Storm Brews Around No Gender Child
The decision of Kathy Witterick, 38, and David Stocker, 39, to raise their child Storm as genderless has caused quite a stir across the nation.
The Toronto couple’s lifestyle is not unusual and is one that many of us in the queer community can relate to.
Both parents come from liberal households where gender identity was fluid — Witterick’s brother experimented with drag as a teen in the ’80s. They have travelled extensively through Mexico and most recently spent a year in Cuba.
Both have worked in social justice organizations — Witterick in violence prevention before becoming a full-time mother. Stocker teaches at a tiny school with four teachers and about 60 students whose lessons are framed by social-justice issues.
The couple lives in a nice home in a city neighbourhood with their three children: Jazz, five, Kio, two, and Storm, four months. Both Jazz and Kio are un-schooled at home, choose their own clothes (Jazz likes dresses) and sleep with their mother and father every night on a big, comfortable mattress on the floor.
Sounds to me that they are a loving family.
However, their latest parenting decision not to declare the gender of Storm has unleashed a barrage of criticism from people around the country after their story was published in the Toronto Star.
When Storm was born they sent out an unconventional birth announcement: “We've decided not to share Storm's sex for now — a tribute to freedom and choice in place of limitation, a stand up to what the world could become in Storm's lifetime (a more progressive place?).”
The announcement was apparently met with stony silence, but the newspaper article has been met with criticism, complaints and outrage.
Of course Fox News has picked up the story, contacted pro-family organizations and come to the conclusion it always does — that Storm will grow up terribly confused about sexual identity.
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