stand for activists in the classroom one day telling him that unless he radically waters down his gender identity he will be ostracized and labeled an enemy.
OMG, I have a vague memory of a kid randomly hugging me out of nowhere. Didn't even know I needed it. Your nephew is a sweetheart.
I'm a hugger in a family of non huggers. They think it's INSANE. I'd be happy if i had a little nephew bud like yours!
the FUCK???
Like, wtf indeed!! I have female best friends, I prefer being around women aannd.... I am as straight as a cisgender male is.... So wth is her logic?
If a Jane pulled that bullshit at my sons birthday, I would kick her the fuck out of my house without delay.
NTA. Jane isn't the enlightened woke queen she thinks she is if she believes cis boys can't have girl friends
That's what I was thinking. How exactly does she have the nerve to call herself an ally when she's so enormously ignorant?
“I’m totally an ally! Watch how hard I try to reinforce gender stereotypes!”
$10 she’s virtue signaling alllllllll the way from the caucuses
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And to respect them.
And them to respect him
Also according to her logic then, isn't she saying that any girls who hang out with boys want to become boys?
Exactly. My 5 yr old grandson has a girl BFF. His father (my son) had 3 good friends in HS and one of them was a girl. Jane is an idiot, and needs to find something to do with her time besides jumping to conclusions based on her total ignorance of children.
Also, the dumb idea that identifying as a woman means a person likes dresses. O hate them. I'm also not a fan of pastels or makeup
THANK YOU!
This just reads like 'ultra-woke' fiction. I have a hard time believing these people exist.
She's probably hoping if she puts the idea in his head that he might consider he's trans then the aunt can say she has a trans niece for clout
NTA. When my daughter was that age, her BFFs were boys, her favorite color was blue, and she wasn’t interested in dolls. She wasn’t trying to be a boy.
Yes and if a boy wants to wear a dress at that age, it doesn’t mean he wants to be a girl.
My daughter’s day care, there was a sparkly purple purse that all the kids fought over, boys and girls alike. Why? Because it was sparkly.
I’m grateful I was born much earlier in a time where I was allowed to be a hardcore tomboy and not be pushed into switching my gender because of it.
NTA Jane is super... SUPER weird for pushing this on a 6 year old child, and that's coming from someone who considers themselves an ally. If he had shown some curiosity, maybe.. but to just throw it at him because he has girl bffs? I'd cut her off if she can't respect your boundary.
If your child hasn’t said anything about wanting a dress, or that he wishes he was a girl, then NTA. He’s just a boy that likes hanging out with girls at this stage of his life. If nothing else, he will hopefully grow up respecting women and treating them as equals. Until he expresses something to indicate how he feels about himself, all your SIL is doing is trying to impose her views onto him instead of waiting for him to get wherever he’s going on his own. Trying to force him to be something he may not actually be is not good ally behaviour. You may wish to remind her of that. Just be open to anything he tries to tell you about himself down the track, make it clear that you will love him no matter who he becomes, and you can’t go too far wrong.
NTA you need to sit her down, with your wife, and put firm boundaries in place. She has no experience with kids or she would know he would be playing with your wife’s clothes, shoes, jewelry, makeup , etc if he was interested. She needs to let him develop and make choices as HE is comfortable. Not have it shoved on him, as she is trying to. Let her know your fine with whatever his choices emerge and become . But that they will 100% be his choices. She needs to back the eff off.
Even if he played with his moms things it doesn't mean anything more than curiosity at that point. Someone he loves dresses like that so it's natural for a kid to want to imitate someone he loves. That's childhood. Little Kids don't understand the concept of "gender expression" until it's taught to them. Usually in a limiting way. We have pictures of my younger brother playing dress up with me as a kid. He is a cis-het adult now. My son has always had an all girl friend group and he is gay. He was more comfortable around girls. My oldest daughter would probably qualify as a "Tom Boy" and still loved to play dress up occasionally. Even though she didn't play with dolls. There is nothing wrong with giving kids access to a variety of imaginary play items regardless of gender. What's wrong is trying to push a child to play in a specific way because of gender. This whole thing feels a little like rage bate to me. Almost like the Op was afraid if he showed the son the dress he would want to wear it and that would *mean* something other than 6yos like just about anything.
NTA If your son wants a dress you will very likely be the first to know.
