Hanover and I both answered that. The answer is that you don't. You leave each person to their own devices in deciding how to live their own lives. I thought a "liberal" would understand that. Human beings are already stressed by being in an environment that we aren't adapted for. This high-tech, cramped, fat and sugar-loaded environment isn't what we naturally evolved to live in. The environment has changed faster than our genetic adaptations can keep up. If you really want to get at the negative effects of culture on our natural conditioning, then overpopulation and the kinds of foods we eat are probably a much bigger problem than how we treat women vs men. The distinction between how the sexes are treated has existed since life split into two sexes and is as natural as every other behavior that defines the nature of that species. Not only that, but I pointed out that treating people differently doesn't necessarily entail treating them unequally.

The rest isn't a rant at all. It's pointing out the inconsistency of the "progressives" in their arguments for gender neutrality and their arguments for transgenderism. Again, what many call "liberals" and "progressives" aren't liberal or progressive at all. They are authoritarian socialists. Like you and un, they want to push a certain way of living on others.

but are all gender-based roles irrational stereotypes? I don't think so. What does psychology, if it's the basis for the movement, have to say about it? Isn't it psychology and neuroscience that showed us men and women brains operate differently. — TheMadFool

The first thing neuroscience shows is neuroplasticity. London cabbies have to learn the knowledge and it changes their brains. Which is what one might have expected really, and means that brain studies cannot distinguish innate from learned roles so easily. There is a ton and a half of social psychology studies on this, but for the purposes of this thread, one can simply assume that if mens' and womens' brains operate differently, then treating them the same in childhood will not affect that because that is what it means for a difference to be innate rather than culturally induced.

The stereotypes are self-sustaining myth. People make the mistake of confusing their preferences for a notion/rule of where they belong. They walk away under the illusion to be of a preference means they must of a gender prescribed in a stereotype.

In the process, it forms an illusion that someone's preferences are being attack. Much as we've seen in this thread, where gender neutrality is mistaken for some notion of everyone being genderless and not having any sort of individual preference. — TheWillowOfDarkness

(my bold)

What I am wanting to contrast here is the American culture that seems to be highly gendered and gender prescriptive, and adversarial, with the playing down of gender differences in Sweden. It seems to me that the whole tone of the debate in the US is overheated and ideological, and is putting great pressure on folks to conform or else to rebel to an extreme. But what seems to happen is that even the idea of reducing the conflict and relaxing the rigidity of the stereotypes is taken as a threat to gender and part of a campaign to emasculate and defemminise.

Among western countries, the United States is most likely to believe that transgender people have a mental illness (32%) and the most likely out of all countries surveyed to believe that transgendered people are committing a sin (32%). Americans are the most likely to say that society has gone too far in allowing people to dress and live as one sex even though they were born another (36%),

. https://www.ipsos.com/en/node/392831

These are amongst the people, (and gays used to be, but have carved something of a niche for themselves) who suffer from the contradiction between what they are, and what what they are is supposed to be. They suffer both from the internal conflict of identity and the often physical persecution of a rigidly coercive society.

I am a man. Therefore however I behave is manly behaviour.

Men behave thus and so. Therefore anyone who does not behave thus and so is not a proper man.
Therefore I am not a proper man, therefore I have the wrong body.

https://eu.usatoday.com/story/news/2018/06/20/transgender-not-mental-illness-world-health-organization/717758002/

This is a misrepresentation of the debate we're having. Education is ideological one way or the other. Separating boys and girls is as ideological as mixing them; gender non-neutral schools are as ideological as gender-neutral schools. Getting kids to sing the national anthem at school is enforcing an ideology. Banning it in every school would be enforcing a different one. If your contention is that the prevailing ideology is not an ideology because you're blind to it then you're a classic victim of ideology. So, the debate we're having is about education policy, which changes all the time, and characterizing it as a novel attempt to put the government in charge of ideology and morality is just an attempt to wiggle out of the responsibility to actually think about the issues at hand. — Baden

Well, let's properly represent things. The grand Swedish experiment appears to be limited to a handful of pre-school schools comprised of 1 to 2 year olds where the teachers let boys dance and play with dolls and girls were encouraged to yell "NO!" and be boisterous. It also looks really cold there. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/24/world/europe/sweden-gender-neutral-preschools.html.

