Parents In Florida Decided To Raise A Gender Neutral "Theyby"

Sep 19, 2019 by apost team

A Florida couple is making headlines after announcing that they will raise their baby gender-neutral. They are also referring to the child as “theyby.”

If you look at any toy aisle in a store, you will see that there are still many examples of gender norms surrounding us. Some people are trying to combat these norms. Ari Dennis is one of those people. Ari decided to leave the space on the birth certificate “unknown” after having her baby, according to WTSP, a local news station.

Sparrow is the child in this story, who will be allowed to choose what identity they wish to be when they are old enough. Sparrow has an older sibling named Hazel, who is 7 years old. While Hazel was not raised as a “theyby,” she says that she is a “demigirl.” This means she identifies as part girl.

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Hazel does want everyone to use more neutral pronouns when it comes to her gender, such as "they" and "them". Hazel told the news that her classmates do get confused at times, but that they are usually pretty respectful of her choice. She said that while they usually do say "she" and "her" in regards to her gender, they are not doing it to be mean.

There is currently a closed Facebook group called “Parenting Theybies” with 430 members at the time of this publication. It is a group that is dedicated to raising their children in the same manner as Ari. Many of the group members are interested in raising their children to be genderless. They do not wish to force any type of gender on their children.

Of course, Ari has been on the end of a lot of criticism regarding her choice to raise Sparrow genderless. Many people worry that Sparrow will grow up and be confused about who they are. But Ari believes that the baby will know who they are when the time comes. She believes that her child will be able to make that choice much easier than many people believe.

"There's no way this can go wrong," Ari told WTSP. "People will be like 'Oh the child will be confused!' No. If gender is something in you, no one's going to change that."

While raising a baby to choose their own gender is still not the norm, more and more parents are considering making this choice when they have their own children. It is a trend we may be seeing more of soon. You can learn more from the video below:

What do you think of her choice? We welcome your comments and would love to see what your friends think about it as well! Please pass this along when you are through! We think this is a discussion worth having.