Thoughts on this book for primary children?

I note he states he's happy to be told where he might have been a "transphobic halfwit", but no mention of where he might have been a "misogynistic halfwit"...

I strongly disagree with his assertion that a "tomboy" would now be a trans boy. It gives me a shiver of panic that had I been growing up now, I might have been misinterpreted as trans, instead of turning out to be a gender critical feminist. There was a period of time around when I was about 8 or 9 where I fervently wanted to be a boy. I wanted to play football, cricket and rugby, and there were no options for girls to do so. I wore scuffs trainers instead of patent shoes, had short hair and wouldn't wear a dress. I thought if I hoped enough I might become a boy and be able to do all the things I wanted to. But, I didn't think I was in the wrong body, I just knew that boys could do these things so that's what I wanted to be.

I was just allowed to get on with it and be who I was, no one ever questioned my gender

Maybe society should let 'kids be kids' - rather than impose rules on what boys and girls are supposed to do. Uniform could be one - as well as hair expectations. If a boy wants to wear a skirt and have long hair, he should be able to - without having to say 'I'm a girl'.

Delete When you are born your bits indicate your sex. This obviously dictates the gender role you are expected to conform to, and the way you are treated in a society that insists on distinct gender roles.

You are right that it is based on genitalia. And the "assigned gender at birth" thing infuriates me as it makes it sound completely random, as if biological sex has nothing to do with it. The idea that it's completely unfair, irrational and damaging to inflict a specific gender role on certain individuals (trans)... rather than unfair, irrational, and damaging to inflict gender roles on anybody.

Meh, what do I know - I'm "cis" apparently. Not calling myself "he", adopting a male name, having surgery and taking testosterone obviously means I'm completely happy with the crappy female gender role I'm expected to live up to...

I am relatively new to the whole trans debate and I'm still trying to get my head around it so please be gentle. I was a 'tomboy' growing up, didn't like dolls, played football, into video games, hated dresses and dressing up, lived in track suits and trainers, basically rejected most things that were considered 'girly'. I was just allowed to get on with it and be who I was, no one ever questioned my gender. When I was a teen I experimented with make up and clothes a bit but have never and I'm still not into it as much as other women. That's nothing to do with wanting a sex change, it's just who I am. Yet now it seems like if your child doesn't fit the stereotypes then there is something 'wrong' with them and they need to change genders? Bit odd, kids like what they like. Not everything has to be 'for boys' and 'for girls'.

The whole 'assigned gender at birth' thing doesn't sit right with me. When you are born you have either girls bits or boys bits which determine your gender. You're not 'assigned' anything, it's just what you are from a medical stand point, if that makes sense?

Will be reading the thread with interest.

I've read the book. It's fairly moderate and well balanced, as these things go (as a pp has said, JKP is a thoughtful publisher as a rule), and does make an effort to differentiate between 'girls/boys liking boys'/girls' stuff' and being 'transgender' (pointing out that the former is perfectly standard).

However, I have serious issues with two specific points - the first, that it says 'cisgender' is the "correct" term for someone who 'identifies with their birth gender'; and the second, that it explicitly states that taking hormone blockers in adolescence is entirely harmless and fully reversible. The publishers have told me they will raise the first point with the editors, but are not engaging in dialogue about the second.

I honestly feel like we are going backwards.

My DD1 (now 30) was fiercely against dolls, dresses and anything pink. She told me she wanted to be a boy. She didn't actively like anything traditionally boyish however, wasn't interested in cars or Lego particularly. I think in her case it was a reaction against her 3 little brothers.

We didn't push it and didn't make a fuss about clothes, except school uniform which was non-negotiable. We continued to offer her opportunities to do things she was interested in, without reference to their being boys things or girls things.

At 14/15 she suddenly started being interested in dressing up and growing her hair and no more was ever said about being a boy. I think, like me at her age, she'd just realised that girls get a bit of a raw deal when it comes to clothes/behaviour etc.

If we'd taken her rejection of being a girl seriously and started her on puberty blockers and surgery what sort of a mess would her head be in now?

We now have a DD2 who is 9. I'm finding that society as a whole and clothing/toys in particular is far more rigidly Girls or Boys than it was in DD1's time. It's these strict expectations of what a boy is or a girl is that is leading to all this "gender" crap.

I can't help but feel that with something so new - so nebulous - we'd be better off with children's literature that addresses the restrictions of binary gender stereotypes for all children. It sounds obvious but there isn't enough of it out there.

The publishers say this book is suitable for age 11 upwards, so that means some year 6 children only.

So maybe it's aimed at secondary school children, all of whom are age 11 upwards.

Not that that changes the fact it's still horseshit.

This is a book for primary children. I wonder what the message is supposed to be?

There will be children who feel they are in the wrong body.

There will be children who have a preference for things that society has decided to associate with the opposite sex to them.

There will be children who will have been told and who will have picked up the message that things they like / their behaviour is 'not typical' of their sex.

