There's nothing wrong with a little boy who relates to female characters and prefers toys and clothes typically favored by girls.
There's always a suggestion that readers shouldn't focus on the details parents cite when they talk about their small children's cross-sex identification—that it all runs much, much deeper. But all we have here is a little boy who likes female characters, likes dolls, likes dresses, and has parents who load these innocent preferences with meaning—from the time their child is just 18 months old—rather than just letting him be himself.
As time goes on, his parents confuse him with questions that are way out of his depth (“Can you tell us a bit more about how you feel? There are some boys who like all the things that society thinks are for girls but know themselves to be boys, and there are some who feel like they are girls inside…”) and cleave righteously to his childlike answers, conscripting his entire social world into the idea that he was born in the wrong body.
‘Some people suggested we just say no, encourage her to identify with the male characters, but how can you explain that to a young child? To what end? No to playing with toys she loved or characters she loved to pretend to be? It felt cruel to say no, to the say the least.’
No, you're right, mum, it's much kinder to say: Because you like these characters and toys and clothes, you're not really a boy. (Check back on how your little social experiment is going in 10 years, though.)
Meanwhile, his parents have armored themselves against self-awareness using the empty language of gender-inclusivity:
‘All girls will have a chance to be the best versions of themselves if they are given the space to be who they are.’
Would he think he was a girl if his parents had simply said: He likes dresses, he's happy, who cares what strangers at the grocery store think?
We’ll never know because these parents couldn’t just let a child be a child.
My son spent his entire 4th year identifying as Godzilla. Good thing we didn't get him the reptile surgery...
If it wasn't serious in its implications fot the wee boy, it would be laughable. There are no "girls toys" or "boys toys", just toys; no "boys clothes" or "girls clothes", just clothes. Anyone claiming that there are right or wrong toys/clothes based on the sex of the child should be laughed out of town, not celebrated.