BBC on gov guidance for schools - points that need to be considered

Yes - take Shereen Benjamin, very experienced early years lecturer who was demoted at her university. She knew full well that gender stereotyping is explored by young children as part of schemas etc and the ideas behind gender ideology are both stupid and dangerous. But she was a heretic.

No idea if any link but @ prof_curiosity1 on twitter regularly writes threads all about children's early development and how gender ideology pathologists normal play and developmental stages into indicators of transexualism.

Another reflection of the situation where the 'old and past it' have been pushed out, yay for new blood -

except this misses that it's the people with life experience, in depth knowledge and years of skills that have been pushed out, and many of them weren't pushed, they jumped because they knew better times first hand, had a lot more understanding of what was going wrong, knew how serious it was, and they couldn't be fooled with nice sounding aspirational fluff as the more innocent can be.

which is a wider problem in teaching where bright eyed 20 somethings with 2 years' teaching experience become SLT

Yep.

Absolutely, she'd attended Stonewalll training and was trying to win an award (aka protection racket) from Equaliteach and had outsourced her thinking to them.

(She has also been promoted way beyond her abilities, which is a wider problem in teaching where bright eyed 20 somethings with 2 years' teaching experience become SLT)

That's horrifying. And a rather grim illustration. This feeding of false information has compromised safeguarding, and it's been done intentionally.

Unfortunately nilsmousehammer the teacher who said that to me was our designated safeguarding lead.

Precisely.

The child very likely would be leaving the school site with a social worker on the way to a foster home before the end of the school day and before social services rang the parents to explain the child was the subject of an emergency order.

It's exceptionally rare and the thresholds are extremely high. Otherwise, yes, if you take action re safeguarding you contact the parents and inform them of it, regardless of how horrible that conversation may be on both sides.

I would like to know how many of those who have trained schools in 'here's what you do re safeguarding in these cases' actually have any safeguarding training. At all. Even the basic level, never mind the repeated and higher level training those in the position of being safeguarding leads advising staff on actions and writing policies have. I suspect the answer could be quite, er, startling.

In any other situation, if the school was so concerned about violence / abuse at home that they felt they couldn't involve the parents, it would be an immediate, urgent referral to social services and looking at having the child removed
This is so true and so well said. I'm saving it for use with my school slt. They tried to justify not telling parents because children weren't necessarily sure yet. To which I responded that if they aren't sure we shouldn't be socially transitioning them in school. They didn't have an answer to that funnily enough.

Thank you. We need parents to be like a dog with a bone over this

@@MrsOvertonsWindow there's no need to do that it was a valid response and it may be the case for many parents, just not in my case.
I also have asd and can take things a bit to literally sometimes. Asd can be helpful sometimes like school situation as I can be a bit like a dog with a bone when I know I'm right 😁

I'm so sorry @Hoardasurass.

I didn't mean to imply any criticism of you in any way. I was clumsily trying to explain the dilemma for several parents that I know who considered and rejected court action. I shouldn't have linked it to your powerful post.
I'll ask MNHQ to delete my comment.

I can vouch for this. My autistic son told his teacher that he watched me hit his older sister. The safeguarding lead rang to tell me we were being referred outside of the school. Never been so terrified of losing my kids. The fact that he makes stuff up and is diagnosed autistic didn't really feature when reporting a safeguarding breach.

It links with the current thread on charities.

It is becoming apparent that followers of queer theory and identity politics are safeguarding trained, but that their beliefs fundamentally conflict with safeguarding.

In those situations, staff are choosing to follow their personal faith in the belief of it holding greater righteousness instead of safeguarding practice and policy.

It is a straight forward question of where is the accountability and consequences for using a position of trust to push personal religion and politics on vulnerable people, particularly children. Bearing in mind that many of those doing it are doing it with good intentions, have been told that they are righteous in the sight of Judith Butler and the kingdom of stonewall shall be theirs, and been fed a lot of false and emotive information so that they would do so with warnings of dire consequences if they didn't.

But we know in a court room, those who did the feeding will shrug and say they can tell schools/nhs/police any old shit and if someone's daft enough to believe them and do what they advise then on their head be it. We've seen that one play out. The inquiry will have to come eventually on how this massive safeguarding disaster was allowed to happen and by what failures of the system that were exploited - much of which will be human goodwill and trust. But for now, what will stop it, is very clear messages to schools and teachers that there are boundaries to their job, and that their own beliefs and politics are set aside in doing their job even when it is a TQ related issue .

And there will need to be consequences. It won't take many for schools and staff to change direction fast.

Yes.

The conditioning has been intense. I can easily see, in my mind's eye, how parents are painted as outdated, bigoted, authoritarian. It's a piece of piss to persuade a teenager. For God sake, it's practically de rigueur for them anyway. What self respecting teenager wouldn't think their parents are old fashioned fuddy-duddies.

It's very clever to weaponise normal adolescent rebellion to alienate children from the very people who are supposed to protect them.

And if this is the case, then the government need to bloody well catch up.

They need to make it crystal clear that transitioning children at school, or any hint of it, is a dereliction of their duties (or whatever the official term would be. I'm struggling with the wording, because I actually want to call it a crime against humanity), and anyone doing will be held 100% legally responsible for any ensuing court case.

Ffs.

What do you mean...Monty is a HUGGGGEEEEE feminist.

Huge I tell you.

@Hoardasurass - it was brilliant what you did, no question however a lot of parents are very scared to push back, with good reason. Safeguarding and the best interests of the child and family surrounding it will look different in each circumstance.