I find it very hard to believe those schools had any lasting impression on the kids, but I'd assume the parents who choose to send their kids to such schools did. If the Baden kids went to school in rural Mississippi, despite however backwards their views might be, I'd suspect they'd come out sounding a whole lot like papa Baden, largely because years of attempted indoctrination through the schools can be unraveled with a single well timed eye roll from dad.

In terms of what gender enforcement is occurring in our schools today, it certainly isn't through a formalized effort. I'm sure the schools are reflective of society in general and there's de facto gender role enforcement, but I can't recall a class where the teachers taught boys how to be proper boys and girls proper girls. Had a girl wished to take wood shop in highschool, she could have. We had one such pioneer in my woodshop class.

So what exactly do you propose we change here? Are you proposing some formalized indoctrination class?

And, for the record, American students don't sing the national anthem each morning. They say the Pledge of Allegiance. I suppose that is indoctrination, enforcing the controversial idea that Americans be American.

That sounds good to me. But is it not also possible to discuss together why you each think your way is the best? — unenlightened

I suppose if the topic came up, as it did here, in a generally open discussion format, there would be value to such discussion. I'm not sure how the subject is broached among neighbors about what might be the best way to raise one another's respective children. I also don't think the topic would generally arise in a benign educational context, but it would arise by those who wished to alter public policy.

Well public education has to lean one way or another. It cannot be trying to be gender neutral and support gender stereotypes, and my guess is that you want it to go on with the way it is, which is enforcing government ideology, more or less by definition. If I was playing hard ball, I would suggest that gender neutrality as described is rather refraining from imposing an ideology of what character is appropriate to each sex. — unenlightened

What are the schools doing now to enforce gender roles? I see it in sports for obvious reasons, but within the educational environment, where do you see it? I also don't concede the point of necessary bias, as in the schools must either be enforcing gender neutrality or gender role play. They could accept a neutral role (the very topic of this discussion is neutrality after all), meaning they don't care what the kids do. The question of how boys ought to be is just not something the schools even need to address.

So, the debate we're having is about education policy, which changes all the time, and characterizing it as a novel attempt to put the government in charge of ideology and morality is just an attempt to wiggle out of the responsibility to actually think about the issues at hand. — Baden

No, here's what actually happens. The schools stop teaching the basic nuts and bolts about the world and decide their role is social engineering. This results in the election of officials who decide to either teach us the world were created in 6 glorious days and then others who wish to teach us that boys and girls are all the same but for a few anatomical variations. That then results in explosions of home schooling, church based schools, tuition vouchers, and school choice allowances so that society can further segregate. What you get when you enforce these ideas isn't harmony, but just reassurance by the right that the left has gone off the deep end and reassurance by the left that the right is committed to living in the dark ages. Then you get Trump. Congratulations. Trump is your fault, not mine. You made me vote for him.

What are the schools doing now to enforce gender roles? — Hanover

I don't know. Do they have different uniform requirements, maybe? But roles can be supported without being enforced, by simply treating the genders differently.

The schools stop teaching the basic nuts and bolts about the world and decide their role is social engineering. — Hanover

That is ridiculously naive. Education has always been about social engineering, you are simply using it as a negative because it might engineer change. What do you think nuts and bolts are used for?

I don't know. Do they have different uniform requirements, maybe? But roles can be supported without being enforced, by simply treating the genders differently. — unenlightened

Most private schools wear uniforms, but few public school do (and I have been previously informed that public and private are used in the reverse in the UK than in the US. Public means government run in the US). I'd think though that a boy could wear a skirt in today's climate.

But I do think we need to figure out specifically what we're asking be changed, else we really don't know what we're arguing about. I

That is ridiculously naive. Education has always been about social engineering, you are simply using it as a negative because it might engineer change. What do you think nuts and bolts are used for? — unenlightened

I'm referencing the misuse of schools to teach a particular ideology. How does teaching math, for example, do that?