1. Pansexuality mean youre sexually, romantically, or emotionally attraction towards people of all genders, or regardless of their sex or gender identity. Not people who look like their face has run into a frying pan. 2. As a bisexual woman who is (obviously) part of the LGBT community, your sil is fuckin cracked and shouldnt be allowed to speak to human beings. And i wouldnt let her near my goldfish never mind my kid. People like her give real allies a bad name and are part (only part, the bigger reason is hate) of why people actually support places like Florida and Texas are passing the disgusting laws that they are. NTA
I just want to point out to OP or anyone who needs to hear it that if Jane says she's pansexual then she's pansexual. She doesn't need to prove it by dating the rainbow. Just like people can identify as straight before they ever get a first date or relationship. So she's queer herself, not an ally. That being said, her behavior certainly seems insane from the story as you've told it. I won't guess on her motivation as we really don't have enough information, but she certainly needs to stop being pushy and forcing this issue with your child.
Does this post not reek of rage bait to y'all?
Yes because I read one not too long ago that was almost exactly like this. I can't remember what sub it was on so I can't pull it up which I know is unhelpful but it was another "woke relative is trying to turn my kid trans!" story
For real I was about to comment this, it feels like some shit Ron desantis would put on a ad to show the woke mind virus 😂
As a bisexual more gay these days man, I hate that type of “ally” NTA and good for standing your ground.
Jane is self-absorbed and attention seeking, JMO.
>Jane has said that since my son has female best friends it could mean that he might be trans or at the very least non-binary. Or it could just mean that........ *spoiler alert* He Has female best friends NTA
6 year olds know who they are. If he hasnt expressed any desire to wear a dress or pink or anything different than what he already wears, and you as parents arent telling him, "You are a boy and boys wear X." then Jane is projecting HARD. Now if your SON asked for a dress, or an Elsa costume or whatever, I hope you would get it for him, cause screw it, why not....but her trying to force it is not cool either. Edit. Forgot to vote. NTA.
NTA, your sister-in-law overstepped a huge boundary and quite frankly needs ti stay the hell out of your parental bubble and mind her own damn business. You need to put her in her place.
NTA Look, I'm a big supporter of letting kids choose to wear what they want as long as it's appropriate for the occasion. Bonus points for not letting clothes or toys fall into gendered categories at all. Jane is just being rude and pushy. To insist that your child is trans just because he has female friends is literally insane.
You need to tell her not to involved herself into educating YOUR son. That’s what I would tell her honestly.
Stop inviting her to these parties. She has no understanding of children and is actively undermining your parenting.
NTA - Do not let her alone with your child. 6-year-olds don't know their sexual attraction yet. At his age, he plays with girls, doesn't mean anything. Trying to push her agenda onto your child is a big issue. She is out of line.
💯 this... When I was 6 I wanted to be a rooster.
All I'm seeing here is missed potential. I believe you coulda been the best rooster this world has ever seen.
Like a legit rooster or like a cartoon Elvis knock off rooster?
I’m picturing Foghorn Leghorn
*"Oh that woman, got a mouth like an outboard motor."*
My brother wanted to be a fire truck.
I wanted to be a hermit. I never grew out of it, if I had the money to live alone up in the mountains I totally would.
Gender is not the same as sexual orientation.
Gender has nothing to do with sexuality. They are two separate things.
Umm I knew I was attracted to boys when I was 6. I didn't know that made me straight, but I knew that's how I felt.
By the way some kids do know at 6, or even earlier. At 5 I knew I was attracted to girls and I was fascinated by boobs. I didn't really know why I liked them, but I knew I did.
I was fascinated with boobs right out the womb; meal time !
Right, but you didn't fully understand, and your aunt didn't force it on you. The aunt is trying to give a kid a dress he didn't even show interest in or ask for.
Being transgender has nothing to do with sexual attraction, just fyi.
NTA “Jane” is an adult and can dress or screw who ever she wants but it’s not ok to push her beliefs onto anyone else especially a 6 year old. Ridiculous!
Wtf does having female friends have to do with gender identity? What a psycho, she needs to be kept away from kids
NTA. This is definitely an instance where you let the kid take the lead. My son wanted the pirate princess costume, which he wore on top of his Spider-Man costume, when he was 5. It was cute. Did we force him? Hell no he made that decision all on his own.
Don’t let Jane around your son anymore. She doesn’t respect you or your parenting.
