Stephen Fry backs P Tatchell's call to revise sex education

Are these men obsessed with sex above all else ? Hard to imagine otherwise that they could possibly imagine teenagers finding lessons like this anything but creepy/mortifying/grim.

Most kids would be begging their parents to sign them off this.

I also would have thought Fry might be more sensible. But sometimes people see something a certain way because it speaks closely somehow to their own experience. I wonder if he felt there was something really lacking in his own sex education as a teen.

That makes me furious, really, really furious. That some hefty six foot male can be “more vulnerable” than a young girl.
Who is telling them this nonsense ? The stats are clear, over two women a week killed by men, while a transwoman is actually more likely to be a murderer, than they are to be murdered.

It is so sad that you lost you friend SirVixofVixHall. This is why it is so disheartening that organisations and politicians seem unable to acknowledge how seriously sexual abuse impacts on mental health. I still haven't quite got over going to see my MP to explain about the impact that the loss of single sex in schools would have on girls who have been sexually abused only for him to tell me all about the mental health issues and suicide risks that trans people face, which means that they should be permitted to use which ever space they chose. I actually had to point out that abused girls and women have high rates of trauma related mental health issues, including self harm and suicide. Later in our conversation he tried to summarise the problem as, on the one hand we have trans people with high levels of mental health issues and on the other we have girls who have experienced sexual abuse who may be traumatised. A few weeks later he made it very clear pubically that he thought that transgender people are the most vulnerable in society and that he cared not one bit for the extreme vulnerability and distress of girls who have been sexually abused. Sorry a bit off topic there.

Back on topic, I just wanted to say that I am feeling quite cross that, as it appears to me, Tatchell is using people's concerns about how to prevent sexual abuse and help children who have experienced it to give his proposals legitimacy. What evidence does he have that reducing the shame about consenting sex will result in children who feel able to talk about the rape or abuse that they are suffering. It feels very much like he is using the suffering of sexually abused children to further his agenda.

Are these men obsessed with sex above all else ? Hard to imagine otherwise that they could possibly imagine teenagers finding lessons like this anything but creepy/mortifying/grim.

Yes, why does someone like this have a “foundation” ?

It is almost as if he wants to inculcate a mindset in the children, that they would obviously want to take part in the sex lessons and so would obviously resist and resent their meanie, oppressive gestapo parents.

We keep seeing this though don't we? Attempts to alienate children from their parents, telling children that their parents don't have their best interests at heart... Why?

The more I see of Peter Tatchell the more I struggle to figure out why he isn't just dismissed as an irrelevant creep.

Which is one of the many reasons why these men should be kept a million miles away from education policy.

Indeed, Ereshkigal.

And yes, Fermats, I thought that about what Jessica Eaton has been campaigning on too. Tatchell and Fry are completely incapable of putting themselves in the place of a teenage girl who’s been abused, who’s been or is being groomed. There is a really chilling lack of empathy and understanding there.

I think this sort of deliberate ignorance of the very different issues that face women and girls in a patriarchal society, the way we are vulnerable and/or harmed in a way specific to our sex, is a really nasty and invidious form of misogyny. You see it all the time among men like this who like to think of themselves as upstanding people.

I think Peter Tatchell and Stephen Fry have no idea whatsoever of the lives of girls and young women. Nor do they care.

Which is one of the many reasons why these men should be kept a million miles away from education policy.

Tatchell's proposals are very "creative" (ahem!) when it comes to the sex ed bit and completely out of step with the DfE guidance on kids being excused from attending.

His wording about parents being "required to physically remove their child" from the classroom is also VERY peculiar.

Quite apart from the nonsensical suggestion that parents should have to attend the school, if this actually was a "requirement" then you would expect the wording to be something along the lines of, "accompany their children from the classroom". Framing it as the parents "physically removing their children" paints a picture of parents dragging their children out by force.

It is almost as if he wants to inculcate a mindset in the children, that they would obviously want to take part in the sex lessons and so would obviously resist and resent their meanie, oppressive gestapo parents. And if parents were coerced to play along with this bizarre scenario and were persuaded that they needed to go to the school, enter the classroom and lay hands on their kids to "physically remove them"??

