What's your take on this? (Child debate)

AutumnLeavesFall

A FB friend just posted this, Her son Aiden is 4.

Ashleigh: Aiden wants to be Tinkerbell and Johnny is saying no! Mind you Johnny dressed up as little red ridinghood our first year together! So I am digging out the picture and giving it to Aiden for some leverage! Screw you Johnny, Aiden and I WILL win this debate!

 Would you let your son dress up as a fairy?

cherylanddoug

I don't think I would.  Not sure about the situation, but I wonder if mom is egging this on (kids say really funny weird stuff sometimes). 

I would not allow it mainly to avoid weird looks and potential teasing from friends and classmates.  No need to deal with these sorts of issues until middle school.

jmhuff

Wow, thats a tough one! I would say yes, but I am not really sure. I want my child to be comfortable in their own skin, whether that be wearing a "female" costume for Halloween or taking ballet. I know DH would say "HELL NO." It's hard to say when you don't have a child of your own.

Pachita

I wouldn't.....he'll probably be ridiculed...I don't need my son to be embarrased or traumatized b/c of this.  

mandy6418

jmhuff:

Wow, thats a tough one! I would say yes, but I am not really sure. I want my child to be comfortable in their own skin, whether that be wearing a "female" costume for Halloween or taking ballet. I know DH would say "HELL NO." It's hard to say when you don't have a child of your own.

This.

bryanandkatrina

jmhuff:

Wow, thats a tough one! I would say yes, but I am not really sure. I want my child to be comfortable in their own skin, whether that be wearing a "female" costume for Halloween or taking ballet. I know DH would say "HELL NO." It's hard to say when you don't have a child of your own.

I would agree with this - I'm really not sure what I would actually do.

shouldbworkin

I might buy Tinkerbell for home and try to persuade him to wear something else for TOT'ing.  I would be afraid that someone would make him feel bad.  At that age, they don't really see things as boy or girl, so I wouldn't want to force a gender stereotype on my DS. But, at the same time, it's my job to try to protect him and his feelings at that age too. 

millejj1

I say it's Halloween, he wants to dress up and have fun. Let him have the fun. There is already enough pressure put on kids by society about everything else, let him to do it.

I get that he may get picked on, the harda** in me says kids need to learn how to stand up to others sometime and working through it and learning how to handle it when they are young is better than trying to do it at 16 when his hormones will be insane and making him out of his mind and less likely to talk to you about it. At least now you can help him through it.

The soft side of me says not to let him do it because we all want to avoid pain for our loved ones.

 

itsmegin

That is a tough one. First, disclaimer is that all of what I say is what I plan and hope I will do, and I acknowledge that each child and situation is different, and all of what I say may change when I actually have children. 

I don't think I would let my son dress as a girl, fairy or not. I don't have a problem with homosexuality, or adults choosing to dress or live as the opposite gender, if my adult child decided to live as the opposite sex I would embrace and love them.

But, I think children don't always know what they want, who they are, or who they should be and dressing in an extremely socially unacceptable way is a behavior that you can teach and have the right to enforce in your own home, and in my home, children will dress gender and age appropriately. Just as I wouldn't let a 15 year old girl dress in revealing clothes, but once she is an adult I wouldn't say anything, I would ask my son to choose a gender appropriate costume and clothing until he moved out and was on his own supporting himself and adult enough to be sure he wanted to live and/or dress as a woman.

God I hope I never have to decide this. That's a tough one! And in this case it definitely sounds like the mom is pushing it to win against her husband. The boy would have probably dropped it if she hadn't gotten so angry about the husband not wanting him to do it. 

Karen1998

Yep.  But first I'd sit down with him and make sure that's really what he wants and he understands why some might find it odd.

Rawr08

I strongly believe a child should be given the chance to be who they are.  I would have no problem with my son dressing up in a girl costume.  Now, DH on the other hand would have a fit I'm sure.  He has the mind set "It's ok for girls to want to be boys, but not ok for boys to want to be girls."