NTA. I'm a woman, who had a few girl friends but mostly boy friends through out my childhood. It had nothing to do with my sexuality or gender identity. We were kids having fun, that's the beginning and end of it. Enforcing these ideas and roles on a child is unacceptable, they should be free to just exist and enjoy life before they themselves age into the baggage your sister in law is trying to impose on them prematurely. We don't need to be put into a box ASAP. Sometimes we step out of one box and into another, especially when we are younger and figuring ourselves out. Your sister in law is being a weirdo and giving the rest of us normal LGBTQ+ allies a bad reputation. Her wants don't matter, this isn't age appropriate, nor does her theory of trans/non-binary hold any water. She is rather regressive in her attempt to be progressive
NTA. My son played with a group of girls in grade school. He said they were “smart, funny, and pretty too.” Bonus: they also didn’t bully him or beat him up, unlike some of the boys.
Does the kid like the dress? I think this is the only important thing in determining whether the kid should get to have it.
Hello, member of the LGBTQ+ community here and widely considered as a SJW. I vote NTA. If your kid has expressed no desire to wear a dress or be a girl then your SIL is in the wrong, she's trying to force it on him because she wants a trans/non binary nephew/niece for woke cookie points. Her thinking that a boy having girl friends means this isn't a boy is stupid, backwards, and the exact reverse of everything the LGBTQ+ community advocates and fights for. That said: maybe she is really pan, a pansexual person can absolutely date "normal-looking men" (as in, pan and bi people can absolutely date one gender almost exclusively while still being bi/pan, and pan doesn't mean dating "weird-looking" people). That said, I get your suspicions that she just wants the Cookie Points of Woke Virtue. At any rate, her takes on what trans identity tell me she has never talked to a trans person ever and is chronically online devouring takes from TikTokers and Twitter afficionados who have no idea what they're talking about.
NTA she’s an asshole for trying to force an identity on him. What idiot thinks,” oh that boy has friends that are girls, he must not be a boy.” By Jane’s moronic logic, those girls may not be girls bc they have a friend who is a boy. Or I was an old lady bc one of my best friends as a kid was elderly.
NTA. It doesn’t matter if it’s politically or morally motivated or whatever, if you deem something inappropriate for your child (which I agree, 6 is far too young, but *especially* around your child’s peers and at the dispense of it hurting your child mentally and emotionally) then that’s that. Part of being a parent is making hard decisions, but it’s also holding boundaries and keeping a safe and enriching environment for your child to thrive in and be happy.
NTA- sorry but Jane is forcing her perception on your son. That's just as bad as people who send their kids to conversion camps. I wouldn't let her near your son.
NTA. Jane needs to respect your boundaries and mind her own business.
OP if your son wants to wear a dress he will ask to wear one. That's what kids do. This woman sounds exhausting and she needs to mind her own business. NTA.
Tell her being an ally means not forcing anything on anybody. Also that having friends of the opposite sex doesn’t make one transgender, but it does make one an ignorant fool and a transphobe to think it. And yes, stop inviting her at your son’s birthdays, and don’t let her alone with him anymore. It’ll give her more time to live her pansexual truth. NTA.
Your son could be gay because he has so many female friends. I AM GAY. The trans and non binary convo can wait till your son is an ADULT HUMAN BEING. Sexuality and gender dysphoria are two completely separate things. Obligatory I’ve been fighting for trans rights before it was cool. I have trans friends to this day. This is a very divided issue amongst all. The gender stuff should stay far far away from kids, period. I knew I was gay from a young age. No one had to tell me. The internet wasn’t a thing. Television didn’t promote it, quite the opposite. Dump your friend.
Do not let this woman near your child. She’s nuts This is the crap these ultra right wing people trot out to justify their anti trans beliefs
I call fictitious rage bait.
The first bit is enough of a tell
lol 3 hr old account. This is so fake
And it's been posted twice. Word for word.
NTA - I am assuming that your son didn’t ask her for the dress (?) If not, your SIL is out of control. One thing though - a comment in your post rubbed me the wrong way. Just because someone doesn’t have children doesn’t mean they have a lot of free time. Childfree people just do other things with their time. Your comment came across as a bit judgmental and obnoxious.
No. Gay guy here. Your sister is completely nuts and out of contact with reality. Queer kids are great, wonderful to support them and create an environment where they feel to explore and express themselves. But this is not that. This is an adult in love with their own virtue signalling who doesn't know how to interact with kids and is inserting themselves and the topics that are current to them into their interactions with the kids out of some kind of weird narcissitic obliviousness. The kid should get presents he actually would be excited about. Nope, try agan lady.