In fact, the most likely scenario is that the decision to attend or not would be agreed between parents and children. If Tatchell's choice of words simply reflects his understanding of normal parent-child relationships then perhaps he has some unresolved issues from his own childhood that he would do well to attend to.

This page has links to the relevant DfE documents:

www.gov.uk/government/consultations/relationships-and-sex-education-and-health-education

The Dept of Ed has also promised that the 2018 Safeguarding Guidelines will help address the problem of so many girls from primary age upwards being raped and sexually assaulted by boys at school.

'Our kids were raped by classmates. The DfE won't listen':
www.tes.com/news/our-kids-were-raped-classmates-dfe-wont-listen

Keeping Children Safe in Education:
www.gov.uk/government/news/strengthened-guidance-for-schools-and-colleges-on-safeguarding

Working Together to Safeguard Children:
www.gov.uk/government/publications/working-together-to-safeguard-children--2

Amongst all that hand-wringing from Tatchell about under-age children being "unfairly criminalised for having consensual sex" with each other, I don't remember much concern about safeguarding.

"Classroom teaching" about sex acts looks very misguided given the mind-boggling number of girls being raped and sexually assaulted by boys at school. Obviously not a priority.

The rapists under 10 are under the age of criminal responsibility anyway, so he doesn't need to worry about them getting a criminal record, which seems to be the main issue for Tatchell.

www.gov.uk/child-under-10-breaks-law

Always decriminalisation of something with Tatchell, isn't it? He's done the bits that people actually wanted but he just can't seem to get himself off that treadmill.

Yes I thought of that too.

The mention of what it will feel like to be in that sort of class for girls who have already suffered abuse makes me think of Jessica Eaton's writing on the scandal of CSE films:
www.victimfocus.org.uk/campaigns (warning - very upsetting content, though a very informative read).

I think you’re right.

I think Peter Tatchell and Stephen Fry have no idea whatsoever of the lives of girls and young women. Nor do they care.

Absolutely agree, SirVix. Until we have a societal shift towards really caring about girls, really caring about fighting child sexual abuse and exploitation, really caring about fighting child abuse in general, no amount of sex ed will keep children safe.

Is Peter Tatchell shockingly, unforgivably ignorant about the reality of the world, especially wrt to the dynamics that affect teenage girls (clearly not an area of expertise of his), or this is a deliberate attempt to groom a generation of teenagers? It’s utterly repugnant whatever it is. I am so angry at men like him who contribute directly to making the world a less safe place for girls but congratulate themselves on being social justice heroes. Beyond odious.

I suspect that both he and Fry are in denial about being victims of abuse themselves, which makes them very dangerous indeed - like those men who endured horrific, sadistic beatings at public school but then as adults proclaim that it “never did them any harm”, completely oblivious to how utterly damaged they actually are, and how they’re passing on that damage by condoning more of the same.

Very much agree with your posts too, Justhadathought.

Chicken another excellent, clear and moving post, thank you. I did not experience sexual abuse while still a child, but one of my close teenage friends did. She committed suicide after having her own child, and the loss of her, this clever, funny, beautiful young woman, and what I know of how she was manipulated by her father, is always in my mind when I read about child sexual abuse.

SimonJT How confident we are as adults in being clear about choices, avoiding coercion, is as dependent on the other person in the equation as it is on our own behaviour. I would like girls to be given more information about coercive control, and what that looks like, but it is a fine line to tread. It is very easy to shift from that into putting the responsibility to not be coerced or abused onto the recipient.

