LGBT+ at summer camp?

[TreeSqueak]

My dc are at a summer camp this week. It's a day camp run by a youth movement. The leaders are aged from 17/18 to mid-20s, the children 6-11. I can't fault the care, my dc have come home every day burbling with happiness, exhausted, loving the leaders and the activities.

Every day has a different theme. Yesterday it was LGBT+. I noticed the flags and facepaint when I dropped them off.

Dc told me last night that they had learned about every letter, what each one meant, including that you may not be the sex that you look like, how people were different and should change if they wanted to, and we should love and respect everyone, etc etc etc.

AIBU that this is not an appropriate theme for the setting?

PinkyU WTF are you on about?
I said it isn't necessary to lie to children. It is impossible to change sex, and telling children it is possible is a lie. Being told lies doesn't make a child more accepting or respectful, it just makes them misinformed.

Sex and relationships is a really important topic and needs to be taught properly in an appropriate way, by trained professionals.

This!

Ask to see their safeguarding policy. Do these woke warriors have qualifications? DBS’s? Who on earth would run a day long session on this without first informing parents

Hang on..... Is this brownies?

I'd be furious. Just the same as when we went to the science museum and made rainbows using prisms. DD corrected me and told me that her teacher had told her that rainbows were made by God when he was happy. NOT fact being taught as fact.

The same appears to be going on here. Yes we are kind and tolerant to all people but males are always male and females are always female. People can dress as they wish but it doesn't change fact. I really object to the indoctrination that is going on in well meaning organisations.

Were you given an outline of activities?

What is the Youth Group? If you are happy to say on here

Yes to seeing their safeguarding policy

There should be written consent relating to planned activities where sexuality is discussed. It should never have happened at a summer camp.

Re: trans. I'd have real worries about any organisation that gave my child the message that people can change sex. It's materially incorrect

Teaching children kindness is of course unarguable. Teaching people about individual differences is important. There are many ways of doing without venturing into areas that a better left to trained individuals

Teaching children that they can change sex IS A LIE. There is no scientific, objective, material or logical truth it.

Why would any parent be happy that their children are being taught lies?

And is it 'kind' that the result of those lies persuade healthy youngsters to cut off their breasts and be redenderdd sterile and on drugs for the rest of their lives?

I also agree with bowl that a summer camp would seem to me to be an ideal location to break down gender stereotypes - by providing fun activities for all to enjoy, encourage mixed-sex groups etc. talking about transgenderism is re-inforcing gender stereotypes. How could a teen leader explain any of this to a Primary age child without using gender stereotypes?

Sounds like a really grim summer camp. My children used to get to go out on Dartmoor and go climbing, cycling, river swimming and generally feeling like they were on holiday.

Darknessinthevalley, what makes you think you know better than the parents ?

The safeguarding policy isn't going to have a clause outlawing the discussion of what the T in LGBT means. That's not what safeguarding is for. Whether the leaders were DBS checked also has big fat zero to do with the content of a Pride session they delivered.

Normally when a child relates something that a teacher said that a parent objects to the first advice is check what was actually said and don't get all your guns going till you know the context.

Here, from some posters, it's as though a child's report of a session on tolerance and acceptance that included trans people is some sort of gateway to mutilation and abuse by the trans mafia!

Quick, tell AIBU about the flashers and the abusers and the big money and power and the loopholes and the predators. Whip this up into a big ol recruiting drive for the GC feminist corner.

Well no, not in my name.

I stand with trans people, and support organisations that seek to inform and educate people, including children, that trans gender is a real thing that exists in our society, and that it's a good thing to be respectful and tolerant of that.

I stand with trans people, and support organisations that seek to inform and educate people, including children, that trans gender is a real thing that exists in our society, and that it's a good thing to be respectful and tolerant of that

Yes. Trans people exist

The OP's children seem to have got the message that people can 'change if they want to'

I would very much want to find out exactly what was said

Well no, not in my name.

Confidential disclosure. You OK with that? I’m not. Neither is any safeguarding body.

It's fine of you want to mock Wichita.

