Today, I was watching the lifetime dating show called Gay, Straight or Taken. The premise is that a female contestant goes on a date with three men--one is gay, one is straight,one is taken. She MUST pick the straight guy in order to go on a dream vacation with the straight guy. If she incorrectly picks the gay or taken one then that guy gets to go on a dream vacation with his significant other.
The Princess was happily coloring away until the very end. One of the men announces that male contestant XY is gay. The woman says to the gay man..."You're gay? I can't believe you're gay!?!?" The Princess then turns to me and says:
"He's gay? Why? Why is he gay?"
I so, did not want to have THAT conversation. I mean, she's three! She doesn't even understand the boyfriend concept. Of course I responded the way any wuss parent would respond:
"He just is. Let's turn off the TV and sing our ABCs."
3 comments:
Oh, no! That's such a touchy subject with kids. We've had gay friends, so we try to leave the impression that people are who they are, but they are older. Their cousins use "gay" as meaning "bad" basically, they say "You're gay!" "That's gay!" it really bothers me. I told my MIL and her boyfriend that I didn't want them teaching the kids that kind of intolerance - if for no other reason than it could get them kicked out of daycare. The visit got weird after that. Yesterday, Sunshine said something was gay. I was pissed
My daughter loves to watch My Name is Earl with me. Every night she'll ask me "is Earl on tonight?!" She never fails to pick up on the stuff I don't want her to...sigh...
As for the gay issue-- I try to explain things as honestly as possible to her. I've told her that sometimes girls have girlfriends and boys have boyfriends. She has played with Barbies and had the 2 women be married to each other - I'm perfectly fine with that - even proud that she doesn't see anything wrong with it.
I try to be as honest as possible with my kids yet explain things in a way they will understand. You simply could have said it's when two mommies or two daddies love each other a lot (lest she think that ANY two women or two men who love each other are gay). Did that make sense? My daughter asked me that question when she was six and I told her it's when two women or two men love each other so much they want to be together like a man and a woman who are married. We have a lesbian couple across the street, so it helped that she could see an example on a daily basis.
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