I think the issues around choice of saying no, are far more to do with a whole-society attitude to boys, that boys must pressure girls sexually until girls cave in, than a general lack of education about sexual relationships while at school. ( School SRE is laughed/cringed at by my dds and teenagers everywhere) . Societal shifts are needed, not more explicit sex-ed at school.
Sex isn’t like learning to drive, it is an experience that also involves another person, it varies within relationships and over time. I think it would serve teenagers far better to learn about relationship dynamics, about coercion, about the relationship shifts that happen after having a baby, or with huge life changes.
More importantly, if we want to help a generation of girls with their adult relationships, we need to help them feel confident in their personalities and bodies, and with expressing their opinions . That has a knock on effect on relationships, including friendships, working relationships, and social groupings. Instead we are living in a time where women with opinions are routinely no-platformed, where a woman who “says things I don’t like” can be vilified, can lose her job, can be shamed. Teenage girls are being clearly told by society, largely by adult men, where their place is, and that place is, as ever, quiet, acquiescent, pretty and sexualised. This is the biggest danger to bringing up confident girls who can express themselves with integrity.
Here we have yet more adult men (childless adult men at that) telling them how to do sex . Creepy, agenda driven weirdness. Just imagine the teacher who would be happy to talk to kids like this.

has

Placemarking.

Nothing useful to add. Except a man who advocates for paedophilia and writes a sex guide for children should be arrested not endorsed.

And what the hell is Stephen Fry thinking? I thought the man was supposed to be smart. He, unlike Tatchell, as a career to destroy.

I’ve just caught up and seen Chicken’s important and articulate post, which expresses the abused child’s perspective. Chicken

some will still be virgins.

I’m concerned about the children who have been sexually abused or assaulted for whom some of PT’s proposed content will be very upsetting and/or triggering. The idea that they’d be forced to endure this at all, let alone in a mixed setting, is abhorrent.

@SirVixofVixHall

Lots of people don’t manage to successfully have those things, often due to a lack of education surrounding choice to express what you do and do not think you’ll enjoy, and a lack of choice in saying no due to the pressures around sex in society and the lack of people talking about sex.

Obviously not suggesting this program is at all suitable, but more does need to be done, it’s just finding a way to improve sex and relationship education is of course very difficult.

Will a Challenor help Stonewall form their policy?

Great post Chicken you have articulated it so well

I have also just clocked adults who sexually exploit youngsters often get away with it because the victims feel embarrassed or guilty about sex and are therefore reluctant to report it
Rape is not “sex” . Exploited and abused children don’t report it for a multitude of reasons, mostly put in their heads by the abuser. Not because they feel guilty about sex

Yes very much this^

Apologies if my next bit is distressing, it is just that I think these things need talking about much more in order to protect children.

As a women who was sexually abused for many years of my childhood I can say that one of the last things that would have helped is teachers educating me about my desires and pleasure etc.

I don't really want to write the things that here that my abuser would say to me but they would fit right in to the programme that PT is proposing. All the talk about pleasure and desire in children is wrong and harmful, especially to children who are being abused. Even the stuff PT writes about consent seems wrong in the the way it is written in his proposals, mixed in with the stuff about pleasure and desire and explicit teaching. My abuser would often imply to me that I was consenting and that I desired the abuse and rapes.

I didn't speak up about my abuse for many reasons but it wasn't because I thought that sex between two consenting adults was shameful. However rape of children and also incest is shameful, even if it wasn't my shame to carry. Even admitting to what has happened to you, as the abused one, carries stigma.

Other reasons for not speaking up include fear of not being believed, fear of hurting other family members with the truth, fear of appearing stupid or people wondering how I had let this happen to me (even though my earliest memory is from when I was 7).

What I needed and what I think that most other children need are contained within PT's proposals although I do not believe that they are his original ideas, and that is teaching about body parts and the basics of sex and also boundaries. Also what grooming and sexual abuse looks like, alongside how to get help and reassurance that a child will always be believed and that adults can handle the information (the other stuff in PT's proposals would, I think, significantly comprise this information). I can't say that this would have made me speak out but it would have given me the best chance to feel able to.

Obviously as a child matures, they should receive more information, but what I expect negatively impacts on most people's sex lives is either bad past experiences or being in a relationship that is not mutually giving and loving. Tackle that stuff most importantly, especially teach older children and young adults the confidence to express boundaries about sex practices and also about the way they are treated within a relationship. I am sure that if a relationship is good and respectful, then most young adults can enjoy figuring out the different ways to enjoy sex themselves.

I really do find PT's proposals deeply concerning and, as I said, some of them fit all too comfortably with the words of my abuser. I think PT's proposed relationship and sex education will make children much less safe.