For anyone who is interested, there in loads of information on what worries mothers and other about the TRA agenda, on Feminism Chat.

I went to school in the late 90s.

Sexual orientation wasn’t touched in either primary or secondary school and my father is a bigot so I didn’t learn anything positive at home. Wish I’d had education like this when I was a child, be it from school or an extra curricular. I imagine the gay kids in our school would have received less bullying too.

Personally, I wouldn't have a problem with what happened at the camp but you may want to have a deeper chat with your children, to see if they have questions and maybe talk about the topic again in a way you see fit.

And for the kids who didn't mention to a parent that this was talked about, but were just left with a lot of confused ideas about being able to change sex if they want to?
Who will help those children to understand?

I stand with trans people, and support organisations that seek to inform and educate people, including children, that trans gender is a real thing that exists in our society, and that it's a good thing to be respectful and tolerant of that.

How respectful and tolerant are you prepared to be?
Are you happy for male-bodied pupils to compete against girls in secondary school sports?
Are you happy for female-bodied pupils to get changed and showered alongside teenage boys?
Are you happy that female Guides may be sharing sleeping accomodation with male-bodied Guides, without them or their parents even being aware that this is now the Guide Association's policy?

including that you may not be the sex that you look like, how people were different and should change if they wanted to

I'd be very concerned about this message, especially in this context.

For all the 'what's the problem?' posters, this is the problem:

There has been a 2000% increase in referrals to child gender identity services since 2009. The vast majority of this increase is made up of adolescent girls - a complete reversal of previous trends. Nobody knows why this increase has happened or why the sex ratios have reversed (there are theories, some good, some less so - this is a whole other thread in itself)

Being trans is nothing like coming out as lesbian or gay. It's not a case of everyone just saying 'that's great' and then carrying on as normal without being a dick.

To come out as trans is to take the first step on a journey that can take a child through social transition, puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and surgery. This is hefty medical stuff even if everything goes according to plan. Too often it doesn't, or someone changes their mind and discovers there's no easy way back and the support's not there and some things are irreversible in any case.

I'd be looking closely into the organisation that runs this camp.

• where have they recruited their camp leaders?

• what training have they had? Do they have the qualifications, experience and skills to be tackling such high risk topics?

• who supervises them? What are their qualifications and experience?

• what materials are they drawing on and who produced them? Or are they just making it up as they go along?

• what plans do they have in place for any fall-out from this session? i.e. if a child tomorrow tells a camp leader they think they are trans because of what they learnt yesterday?

• what pastoral care do they have in place for these circumstances and what policies do they have around that, especially wrt safeguarding? Would you even be told, if it was your child?

I think it sounds fine. They probably just explained what it means to be gay and that people can feel a different gender to how they are born looking and can take steps to change their body to match how they feel. This is fact. Has nothing to with predators or pedophiles or rabid trans activists. I do somewhat doubt this even happened in real life though. It seems like another excuse for people to moan on about not believing in trans.

I imagine that a lot of these sessions happen because a child in the group/class has parents who are LGB or indeed T. And that the child is experiencing less than kind behaviour from other members of that group.

They mainly suggest that it's not OK to bully a child because their family doesn't conform to a M/F norm. And then give a brief understandable explanation of what the individual letters mean.

I hope those of you who believe this is a big TRA conspiracy don't also believe that it's OK for your children to bully a child with a trans parent, because that's what some of you seem to be implying.

It's true there's plenty on FWR for people to hear about how a number of GC feminists feel worried about trans related laws and certain individuals who are trans.

Don't go in there looking for balance though, and definitely not to discuss any of it from a trans sympathetic viewpoint unless you want to be called a whole lot of ugly things. They've driven out dissenters with a spiked broom of "intelligent and witty discourse of biological facts".

That's all fine, mnhq are willing to allow it, and people who don't like it can stay out of the board and not have to see 9 threads out of 10 demonising trans one way or another, sharing daily mail links and cataloging every dubious move any trans person ever makes as grist to their mill.

But it really would be nicer if just now and again there could be a thread that mentions trans people elsewhere on mn that doesn't act like a klaxon to summon the GC troops to come along and sound the alarum about how trans is going to ruin our children's lives.

