I'm sorry that an 8-year-old has gender-identity issues--although somehow I doubt that's indeed what this is.

But to make that everyone else's problem,at taxpayer expense, verges on criminal.

Besides, this kid is now absolutely destined to get a pounding out in the schoolyard!

Someone's parents are a great big bucket of fail.

I'm torn here. On the one hand, I certainly believe that transsexualism or transgenderism is real, and my contact with Zoe Brain has cemented that belief. I am also pleased that a school is being tolerant in a good way (rather than requiring all female students to wear abayas and headscarves). However, I'm a bit bothered that there is so much focus on it. Rather than letting her simply come to school and continue on (albeit as a different sex), they are forcing counseling all the other students.

The best I can do is offer an example. My father died of cancer when I was 12, and in sixth grade. This happened partway into the winter trimester, and my teacher decided to instruct my classmates on the appropriate reaction to my return after having been out for a week. Instead of allowing me to return with little fanfare, she insisted on holding a class meeting the Friday before my return to tell the other students what exactly had happened and what I would be feeling.

I left the class being an outcast and a geek, and I came back being an outcast and a geek to be pitied. Singling out a student, especially after a life-changing event, serves no one except maybe the adults who feel they are doing the children some good.

(by the way, the form won't let me post with my newest blog URL - I know it's an evil domain, but still, not everything on b***s**** is bad. I'm in exile, after all.)

While that's a compelling story of what to not do to a child who's suffered a tragedy, unless I'm missing something here, that's not what's happened. What we've got here is someone who's decided, for whatever reason, that he wants to dress like a girl. Based on what I know, gender identities are in a proto-stage at this point and this could be nothing more than a phase or some sort of rebellious behavior. To force the rest of the school to deal with the behavior is, as Mark put it, bordering on a level of nonsense that somewhat boggles the mind.

My problem is the age. At 8, in my opinion, school is about basic skills and learning. Gender identity and issues should be discussed, but at a much later age when everyone is having them. Plus there's the whole "look! look! someone's being different!" stigma you mention.

Blogspot has been removed from the ban list, at least for now. :)

Ron and Scott, I certainly understand what you're saying, but think about it. When you first had the thought "I'm a boy," how old were you?

Gender dysphoria isn't someone just saying one day, "gee, I'd like to be a girl now." It's a medical problem (not just psychological), within the spectrum of Intersex disorders, that sufferers realize fairly early. There are case studies that talk about how devastated some people were when they found out that their bodies weren't going to change to the opposite sex when they went through puberty. Every transsexual I've known (and I've been a bartender in Manhattan for a few years, so I've known a fair number), both pre- and post-op, have had the same story: "I knew something was wrong, that I wasn't born with the right body."

If this was just a case of a boy wanting to dress like a girl, rather than wanting to be a girl, then he's still a boy and should be treated as such, but wearing girls' clothing. The fact that they're putting so much effort in tells me that there's something more going on here, possibly more than they're telling us due to privacy reasons.

"The fact that they're putting so much effort in tells me that there's something more going on here, possibly more than they're telling us due to privacy reasons."

People have put a lot of effort into con games before, too. To me, all the demands to protect a child who hasn't even suffered any discrimination (yet) reeks of the same "look at me! LOOK ONLY AT ME!!!" mindset that Munchausen Syndrome By Proxy sufferers have.

Kat - arguably the workings of the brain are damned complex. However, I'm not quite sure that it's a cut and dry. I'm also not sure that trying to demonstrate that the effort being put in to this proves that it's an actual medical case and not some kid just being silly.

Another worry is what's next? What other accomodations are we, as a public, going to be forced to bear - financially and otherwise?

As for your "when" question - I honestly don't remember that far back, at least not on something like that.