LurcioAgain Mon 21-Jul-14 16:56:19

LRD - can I nominate your "Freudian outakes" image for post of the week!



Ender - for me the problem with your approach is that it heads perilously into the territory of gender essentialism. I'd far sooner say (and in fact do say) to my DS "there are some very silly people who think some toys or activities are only for boys and some are only for girls - but they're wrong - it is perfectly okay for you to like football and playing with your dollshouse, and for (female-friend's-name) to like dresses and climbing trees."



Otherwise you get to the ridiculous conclusion that because I'm good at maths and map reading, and like playing football and rock climbing, but also wear high heels occasionally, like dresses, can sew and cook, this means I must be intersex. It doesn't. I'm simply an individual member of the human race (who is biologically female) who happens to have a wide and eclectic range of interests.



Penny - your daughter is probably not unlike me at that age. I think if 70s feminists could have political lesbianism, what I went through was a phase of political transexualism. It's not that I wanted to be a boy, simply that they had all the cool stuff (train sets, cricket instead of rounders, woodwork instead of needlework at school) and I thought passing as a boy would help me to gain access to this cool stuff. I think your "There are women footballers" line was perfect - read up on Rachel Yankee, most capped England player ever, with her - I think she'd find her fascinating (not least because at one stage as a child Yankee did pretend to be a boy so she could join a local boys' team).