To not want a stranger asking my daughter if she thinks she's a boy

[moonmaker]

Really cross about this
My daughter is at an all girls secondary
She said they had an lgbt workshop at school yesterday but it was predominantly about gender identity .
Some of the things said were :
Are you sure you're a girl ?and why do you think you're a girl ?
You have a choice , you can choose to be male
Don't worry about your religion getting in the way , you can b x religion and trans
A good percentage of you , statistically speaking , are going to be trans
Being a boy / girl is a 'feeling ' so you can change

Am very unhappy about this. Why should 12 year old girls be forced to speak with a stranger about their sexual identity and orientation ? In dds words 'it was like he was forcing us to admit we are trans' 'I had to go along with it or get a detention'
Would it be acceptable for adults to be made to speak with someone they don't know or trust about something like this ?
I believe it's dangerous telling girls they can be men if they want to . And irresponsible .
We're supposed to be telling our young women that they can do anything as women, pursue whatever interests, hobbies or career and that makes them no less a woman . Wtf is going on ?
I want to call school today and discuss this . What should I say ?

Bertrand why does the name of the organisation matter so much to you ?

Thanks caribou. Will send you a message. It rang alarm bells for me too safeguarding wise .

The name of the organization matters because you can look at their website and resources and find out exactly what they offer. Then you will know whether what your dd got from the workshop. Is what she was supposed to get from it, or whether she misunderstood/they went off script. How can you take it forward at all without that information?

pork
Things like long hair, make up etc aren’t necessarily female attributes but unless you wouldn’t bat an eyelid at a male identifying man going about his business in a full face of make up with bum length hair (and I expect that would induce a fit of vapours in many on this thread) you have to accept that at the present time these features are more associated with women. If more women have cropped hair, wear no make up, have equal access to male dominated careers etc than what is seen as female and male would change.

I am embarrassed for you with this comment. Most people who grew up in the 60s, 70s and 80s would hardly have a fit of the vapours over what was normal in the mainstream pop culture. As for Rocky Horror nights you could guarantee most of the blokes were wearing more makeup than the women. As for long hair on men that is partially dependent on culture as well. Would anyone be surprised at a Sikh or Rastafarian man with long hair?

To clarify what I wrote earlier - as this is a Y7 or y8 workshop, in an all girls school, I would in the first instance expect something that needs delicate handling initially (remember many of the girls may not yet have started their periods, may not be well in the swirl of hormones that puberty delivers, may not yet really have started to think about sex or boyfriends/girlfriends/etc, and one would hope that very few of them, if any, had actually had sex, so for many it will be at a point where sex and relationships are still abstract conceptual things).

If it was an LGBT session and the only LGBT session being run in the year amongst other PSHE (sorry, can't remember exact title) sessions, then I would expect it to spend much longer on the basics, and to spend much longer on the LGB part rather than the T part as statistically you would expect that to be relevant to many more people there given the proportion of LGB vs T in the general population.

I would expect the topic to be covered again as the dc progress through the school and as you can explore the ideas in more depth as the dc get older and more able to deal with the discussion. But initially I would expect one of the younger friendlier nicer accessible female members of staff to run the workshop, certainly not an external person that came from a biased pressure group.

Workshops with role models from particular communities is great - but probably not until about y9 or above.

And if any child is in a workshop and feels uncomfortable in the way that your dd did, they need to be able to leave and talk to a sensible adult to raise the safeguarding issue at the time. If children who are normal, sensible, active participants in class (as opposed to troublesome kids that do anything to disrupt - big sweeping generalisations I know) are worried about participating for fear of being punished for asking perfectly reasonable sensible questions then that's terrible. And as I said before - making everybody say the gender they identify as at any age - let alone at such a young age - and then writing it up on the board is a dreadful thing to do.

I really hope that you have success making the school understand quite how appalling this is and what a failure of their safeguarding processes (not to mention the trust that parents and pupils put in it) it is. And I hope that the Easter holidays don't get in the way so that the complaint is lost - and that they manage to do something to rectify the situation...

@PorkFlute Things like long hair, make up etc aren’t necessarily female attributes but unless you wouldn’t bat an eyelid at a male identifying man going about his business in a full face of make up with bum length hair (and I expect that would induce a fit of vapours in many on this thread)

Feminists would absolutely not bat any eyelids to this. If men want to wear lippy, have long hair, or can-can through Soho wrapped in feather boas, bloody go for it. But that does not make them women.