What I am wanting to contrast here is the American culture that seems to be highly gendered and gender prescriptive, and adversarial, with the playing down of gender differences in Sweden. It seems to me that the whole tone of the debate in the US is overheated and ideological, and is putting great pressure on folks to conform or else to rebel to an extreme. — unenlightened

You need some perspective. If American culture is highly gendered and adversarial and the debate is overheated and ideological, then what would you call what would happen if you suggested Iran change their culture? There are far worse extremes in the treatment of women vs men in other cultures - differences that I would call unequal. American culture is one of the most open cultures on the planet. You seem to think that any questioning of your ideas is overheated and ideological (and silly).

I'm referencing the misuse of schools to teach a particular ideology. How does teaching math, for example, do that? — Hanover

by simply treating the genders differently. — unenlightened

... in a myriad of small ways, ignoring, ridiculing, one sex, and encouraging the other. By simply assuming that girls aren't usually as good at maths, or that they're not as interested, or that they won't need it, by not challenging such expressions when they are expressed by pupils. Again, one does not put the dominant ideology on the curriculum because it pervades the ethos of the school. One does not teach gender stereotypes because they pervade everything one teaches. Your maths question is silly, and I have given it far more notice than it deserves.

I'm not saying that gender neutral schools are a bad thing. I'm saying that it shouldn't be pushed into all schools, just as I think a certain religious philosophy shouldn't be pushed in all schools. There should be options. That is why these new magnet and charter schools are a good thing. Privatization of the educational system with a common standard of expectation in math and English would open up a whole new world for Americans in how we educate our kids. More options are good. One way is not the best way for all.

Should we abolish one-gender schools? Or should that remain an option?

.. in a myriad of small ways, ignoring, ridiculing, one sex, and encouraging the other. By simply assuming that girls aren't usually as good at maths, or that they're not as interested, or that they won't need it, by not challenging such expressions when they are expressed by pupils. Again, one does not put the dominant ideology on the curriculum because it pervades the ethos of the school. One does not teach gender stereotypes because they pervade everything one teaches. Your maths question is silly, and I have given it far more notice than it deserves. — unenlightened

Many of these behaviors are instilled in people before they get to grade school. It starts in the home. Your first few years of life are where you adopt your norms for the rest of your life.

We currently have a common expectation of math skills for boys and girls. There is no difference in grading for boys and girls. I don't know what you're talking about. My daughter doesn't get graded nor do I expect less of her than from my boys in math.

in a myriad of small ways, ignoring, ridiculing, one sex, and encouraging the other. By simply assuming that girls aren't usually as good at maths, or that they're not as interested, or that they won't need it, by not challenging such expressions when they are expressed by pupils. Again, one does not put the dominant ideology on the curriculum because it pervades the ethos of the school. One does not teach gender stereotypes because they pervade everything one teaches. Your maths question is silly, and I have given it far more notice than it deserves. — unenlightened

This is uncontroversial. No one is supportive of ignoring, ridiculing, and discouraging anyone, and no school I know of believes girls should be excluded from math class. So what is it that we're disagreeing about? I was assuming there'd be some rule in some administrative handbook that would be changed after we instituted our gender neutrality polices, but it doesn't sound like there is one.

To the extent that girls are being treated like second rate citizens, I'm as concerned as anyone. I just don't know what real life rule will be affected by this.

Your maths question is silly, and I have given it far more notice than it deserves. — unenlightened

If you say so. My objection remains though, and I don't see how we'll change the math curriculum in a gender neutral society, not do I see how adding and subtracting numbers enforces gender bias. I get how excluding girls from such enterprises would, but I am opposed to such things.

I don't see how we'll change the math curriculum in a gender neutral society — Hanover

Nor does anyone else in the whole wide world. That's why it's so silly.

