Also, it's worth it to note that the kid will not answer to 'Shiloh', only to the name 'John'. I'm actually personally really impressed by how awesome the parents are being in the face of all of this.

"“She only wants to be called John. John or Peter. So it’s a Peter Pan thing. So we’ve got to call her John. ‘Shi, do you want …’ – ‘John. I’m John.’ And then I’ll say, ‘John, would you like some orange juice?’ And she goes, ‘No!’ So, you know, it’s just that kind of stuff." Brad Pitt talking about his [kid] on Oprah." Source.

My 7-year-old girl opted for a "pixie cut" the last time we got her hair cut, and was teased by her classmates for looking like a boy. It upset her a lot. But she also says things like "It's sad that none of the other kids in my class are interested in astronomy."

Maybe the kid is trans? In which case, I would argue vehemently that they are not only NOT harming him, but absolutely doing the right thing, by allowing him to choose his own gender identity.

On the other hand, there are certainly tomboys, and the kid could just be a more "masculine" girl, in which case...I still think they are doing the right thing by allowing her to choose her own gender presentation!

I'd like to note that the magazine frames John's clothing and haircut as the "fault" of Angelina, and not Brad. This is one more example of the mother being solely responsible for how children turn out. Pathetic, Life & Style.

Didn't Margaret Atwood purposefuly raise her daughter without consideration to the social gender norms? I remember having hear that somewhere... Anyways, I wonder how she turned out.

And I don't think the fact that Shiloh wants to be called John is any reliable indication that she is transgender, given her age. I know a woman who asked for a penis for christmas when she was a kid, and did not end up being transgender later on in life.
However I do think it would be wrong to steer her forcefully towards a gender to which she doesen't identify, even if it's "just a phase"

My mother dressed me up in the most girliest girly clothes (barf) as a small girl. And guess what?! I grew up into a tomboyish punk rocker!

Wow, people need to get over themselves. I was laughing so hard when I saw that cover. It's just so offensive, sexist, transphobic and homophobic. I'm impressed with the Jolie-Pitts for being so open-minded and allowing their children to dress and be what they want.

So the kid is what, 7? Who cares what she wears? I think it's ridiculous that at 6, my daughter is already aware that if she wears her favourite "Spiderman" t-shirt to school, the kids might make fun of her for dressing "like a boy". And where do the kids learn this?

As for the whole "John" thing, kids go through phases like that all the time. Again, my own daughter insisted on being called "Mary" for several weeks when she was a bit younger. I remember my little sister doing something similar.

We can speculate about "trans" or "gender-identity" but the fact remains that this is a child we're talking about. Why can't we just let kids be kids and realize that they are still discovering who they are and how they fit into the world. Kudos to the parents though for not being uptight about it.

@Christine Nectarine -As for the whole “John” thing, kids go through phases like that all the time. Again, my own daughter insisted on being called “Mary” for several weeks when she was a bit younger. I remember my little sister doing something similar.
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Yes, like the case (not uncommon at all) of small children wanting to be called something other, especially if it's a story or toy character or someone they personally know that is somehow meaningful to them, without caring in the least if it's a boy or a girl character.

I can only speculate how idiotic the reactions of some people who are obsessed about transsexualism would be, if they had a real case like a girl who wants to be called ‘Fred’ at age 3 for about a month (then she switches to ‘Dorothy’ and then ‘Snow White’).

At first they would be so delighted to think their girl was expressing her innermost primal genetic transsexual gender make-up. How wonderful that they were evolved enough to recognize her transsexualism right away!

One month later, they would be alarmed and distressed that said little girl had switched, SWITCHED, genders. Ah, the horror! And Dorothy, so feminine, so gender conformist, so horrible. The nasty influences of those gender conformists bullies, that gender police messing up the gender identity of their precious transsexual little girl.

One month later, the poor kid switches again to "Snow White." Transgender-transsexual-obsessed parent goes off the deep end! Don't ever call yourself Snow White! She's a stupid, submissive little woman who only puts herself up as a sex symbol to gain the attention of some prince. You go back to calling yourself Fred right now, it's what you were born to be, do you hear me?

Kid completely freaks out. And that's just the beginning of it.

Fortunately the real kid never had parents like that.

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On a second note, I find it completely ironic on a site where there is a large number of people who conform to a certain ideology and who go through life trying to make others (sometimes quite forcefully) conform as well, they are always taking shots at "conformity." Like the pot and kettle of conformity enforcement, you know.

I kind of LOLed at the title of this post.

How amazing that people here can tell that Shiloh is likely trans because the kid has short hair and likes to be called John. Now that’s talent.

