9 yr old told off for calling non-binary teacher Sir

You will never make women safer if you indulge any belief from a man that they are actually a woman.

If you cannot respect women's material reality, you have completely missed the point of how they are oppressed by society.

And you side stepped the point. If we should allow men to pretend they're women so they feel 'at peace', should we do exactly the same thing for white people who identify as African American? Or able bodied people who identify as disabled?

Some years back, after a particular Matt Smith 'Doctor Who' episode aired, one of the boys in my S1/Y8 class announced that he wanted to be known as Stormageddon.

"Fair enough!" I said.

A fortnight later, he was begging me to use his real name. "But you asked me to..." I pointed out.

"Yes, but I didn't think that you would do it!"

Haven't RTFT.

Anyone going into teaching needs to be clearly told that it isn't up to children to affirm their identity. Children will call you Miss when youve been married for 30 years, they will sometimes say Miss when they mean Sir. The appropriate thing to do is either let it go or laugh.

And if you really really really want children to accept you as a woman sometimes and a man sometimes, and get the terms of address right each time too, you need to grow up. Children arent there to stroke your ego. You're there to keep an orderly classroom and to teach them, not have your identity affirmed by compelling the speech of children.

May I ask what they're suppose to call him if not Sir or Miss? Hey you?

OK, so, assuming this incident went as the OP tells it, if a child mistakenly says 'Sir' to a teacher who is male but who wishes to be seen as non-binary, what should happen?

My mother taught 6-yr-olds and they occasionally got mixed up - they called her mum or mummy.
I don’t think she even bothered to correct them if it was an afterthought.

The problem with your argument in my view is that you start from the point of view it’s a mental illness - which I don’t agree with. Where do we stop? We don’t stop we continue forward that’s my point. We find a way to make women feel safe and trans feel safe. There is no stopping. As long as there are humans we will have to continue to adapt to new challenges and our job is to try to make groups that are more at risk safer.

All the arguments against Mx, not least the where are we going to draw the line one, were used 40+ years ago when Ms bean to see widespread usage.

Not sure I'd want to die in a ditch defending it but it fulfils a purpose.

Thank you and i am more than delighted to accept the award. I shall display it with pride.

Keeping Children Safe in Education, p12, definition of emotional abuse, bolding mine.

Emotional abuse: the persistent emotional maltreatment of a child such as to cause severe and adverse effects on the child’s emotional development. It may involve conveying to a child that they are worthless or unloved, inadequate, or valued only insofar as they meet the needs of another person. It may include not giving the child opportunities to express their views, deliberately silencing them or ‘making fun’ of what they say or how they communicate. It may feature age or developmentally inappropriate expectations being imposed on children. These may include interactions that are beyond a child’s developmental capability as well as overprotection and limitation of exploration and learning or preventing the child from participating in normal social interaction.

The power balance is all one way. Humans see sex. He was being respectful and using standard language and it is highly inappropriate the school is making an issue of this. As previously mentioned, teachers get called all sorts and let it go because they're there to do a job and to put the wellbeing of the children first, not have their feelings validated and cause drama about their personal identity.

And also, what if the child is 'gender critical'? Those are protected beliefs. Compelled language and belief about something that makes as little sense as gender ideology in a school setting over a period of time is emotional abuse IMO. Children don't have any power in this situation.

If it's about how individual perceive themselves, then how far do we go.

We know that people 'perceive themselves' to be different races, different ages, different species, even disabled when they aren't.

Do we acknowledge that and tell them
all lies so that they feel at peace with themselves? Or do we say, no, that's a mental illness, go and seek treatment.

And why would this be any different?

Seems very harsh if it wasn't in a nasty way, kids make mistakes I once called a teacher dad (the shame lingers).

I agree with you that scientific reality should be highly regarded. But this subject is more nuanced than that - it’s about how individuals perceive themselves and how they want others to perceive them. It’s about how they feel and think and how they can be at peace with themselves and the world.

it’s not about lying - that’s a very simplistic view of the matter in my opinion.

No such thing as non binary.

My child would be taken out of that school immediately. You do not want your child being taught by these lunatics.

So how exactly do you know that this teacher is getting sexual kicks from children? There’s nothing to even imply such a thing.

I use it all the time, I love it.

There is nothing bigoted about pointing out the truth.

Most bigoted comment award goes to ☝️

Spend a huge amount of time on things that would be less effective?

The barrier to entry has been lowered, thats not a bad thing.

Using AI for good - like this - is a brilliant use of tech, it's not a gotcha if you say "ooo look AI"

Yes courts are legislating for it.

As you probably know, they have legislated that people's biological sex takes priority over any 'gender identity' in law. This is exactly as it should be.

Humans can't change sex or alternate between sexes. It is not beneficial for anyone to lie about that, directly or indirectly. We must hold scientific reality in the highest respect.

What would we do without ChatGPT?