The schools stop teaching the basic nuts and bolts about the world and decide their role is social engineering. — Hanover

What un said, plus: About the first thing that's done when designing a curriculum is that the underlying ideological basis is decided on. You will be pained to know, I'm sure, that these days that is usually some form of liberal humanism (which is why teachers are not supposed to hit your kids, scream at them or force boring rote-learned work down their throats). And that ideological basis has developed over the years, which is largely why education now in the West is, thankfully, very different from what it was a hundred years ago. So, the social engineering is happening all the time; it's called education policy. And it's never just about neutrally teaching nuts and bolts. There is no perfect neutral standpoint. So, obviously ideological forces fade into the background when you take them for granted, but we're always immersed in them regardless.

I'm not saying that gender-neutral schools are a bad thing. I'm saying that it shouldn't be pushed into all schools, just as I think a certain religious philosophy shouldn't be pushed in all schools. — Harry Hindu

So, who is your foil here? Who is saying that gender-neutral schools are necessarily and unqualifiedly a good thing? What your interlocutors are attempting is more like exploring the grounds on which the subject could be meaningfully debated. What we're getting back in return is an attempt to shut things down on the basis of buzzwords like "authoritarian socialism" etc. So, maybe they represent progress. Maybe not. Shouldn't we explore how we would find the answer to that question?

Then you get Trump. Congratulations. Trump is your fault, not mine. You made me vote for him. — Hanover

That was supposed to be reverse psychology, dummy.

So, who is your foil here? Who is saying that gender-neutral schools are necessarily and unqualifiedly a good thing? What your interlocutors are attempting is more like exploring the grounds on which the subject could be meaningfully debated. What we're getting back in return is an attempt to shut things down on the basis of buzzwords like "authoritarian socialism" etc. So, maybe they represent progress. Maybe not. Shouldn't we explore how we would find the answer to that question? — Baden

That is what the free market system is for. Make it an option for parents to try or not. It shouldn't be a requirement or even experimented with in the public school system.

What I don't get is how we would apply this gender-neutral idea to all these new "genders" that have cropped up. If we are to use gender-neutral pronouns then why were all of these other "gender" names invented as if we are suppose to recognize all these new "genders". What exactly is it that we are suppose to recognize if not the physical differences between males and females?

Speaking of shutting down meaningful debate - whenever the left's definition of "gender" is questioned, what we get back is an attempt to shut things down on the basis of buzzwords like "hater", or "bigot", or "prejudiced". The fact is that this very debate the OP is based on is questionable - namely your definition of "gender".

What un said, plus — Baden

What I said.

About the first thing that's done when designing a curriculum is that the underlying ideological basis is decided on. You will be pained to know, I'm sure, that these days that is usually some form of liberal humanism (which is why teachers are not supposed to hit your kids, scream at them or force boring rote-learned work down their throats). — Baden

This isn't what I'm referring to. If screaming at kids and using rote learning worked, I'd be in favor of it. When my son was young, I would slap his head as he did his math homework, explaining that if he could work under such conditions, real life would be a breeze. I'll have you know, he's a straight A physics major right now. My results have even been published. I mean I'm right now publishing them here, so I think that counts.

What I'm referring to is having teachers teach a political ideology like it's fact. A teacher can teach socialism, but not that socialism is good. Once she does that, kids start getting taught at home that their teachers are idiots. This assumes every home is like mine, and that seems a safe assumption.

There are some issues that I thought that a gender-neutral school might encounter. For instance, how do they handle the bathroom situation? If the bathrooms are segregated, then is it still called a gender-neutral school?

What if Johnny tells his teacher that he feels like a girl and then puts on "girl" clothes? Does the teacher tell Johnny, "No, Johnny you don't have to be a girl to wear those clothes. Girls and boys can wear any clothes. You are not a girl. You are a male that can wear whatever clothes he likes." Is that appropriate response? Or do we tell "her" that you don't have to wear those clothes to feel like a girl, you can still wear those clothes you have on and be a "girl". What would be the appropriate response in a gender-neutral environment? Surely, pointing out the fact that someone is a male or female isn't the same as treating them differently because of that fact. How I treat someone is separate from what they are, or else what are we discussing if not one's identity as opposed to how they are treated as a result of what they are?

