A great way to be a shitty parent.

Read this, if you haven't already: http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/06/07/sissy.boy.experiment/index.html

If it's too much to read, the synopsis is that these parents put their effeminate 5 year old son through "therapy" to "cure" him.

At 38, he took his own life.

I have had so many reactions to this that I can barely sit still. In fact, I'm 4 sentences in, as you can see, and I've already paced around my apartment several times, returning to the computer to try and make sense of it all.

First, I'm over the moon with joy that my parents didn't (and hopefully had they had the chance wouldn't have) put me through such a bizarre attempt at conditioning.

Next, I'm seeing the very obvious end to the "nature vs nurture" argument about homosexuality. This kid obviously didn't decide he was gay, or have effeminate tendencies, they were just there. The problem with nature vs nurture, is that they shouldn't be at opposition, they should be cooperative. As a parent, you are to nurture whatever it is you created via nature.

Then I'm angry for more reasons than I've counted or organized in my head.

The mom, who volunteered her kid for this based on some ad on TV, shouldn't have been a parent. If you think your kid is damaged because he'd rather wear a wig than play with a pretend razor, you are the problem; not your kid. To allow a system of reward vs violence based on that criteria makes you a sadist. Enrolling your other "normal" children in the system to make the "sick" child feel the reward vs violence system is ok, is abuse. The father who routinely beat his kids every Friday for years after the "therapy" concluded is just as culpable.

The long term trauma suffered by this child extended to spending his youth feeling ostracized, frightened and alone. He spent 3 years in high school eating lunch on the toilet to avoid interaction. His siblings have also been hurt by this, recalling that their brother lied to the researchers because he was "conditioned to say what they wanted to hear." After being beaten constantly when being myself, I'd do my damnedest to be someone else too.

The parents of this kid wanted to raise a "normal" well-adjusted child. They believed that this "treatment" would be to the benefit of all. I'd like to think that if they thought the "therapy" would cause the eventual suicide of their kid, that they'd not have gone through with it. They now blame the researcher that conducted the study/therapy for the death of their son.

The researcher in this case, went on to a successful 30+ years of being a champion of "fixing gay" and lobbying against LGBT rights based on his research, lending his scientific credibility to religious lobby groups and founding the Family Research Council (a faith-based lobby group).

So many people I know are parents. I hope all of you read this. Wake up. If your kid is displaying behaviour that you don't agree with, think about what they're doing: Are they hurting anyone? Are they trying to understand the world? Are they learning from what they're doing? Are they being self destructive? Ask yourself why you disagree with their behaviour. Why are you bothered that your daughter is playing with trucks or into playing hockey? Why are you bothered that your son has created a planet full of unicorns or rocks out to Shania in your heels? Ask yourself if you're projecting your own conditioning onto your kid. Your job as a parent is to raise a good person. Teach your kids right from wrong. Teach them to do right by people. Be there for them when they fuck up. Make them understand that doing the right thing is the most important thing, even when it sucks. Your job isn't to hold your kids to ideals, or force them down a specific path, or to ensure they marry the person of your choosing.

Never forget that when you're raising a kid, that while you want nothing but the best for them, you need to respect what they want. You are raising a person. While they may look like tiny versions of you, they're in fact individuals with their own needs and desires. You can learn from them as much as you'll teach them. Be ok with what your kid wants, and be happy when they live the life you made for them.