Teacher upset with my child questioning about trans child

I'll say it again: @Lacksie you would fall at the first hurdle during a selection process to work with children in education. You would be asked a range of questions at the beginning of the process about your understanding of KCSIE and how you would follow and implement the guidelines, usually by being given a set of scenarios to ascertain how you would react.

Your views are in complete opposition to the legal and statutory guidelines set out to protect children.

You would not be cleared from a safeguarding perspective to work with children in an educational setting.

Thank God.

But almost everyone does have a gender identity. Gender identity is simply the brain's awareness and recognition of oneself as being a particular sex. Almost all children develop this understanding very early, typically by around three or four years of age, and it becomes more stable over time.

There may be particular developmental or neurological circumstances in which this understanding isn't acquired in the usual way, but that certainly isn't the norm.

The idea that "gender identity" is some false ideology promoted by trans activists rests on a fundamental misunderstanding of what gender identity actually is.

But you can't simply point to an entirely different hypothetical and use it to dismiss a recognised clinical phenomenon.

Gender incongruence and racial identity are different phenomena, with different developmental, psychological and social dimensions. Why would you assume they must operate in the same way or be understood in the same terms?

Gender incongruence needs to be understood on its own terms, informed by the relevant clinical and developmental evidence, not dismissed through remote hypotheticals. You can't simply invent a superficially similar scenario — one that isn't even an established clinical phenomenon — and assume it has the same underlying mechanisms or implications. That's not a scientifically meaningful comparison.

No. That is your belief that everyone has a gender identity. You have no evidence that gender identities exist in any way other than philosophical belief.

You are again making authoritative statements and you cannot support that with anything other than incoherent explanations further needing belief to support.

But almost everyone does have a gender identity. Gender identity is simply the brain's awareness and recognition of oneself as being a particular sex. Almost all children develop this understanding very early, typically by around three or four years of age, and it becomes more stable over time.

There may be particular developmental or neurological circumstances in which this understanding isn't acquired in the usual way, but that certainly isn't the norm.

The idea that "gender identity" is some false ideology promoted by trans activists rests on a fundamental misunderstanding of what gender identity actually is.

Legal and statutory guidance once restricted the discussion of homosexuality in schools too, supposedly to protect children from harmful influences. That didn't make the underlying assumptions scientifically valid, or the policy a triumph of safeguarding, did it?

So forgive me if I don't regard the existence of current government guidance as conclusive evidence of what is scientifically true, psychologically harmful or in children's best interests. I see it as reflecting a political climate that is increasingly hostile to recognising and understanding trans people's experiences.

The "evidence" is that almost all people are aware of themselves as being either male or female, and this awareness develops reliably around the ages of 3 and 4 and becomes increasing stable with time. We know this because we can ask children and they can talk to us.

This is what gender identity is. I have a gender identity because I recognise myself to be a female person. That's it. The end.

What is it that you find "incoherent" here?

But you can't simply point to an entirely different hypothetical and use it to dismiss a recognised clinical phenomenon.

Gender incongruence and racial identity are different phenomena, with different developmental, psychological and social dimensions. Why would you assume they must operate in the same way or be understood in the same terms?

Gender incongruence needs to be understood on its own terms, informed by the relevant clinical and developmental evidence, not dismissed through remote hypotheticals. You can't simply invent a superficially similar scenario — one that isn't even an established clinical phenomenon — and assume it has the same underlying mechanisms or implications. That's not a scientifically meaningful comparison.

The "evidence" is that almost all people are aware of themselves as being either male or female, and this awareness develops reliably around the ages of 3 and 4 and becomes increasing stable with time. We know this because we can ask children and they can talk to us.

This is what gender identity is. I have a gender identity because I recognise myself to be a female person. That's it. The end.

What is it that you find "incoherent" here?

"Gender identity" used to be used in child development as a synonym for sex identity, meaning that a child understood they have a sex and that it can't be changed.

The pomo version that it means you can identify as the opposite sex is nonsense.

Yes. A child understands they have a sex and that their sex can't be changed.

A boy having a gender identity of a girl is impossible.

But gender identity is sex identity. It refers to a person's recognition of themselves as male or female. That's precisely what the concept describes.

A list of contributors to KCSIE:

The DfE's Teacher Regulation, School Safeguarding and Safety Team along with policy experts across Westminster.

School Leaders & Education Staff: Headteachers, teachers, Designated Safeguarding Leads (DSLs), and deputy DSLs.

School Governance Bodies: Governing bodies of maintained schools, academy trust proprietors, independent school owners, and management committees of Pupil Referral Units (PRUs).

Local Government & Social Care: Local authority children’s services, social workers, and multi-agency safeguarding practitioners.

Professional Unions & Trade Bodies: Teaching unions (such as the NEU or NASUWT) and supply staff agencies.

National Safeguarding Bodies & Charities: Independent advisory panels (like the Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel) and national children's charities like the NSPCC.

I could go on.

But of course, these are not informed voices who have children's best interests at heart.

You are fucking terrifying.

But gender identity is sex identity. It refers to a person's recognition of themselves as male or female. That's precisely what the concept describes.

It is a lie and the convoluted word salad required to explain why the obvious lie is not a lie and why empirically provable material reality is not material reality is developmentally inappropriate for the children expected to understand it. Educated adults don't accept the 'explanations' even when they have the capcity to understand the drivel being spouted. Doubling down and trying to force those children to believe or pretend to believe something they can't understand - that's emotional abuse according to the definition in KCSIE.

And people can't change sex. So it's not possible to have an opposite sex 'sex identity'. Is that really so hard to understand?

A boy having a gender identity of a girl is impossible.

Why do you keep repeating this when it's (a) contradicted by empirical evidence and (b) not supported by what we know from neuroscience?

I've explained both points repeatedly. Can you explain what scientific basis you have for declaring the phenomenon impossible, rather than simply restating your assertion?

A boy having a gender identity of a girl is impossible.

Why do you keep repeating this when it's (a) contradicted by empirical evidence and (b) not supported by what we know from neuroscience?

I've explained both points repeatedly. Can you explain what scientific basis you have for declaring the phenomenon impossible, rather than simply restating your assertion?

What has "changing sex" got to do with it? I've repeatedly explained that our physical anatomy and our neurological experience of our anatomy don't necessarily correspond. Are you denying that neuroscientific research?

If not, why do you keep insisting that sex identity must follow directly and inevitably from physical sex characteristics? One concerns the anatomy and physiology of the body; the other concerns how the brain recognises and experiences the body in relation to sex.

What has "changing sex" got to do with it? I've repeatedly explained that our physical anatomy and our neurological experience of our anatomy don't necessarily correspond. Are you denying that neuroscientific research?

If not, why do you keep insisting that sex identity must follow directly and inevitably from physical sex characteristics? One concerns the anatomy and physiology of the body; the other concerns how the brain recognises and experiences the body in relation to sex.

'Sex identity' means recognising what sex body you have and that your sex can't be changed.

Since sex can't be changed, it's obvious that a sex identity has to be the same as the actual sex of the body.

Some people have neurological disorders like thinking one of their limbs doesn't belong to them or thinking they are the opposite sex. But these are disorders which don't change biological facts.

Since sex can't be changed, it's obvious that a sex identity has to be the same as the actual sex of the body.

Ok well this is just a fundamental misunderstanding of how the brain works. We've discussed numerous well-established neurological phenomena that demonstrate that the body, and how the brain neurocognitively represents the body are two separate things, and don't always correspond.