Stonewall protest, July 5th

The Stonewall education conference that we are protesting outside of on Friday will have hundreds of delegates who are teachers in primary and secondary and we think it's really important to give these people the other side of the story that they are being told that day. It's such a great opportunity to meet this highly targeted (by Stonewall) group.

I don't care if it's just a few of us giving information to these people but it would be even better if there was a large group of us. The head of Ofsted is a keynote speaker ffs.

I know not everyone can make it but I have booked the day off work and arranged childcare because I think it is so important.

I'm not well enough to go... but thank you to those of you who do go! I am about to tackle my children's primary school and find out what their position is... and hopefully flag up that they may well have a problem if they don't make sure their plans line up with the EA etc.

I believe the general idea is that people turn up to protest against Stonewall's stance on transing children and the wider effects of their 'inclusive' guidance and training to schools and other orgs that work with children and young people. And the vast amount of public money they spend doing this, and the vast amount of private money they make doing this.

Please come and give your voice to this pushback, where we say no to indoctrinating our children, no to putting girls last, no to endorsing this harm.

That's a simple enough message, isn't it?

Come along, bring your own placard/leaflets/stickers/badges if you prefer, edited to your own specifications, carrying your own personalised message and in your preferred font. Or just turn up willing to talk to people about what you think is wrong with Stonewall and their interference with children's development and wellbeing.

Useful background reading here:

www.transgendertrend.com/back-to-school-with-stonewall/

Background on Stonewall's obscene financial clout here:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3488261-The-Financial-Juggernaut-that-is-Stonewall

There are all sorts of angles that could be taken and many different messages that need to be communicated so please join in if you can.

For the record, just in case someone with editing authority is reading this, the reason I don't like the info sheet is that it starts very confusingly for anyone who is not aware of the various organisations or what they stand for; with a negative statement about "what Stonewall says" about Transgender Trend. It doesn't matter what Stonewall says about TT: just define the problem and clarify what needs to be done.
A person new to all this might easily think that TT is really producing a "dangerous" resource pack, if they don't (yet) know what TT is or what they stand for.

"That’s why the ‘schools resource pack’ produced by Transgender Trend this week is so dangerous. Masquerading as professional, ‘evidence-based’ advice for schools on how to ‘support trans and gender nonconforming young people’, the pack in fact provides the reverse.

But -- it's just me.

I didn't too much like the way the actual brochure is written; it doesn't get to the point strongly enough or early enough. If it were me I'd edit it, move things around. But it's not me, so....

The video's content was good but I didn't like the format, writing as you read as I read quickly and get very impatient with such videos! I'd prefer the writing to be in normal font, the whole text on each page visible from the start, but left for a while so slower readers have time to read and fast readers have time to absorb the message. But that's just me.

It will be great to see both of you, Venice and Pencils!

Me!

Who is coming on Friday? I will be there!

Thank you very much for that link, MoleSmokes. They look very suitable. And not too expensive too. I'm going down the local camping shop tomorrow but those sticks look handy.

@PrawnofthePatriarchy would one of these Walking Stick Seats be any use? I use the simple one that folds up into the triangular carrying pouch

www.completecareshop.co.uk/walking-sticks/walking-stick-seats/

Yes, it would, EmpressLesbianInChair. I suppose I could find a light picnic chair and carry it on my back. I'll explore the options.

But I can get there later. How long is it expected to go on for?

I don’t know, but the last one involved standing for a long time. Would that be a problem?

I haven't seen the video you made, placemats.

What I didn't like about the video was

A. The music.
B. The teacher was female.
C. It had the smack of victim blaming.

I won't be able to get to London for an 8.30 start. I have mobility problems and can't travel when I won't get a seat.

But I can get there later. How long is it expected to go on for?

I don't know any trans people who would support doping kids like this.

How many trans people do you know who support Mermaids? They’re pushing for both drugs & genital surgery for children.

I will see if DH can do school run so I can come along.

I am also with Posie's aims 100% which is why I shall be at County Hall next week. I dearly hope to see some of you there.