The people who are calling the OP a bigot need to ask themselves the following questions:

Is safeguarding important? Do loopholes in safeguarding get exploited? Is creating a loophole in safeguarding to recognise gender identity more important than protecting vulnerable women and children?

Because what you are cheering on is one thing on the surface and another thing underneath. On the surface it is people with dysphoria being given the right to self declare and make their lives easier (quite right too). Underneath there is a giant loophole created to allow anyone man who wants to access safe spaces and single sex protections an in just on his say so.

Let me be clear here. There are people who suffer gender dysphoria and they should get help and support and be accepted. There are people who are gender non-conforming and they should be able to present as they want.

But there are also people who have attached themselves to the coat tails of this movement, not trans sexuals, not really gender non-conforming, who have a vested interest in making loopholes in equality law and safeguarding.

By swallowing the gender agenda whole and uncritically you are not helping trans people. You are helping to reinforce gender stereotypes and create safeguarding issues.

Stop being so knee jerk and actually look at what trans pressure groups are saying. They are openly telling people what they are doing. If you stop and listen.

Witchita - unless you know something the rest of us don't about the content of the camp day and where they got their material from.

This is the point - we don't know, and OP doesn't know, exactly what the content was, or where the material came from.

there is nothing to worry about that it was discussed as part of a day topic on LGBT.

You sound very confident given you just said we don't know the content that was presented or where it came from.

argumentativefeminist you sound confident too when you say But there really wasn't any harm done.

How do you know? Do either of you have expertise or experience in this field? Could you show us the kind of materials this day camp is likely to have used? It would be good if parents could be reassured.

MissSusanSays - can we just break down what the OP has actually said? She's not actually saying that anyone was sitting down and telling the kids 'hormone blockers for all!'. No one was telling the kids they were trans, or getting into self ID.

As far as I can say, the kids got a very simple explanation for L, G, B and T, and then told everyone deserves love and respect. That's all. Just 'this is how some people feel they are and you should be nice to them'. Absolutely everything else is in alarmist posters' heads.

people can feel a different gender to how they are born looking and can take steps to change their body to match how they feel

What is gender anyway? How does it feel to be a female or male? Why not emphasise that people can wear what they like.

Teach them that girls and boys are equal (as some of the issues seem to be around girls wanting to do 'boys' things so are thought of as wanting to be a boy) and that and boys can knit and girls can play rugby?

It would appear that society has got more conservative on some issues around indicators of gender - so in the 70s my brother and all his male mates had flowing locks and my sister had spaceman outfits and played with action man.

We wore flares and dungarees. Pop stars wore what looked like their mums frocks and lipstick on top of the pops.

David Bowie dressed like a girl and dyed his hair. Bianca Jagger rocked a 'man's' suit and Anne Lennox later sported a very short, orange haircut and I (like a lot of girls) had most of my head shaved and wore mens jeans and DMs.

'Gender bending' was the order of the day and our mums and dads tutted and giggled at us behind our backs (not always beind).

Now I'm seeing young men walking along the street (well, posing really and eyeballing people as of to dare them to comment ) near my office in a skirts like they invented it.

I must be old - I've seen it all before (and it was less political and scary in ye olden days).

Alaaya

I was addressing those who have leaped up with the rally cry of ‘bigot’ because OP was uncomfortable with her children being told that people can change sex. They can’t. People can perform different gender roles to their biological sex (absolutely, let’s break down those gender walls) but they cannot, even with all the hormones and surgery in the world, become the opposite sex.

What a confusing lie to teach a child.

I would imagine the OP is also concerned about what else her children were told about sex and gender if this is the kind of asinine thing the group leaders were saying.

Days like this I think I must really be an old fart.

These kids are aged 6-11. Primary aged. Most of them are going to be a while off puberty.

While I'm all for teaching kids to be inclusive and kind, if you're going to go through LGBTetc letter by letter then surely the focus is going to be about adult sexuality and sexual relations. Isn't that totally inappropriate for kids of this age group?