I know a parent whose child who has a disability that leads to severe periods of illness who was left alone in a room when ill so that the school didn't have to mark an absence (due to attendance targets presumably). When the parent challenged this as unsafe and insisted on her child being off school when unwell, the school threatened involving social services. I told her that as a brilliant parent, she had nothing to fear, but she didn't want the stress on her and on her child - stress exacerbated the child's illness; instead she homeschooled for a period and then moved schools. Yes, she could have taken them to court and won but she felt she couldn't cope with that and I think that's why so many parents stay silent. They look at the impact of legal action on the whole family (and its finances often too) and decide that legal action itself may do more harm than good. If access to justice was easier maybe this wouldn't be the case but unfortunately it is.

There are lots of stories on here of parents facing veiled and not so veiled threats - in one case including threat they were committing defamation for pointing out the school had got the Equality Act protected characteristics wrong - when they raise concerns. It is very anti- safeguarding that in so many schools parents are seen as the enemy but this seems to be where we are and it is very concerning.

Excellent points Datun

I was concerned on the BBC news yesterday to see a teacher explain it merely as a conflict between the wishes and feelings of a parent and the wishes and feelings of a child, with the child obviously being the one they are primarily interested in.

This misses the point by miles.

Teachers have absolutely no business actively enabling alienation from parents. The first thing an abuser does is switch the victim's trust and allegiance to them and break down the child's links with other protective relationships. The parental relationship is the primary one for this! The parents live with the child, it is their child, they have invested years in that relationship and protection and care of the child - no employed person who sees the child for a few hours a week has the right to put themselves in the middle of that through some misguided sense of do gooding.

Boundaries need to be urgently re established.

Sexed provision for sexed bodies, sex is a fixed, unchanging fact through life whatever gender choices are made, and it is not kind to children to enable a pretense that things can be otherwise. And if a child presents an additional need or distress requiring something different, then additional to and different from provision should be there. There is no justification for forcing girls to tolerate males in a forced pretense of their being female and making those males an exception from normal safeguarding other than a quasi religious ideology. And it is not the place of schools to be training any one belief in children particularly against the culture, values, faiths and beliefs of children and their families, in the belief that they are superior and their personal beliefs are superior.

Some children will identify as trans. This is fine. But the boundaries are reality and other people's needs, and those cannot be set aside in finding ways to meet those children's wishes and feelings.

Personally I'm enjoying the sight of schools that have stepped way beyond their appropriate sphere realising how vulnerable they are.
Yes, the government should have dealt with this earlier, but it doesn't mean that schools shouldn't have said 'hang on, we'll wait for government advice before we adopt policies that don't involve parents'

Sorry should say threatening to take the school to court (in my case).
I would have taken it all the way if necessary but thankfully I didn't need to

I have to disagree with you here if you had any idea what this teacher put my vulnerable autistic son through you would not say that taking the school and teacher in question to court was not putting my child's welfare first because it absolutely was. He is not trans nor does he believe in a gendered soul yet this teacher insisted that he was both asexual and trans and would not stop trying to force these identities on him just because he is a gender non conforming asd child (with other co-morbidities) who due to his cognitive problems and mental age hadn't yet developed any sexual feelings oh yes he was also 11/12 at the time.
I can assure you that his welfare has and always will be my number 1 priority

And well done @Hoardasurass for being so clear with your child's school. That was so effective.

The reason that no school has yet been dragged through the courts is because furious parents put their child's welfare first rather than drag a school through the courts for actively harming their child and removing parental rights.

That's why the government should have intervened years ago - and why the political capture of the DfE, Ofsted, teacher's unions etc by the adult fetish organisations has been so catastrophic.

That's a really good point.

These people have been manipulated. And are operating on that basis. It's only when they need to really analyse their own actions, that perhaps that manipulation becomes evident to them.

In any other situation, if the school was so concerned about violence / abuse at home that they felt they couldn't involve the parents, it would be an immediate, urgent referral to social services and looking at having the child removed.

Exactly. That's how you know they're unsure of their ground, whilst not realising why. It's the cognitive dissonance at play.

It's a very clever manipulation. Bill transgenderism as an innate misunderstood but profound part of someone's inner soul, etc, and persuade children 'coming out' they are brave, progressive heroes battling prejudice.

Deliberately ensuring the alienation of the very people who are there to protect children.

Because what parent wouldnt be concerned about a vulnerable child being suddenly determined on a course which could easily result in life changing and desperately limiting 'treatment'? It's a completely normal attitude, which should be encouraged!

It's infuriating and frightening that a parent's normal protection of their child has been weaponised to damage that same child.

If 75% of teachers will happily socially transition a pupil and 39% would do it secretly then something has gone terribly wrong.

And as with so much of this, the government are playing catch up. TRAs are constantly trying to get ahead of the curve. And 'guidelines' won't be sufficient.

Consequences need to be spelled out.

Teachers being held personally liable is one way. Is that the legal position, does anyone know?

Because its a very effective counter position to take.

Safe schools alliance are right. The real story is the safeguarding.

The toilets is an issue, but it's easily resolvable, and it's getting there, what with the government intervention.

The same way that the Tavistock case lay the responsibility for administering puberty blockers squarely at the feet of the doctors prescribing them, the consequences for social transition should unequivocally be attributed to those doing it.

And as for Katie Montgomery on Jeremy Vine. Any shred of credibility that Vine may have had in my head, just disappeared. Montgomery is a joke.