“You can choose your friends but you can’t
choose your family,” or so the old saying goes, however fast-moving
technological and legal shifts are altering concepts of parenting and
relationships, and as it turns out you can pick your own family. Joining me today to talk all about the people
who changing the way we think about families and where the notion of a
“traditional” one came from is Lisa Belkin, the chief national correspondent for Yahoo News.
Back in 2014, Maine’s Supreme Court ruled that the Orono
school district had violated the states anti-discrimination law by not allowing
a young transgender student named Nicole Maines to use the girls' bathroom. The
decision made history, as it was the first time a state court ruled that
transgender students must be allowed access to the bathroom of the gender with
which they identify. However, the news
coverage at that time only told part of story, the other half, one in which a family
itself was transformed was never really told.
In her new book Becoming Nicole: The Transformation of an American Family Pulitzer Prize winning
journalist Amy Ellis Nutt of The Washington Post tells the story of
the Maines’ family and how they came to reckon with an exceptional situation, and
in so doing also became, in their own ways, exceptional. Amy joins me on the show today to talk all
about the book and this inspiring story.
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