‘An X in your passport at birth. That seems like the solution to me

Patricia van Liemt is a radio host, writer and mother of Maria (12) and Phaedra (9). Every Friday she writes accurate, honest, funny and above all recognizable columns about her life and motherhood.

An X in your passport at birth. That seems like the solution to me

Just being born as a person. And then, as your life progresses, decide for yourself which gender you want to join. Or not, then you stay nice X.

Big party

When I posted this statement to my Instagram, a friend responded, “But I loved telling you if it was a boy or a girl!”

Well, I’m sorry you can’t throw a gender reveal party anymore. But surely we can all come up with something else fun, right?

For example, a cake that says that your baby is healthy. That seems like a much bigger party to me. A 20-week moment with confetti bombs, a crying in-laws and dancing rainbow alpacas.

Also read – All about sexual orientation, LGBTIQA+ and gender: what’s the difference? >

X in your passport

Okay, okay, I’m kind of poking fun at it. I know. But I was angry this morning. Angry on the radio and so I was yelling out loud at my dashboard that I didn’t agree.

Any explanation.

At the time I am writing this column, Member of the House of Representatives Lisa van Ginneken of D66 is making a case for the fact that you can change your gender to an X in your passport at the age of sixteen. A journalist then said that it might be a bit young to determine whether you feel like a man or a woman or neither.

imposed box

So then my clog broke.

yo-hoo. Now society determines at birth whether you are a boy or a girl. If you think about it a little longer, it’s actually a very horribly imposed box. Purely because everyone, including your own father and mother or father and father or mother and mother – you get it – treat you that way too. They will put you in a pink or blue box. And that blue box still has more advantages than the pink one. In the Netherlands too.

So I argue for an X in the passport at birth. So that everyone can use their full human potential.

Amen.

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