Mother Loses Custody Of 13-Year-Old Son Because He Is “Too Effeminate”

I feel like the constantly battle for masculinity and femininity is getting a bit tiresome. I would like to see a society where we are focused less on someone’s gender expression as being too masculine or too feminine and we are more concerned for valuing the person’s choice of expression. I think the underlying problem with this particular case is that the system seems to be demonizing the child on the basis of a possible transgender identity. I find this alarming and very heteronormative. I personally do not believe that effeminate behavior denotes a “personality disorder” as the article states. I would like to find some more information on the case so I can be more u to date on the details. Click here for the full article.

$5.00 Date Assignment

Recently, I saw a picture floating around on several social media sites. I did a little research and found that in Salt Lake City, a high school teach asked students to complete ans assignment called the “$5.00 Date.” The handouts included a paper for the women in class called “Girl’s Date’ and one for the men called “Boy’s Date.” There are a lot of general assumptions made in the assignments about sexual orientation, gender identity, gender norms, gender roles, and a plethora of other social identity statues and intersections.

I thought the assignment was a blatantly sexist, heterophobic, misogynist, and just generally offensive. The young woman who reported the assignment should be labeled as a hero–not everyone has the ability or social capital to voice their concern and be heard.

Below is a link to the article I found and a view of the images.

‘Don’t waste his money’: Utah high school assignment on dating draws accusations of gender bias. By BENJAMIN WOOD | The Salt Lake Tribune