VeilSdeGTO

I would let my son dress up as a fairy. DH said that he would try and come up with different (not necessarily "boy" costume suggestions), but if that is what our son really wanted, he would be fine with it.

I know of at least a half dozen of our "cooler" middle school boys that will be dressing up as girls this Halloween. They are just that comfortable with it (and yes, a little is for the laugh factor) and they actually understand that it doesn't really mean anything about their sexuality, just that it's Halloween.

Jessicaanne_1@yahoo.com

Well I think giving your child "leverage" against his dad it dumb. My DH and I don't always agree about parenting decisions, but our kids don't know that. Also I think its really trashy to put all business on FB.

That being said. He is 4, dressing like Tinkerbell is not going to make him gay or feminine . The same way my daughter playing trucks is not going to make her gay or masculine.  If he wanted to play dress up at home I would not care. I let my nephew run around my house in fairy wings and princess crowns. In an effort to spare my (imaginary) son ridicule, I am going to say no, I would not let him dress up for Halloween as Tinkerbell. 

b2b999

Honestly, if it was something he really wanted to do (and not just something he mentioned in passing) I would say yes. He is 4 so it is really only for TOT and not like he will be wearing it all day in school or even would be in school the next day to be teased by other kids. 

I do agree, however, that I would not make it a power struggle between myself and DH. If DH was opposed to the idea then he and I would discuss that in private (away from little ears) and present a joint decision to our child.

However, I must say that this is all hypothetical as I do not have a child to dress up one way or the other.  

ZZsmommy

I would probably try to prod my child towards a more masculine character from the same movie - 'I know you love Tinkerbell - how about you go as Peter Pan?  We can put Tinkerbell on your shoulder!"  But, if my son were TOTALLY in love with the idea of being Tinkerbell, and it was not just a passing whim, then, yes, I would let him be Tinkerbell.   Your power over their choices and desires ends early on - this year, my son's 3rd Halloween, I had his costume all picked out - and then, he told me he wanted to be Elmo, and no amount of trying to persuade him to my side of things worked - he is going to be Elmo.  If he wanted to be Dora, I would have also tried to persuade him differently, but, if in the end he stuck with his idea and did not waver, I would be parading around to our neighbors' houses with the boy in the Dora costume. 

I think a lot depends on the child and how much the child wants to be his own free-thinking individual.  My kid is quite free thinking.  My nephew (who is going to be The Riddler) is as well - there was NO convincing him that he could not be the Riddler because we couldnt find a costume - Nope, he was going to be the Riddler, and that was the end of the story!)

Your friend's story sounds like a battle of wills between mom and dad - and not so much about their son.  Of course, I don't know - maybe he is a strong willed kid and mom is just trying to get dad to see that it is healthy for a kid to be comfortable in his own skin.  Somehow though, I doubt it.  Personally, I also would NOT be telling everyone on Facebook that my liltte BOY wants to be Tinkerbell -- I may let him dress as Tinkerbell, but I wouldn't broadcast it.  Just because I am forward thinking enough to let my son dress like a girl doesn't mean I want everyone else out there to know about it and use it to ridicule him in the future....

 

MrsGo4Hockeychick

absolutely. but I'd also allow my son to wear pink, purple, dresses, skirts and to play with dolls if he wanted. 

 

I'm not real big on traditional gender roles and stereotyping.  

damabo80

around the house, sure.

But out in public, until he can anticipate and deal with the ramifications of going against societal norms, then no.

I think around age 12-14 is when kids are prepared to think "if I wear this, my classmates/peers/society will react to me this way, and I am prepared to deal with it". So if he still wants to wear a fairy costumer at that age, then sure. He can rock with with my approval.

EmeraldEyedLady

I wouldn't, not at age 4.  Maybe 14 or 15 or older, when he's old enough to understand any social issues he may come up against he can wear whatever he wants as a Halloween costume, but at age 4 I don't think that a kid would realize that he could be teased for it, he just thinks it's pretty and likes it.