Posie’s tactics are essential in all this because we need a mix of messages to reach different people, and the questions in this video are great. Many teachers will feel deeply uncomfortable with what they are being asked to do. Important questions to ask.

But there is more to say if Posie is looking to persuade teachers who are committed enough to be at a Stonewall event.

Posie is a brilliant, empathetic, witty, to-the-point video presenter, I think she could film something in her car in 5 minutes that could supplement this video and make the overall message better understood.

This video relates to issues to be protested at an event about LGBT teaching in schools from Stonewall. Many people still think Stonewall is the LGB-supporting charity that it used to be. Many of those people don’t understand the solidarity that gender critical women (regardless of their sexual orientation or gender conformity or not) have with lesbian women and transmen, who are being horrendously gaslit by this male sexual rights movement. Because this agenda is a common threat across all women.

A key problem with this video is that it doesn’t mention the concerns there are for lesbian and gay kids (and adults!) and what we know about the TRA agenda’s existential threat to the right to same-sex attraction. Transing away the gay.

The video doesn’t mention the disgusting pressure on lesbians around the ‘cotton ceiling’, being pressured to accept sex with men if those men identify as women, doesn’t mention the complete takeover of youth groups and LGB organisations by this dogma leaving lesbian, gay and bisexual kids very little space to find support.

Lesbians out on the scene are being made unwelcome in their own spaces and are becoming made synonymous with ‘TERF’ in an increasingly violent rhetoric against TERFs online and in real life. Also crucially for school teachers to understand- detransitioned young people are being marginalised and socially excluded because they have deviated from the narrative.

What support is Stonewall advocating for, for them in schools? Do teachers feel free to ask about that, if not why not?. I think this politics is extremism and don’t schools have statutory duties around that?

It would be good also to advocate for more NHS spending on mental health support for kids and teens being needed who are already experiencing distress around ‘gender’ whatever the complex roots of that are (internalised misogyny, homophobia, anxieties about growing up, rejection of being constantly sexually objectified as an adolescent, pressure around personal appearance from porn imagery and many many other issues.) not to mention for those who detransition.

Finally Posie has been accused of taking funding from American pro life groups, the far right and whoever else and this particular video doesn’t say where it’s funded from. For some people that will be reason to dismiss it. The creepy music, American-looking school bus and clock tower school imagery, and silly spidery writing don’t help.

I am with Posie’s aims 100%, I massively admire the time and energy she is giving to this and I think the protest will be great, I just hope she will follow up with further videos. I would particularly like to see her and Julia Long co-present a video about lesbians and this agenda in time for the protest.

The video clip was odd, I agree.

It would have been better with audio for people who struggled to read the text or who couldn’t read it quickly enough.

Still a desperately needed conversation though and I say that as a DSL in a primary school who discovered on a training course that Mermaids have already been in to at least one of our schools to “train” the staff.

Ok, that's good to hear the positive comments, it must just be me then! Happy to stand corrected. I usually like the direct style of PP, I think I was mainly creeped out by the music!

I think this bit will hit a lot of people who have been there smack between the eyes and will have a lasting impact.

With some of the later "slides" that are completely unqualified by "most" or "some" etc. I thought at first it was pushing it a bit far but it's a clever way to provoke a response that asks for a more reasoned, factual answer.

"You can't say all children blah blah blah!"

"No - but how do we know which children and X% . . . etc."

I liked the video too. Hope I don't get labelled a pedant but in the slide that starts with "worst still" shouldn't it read "worse still" or do I need to go back to school? I think it asks quite a few very pertinent questions.

I do value the calm and measured approach of other campaign groups but PP's message conveys my own anger tinged with a touch of couldn't give a fuck militancy. It always seems to be a woman's job to, compromise, be a mature negotiator and find compromise in difficult circumstances; sometimes my only response to some of this madness is none of those thing and I'm just thinking, "oh do fuck off and stop irritating me".

I liked the video. It was different and needs to be to stand out and be memorable. Something more 'matter of fact and down to earth' would too easily blend in to all the other matter of fact and down to earth info we read every day and be forgotten.

London is a long way from where I live but I'd be up for a day trip to support this.