It's an AIBU but it belongs here - Stonewall

Why can't those lobby groups do some fucking safeguarding training - everyone else working anywhere near children does. Honestly it's like they think they're somehow exempt or above it

Seems to me that the goals of some of these groups is to breakdown safeguarding, not uphold it. Imo.

Background as a youth worker and doesnt have the first understanding of how to keep children safe

https://www.vogue.co.uk/miss-vogue/article/tanya-compas-interview

You cannot know you are trans at age 12 because being trans is not a thing. You are the sex you are and it just is what it is

Gender dysphoria and trans is a thing. There's always been a tiny percentage of people that have struggled with this. I'm not including the people who don't want to change anything about themselves yet claim the title of woman in that. But It doesn't help young people with those feelings by denying them. It makes it worse.

Online safety is one of the hardest aspects to reinforce through teaching in school. You can cover it every year from Nursery upwards and children always give the right answers in class but being in their bedroom on their phone is a completely different matter.

That form could have been taken straight from an exercise highlighting what sort of information you shouldn't give out to strangers online. Imagine though if an LGBT child stumbles across it from a retweet on Stonewall/Mermaids - that's enough of an endorsement in their eyes to no doubt consider it legit.

Why can't those lobby groups do some fucking safeguarding training - everyone else working anywhere near children does. Honestly it's like they think they're somehow exempt or above it.

Being trans is clearly ‘a thing’.

OMG that form! The woman who set the organisation up has zero understanding of children's safety online.

Intersex as a sexual identity And also what is a non-Black POC person?

Urgh. I joined an online course today and out of about ten intros two claimed to have trans children (one 10yo). I’m sitting on my hands lest I use the phrase vegan cat. I have no idea if I can contain myself in group discussion for fifteen weeks.
Allison is a tour de force and I bloody hope these numpties have the capacity to grasp safeguarding concerns. Whatever the fuck happened to ethics committees? Have they been cancelled?
I’m a district commissioner for girl guides and an adult trainer. I am utterly militant about age group segregation for very real reasons. There has to be a bloody good reason why I mix teen groups, and we have a hard stop at 18. At that point if you want to volunteer with youth we require screening and police checks.
And sure - girls in my 12-14yo group do occasionally come out. It’s a safe space and it’s no big deal. It’s not like we don’t have lesbian leaders.
An entire mixed youth/ adult group solely based on sexuality? Collecting data from children? That’s fucking creepy.

It's v late but I'm wondering if this is something the could be reported to CEOP?

Gladysthesphinx

I'm very naive - this group supported by Mermaids and Stonewall - what do they mean by telling critics to "suck their mums"? My first thought was that it was a seriously gross under-age incestous oral sex reference, but surely even Mermaids would not sink so low as to admit to supporting that, in public at least?
Can anyone enlighten me?

Your first thought was probably correct. There was a thread about this phrase a year ago: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/3666425--Suck-your-mum?

Bergdorf got dumped by the NSPCC for pretty much this.

It's bollocks to say that many youth groups are from 12/13 to 21/25. They aren't. Scouts and Girl Guides are youth groups for those type of ages, but they are strictly divided by age, and there is safeguarding and protections written in to ensure that children and adults don't mix, or if they do in limited circumstances they are separated by age for many activities.

No adult leader in such an organisation would communicate on social media with a child under 16 (18 in some cases) without parental supervision.

No adult stranger should ever look for any personal details from a child under 18 - that includes an email address, a phone number, certainly bank account details, so how children completing these surveys could be paid baffles me. Though that is, quite frankly, the least of my concerns

[quote ArabellaScott]They appear to be asking children from 14 upwards to fill in a form giving name, address and other personal information, plus asking if they can take pictures. This is a pretty straightforward safeguarding issue, I don't think the sexual orientation or identity even has much to do with it.

docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdL-G9RJ6HezFn42JN8MFTMna61foNhAuwI2A9-EPp04qYpPw/viewform[/quote]
No, but when these glaring safeguarding alarm bell situations arise, as they consistently do with these organisations, the potential LGB or T status of the children involved is often invoked as a reason why these alarm bells should be ignored.

Would anyone know what the law relating to surveys etc - obviously GDPR is a consideration but presumably there are other regulations especially for contacting children?

• to be clear, this might be a different form from the one they're currently asking for 12 years plus to fill in, but it's one that the founder is sharing on her instagram.

Safeguarding fail. Honestly, can she not see that Allison is actually trying to help her out, here?

They appear to be asking children from 14 upwards to fill in a form giving name, address and other personal information, plus asking if they can take pictures. This is a pretty straightforward safeguarding issue, I don't think the sexual orientation or identity even has much to do with it.

docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdL-G9RJ6HezFn42JN8MFTMna61foNhAuwI2A9-EPp04qYpPw/viewform

Never ceases to horrifying and astonish that some in the self styled 'LGBT+ community' care so bloody little about the wellbeing and safeguarding of young people who are L, G, B or even T. It's like they are determined to create loopholes specifically to make those particular children more vulnerable. It's infuriating.

I'm very naive - this group supported by Mermaids and Stonewall - what do they mean by telling critics to "suck their mums"? My first thought was that it was a seriously gross under-age incestous oral sex reference, but surely even Mermaids would not sink so low as to admit to supporting that, in public at least?
Can anyone enlighten me?

Yet again, an organisation with a worrying approach to safeguarding proves exactly why we should be worried about their approach to safeguarding!

It will probably come as a surprise to no one that Mermaids and Stonewall have re-tweeted this org.

Joined Twitter June 2020 with no website link, there is an Instagram page but only a link to a google form. I've never heard of them before, not that I would but how would you know they're their legitimate SM pages (fake clone pages crop up all over SM) even if it is a legitimate organisation?

Under 16s should not be giving out personal details online to total strangers. 16-18 is a bit more debatable I suppose (but still less than ideal) but for anyone of school age it's a big safeguarding issue.

We get countless letters from school about online safety that cover exactly this and presumably the pupils get lessons about it in school too. It doesn't matter how a child identifies either or what they consider their sexuality to be.

I find it fairly horrifying that some people seem to think that safeguarding doesn't apply to all children. All 12 year olds are first and foremost children.

What they are doing is telling 12 year old children who are growing into sexual maturity that 20 something men & women are their peers. They are not. It helps facilitate grooming & abuse.

She’s absolutely right. Allison is an absolute legend to keep pushing like this.

Actual reputable, ethical organisations would never push, support or follow anti-safeguarding policies or politics in order to secure funding for themselves.

I have one or two gay friends - mostly male - who say they knew from early on that they were gay. Many other friends who spent a lot of their teens uncertain about their sexuality, and came to varying positions before adulthood.

None of them were asked to state and commit to a firm decision, it made no practical difference if they continued to hold to their original feelings or if their position varied and changed over time as they matured. Certainly none of them were considering making permanent, very seriously life impacting decisions to their body, health, development and reproductive future based on it.