As promised, here is another in my series of quotes from Who’s Your Daddy? And Other Writings on Queer Parenting. I’ll be running them for a couple of weeks courtesy of the book’s editor, Rachel Epstein. I’m choosing the quotes I feel are most intriguing and thought provoking; I don’t always agree with the sentiments, but I hope they will spur some discussion in the comments and encourage you to seek out the book for yourselves.
For more on how to get this Canadian-published volume (and you should!), see my original post about it.
Today’s quote is from Laurie Bell, whose essay “Who’s Your Daddy? Reflections on Masculinity in Butch-Parented Sons” inspired the title for the volume:
It is chief among our responsibilities as lesbian parents to protect our sons from the lingering suggestions that he needs an actual man to show him how to be a real man.
The relationships my son has with the males in his life are influential, beneficial, and cherished, as relationships should be. He has always lived with the company of men and other boys who are an integral part of his family life and social relations. Yet, when lesbian parents are raising a male child, we assume the position of responsibility to nurture the child’s gender as an organic feature of his childhood development. We cannot be expected to outsource his gender formation. . . . In asserting that no particular male figure is necessary for our sons, we are disrupting the assumption that men are the only, or always the best, people to promote masculine identities and sensibilities for boys.