Women (and men and many trans people) opposing the current trans agenda do so because both sexes should be able to look, dress and behave however they wish to without claiming to be the opposite biological sex.

The trans ideology reinforces ridiculous sex-based stereotypes and suggests people are born in the wrong body.

Why is the body the problem? And not societal expectations?

Many women opposing the trans ideology have the cropped hair and no make-up look you describe.

Since when were feminists the oppressive class as the trans ideology would have you believe, doesn’t it make you consider that the concerns do not come from a place of bigotry?

You come across as well-meaning but woefully uniformed in this debate. Read some of the threads on the feminist board. (I suspect you will not as remaining in your safety bubble the more comfortable place to be – I was there once too).

@facsicle What are you asking?

what determines whether somebody is gay or not? What decides a person's sexual orientation? How can you tell a person's orientation?

What determines whether someone is hat is whether they feel sexually attracted to the same sex.

What decides that i.e. cause - as far as I’m aware there are no definitive studies to tell us.

Are you asking if it’s nature or nurture? If so, why?

As to how you tell a person’s orientation, they tell you if they feel comfortable sharing that information. Unless you happen upon them in a compromising situation with another person, you can’t ‘tell’. But no one should be asking a child.

Talking about other cultures and past sub cultures doesn’t change the fact that in uk society today make up wearing and long hair is by far more associated with women.

Going into an all girls schools and asking the girls if they are girls or not seems a really peculiar activity. It's a girls school so they are all girls pretty much by default. I wonder how they framed the question in such a way that any of them considered saying they were actually boys or what other options they were provided with.

I'd be really unhappy with this. My children's school did a session on acceptance and bullying at a similar age with a focus on homophobia but it didn't at any point ask any of the children to publicly state their sexual orientation. Pushing children to out themselves seems very wrong to me and is utterly unnecessary.

"Learning about trans people isn’t going to turn people trans mo more than learning about homosexuality turns people gay."

I disagree strongly.

Whether a person is sexually attracted to their own biological sex is pretty much fixed by the time they are born (or, a few weeks old, rather), and seems to be a mixture of genetic and prenatal factors.

Conversely, whether gender non-conforming people decide to live their lives as a gender non-conforming member of their biological sex, or as a gender-conforming member of the opposite biological sex, is very strongly influenced by culture.

A fey, "feminine-presenting" male person who grows up in Thailand or Brazil is quite likely to end up living as a woman (and in Iran, they are almost certain to do so); the exact same person growing up in Norway or the UK has historically been much more likely to live as a somewhat flamboyant gay man.

It has a lot to do with how rigidly gender roles are policed. In societies which have very rigid ideas about how men and women are supposed to be (men have to be macho, being gay is bad or even illegal) it is far commoner for feminine-presenting male people to end up living as women.

This means that the cultural messages surrounding trans are actually crucial. You can't talk someone into being gay, but you almost certainly can subtly pressure a gender-non-conforming person into believing that they "should" live as a member of the opposite sex.

(in case anyone is wondering what "a few weeks old" means.... there is some tentative evidence that a hormonal rush which occurs in newborns at a few weeks old may play a role in helping to determine their eventual sexuality /randomfact).

The way the delivery is described is a bit off... but you weren’t there so you don’t know.

I don’t see anything wrong with helping young teenagers explore their identity. They are changing faster than previous generations so whilst it seems very young it’s actuslly not. They are all thinking these things anyway so surely allowing them a space to question what life is all about is a good thing? And the fact she feels she can come home and talk to you about it is even better?.

I don’t think a few sexuality chats is going to turn someone gay or make them transgender, especially if presented well, but for the child really questioning who they are and struggling with their feelings, and not having a parent they feel they can talk to it might make a huge difference to their world, and for them to want to stay in it.

YANBU

I would say that for the many children that may be feeling a lack of confidence or are being abused emotionally or physically, or have some other emotional difficulties, including Autism, the last thing these children need is for the idea to be put in their heads that there is something wrong with them or their body that they need to challenge and change (becasue transtionong would require some actual change with hormones etc), when more than likely the cause of their distress is something external such as bullying, family problems or abuse, and that in that case it is the behaviour of the other people that needs to change or be challenged to alleviate their distress not them.

Children frequently (and wrongly) internalise blame eg for painful things beyond their comprehension like divorce etc g "if I had been better behaved then Daddy would have stayed"; they wrongly blame themsleves for being victims of abuse, or may develop anorexia or self-harm as a means of dealing with issues of shame, body autonomy or lack of control over lives, so I would say children are hugely at risk from a trans agenda that assertively pushes the child to look so closely into themselves at this young age (and question biology) as if they are emotionally and intellectually capable of understanding and taking such choices upon themselves.

