School trans inclusive policy

The thing is, Bowl, that could be taken to apply to children with, say, a facial disfigurement or non-NT behaviour. I have a feeling that's what Kay is getting at when mentioning experience in SN, and excluding a child for such differences isn't OK.

I know that's what Kay is getting at, but we know that's a false comparison.

Boys and girls are segregated for changing and sport, for safety, dignity and opportunities. Kay wants to override this sex segregation.

The student who is causing the discomfort is the one who needs alternative provision.

The thing is, Bowl, that could be taken to apply to children with, say, a facial disfigurement or non-NT behaviour. I have a feeling that's what Kay is getting at when mentioning experience in SN, and excluding a child for such differences isn't OK.

Women’s safety matters kay - many women have put up over the years with a range of shit, from low level comments through groping and voyeurism through to serious assault. I don’t know a single woman who has never experienced anything of that ilk. Not one.

Now we are told that we just need to be nice and let all those men in our spaces and it’ll probably be ok. Butvwhen you’re my age you’ve seen too much bad behaviour to think it’ll be Ok. It won’t.

Is it a surprise that those women say no?

Children’s safety matters. Many women have put up over the years with men impinging on their boundaries - but if someone threatens the safety of their kids they will not put up with it. There’s a biological imperative to protect children that goes beyond self preservation. If the public realises what this means for child safety its game over for TRA influence.

I’m sick of being nice and being harmed because of it. I no longer believe it’ll all be Ok. I’m sick of reading endless news articles about the damage men do women and children. I’ve seen too many things happen to women. Enough. I say NO.

NO NO NO.

And I have no respect at all for men who do not heed when a woman says NO. None.

Kay - if you gaslight women on a feminist forum, they are going to challenge you. If your reaction is to appeal to female socialisation, they are going to challenge you again. If you then flounce from the thread only to turn up on the next thread and repeat the pattern, you're going to get challenged again. You seem incapable of reflecting on why you are regularly challenged. Such reflection may be helpful. Endless temporary flouncing is not going to get you anywhere.

Even non competitive sport is an issue. Girls need to be able to compete fairly in school during ‘casual’ sport or they will quite right wonder what the point is.

Most competitive sport is fed by kids who want to try something g new or who have done well at something at school and want to go further. It all starts out as non competitive- no one turns up and is county level on day one (unless you’re a boy running the girls race I guess...)

If we make girls uncomfortable in casual sports at school, it will have a devastating knock on effect to women’s sport.

If we pressure girls to accept ‘fair enough’ solutions that they’re not actually happy with but accept because they have no choice then we create an entire generation of girls taught that they can’t say no. That their discomfort is less important than a man’s validation. That their boundaries can be broken easily.

Is that what we want? It seems like a shitty move to me. Aren’t we supposed to be telling kids that their bodily autonomy and boundaries are important? That they can say NO?

All these great campaigns like PANTS by NSPCC etc teach kids The importance of being able to say no to things they aren’t comfy with. This blows it out of the water.

The student who is causing the discomfort is the one who needs alternative provision. The girls who are discomfited are not the problem.

Of course an entire generation of kids who can’t say no, who have no boundaries and who are taught that their comfort and happiness is secondary to men’s desires - some might say that was the aim.

Hence looking at the Guidance notes provided, and imagining how things could be devised to satisfy the document, and provide for the needs of the trans-identified child.

If you decide to come back to this thread, Kay, I've got one simple question for you.

We have sex-segregated changing rooms and toilets in schools because boys' bodies are different from girls' bodies. I hope we can agree on that. Can you describe what changes when a child declares that they are trans? Since they still have the same body, and that is the reason for separate changing rooms for girls and boys.

Despite my careful, if imperfect, efforts, a minority of posters have repeatedly showed themselves to be angered by what I have said. Or rather, what they assumed I meant, despite me not saying it.

You LITERALLY said it.

just sick of insulting assumptions about my words and intentions

It isn't an assumption. It is your words.

I don't want safeguarding policy writen with the assumption that trans children are rare and that few of those children would want to cause problems for other children. It's almost as if we are saying that the probability of male children undressing alongside female children is so rare, we don't have to consider it.

It just takes one child, and lots of school girls are forced to undress alongside male school children. We need to ensure children are safe at school, not just cross our fingers and hope it doesn't happen.

I retire from this stuff. As someone who has had many years of experience in drawing up and operating special needs guidance, for individual schools and also for an outer London Borough, I kind fgo thought that my experience would be relevant. Hence looking at the Guidance notes provided, and imagining how things could be devised to satisfy the document, and provide for the needs of the trans-identified child. **

** I say trans identified , because at hat stage no formal assessment will have been made, or would be appropriate. Like the Tavistock , I do not regard someone who MAY be transsexual / transgender as provably so. So the protection and safety of the other pupils is even more essential.

Despite my careful, if imperfect, efforts, a minority of posters have repeatedly showed themselves to be angered by what I have said. Or rather, what they assumed I meant, despite me not saying it.

So, I retire from this thread. Not defeated, just sick of insulting assumptions about my words and intentions. Have fun.

I find it disturbing that school policy would not state single sex changing explicitly.