I find such presumptions just as troubling as I do this magazine cover. It’s either “OMG they’re HARMING their kid!” or a knowing “Yes, the kid must be trans.” Why must it be either? Why do the all knowing peanut gallery always have to chip in and define this child by their own ideas of gender?

The child is a *child*. How about everyone let the kid be a kid without imposing their ideas of gender on it. I see no reason to presume that this particular mode of dress is harmful *or* indicative that the child is trans. If it wasn’t for externally enforced gender roles it would be pretty much impossible to tell what sex pre-pubescent a kid is just by looking at it until puberty. Half the time Shiloh is dressed in fancy dress costumes. Perhaps she’s really a superhero! Or you know, a child.

And on an unrelated note – what an adorable kid!

And I was also thinking about the comment someone else made (elsewhere) that maybe it's about time we had a law banning pictures of celebrity children in the media. I haven't given it too much thought, but I think I might endorse it.

Secondly, all this energy that is spent gawking and discussing celebrity children could be better spent taking some concrete action helping, for example, some orphaned and abused kid in Haiti, yet here we are.

Something I need to give more thought to.

Just chipping in to comment that after the movie "The Incredibles" came out, my niece insisted for months on being called Dash, as that was her favorite character. (She also called her little sister "Jack-Jack" during that time.) She saw nothing weird in dressing up in pink and purple as she did this either.

Of course, I can top "John"'s story--not only was I a tomboy with a short haircut as a kid, I also insisted my name was "14-9-9-6." I guess I was a trans-mathematical.

Forty years ago, my Mom made sure both us girls had those pixie haircuts - so she wouldn't have to deal with washing and fixing our hair! Both of us were small for our ages and had very delicate facial features, but were ALWAYS "mistaken" for boys. Now I bless Mom for the practical school clothes and rugged playclothes, as well as for letting us run in a pack of cousins. She expected us to be outside unsupervised for hours on end; if there were too many kids underfoot she'd say, "don't make me find something for you to do..." Both work and play were equal opportunity; boys and girls did it all without regard for "traditional" gender roles.
Kids today are certainly under far more pressure to "perform gender" than we were.

That awful magazine cover made me cry (said the tough genderqueer chick w/ the boy haircut). call me a cultural elitist or out of touch w/ the "real" u.s.a., but shit like this is why i expose myself to as little mainstream pop culture as possible.

On a completely unrelated note, damn... just looking at those shoes made my feet hurt.

please. my daughter was Sinbad for a while. kids don't need gender policing.

Slightly off topic, but related to the argument "nobody has to buy those clothes", the thing I've noticed (well, in Australia at least) is that you can pretty much only buy 'non-girly' clothes (i.e. not pink) in boutique stores and pay a lot more for them.
I remember when I was pregnant with my son that I was really hoping he would be a boy because there was far more choice in clothing for boys!
Now I'm hoping for a girl next so that I can sew funky dresses and skirts and what-not in something OTHER THAN PINK. I hate pink, I don't want to have to dress my kid in pink just because that's what the stores tell me to do.

Even though gender identity is said to be fixed by about two, I guess it takes a while longer for kids to realize what their gender is. I remember being three and confused as to whether I was a boy or a girl. Sometimes I'd pretend I was Wonder Woman, other times I was Superman. I had a vague idea that there were different genders, but I still hadn't figured out how to tell the difference.

Also, the magazine cover gave me the impression that the child was being forced to wear "boy's" clothes and to be called John.

Surprisingly, many of the comments suggest that gender identity is fixed--as if one is essentially a girl or a boy, and it's a matter of it "emerging" by age 2 or some other age. If we didn't have gender (which is really about gender inequality--one sex being privileged over the other--we wouldn't have "gender identity" and we wouldn't have trans. If gender disappears, there's nothing to transgress.

So let's get rid of gender and stop reinforcing fixed notions of gender identity.

I suggest reading an old article by Ann Ferguson on "Androgyny." And by that she means getting rid of gender entirely (not the usual conception of "androgyny").

Or read something by Judith Lorber on how gender exists as part of patriarchy: we need to "know" someone's sex, which we often do by how they enact gender (or even a person's name or hairstyle), and that tells us who to privilege and who to disadvantage (i.e., privilege men and disadvantage women). Get rid of gender and we get rid of gender inequality.

It worries me that in the last several years gender is treated purely as a performance rather than a category of inequality.

oh, and on the trans discussion: while I agree that it would be nonsensical to try to discern and label the "gender-identity" of a 3-year-old, or really any stranger's, for parents themselves it might be a good idea to pay attention to this before the kids even hit puberty.

It came up in a discussion about this cover on a different forum; basically, since a lot of kids can tell that they're trans relatively early on, catching on to that early would be beneficial, because you wouldn't have to undo the "damage" done by puberty to the kid's body; I would imagine it would also save them the increased trauma of ever-growing gender dysmorphia as their bodies develop in the wrong direction.

