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Original poster

Telegraph: Sex education for three-year-olds in Wales branded 'extreme and unbalanced'

65 replies

ResisterRex · 16/11/2022 06:57

This is an outline of the hearings which seem to have begun. Perhaps most chilling of all, is that children now don't seem to be children, but "learners":

"A Welsh Government spokesman said: "Learners will only learn topics that are appropriate to their age and development."

This is what the barrister for the parents said:

"Paul Diamond, a barrister representing parents, said the RSE code was "the most extreme and unbalanced documents there could be".
"When parents send their children to school they don't expect to have psycho-sexual theories and 'plus issues' taught from the age of three," he said.
"This is the most comprehensive change in the school environment and it places its entire focus on one issue, that of LGBTQ+."

Then this for very young children:

"The RSE code says that from the age of three, lessons should promote "an awareness of how to communicate wants and needs in relationships" and "awareness of how needs relate to rights"."

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/11/15/sex-education-three-year-olds-wales-branded-extreme-unbalanced/

OP posts:
Datun · 16/11/2022 08:30

RoyalCorgi · 16/11/2022 08:25

I've not been able to access the curriculum itself. This is the analysis that Safe Schools Alliance have carried out, but I found it a bit hard to follow:

safeschoolsallianceuk.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/A_Review_of_the_Relationships_and_Sexuality_Education_Curriculum_in_Wales_-_October_2022.pdf

From the link

● The academic approach to the curriculum is that of posthumanism and Queer Theory. This involves reconceptualising, and specifically sexualising, established concepts such as the child. This is part of an “ethico-political project” known as “queering”.
● Children and young people are therefore considered to be sexual beings from birth. Normal healthy development in infancy is reframed as sexually motivated.
● Safeguarding and child protection is identified as an inhibitor to children’s development
● The curriculum code’s “sex positive” approach is grounded in socio-political theory and activism, which endorses criminal sexual activity, including for and among children
● A child’s sense of self is their “gender”
● The posthumanist approach imagines a “post-human” society based upon “assemblage”
theory. This is prioritised over human beings and human characteristics to enable
“inclusivity”
● The erasure and obfuscation of biological sex and the ideological redefinition of associated
terms is essential (aka “queering”). This includes diverging from established legal
definitions, including sex and sexual orientation
● Moral considerations are deemed irrelevant to a “sex positive” curriculum

RoyalCorgi · 16/11/2022 08:25

I've not been able to access the curriculum itself. This is the analysis that Safe Schools Alliance have carried out, but I found it a bit hard to follow:

safeschoolsallianceuk.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/A_Review_of_the_Relationships_and_Sexuality_Education_Curriculum_in_Wales_-_October_2022.pdf

Original poster
ResisterRex · 16/11/2022 08:24

In the context of parents being concerned about something to fundraise and go to court, where it involves 3 year olds, I'd have thought someone might've said

"You know what? Maybe learners is a bit odd here, because no normal member of the public talks this way, maybe we should say children. After all, we are trying to convince the public that there's nothing untoward and we go on to say that these parents are simply misinformed"

Something like that.

Frankly, if the public sector has been saying this for 40 years then they've been doing it on the quiet. Our school - and nursery given this JR captures 3year olds - has never and would never dehumanise children like this.

It's not in Keeping Children Safe In Education, I notice. Maybe it's in the Welsh version then?

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachmentdata/file/1101454/Keepinggchildrensafeeineducationn_2022.pdf

Perhaps, once you get into that mindset, it creates bad outcomes. Local governments have been switching between "service user" and "resident" when it suits (latter usually where you're availing yourself of a service like housing which you've every right to, but the shitty nomenclature they use makes it sound like you're a lazy feckless chancer).

Using language like that removes us from who we are talking about, which seems deliberate.

OP posts:
YomAsalYomBasal · 16/11/2022 08:14

I've not read anything in there that concerns me yet, can you tell us what worries you?
We were using the word "learners" when I was working in schools 20 years ago, that's not new or particularly worrying.

Datun · 16/11/2022 08:01

GrammarTeacher · 16/11/2022 07:56

It isn't controversial. They are learning age appropriate things. This stuff is important. They are not being taught how to have sec etc at the age of 3!
Would you deny them access to books like And Tango Makes Three or Nen and the Lonely Fisherman? There's nothing to worry about here.

Do you have access to the material the parents are concerned about?

GrammarTeacher · 16/11/2022 07:56

It isn't controversial. They are learning age appropriate things. This stuff is important. They are not being taught how to have sec etc at the age of 3!
Would you deny them access to books like And Tango Makes Three or Nen and the Lonely Fisherman? There's nothing to worry about here.

GAH3 · 16/11/2022 07:55

(NB I haven't read the article due to the pay wall )

GAH3 · 16/11/2022 07:54

"an awareness of how to communicate wants and needs in relationships" and "awareness of how needs relate to rights"

Surely that just means "Mary wants to play with Jonny's doll. Jonny does not want to share his doll. Mary is upset, but Jonny has the right not to be scratched in the face by her"?

I don't see what is controversial.

Original poster
ResisterRex · 16/11/2022 07:54

Ah here's one

archive.ph/J1s0S

OP posts:
Original poster
ResisterRex · 16/11/2022 07:52

Datun · 16/11/2022 07:15

Apart from all the dodgy stuff, how can any teaching that includes T in the LGBT, not completely undermine the L, G and B?

It's a nonsense.

Jonathan Moffett KC, representing the Welsh Government, said many of the parents' concerns had been "plagued by inaccurate information".

Well, we'll see won't we.

If the parents had been raising concerns it would seem to be incumbent on the government to provide them with information.

Maybe let's see all the lesson plans out in the open then? Definitely up for that

OP posts:
Original poster
ResisterRex · 16/11/2022 07:51

I can't see it's been archived yet anywhere and the Telegraph doesn't do share tokens. But normally a Twitter search throws up an archive link...not yet though...

OP posts:
PinkFrogss · 16/11/2022 07:50

Do you have a share token, or can you add more specifically what the issue is?

2greenroses · 16/11/2022 07:49

Well, children have been called "learners" for a good 40 years!

Tabasco007 · 16/11/2022 07:47

Is there a share token for this at all?

Datun · 16/11/2022 07:15

Apart from all the dodgy stuff, how can any teaching that includes T in the LGBT, not completely undermine the L, G and B?

It's a nonsense.

Jonathan Moffett KC, representing the Welsh Government, said many of the parents' concerns had been "plagued by inaccurate information".

Well, we'll see won't we.