The trans agenda you describe OP is completely different from a gay/ lesbian/ feminsim workshop where the message would be "you are fine to be exactly who you, are whatever that is and however that may evolve (gay, tomboyish, feminine etc) - you DON'T need to change".

If a trans feeling persists after they have been encouraged to accept themselves and their natural bodies free from other people's expectations and stereotypes, then that can be dealt with then, not before.

Oh and for internalising blame and magical thinking read "if I had been born a girl instead of a gay boy then Daddy would love me more (and would not have left us)"

or "if I had been born a boy instead of a girl then XYZMan would not be coming into my bed at night and doing bad things to me" and "it is my fault as I was not brave enough to run away from the bad man at home even though I wanted to".

These are things that damaged children actually think and say... Put that together with a 'cool' workshop that says "are you sure you are really a girl?" "you can choose" and "being trans is brave" what might that little girl might start to think and act on?

I am really worried for children nowadays.

Sounds just like Safe Schools program in Melbourne and Victoria in Australia.
This is precisely the reason why we are moving out of Victoria to NSW where they don't enforce these lessons. You cannot opt out.

I

This is disgusting. And deceitful as it is simply not possible to choose to change sex, and gender is a load of bollocks anyway. Girls should be empowered to embrace themselves, love themselves, believe that they can achieve anything they want to. As themselves. As girls.

This isn't helping kids explore their identity, this is indoctrination. The movement is homophobic and sexist, it ends all sex based protections and teaches kids that they have no boundaries. It seeks to replace biological sex with stereotypes. My daughter likes girls and boys, she is gender non conforming and is very vulnerable to all this bull shit. She is told by the other kids that she must be trans because she looks like the other ftm's. I am open about my views and she understands but my god this movement is strong and is going unchallenged.

this is the opposite of letting kids be themselves, this is telling kids if they like certain things then they are the opposite sex. Sexist, homophobic bullshit.

Heads above the parapet now, some bugger has to stand up for our kids.

I would want to know if this type of visit is going to happen regularly- in case there is a risk of brow beating DCs into a way of thinking. If it happens regularly there should also be talks including all the other options- gay heterosexual etc

DamnDeDoubtance. The movement is very strong because it has serious financial backing from American pharmaceutical companies who have a vested interest in getting kids dependant on life long cross sex hormones. Some schools, universities and hospitals are receiving funding, it's in all of their interest to promote it. The kids are just collateral damage.

BarackerBarmer

I am surprised you are having trouble with the question I raised.

In your post at 17:29 yesterday, you rejected the state of being trans. You said there is no fact or logic to it, whilst at the same time accepting sexual orientation as fact: gay is same sex attraction...There is nothing to dispute about whether this is a real phenomenon.

You reject entirely the state of being trans whilst accepting different sexual orientations, despite the fact that the origins of both are unclear and acceptance of both is based on accepting what an individual tells you.

Your argument is completely inconsistent.

It's not even about inclusivity in schools anymore, more that TransTrenders have taken over in their quest to be 'seen'.

DD1's school have gender neutral toilets now, and a "Rainbow Reading Room", which has been set up as a place for gay and Trans identifying Year 8's to meet up. She's said the club has about 15 pupils from her year group (of ~90) who are 'trans-curious'.
I seriously doubt 1 in 6 people are Trans, ffs.
They're 12, it's fucking nuts.

I'm a retired secondary teacher, and this doesn't surprise me in the least. Good on the OP's dd for seeing through it.
As for those who don't get the difference between biological sex and sexual attraction - where were you in Biology lessons?
Sex is binary, Female or Male, XX or XY chromosomes. Fact.
Sexual attraction is on a spectrum, from "exclusively attracted to men" through "bisexual" to "exclusively attracted to women". It's often independent of your actual sex, for reasons that are still largely unclear.
It's not hard to understand.

It’s such a worrying trend. I believe very strongly in an individuals right to be themselves.

To love themselves and to accept themselves and celebrate themselves and who they are.

I know a very brave and lovely trans woman, and I can see what a difficult and traumatic journey she has been on and that she genuinely she’s happier and more herself living as a woman. And I believe in her rights to do so. I would stand up for her and other trans people’s rights.

But I am very concerned about the specific sub group of activism, that, at best, is going about it the wrong way, and, at worst has intentions that are not congruent with values such as equality, acceptance etc.