A boy in dd’s Guides Unit

You may not be able to ask about the gender if this person from the leader but you certainly have a right to ask about toileting facilities. It they didn’t have single sex toilets for use by biological girls I’d be removing her.

Yes of course i see that. I don't for one moment think (and have certainly not suggested) that OP tell her daughter that she is wrong.

I also don't think she should assume that she is wrong.

I do think, and have stated, that there is more than one possible explanation, and that it makes no sense for anyone who has not met this child (OP included) to be coming to any particular conclusion or decision at this stage. Let the daughter get to know the other Guides and see what unfolds, if it is an issue.

Oh definitely, it's worth finding out. The problem is, asking may not produce any kind of useful information.

Yes, it's entirely possible that a short haired girl could be mistaken for a boy, by a child who is only glimpsing at external stereotypes.

Especially, in this day and age when short hair on girls seems to be fairly uncommon.

Why are you so bothered by this though?

I don’t understand why this is such a hard concept to grasp. If I send any of my DDs to anywhere, I want to know who is there. If I send my DDs to a place that is only meant to have group A and instead it’s group A and B mixed together I would want to know why I was misled. For example if a party is for our school members only, but it turns out anyone from other schools can attend it changes the dynamic. I would want to know why and why I wasn’t informed.

At the pointy end of this, for the welfare of my DDs, if something is supposed to be single sex - female - and there is a male there this does two things. It changes the dynamic, which may negate the whole reason my DDs are attending in the first place; they want to be with just females. And second, it raises a safeguarding concern.

This is not a reflection on the nature, good or bad, of the male there. But it means my DDs might be placed in a situation where they are alone with a male they don’t know. The teachers/leaders might be placing children of both sexes in situations that may not be appropriate (without being nefarious), so the leaders need to know what they are going to do in that situation and be able to relay it to me. This protects everyone: my DDs, them, and the male.

But a lack of open communication of such a situation would lead me to think they haven’t even thought about such issues, don’t have safeguarding policy and/or would think I am not entitled to have any say about their approach to supervising my DDs. I will not be lied to or gaslit into thinking everything is fine in this scenario because experience tells me that these organisations do not place the feelings or welfare of mine or anyone else’s DDs at the forefront, but do the males.

It doesn’t matter how minor it is, how small a thing it is, how it may be perceived that the thing they’re doing in this mixed sex group doesn’t pose a threat as far as they can see, I still want to know.

If I could confidently think that the world has the back of my DDs to do what’s right, then maybe I wouldn’t be “so bothered” but it’s highly likely their needs will be put last.

And finally by getting worked up over what might be a small thing to some people I am setting an example to my DDs that if you’re promised something as a right, it’s taken away from you, and then people pretend it isn’t happening (“that’s not a boy, silly!”), then let’s stand together and make a fuss about it and not just accept it meekly and let these people get away with it.

So I imagine that’s why the OP is bothered.

”Natal female people lose opportunities to give natal male people more variety and choice over theirs, even though other mixed sex provisions were available to them.”
RedAppleWreath

Women’s worlds get smaller, men’s get bigger.

I'd mind my own business.

When your daughter has been going there a little longer, no doubt she and you will be better informed.

I also don't think she should assume that she is wrong.

I do think, and have stated, that there is more than one possible explanation, and that it makes no sense for anyone who has not met this child (OP included) to be coming to any particular conclusion or decision at this stage. Let the daughter get to know the other Guides and see what unfolds, if it is an issue.

@MrsFin eh? I was a guide we never had showers together or dressed together...we did activities together but I never saw anyone even semi-naked?

The problem with that is you actually have to have some kind of coherent argument to put forward.

And as we all know...

I was away for more than a week, Datun, and really noticed when I came back to the board that something had changed.

Yesterday's thread 'Letter to the PM' if you can find it, looked like a calculated way to set MNetters up as right-wing Christian bigots. I didn't recognise the names who said they'd signed it without, apparently, reading it and applying their brains. The woman who wrote the letter is a right-wing Christian who says the Bible says that sex outside marriage (and she means heterosexual marriage) is a sin. And apparently a load of MNetters signed it...

Loads of girls go to Scouts and Cubs. You're not allowed to run exclusively "girl" or "boy" clubs anymore as it's discrimination. It probably is a boy.

Actually, yes you are.

Because my dd thought it was a boy and guides is for girls

Ha ha ha!

Guides is "for anyone who identifies as a girl or woman" these days. It's one of the reasons I left Guiding after volunteering for nearly 20 years.

Good luck with the sleeping/dressing/showering arrangements on residentials OP.

Or it's about teaching your children tolerance and to celebrate difference

You can do this whilst still practising safeguarding appropriate for mixed sex situations, as Scouts do. Which means being honest with parents.

Or it's about teaching your children tolerance and to celebrate difference......

Haha! The difference that they're not allowed to acknowledge!

Although it's a nuisance, it's the tried and trusted method of making everyone become gender critical.

I would say a good 80 or 90% of people who understand the issues, were brought to that understanding by watching TRAs fail to make their argument, rather than listening to women in the first place. Such is the way of the world. But fortunately, in this respect, it works in our favour.

My DD went up to guides when she turned 10. A couple of weeks in, I noticed a boy going in. I assumed an older brother/leader’s son. But when he came out at the end, without a jacket on, he was wearing a guide top and was picked up by a parent.

I asked DD. She had been confused by this child, she also thought it was a boy but they used a girl’s name.

She eventually dropped back down to Brownies as she didn’t really enjoy it (at 10 she was the youngest by some way and couldn’t socially bridge the gap to secondary school kids) and there didn’t seem to be other brownies from her pack there.

When she went back up to Guides we chose a different evening, and found a fair proportion of other former brownies from her pack there. Appears to me that other parents knew and deliberately didn’t send their child on the same evening as brownies. I imagine the mixed sex pack will wither as other parents make the same choice (it was already run by a temporary leader).

Guiding has truly lost its way on this one, and my two go only because they love it, but the gaslighting that it is a single sex organisation is unbelievable.

Children who identify as trans need support and understanding, but neither they nor other children should be lied to about whether humans can change sex and whether single sex (not single gender) services are important.

OP, the first two responses to you post are from a very vocal trans supporter and someone who appears to have joined MN yesterday. Lots of other people on here telling you to chill, it's not a problem are names I don't recognise — and I've only been posting here for a year or so.

There are some strange things going on on this board. Yesterday about 20 people had signed a letter from a clearly right-wing, Christian and very probably homophobic organisation.

Seems to me that since MNHQ separated Sex and Gender from the rest of feminism, there seems to have been an outbreak of new posters telling feminists that they're not seeing what they're seeing...

I would tread carefully. I am a Brownie leader and we had a girl who said she was a boy. She has a complicated family set up.

Are you implying that children who are trans or non binary have complicated family set ups? WTF?

Why are you so bothered by this though?

Guides is not for girls. Girls can join scouts, boys can join guides.

Get over it and do nothing.

But your dd is there?

Not at the OP's suggestion though.

@Fruityfriday
The scouts safeguarding policy is written for a mix sex cohort.

The guiding safeguarding is based on single sex and never updated to reflect they are gender based now. Their safeguarding policy is a joke.

That's why it's okay for scouts to be mixed and not guides