People making these policies for schools need to start engaging their brains and thinking about why we have single-sex toilets and changing rooms in schools.

Is it because girls are caring and nurturing and boys are macho? Is it because girls like wearing pretty clothes and boys like football? Or could it be just because girls' bodies are different from boys' bodies? And if that is the case, what actually changes when a child declares that they are trans?

Didn't Lily Madigan's school try to treat her kindly while preventing her using the girls' facilities with the girls? And isn't she currently boasting about suing them for it?

And here's a school this year that tried to use sensible wriggle room but was forced (by Gina-sometimes Denham) to change its mind:
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-beds-bucks-herts-43462823

Kay, do you think that their first policy was correct, or the one they were forced to change to?

Step aside girls.

(To save any effort, I'll report myself for daring to be bloody furious at open gaslighting on a feminist board.)

I'm not immensely happy at the idea that we write guidelines with 'wriggle room' that means they don't quite mean what they say.

KayM2, are you saying that we should officially tell schools to treat male children as girls but wink and nod at them until they understand that it means 'but not really'?

The OP of this thread was looking for trans-inclusive guidance that is currently going into schools on behalf of her granddaughter (presumably because her granddaughter's school is about to adopt this guidance). We have found it for her.

To say that it is an urban legend that schools who adopt this guidance actually implement its recommendations is a direct lie. A gaslighting, lying, lie. Shall we tell the mother whose 11-year-old daughter was exposed to a classmate masturbating an erect penis in a school changing room that she made it all up? This is MRA, victim-blaming rhetoric and it has no place in a feminist space.

Shame on people who do this. It's actually worse than open transactivists who come on here and say the guidance is great. At least they are being honest.

The indifference is probably because we have allowed people to go onto schools and basically groom children out of defining boundries.

This.

Just like my parents generation didn't understand people being gay, I struggle with trans - my kids just don't care, they accept people for who they are

This statement contradicts itself. Being trans is about not accepting yourself for who you are, and thinking there is something wrong with your body, then trying to get everyone else to accept you as something you are not.

I'm happy to accept everyone as they are - gender conforming or non-conforming. What I can't accept is that someone who is gender non-conforming and/or hates their sexed body is somehow the opposite sex.

I think Kay makes an interesting point. The only case I have come across - at the school of a friend’s child, arrangements were made for separate changing facilities for a trans girl. I have read, and been mightily alarmed by Allsorts guidance for schools, but I think it’s true that most schools and teachers - as I think most people in general will not be at all comfortable shoving a male bodied child in with girls changing. They will make “sensible arrangements” which satisfy everyone.

However, with the concept of self Id, and the cultural shift in respect of trans people, I think it inevitable that separate arrangements will be challenged, that there will be insistence on “inclusivity”. After all, TWAW so TGAG. This is when I think people will start to wake up. Parents WILL complain. Teachers WILL be divided. They won’t be able to simply make sensible arrangements because they will be seen as discriminatory and transphobic. This IS the way things are going even if rare or unheard of now.

I do NOT buy into the idea that young women are not bothered at the idea of male bodies in their spaces. Some might not, some are too keen to fit in to say they are bothered by it. I know that my 11 yr old would be extremely distressed at having to remove clothing in the presence of a male body.

Do kids actually shower at school - my high school kids never have.

A local school had a 16yr old turn up one Monday as a girl. The school was shocked initially but supportive. Seperate loo and changing was agreed. This was a few years back though so might be different now.

I go to a lot of different schools as I teach dance workshops. In my experience, trans students are usually given a separate space in which to change or allowed to change before/after everyone else. They are usually happy with this decision as most of the time they are just bothered about being able to change comfortably, not making a stand.

Annie.

The indifference is probably because we have allowed people to go onto schools and basically groom children out of defining boundries.

All the YouTubers. All the visitors to schools.

They have been groomed to accept this. They won't realise til it's too late and they are assulted in a previously safe space.

Turkeys voting for Xmas.

Can I point out that young people are a lot less bothered by all this than Mumsnetters! They take it all in their stride, I'm met with a "mum you don't understand" when I express I'm uncomfortable with men's bits in the ladies changing rooms whereas dd thought it was hilarious, not male body parts but my reaction! Just like my parents generation didn't understand people being gay, I struggle with trans - my kids just don't care, they accept people for who they are and are really fluid on sexuality too (both are straight but seems experimentation is the norm). I accept I just don't get it!

The policy at DD's old school was that trans identifying students could change in the cubicle toilets (separate to changing rooms) or or office - arrangements are made based on needs. The f-m trans all stayed in the girls changing room, the m-f used the office (yes 4 students in DD's year out of 750 students!

a wise school will suggest that the pupil might wish to change in the next, but gender appropriate , room/ space, or in the teacher's changing rooms. or not enter the changing rooms till the " bottom half"was sorted, in a single cubicle loo

Can I just check that I understand your suggestion ? The school would suggest to a trans girl that she changed her underwear / shorts in the cubicle and then she would be free to enter the communal shower/ changing area where XX girls were naked or in their underwear. Is that correct?

Fairytale of W; no, I am not suggesting that. Why would I be, when I am vocal in protecting women and girls from fear and danger?

That is EXACTLY what you said. Word for fucking word.