‘Beaten by a girl’. How offensive is this?

[Trainfromredhill]

DS (9) came home in tears from school yesterday having been given the worst punishment the school has (goes on his record)for saying this in a science class to a male classmate after a dexterity experiment in which said classmate was ‘beaten by a girl’. DS still has no idea why he shouldn’t have said it.
I’m a feminist. DH is extremely supportive. If this was said to me I’d feel triumphant. I’m struggling with the harshness of the punishment and that DS obviously hasn’t been given an age appropriate explanation. Thoughts?

Very offensive. I stopped allowing Cbbc for my kids after hearing this phrase on one of their challenge/ game shows!

How can you not see how offensive this is?

If your DS laughed "ha ha, you were beaten by a girl" - very offensive, because of the underlying assumption that girls are weaker than boys.

If your DS simply made the observation "oh, you were beaten by a girl" - still very offensive for the same reason.

Does your DS really not understand this? You need to explain it to him.

You're no feminist if you are OK with this, or don't understand why he shouldn't have said it OP.

Maybe you should give him an age appropriate explanation of why he shouldn't have said it. I'm surprised you haven't already.

I love the way things get assumed on MN. Of course DH and I have explained it. But at the point of telling me what had happened he had no idea.
you’ve all made your point- thank you. I will reflect and bow out now.

Then why did you say that he ‘still’ doesn’t have idea and have to ask why it’s offensive?

How can he still not know after 3 people explained it?

Sounds like he may have just decided everyone is wrong and using ‘I don’t understand’ as a cop out.

My son would have known why it was wrong at that age.
The fact he didn’t means he has never had equality instilled into him from a young age

Nothing has been assumed. You say he still doesn't understand it. So perhaps the school did explain it to him, as have you, but you need to consider a different way of explaining. Although, he is 9, it shouldn't be too hard to explain.

Of course DH and I have explained it.

there's no "of course" about it. At no point did you say you'd explained it but you did say it hadn't been explained in an "age appropriate" way and that he still didn't understand.

Then you need to explain it to him.

DS still has no idea why he shouldn’t have said it.

So why have you changed your mind halfway through the thread to say he does after you and DH explained it?

Please don't raise your son to believe boys should be better than girls by virtue of their sex . I am glad the school is being strict about such misogyny at a young age. Hopefully it will lead to a better society going forward of this is the approach that schools take.

9 years old?

Of course he knows it was an insult, because that is precisely why he said it!

Awful.

Well done that school.

Sorry to the future wife - yet another golden boy being brought up.

He should have been corrected by the teacher and taught why it’s wrong, but kids say silly stuff they pick up all the time - usually from other people older than themselves. Putting it on his record ffs? Ridiculous. And “being a girl” is not some sensitive tiny minority group equivalent to, say, being the only black or Asian kid in a class of white kids, or being the only openly gay kid in a class of straight kids. Both girls and boys will make jokes about each other based on their sex all the time. As long as there’s no spite or violence involved it’s actually pretty natural. The boy was wrong to make his comment, but ridiculously OTT reaction by the school by the sounds of it.

Easy explanation: he came home in tears. What if his dad had said "Oh don't be so pathetic, stop crying like a girl"? Talk about how that might have felt and how that fosters shitty misogynist contemptuous attitudes in society.

Poor kid . Hes 9 years old. There had always been competition between girls and boys.
I was at primary school in the late 60s and we were quite capable of fighting our own battles thankyou.
Stop treating us like weak individuals who need protection from a 9 year old boy who said something "offensive " we dont

To be honest, I think it is now over to you to help him to understand why blatant sexism isn't okay. This is a good learning opportunity and I think it is good that the school has a zero tolerance policy on sexism. This is where it starts and enabling the behaviour will make it worse.

It's not about treating us as "weak individuals" it is about stopping people using female as an insult.

I cannot see any reason for this harsh punishment. This was a learning opportunity - the teacher could have examined with the class why anyone might say this and the message it sends. To treat it as a punishable offence is appalling!

It was also an opportunity to examine the science - does research show different speeds of developing dexterity between boys and girls? The pupils could have looked this up and learned.

The teacher is no good.

He could have just been saying it as a statement of fact, unaware of the sexist connotations.

Actually. In many types of sport boys are better than girls if you see speed and strength as the hallmark of what constitutes best.

It's a biological fact. It's why there's so much furor (rightly) about transwoman competing against woman.

So if a male is beaten by a female it is unusual. Kids will see this. I doubt at 9yo they realise the biology of puberty affecting it and at 9 it hasn't quite set in yet.

But between the ages of 9-12 girls are often "better" at sport than boys.

By 14 boys are generally stronger and faster as they've had their testosterone increase which affects how their bodies work.

I'd have thought this was an ideal time to have a really good talk with pupils and a discussion.

I don't think the comments as such are 100% nice and can be used as an insult and a small consequence could be necessary dependent on context.

But really harsh punishment without any explanation or context or discussion or even understanding of why it's not ok do nothing
to teach someone. It seeks to silence them.

And I'm actually not bothered with this type of comment being bourne from misogyny. It never harms for males to realise woman can be just as good or better than them and to comment out loud on it. The more they realise it the better imo!

And I'm actually not bothered with this type of comment being bourne from misogyny. It never harms for males to realise woman can be just as good or better than them and to comment out loud on it. The more they realise it the better imo!

But that’s not the connection, imo. It isn’t ‘wow that girl is so good at xyz I didn’t realise girls can be better at that: lesson learned for me’

its ‘oh my god X boy was beaten by a girl, so X must be really bad at that’

But it wasn't sport it was science?

I’m guessing they did explain it but he was too busy being upset he was getting a bollocking to take it in.

So just explain it to him, in simple but sharp terms, and tell him the school was right. He’s a bit old at 9 not to understand this, especially if you / DH are feminists.

You are being a bit of a precious mummie, knock it off.

@itsgettingweird

It was a science class you plonker

Isn't it all about context? If he said it in misogynic way, he deserves it?