to find CBBC's 'Just a Girl' programme re a transgender child inappropriate?

[PatButchersEarring]

..totally prepared to be told I am being U on this one, but...

My 7 year old daughter is currently watching 'Just a Girl' on CBBC. This seems to be a dramatisation about a pre-teen, transgender girl- so born a born, but living as a girl. Also either currently or looking into taking hormone blockers.

AIBU to think this is an inappropriate topic for a young age group?

Too young as 7, cbbc isn't all for younger kids. Older primary then fine as at age 7 they don't really know about how babies are made so trans would be way above their understanding.

For any poster who thinks it's great and tolerant to accept kids who transition at primary school, I'd suggest it's more open-minded to accept that most children play with, or like wearing, things across the gender divide. Accepting child transition normalizes pathology.

My oldest DS is now a hulking great bloke with a shaved head and a gf. Not so very long ago (not in mum years ) you couldn't part him from his baby doll and his pushy. Heaven help me if I'd been fool enough to believe he was "born in the wrong body" when he was small.

Just to clarify my position: I'm with prawn and others of a similar view point here.

Whilst I acknowledge that there are adults who believe themselves to be transgender and I respect that, I don't believe that this is something that should be normalised to children.

Deciding whether or not you need to undergo treatment which will permanently alter your body for anything less than a purely medical reason should be the preserve of those who are of an appropriate age to make such a decision.

id take it as a perfect opportunity to discuss how the theory that a boy can turn into a girl is factually incorrect and why its incorrect (boys/girls biology and how this cannot change etc) and that its fine to wear/act however you want without feeling there is something wrong with you that needs to be labelled.

Thanks for clarifying Pat

is this programme going in for "boy brain" and "girl brain" crap?

It must be awful to feel that you want to cut your genitals off with scissors, but what I don't understand is why do we treat this differently to any other form of self-harm? Why do we say 'that's ok, the dr will cut it off for you' instead of, you obviously feel terrible, let's help you to accept your body the way it is?? I don't get it

CBBC is aimed at 6-12 year olds. Whilst there may be some scheduling decisions about having the programmes targeted to the younger audience at an earlier time, their channel remit is simply 6-12 (unless something has changed while I wasn't looking).

I've talked to my 9 year olds about people being transgender - I'm not sure how it came up but something they commented on triggered the discussion. I wanted them to have the correct language to discuss it and to understand it at an age appropriate level. My 5 year old was there so heard some of it. We also have lots of discussions about gender roles (i.e. not defining activities or colours according to gender).

I haven't watched the programme so can't comment on whether it's appropriate or not, but it's definitely the sort of thing I'd want to watch with them so we could talk about the issues. I think they could find it confusing and certainly would have done at 6 when they were very fluid in their play between stereotypically boy and girl stuff.

I don't mind things that raise issues, but I'm surprised at CBBC commissioning a whole series centred on this. In real life most people let their kids watch CBBC without supervision and this is definitely one which needs a thoughtful and considered discussion.

its not necessarily self harm either. the one time I read about this it was a 3 year old. my 3 year old was quite likely to wave round scissors and I can easily see 3 year old thinking 'my willy sticks out' 'chop' or even just wanting for example to look like their older, perhaps favoured, sister, or the new baby.
anyway, the programme I saw on cbbc didnt talk about that, it was all long hair, dolls and pink ballerina tutus.

I was reading the blog of a ftm woman who has now detransitioned, and due to taking testosterone, she now has vaginal atrophy, which causes her to be incontinent and be dripping urine uncontrollably, all the time
That sort of side effect for a non essential medication is really not an acceptable risk imo. And this is someone who now feels that she was obviously not 'really trans' due to the fact that she has now detransitioned. And this wasn't picked up by her Drs prior to prescribing hormones

Bombardier it was someone on the thread who mentioned cutting generals off. Sorry I should have clarified that

Ha! Not generals. Genitals. My phone must have thought it was being very clever then

cutting generals off sounds like a military coup :)