Maybe society should change to help children in the last 2 categories and discussion can somehow be had about children in the first category.

Kit, the protagonist, doesn’t like playing with dolls or wearing dresses and at the age of three asks to be called Christopher. “You see,” explains Kit, “I have a different gender identity than I was assigned at birth. Another name for this is called being transgender.” He begins to wear boys’ clothes, using he/him pronouns, changes his name on his birth certificate and explains that hormone blockers will stop him going through female puberty “and stop my body developing in ways that make me unhappy”.

I think it is very dangerous to simplify and normalise both the idea that one can 'be' the opposite sex and the process towards complete physical transition.

The book is also confusing sex and gender.

In my view its rubbish and will not benefit either children / teachers generally or that very, very small minority with real body dysmorphia.

The author says:

“If you identify as a girl, assigned female at birth, and you like the colour pink, you like wearing dresses and sparkly things, that’s awesome. But if you are a boy who likes pink sparkly things that’s also awesome

Which is at odds with:

Kit, the protagonist, doesn’t like playing with dolls or wearing dresses and at the age of three asks to be called Christopher. “You see,” explains Kit, “I have a different gender identity than I was assigned at birth. Another name for this is called being transgender.” He begins to wear boys’ clothes

I hope the book explains that it's ok to 'be different' and to break down traditional gender roles. That's what schools should be focusing on - and they should be aiming to treat boys and girls the same (whilst identifying and working on any barriers particular groups face in education)

I don't get this bit:

"Kit, the protagonist, doesn’t like playing with dolls or wearing dresses and at the age of three asks to be called Christopher. “You see,” explains Kit, “I have a different gender identity than I was assigned at birth. Another name for this is called being transgender.” He begins to wear boys’ clothes, using he/him pronouns, changes his name on his birth certificate and explains that hormone blockers will stop him going through female puberty “and stop my body developing in ways that make me unhappy”.

No - another name for this is called being a girl who likes playing with stuff 'normally' associated with boys. Maybe we could live in a world where girls can play and do stuff 'not normally associated with being a girl' and vice versa.

Labelling a child who likes doing stuff that is seen as being for the opposite sex as transgender is dangerous.

A society where children are free to be children and to do what they want to do without being told ' you can't do that, it's for boys / girls' is far better than a society where children are labelled as transgender and go down the transition route.

I think the book is hideous.
The stats about suicidal thoughts/actions within this group have been debunked, in that they worryingly do not alone apply to 'trans' children. The book is telling vulnerable children, that if they feel "other", that if they don't feel that they fit in with what they are expected to be, the book is advising that the doctors can 'fix' them with drugs , the kids can change who they are. This position homophobic and promotes damaging gender stereotypes.

And the people who are shouting about and promoting this are a Trans lobby who deny any sexual motivation for their own later life transitioning.
By encouraging kids to do this, they are justifying a (sometimes sexually) motivated fetish which revolves around their own interpretation of "women". They claim they are preventing the kids from having the hurt they have experienced, in not being their authentic self in a world which understands them. I say let's let the kids be whoever they want to be, their genitalia do not determine their personality, their aesthetic choices, their interests, their hobbies/career etc.

(In my experience this shouting is loudest from Transwomen who revoke back to traditionally male methods of abuse when their POV and doctrine are challenged.)

I cannot believe this is happening.

This bit is the most disturbing...
Kit, the protagonist, doesn’t like playing with dolls or wearing dresses and at the age of three asks to be called Christopher.
So a girl that doesn't like playing with dolls or wears dresses, ie doesn't conform to female stereotypes, should now be seen as a boy?! How is this progressive?! This transing of children has to stop!!

yellow

I meant that the idea that a baby girl and a baby boy will - obviously and automatically and without question - be raised in different ways according to their sex is something that a fundamentalist religion would approve of (and do).

There is nothing progressive about this type of trans narrative at all. It is simply endorsing - reifying - presenting as innate and immutable - the idea that boys and girls and men and women are deeply fundamentally different, and if you don't fit in the box that is given then you need to be corrected. Religion tries to correct through punishment, coercion, prayer, and force. Trans tries to correct through offering to get into the other box.

Fuck the boxes, fuck religion and fuck this type of trans ideology.

The assigned gender at birth line always makes me think of the Harry Potter sorting hat. As has been said on here many times before, gender isn't assigned at birth, the sex is noted, but seeing as we apparently live in a post truth world now let's crack on with misinformation for young children and never mind the consequences.

It's an updated version 😄

Or as a poet says

Roses are red
Gender's performative
Trans-Ing children
Is heteronormative

Transing children is child abuse.

It's fine to say boys can like dolls etc, but not "boys who like dolls are really girls and should be chemicallysterilised"

It's gay eugenics and nobody is speaking out against it. Telling children their healthy bodies are wrong is child abuse. Telling children they can change sex is a lie. We don't know the long term effects of puberty blockers and cross sex hormones. We are experimenting on children.

I don't know what there isn't an outcry about this.