My wife and I have a 2-year old who has yet to have a haircut (we trim his bangs so his hair doesn't get into his eyes). We ask him if he wants a haircut and he sometimes says yes but when it comes to making an appointment, he demurs. We love his hair but I admit it's a riot to see the other parents react to him. "Oooh, isn't she cuuute!" He doesn't seem to notice.

We live in a town deep in the bible belt near a large military base. Most boys have crewcuts at young ages. I'm fairly sure it bugs the military parents but we're going to let him decide when to cut it.

I'm pretty sure we're not turning him into a girl, especially when in the tub he grabs his penis in the tub and shouts "MY PEEPEE IS LOOOOONNNGG!"

My mother never lets me forget that I, at that age, had a white tutu that I absolutely wouldn't part with. My hair was down to my waist and I asked to be referred to as "Fifi" at one point.

I say this because as an adult I'm a transgendered FtM. Of course I got a whole lot more tomboyish as I got older, but I invested very little meaning in my clothes or preferred name when I was at that age. And I've also known girls who masqueraded as boys for a time when younger, and grew up to live happily cisgendered lives.

I had a coworker who once told me a story about his daughters. Seems like they hit a "goth" phase right around the same time the neighbor's daughter did. Well, my coworker refused to react to his kids' insistence on dyed black hair and black combat boots; he told them they looked pretty as always and left them alone. His neighbor, on the other hand, fought with his own daughter about her gothic clothing and tried to force her to change. By the time they graduated my coworker's daughters had gotten over their goth phase, and the neighbor's daughter was still stubbornly wearing all-black every single day.

My little niece thinks she's Shaun White :) His image will come on TV and she says 'Look, it's me!'.

People are gonna give her crap about it now, and they will continue to do so forever. The same happens to me. I'm female, but don't conform to anything typically female, and dress relatively androgynously. And I get so much crap for it, unintentionally of course. Or maybe not.
I never can use public toilets purely because of the looks I get, and women actually confronting me and telling my I'm in the wrong toilets. It's weird.
One time some drugged out guy wanted to literally kick my ass because he thought I was a gay dude.
But seriously, who really cares what the kid wants to dress like? It's just really awesome that her parents let her express her individuality and don't try to force "feminineness" onto her.

Is Shiloh being harmed because her parents aren't forcing her into a mold based on what genitals she was born with? No, she isn't.

In case this post needs another anecdote:

My little brother used to let my sister dress him up in dresses and a wig and call him Daneille when he was about 5. (No, his name isn't even Daniel.) He LOVED it. A few years later, around 9, he wore nail polish to school regularly even though my mom had a talk with him about how the other kids might tease him.

He's 19 now, and about as masculine (and heterosexual) as a college freshman gets. But at least we have photos of Danielle to show to any girlfriends he brings home. :)

I'm a straight 23 year old female, I dress very androgenously most of the time. Most of my shirts are unisex t-shirts and some of my clothes I've actually bought in the male sections of stores (though ironically enough I'm wearing a skirt as I write this). Growing up, I wanted to be a paleontologist. I majored in biology and I work in a chemistry lab. This means close toed practical shoes and no makeup that acts as solvent for harmful chemicals -not that it affects me much because I've never worn much makeup.
As a kid I launched rockets, played poker, bloody knuckles and kickball with a group of male friends (I still remember sliding into home after a rainstorm), and beat all of them in arm wrestling. I did resent one rule my parents had, that I couldn't call guys until I was 16. I had little romantic interest, but it really sucks when you can't call your friends.
I hate the color pink. While many of my girl friends have dreamt of getting married for most of their lives, I haven't.
I've had people question my gender identity a LOT (strangers, friends, and family included). When my (now ex) boyfriend of 6 years and I were dating, people were convinced he was "a little" gay because he was effeminate-looking (tall and thin and even though he's my ex I'll say it- hot as hell) and liked to cook.
I think that forcing a gender on a kid in any way is unfair. I have a friend who strongly believes that girls should not play with dolls because that reinforces gender stereotypes and that baby dolls are not the girls' babies, they are the girls' peers.
I think if a girl wants to play with baby dolls, great. If a girl wants to play with t-rex puppets and rip the heads off her Barbie dolls...buy her more dino toys, please.
Kids should be kids and their imaginations should not be limited by our expectations, and/or forced to grow up too fast.

Clothes are a means of self expression. That is why they are so important. I believe we should be able to wear whatever we want. It would express so much more of who we are than the standard fashion uniforms we are supposed to wear.

i had short hair for a very long time, and even though it's long now, i still get that 'are you a boy or a girl?' thing, or a funny look when i walk into the girl's bathroom....i'm 16....