When I was a teenager I hated my body and cut the parts I didn't like with razor blades. What helped was growing to accept myself, dealing with the depression that made me feel that way about my body, finding other ways to manage my extremely powerful emotions. Being a teenager can be very hard and you can feel engulfed with overwhelming self loathing, hatred and anger. I remember being primary age when I first felt the urge to slice off my 'fat belly'. Thank goodness no one suggested that I get a surgeon to do it for me or told me that my feelings were correct and that my body needed to be altered for me to find peace. Far better that I grew to find peace with myself without mutilating my body. If someone had given me surgery such as liposuction, rhinoplasty etc to correct what I perceived as hideous anomalies that didn't belong on my body then I would have transferred that self hatred onto another aspect of myself. It wouldn't have solved the problems that I had. I am sure that there are of course trans people for whom transition is the best course of action, thoroughly supported by counselling and help. I am very afraid of the narrative that seems to be emerging which tells children that hormones and surgery will solve their problems and that transgenderism is common. My feeling about transitioning young children is that it is harmful and wrong.

Around 80% of boys who do this (identify as girls/say they want to be girls/feel like girls inside etc. during childhood) "desist" (i.e. stop feeling this way) around adolescence. Only around 20% or so end up as transwomen. The other 80% end up simply living as men--usually gay men, though occasionally they can be straight.

Given the basic reality of these statistics, the best tactics for parents whose son is identifying as a girl is to encourage them to explore a range of activities and not shame them for wanting to do traditionally "feminine" things--and then wait to see what happens around puberty.

If parents start rushing to get the kid onto a rapidly moving conveyer belt of "official gender" changing, name changing, puberty blocking, hormones and surgery, you will inevitably end up with quite a lot of confused young people who regret the treatment they have been hurried into.

It's good that reassignment surgery and so on exist for the relatively small number of people who are genuinely and permanently gender dysphoric, but childhood is too early to make the call.

Thank you Tarttlet!

One of my friends at primary school dressed as a boy was assigned female at birth and asked to be referred to by a male name. We all accepted that wholeheartedly. He repeatedly told people he was a boy; he was distressed when people referred to him by his birth assigned sex. What wasn't accepted (from adults and professionals) was the idea that he wanted to transition from female to male. These arguments about it being too early, or about him not knowing his true feelings yet were banded about. Despite his gender presentation being male, from ages 8 onwards he repeatedly mutilated his vagina and then his breasts, and attempted suicide many times because of the way he felt about his body.

It was never just about gender nonconformity. Those arguments are reductive. Gender dichotomy is a different issue, which is also incredibly important. There are some people who will be happy forming their own gender expression. There are others for whom the issue runs much deeper.

Most kids who transition turn out to be accepting of their birth sex in adulthood, so they basically reject their transition and are often just gay

http://winewatcher.tumblr.com/post/149949518044/4thwavenow-i-get-requests-all-the-time-for

Much better to cut off generals than genitals, imo

When I was a child I played football, climbed trees, wore my big brothers old clothes, wrestled, got muddy, was 'bossy' (if I was a boy I'd have been a 'leader'), at one point said I wished I was a boy. I'm sure that was because boys didn't have to wear party dresses and be told they weren't ladylike
... Anyway my point is that children are just children and we need to let them explore themselves and their interests without labelling them. If I was that same child now and I was taken literally then I might have been given hormones and never married my husband and had our lovely baby - the thought of that is horrible. Plus I love being a woman

Any 8 year old who mutilates their vagina needs some serious support and therapy, and quite possibly is the victim of abuse of some kind, I would have thought

The whole concept of gender identity is poisonous shit which is setting feminism back by decades
^^ This
Teaching DCs that there is something wrong with them because they're not following gender stereotypes is incredibly damaging. And don't get me started on prescribing puberty blockers when there hasn't been medical research on their effect on children or adolescents; or ultimately prescribing surgery when the only research on outcomes shows that surgery has no impact on MH outcomes for people who identify as transgender.
It's irresponsible and non-scientific.
I wonder if CBBC would be so quick to broadcast a programme that explained DCs had to stay away from certain countries so they didn't fall off the edge of our flat earth? Or would they demand some kind of intellectual and scientific rigour before commissioning such a programme?

abuse was also my first thought :( I hope the fad for seeing trans everywhere is not being used to cover up sexual abuse as well as emotional abuse