If we treat people the same, then we erase their individual identities. Treating people differently is what gives them their individual identity, right un?

Nor does anyone else in the whole wide world. That's why it's so silly. — unenlightened

Alright, so we leave math alone in a gender neutral society. The only thing I've seen that's in need of change is how we are to let our kids play in preschool when they are 1 and 2 years old. Most 1 and 2 year olds are pretty limited in their conversations and understandings of things, and many haven't yet mastered such skills as walking and not spitting out their Cheerio's, let alone understanding the differences among the genders.

The only thing I've seen that's in need of change is how we are to let our kids play in preschool when they are 1 and 2 years old. — Hanover

I didn't see that bit where someone, anyone at all, said gender neutrality only applies to preschool. Remind me.

An anecdote. When my family visited Portland, Oregon some time ago, we encountered a 6 foot tall guy walking his dog, wearing a skirt and a bikini top walking down the street. My youngest son said, "Dad, did that guy lose a bet?" Seeing it as a teachable moment, I explained to him, "Son, you're a long way from home." Then we got some ice cream.

I didn't see that bit where someone, anyone at all, said gender neutrality only applies to preschool. Remind me. — unenlightened

The Swedish study as described in the NY Times article I cited above seemed to relate to 1 and 2 year olds. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/24/world/europe/sweden-gender-neutral-preschools.html.

What I'm referring to is having teachers teach a political ideology like it's fact. A teacher can teach socialism, but not that socialism is good. — Hanover

? Who's suggesting putting socialism in the junior school curriculum?

The Swedish study as described in the NY Times article I cited above seemed to relate to 1 and 2 year olds. — Hanover

Right, I see, so you thought this conversation was about teaching Karl Marx to toddlers.

Right, I see, so you thought this conversation was about teaching Karl Marx to toddlers. — Baden

His link said nothing about Karl Marx. I think you and un, are the extremists here. When you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.

When did you expect to teach gender-neutrality to a person - when they are old and grey - when they are already set in their ways? At what point in a person's development were you implying that we teach gender-neutrality? Where in these Swedish studies do they ever mention what they do with the bathroom situation in a "gender"-neutral school?

The paper says that the teacher doesn't refer to the children as "boys" and "girls", rather as "friends". Is that what the sign says on the bathroom door - "Friends"?

One might say that I'm confusing sex with gender. I say that I'm not. That would have to be settled before we could even begin to debate the topic in the OP. The fact is that, like the idea of "god", "gender" hasn't been defined as anything meaningful or coherent, other than being a synonym for "sex".

Yes, amazingly, an article about preschool focuses on preschool, although it does talk about 4 & 5 year olds not just I & 2. And there is a suggestion that this is an important age, and horrifyingly points out the they actively seek to undo some of the stereotypes that the kids have already absorbed.

But there is no suggestion at all that this is anything separate from or antithetical to general education and general social policy in the country.

Nobody is suggesting teaching socialism the subject as Hanover implied. And we can't even get started on the debate as to whether gender neutrality should be applied (rather than taught as a subject) because you two refuse even to consider how we can determine under what circumstances any change in the treatment of gender might be countenanced in education. You instead presume that un and I are all for it by default because "authoritarian socialism" or whatever. And when it's pointed out that your presumption is wrong and you're not reading properly, you double down. So, let's just leave it at that.

Nobody is suggesting teaching socialism the subject as Hanover implied. — Baden

Read it again. That was just an example he gave as to how we should handle teaching gender-neutrality to children. The fact of it's existence should be discussed and mentioned, but placing value judgements on political ideologies (gender-neutrality is part of a political ideology) is not what teachers should be doing, and I've already mentioned several times that your presumption of "gender" is wrong - which is why we have nonsensical discussions like this.

And we have considered it. We (or at least I) said that it can be experimented with in a private institution, not in the public schools. Because you aren't happy with that is what makes me think that you want more - that you want everyone to live the way you think is "right".