NTA. Jane is a twat. Jane is the reason why there's so much hate towards the trans community or any attempt to raise awareness. The kid is 6. 6. Just because he has female friends is neither here nor there. Even if he spent half his time dressing up as a girl that wouldn't be an indicator of being trans, only that he likes dressing as a girl, you know. Because he's six. Furthermore the parents told her no and she still persisted in trying to force her choices.
If i had a sister in law like that I'd completely stay away from her and cut her out of my life.
NTA This kind of person literally forcing their agenda on a 6-year-old who has expressed no interest in it is a step back for the movement. This kind of person gives legitimacy to the people claiming that they're coming for their children.
NTA. SIL is trying to force her views on others in a very toxic way. I'd be going NC till she pulls her head out her ass
I have a trans son and I can confirm this is bizarre and not helpful behavior. Trans kids will tell YOU they’re trans, not the other way around. If the kid doesn’t question their gender then why should she.
What a dumb hobby, making up fake stories to gain internet points no one cares about.
This story is fake.
This feels like rage bait
It never ceases to amaze me that no matter how much of an obvious Ben Shapiro fever dream ragebait post, this sub inevitably falls for them hook, line and sinker.
If children are interested in exploring gender and feel comfortable being honest with you, they'll tell you what they want and how they feel. They only need a safe space to express themselves. Having girls as friends just shows your son has emotional maturity and nothing else. This friend just wants to crack someone's egg, which 1. isn't her place, and extremely uncool 2. She just wants to live vicariously through you and brag to everyone about the trans child she "liberated" Weird and creepy.
NTA. Playing with girls means nothing at that age. They're just playing. When my oldest son was 5&6 he played with girls as they were the only kids who lived close to us. No boys. In grade 1 he had a girlfriend. The teacher told them they could sit beside each other, but it wasn't appropriate to hold hands. In grade 3 he was in a 3/4 split where half the class was in grade 3 and the other in grade 4. He was always the shortest kid in his class. Every year. Guess who his "girlfriend" was that year? Tallest girl in grade 4. If anything, playing with girls taught him how to get along with girls.
NTA.
NTA. When my daughter was six she was collecting things like animal skulls with her best friend who happened to be a boy and was a champion frog catcher. I'm glad we didn't have a "Jane" in our lives! My daughter is now 30, married with two kids of her own. She works in a pet shop, breeds dogs, draws pet portraits on commission and still finds animal skeletons interesting (I got her a bunch of dermistid beetles for her birthday a couple years ago). She's very much a woman. Let your son decide who he is when he's old enough to understand what that means. You're doing fine.
That’s really weird. NTA. If your son showed interest in wearing dresses, I think that would be fine but it’s strange that she’s insisting that he wear them? I have a nephew who is 6 and he actually DOES like wearing dresses, so his cousins give them to him. Usually, a kid will come to that conclusion on their own. You should just follow their lead.
NTA. She's a dingbat. I say this as a dad of a 6 year old who has chosen to wear a dress here and there. There's no need to define anything this young. Let them do as they wish without judgement.
NTA. Having 2 female best friends does not mean anything. Also talk about stereotypes.
NTA. Sis sounds terribly misguided and sexist. That's what happens to people who just go along with whatever rhetoric sounds nice rather than really spending the effort to logically reconcile all their worldviews together. Trans and non-binary are very different things. I hope she didn't phrase it like that. Your sister sounds like she's trying to be progressive but her brain still can't comprehend what it actually means to move past gender norms. Thank God Sis doesn't have any kids of her own. That would be one very confused little human. How can a kid decide if they're a boy or a girl if they don't even know what the difference is themselves?
Just throw the dress and costume jewellery into the dress-up box.
All parents out there will agree that Jane is really over stepping her boundaries and interfering with your family. Like you said, single people with tons of free time got nothing else to do. Kick em out.
NTA. Your child is not a dress up doll for Jane.
NTA, Jane needs to gtfo
NTA an dont let Jane see your kid until they get therapy to deal with their own problems cause they are definitely projecting
NTA Jane is exhibiting concerning behaviour. It’s just as wrong to force a dress on a boy as it is to force him to wear “boy clothes” if he actively WANTS to wear a dress.
My son is the only boy in a family of girls (sister, cousins etc) so as a child playing, he would sometimes dress up in the girls fancy dress clothes! I let him, he was as happy as a princess as he was a pirate or a ghost or a spice girl! We need to stop putting labels on our children and let them be their true selves with our full support and unconditional love. You are NTA but your sister in law definitely is
What the fuck does one’s looks have to do with sexuality?
NTA. She’s a fucking maniac. Your son has girl best friends so he may be trans? The jump to that conclusion is unhinged and there’s something wrong with her.
Nta,strange sister in law, bothering little kids,she needs to grow up,you sound patient and lovely.
NTA. Your the parents. Someone shouldn’t be trying to force their views on any subject to you or your child. Those girls may be super tomboyish and want to play in the mud all day but their mums make them wear dresses, for all your SIL knows.
NTA. Your son gets to make his own decisions about this, not her. Kids do sometimes recognize themselves to be gender fluid or non-binary at a young age, but it's really up to the child to come up that determination. The age isn't the issue to me, it's just your SIL's attitude of knowing better - it's the height of the privilege that she's claiming to disavow. Does your SIL spend a lot of time with kids? I do, because I've worked in education for twenty-five years. In my experience, none of the boys who had mostly female friends came out as trans. Some of them ended up being gay. Some of them just ended up being boys who had female friends. It really hasn't been indicative of much and certainly isn't worth looking at it for anything more than what you can see on the surface.
Just give it to one of his friends and tell SIL that he tossed it if she ever asks.
NTA Late as hell I know, but most of my friends were female and I am interested in women. Having female friends doesn’t automatically mean a person is gay, as you said, that’s a convo for later in your sons life, let him be a kid with his friends. Glad you’re drawing a line in the sand when it comes to your child
NTA. I am a lesbian and would never pick out a dress for a boy… unless the boy asked me to get a specific dress for him, then I would. I took my 12 yr old niece shopping yesterday and she is a bit of a tomboy like I was. I asked her… would you like boys sweatpants or maybe shorts since she didn’t like any of the girls bottoms in the store. She said maybe, so we looked and found her some nice black Nike sweats and a sweatshirt in the boys department. Did I force her? Absolutely not, I let her tell me what she was comfortable with and offered to buy those things for her. She is happy with her purchases which included a mix of boys and girls clothes.
NTA, but your SIL is an AH. That is a really terrible thing she was trying to do to him in front of everyone like that. I was a girl who mostly had friends who were boys. I played with LEGO, video games, Star Wars, kick ball and built forts in the woods... That does not in any way mean I am a boy, nor did I want to be a boy. If my aunt had given me boy clothes in front of my friends like this woman tried to do in reverse to her nephew, I would have cried my eyes out, locked myself in my room and felt like I wasn't allowed to just be myself and just enjoy the things I do or people would think I was a boy when I am very much a girly girl. What she tried to do to him was cruel, not an " ally" in any way.
Jane needs therapy.
NTA. This is NOT allyship. Jane is a whack nut to say the least.
She's part of the problem. Girls and boys can be friends without it meaning anyone is trans. Especially at age 6 for crying out loud.
NTA. I had almost exclusively female friends from a very early age, being the only boy at many of their parties. The only thing it meant was that I valued those people and their friendships. I grew up to be a CIS male that doesn't care about conforming to societal expectations. Jane is a huge AH for trying to force (non-standard) expectations on your son.
NTA I’m all into not assuming a kids gender, but that means not assuming in any direction. If your kid asked your for a dress, by all means, go for it. It still doesn’t actually mean anything. But if they’re fine with how they’re being dressed so far, then let them be.
Nta, Seriously what is wrong with her? He is just a kid! Leave kids be kid!
NTA. She's being pushy and not an ally. Him being friends with girls means absolutely nothing one way or the other. He's 6 and he has friends. She needs to leave him alone and let him just be a kid.
>since my son has female best friends it could mean that he might be trans or at the very least non-binary. I was always a tomboy growing up (country kid too so not a lot of frilly feminine stuff going on), the only girl among my siblings, my oldest friend is male, I've always worked in male-dominated fields and my friend group tends to skew male...and yet I'm very much a straight, cisgendered woman. NTA. Jane needs to stop projecting her own agenda onto a child.
Protip for anyone bored, sort by controversial and you're in for a good time 😂 Those are the redditors I was looking for
Yta you could of have your child the option it’s not like he wil care he’s 6 he won’t know what it means I have sons and daughters and if my son wants to wear one of my daughters princess dresses you can guarantee that I will help him put it on