To ask if you are OK with your daughter's subs being spent on this?

[KatieAlcock]

I've just come to update you on my case against Girlguiding, where they expelled me for raising safeguarding concerns and for asking why we had to believe in inner gender identity to be a leader.
Girlguiding have spent AT LEAST £35,000 and probably more like £100,000 of the subs you pay for your daughter to go to Rainbows, Brownies or Guides, on defending a case against me, a committed leader who wants to make sure girls are safe and leaders have freedom of expression.

Full text of my update in the next post so as not to bore you to death!

You’ve got that arse over tit. People who don’t agree with GG’s approach to safeguarding are forced out. These leaders were forced out before the legal action. It’s one of the reasons they are taking legal action (along with wanting to see the law of the land adhered to and children protected)

Personally I’m grateful to the whistleblowers. GG are miles out with this and I think the tide is beginning to turn.

It seems likely that part of the reason for excluding you from meetings may be to do with the way you’re very publicly stirring up other parents to join your cause.

Are you scared that parents will find out that GG is now admitting boys?
They should be, as others have said, PROUD of their policy change if they think it is a good one. They should be shouting it from the rooftops, and letting us all know how they are dealing with safeguarding issues.

www.girlguiding.org.uk/making-guiding-happen/running-your-unit/including-all/supporting-trans-members/

There is masses of info on their site. They couldn’t be more open.

So what is the problem then? If the information is on the website and Katie is publicising it, you should be happy with that.

That's one page, and there's one page on residentials.
It's all doublespeak, with most people not knowing whether "transwoman" means "male" or "female" and most people thinking that all adults have had SRS, it's obfuscating at best.
I know no parents or leaders who have knowledge of receiving notification about this - apparently it was sent round in an "update" (email with 10 PDFs attached) about 3 years ago.

The general public takes "girl" to mean "child who is female". Not "child who likes pink".

If they are open and proud about it, they should be explicit about who they are talking about and they should have agreed to be interviewed by the numerous journalists who have written about this.

Find me one interview where they have actually answered questions from the press (as opposed to, provided a comment or declined to comment or awaiting comment) and where they have been open about the biological sex of the people involved AND where they have addressed the secrecy issues.

Find me a mailing where all parents have been told exactly what this means. Same for leaders.

Find me a leader who can actually get all the information they need from the GG website too! And find me a parent who's read everything on there.

Well sorry if parents choose not to look on the site that is their own issue. They are there and easy to find.

Many people think that 'transwoman' is a woman who decides to transition. Its as clear as mud.

The people who quietly leave or don't join because they don't want mixed sex sleeping are pretty much invisible, as usual.

If you care that much you look up policies on sites, the same as if you have issues with schools. All the policies are there. If GG sent out bundles of policies they’d go straight in the bin.

Nobody has to leave.GG seem to have quite a balanced “bespoke” approach. On weekly sessions I see zero issues Re trips which aren’t a frequent occurrence they’re all involved with the planning and any child can request alternative sleeping arrangements.

“We recommend that you involve all young members in planning residentials, so each young person has the chance to explore their individual needs and a balance can be found that works for everyone.”

“Any young member can request an alternative accommodation arrangement. “

“If any young member feels uncomfortable sharing accommodation, an alternative option should be provided where reasonable and practicable to do so.”

Zero need for scaremongering.

But it is the girls who would have to request separate sleeping accommodation. The xy chromosome child in a dress WANTS to be in with the girls. So the girls would have to know that an xy child is there but it would be outing to tell them. You know this, of course, this is the playbook.

Zero need for scaremongering.

Good thing it is scaremongering then. And full need for upfront discussion about the strength of these decisions regarding safeguarding.

Why would anyone protest safeguarding measures being challenged for not being suitable for full protection of the children and women they are supposed to protect?

WHO benefits from these measures being able to be abused? Who?

The majority don’t care. The few that do can request separate accommodation to be sure there are no transgender children in the same room on the few overnight outings that crop up. If they’re involved with planning they can request sharing with close friends too.

Not really a problem or big issue. My dd’s friend requested her own room for sleep issues as wanted to be sure she wasn’t sharing with anybody rowdy enough to keep her awake.

I'd suggest that actually, the majority don't know. Hence the need for discussion.

Many of my friends have daughters in various guide groups and they are all shocked and suprised to hear about it. They are extremely uncomfortable about it once they know and quite a few work in schools and know the safeguarding requirements.

How have you assessed that the majority don't care? It seems that the more people hear about it, the more they do care and you bleat that Katie should shut up so that it can stay a secret.

If you say that girls who need single sex accomodation are the odd ones out who need to be separated, you ignore the fact that a percentage of girls are dealing with sexual abuse, and you are ok with them having to out themselves or be re-traumatised.

In 2020 it’s a given that all minority groups are going to be given equality. It’s been widely publicised.

Those dealing with abuse don’t need to out themselves that is just scaremongering. If children need their own room for private reasons nobody would insist on prying.

@growinggreyer

How have you assessed that the majority don't care? It seems that the more people hear about it, the more they do care and you bleat that Katie should shut up so that it can stay a secret.

They very clearly have assessed no such thing, let's be honest.

How does a girl know she's going to be sharing or showering with a boy?
GG is billed as girl only.
Admitting boys isn't something that parents should have to delve into policy to detect.
All parents should be told on enrolment and given the option to say "sorry not comfortable with my DD sharing with a male bodied child" on every camp permission form.
Girls should be able to discuss periods, harassment, sex etc in an all girl environment so yes, it's a week by week issue.
Some girls are happy in a mixed sex environment. Some are not. They should just be given explicit information about what they are joining.

I think it is little known or understood amongst parents. Most just think Guides = girls because it's always been thus. Several of the girls in DD's unit have selected Guides over Scouts to be in a single sex environment.
I've attended the safeguarding training - which in the main is very good. This wasn't mentioned in any form.
Interestingly one session I attended raised a hypothetical situation where a vulnerable child actually posed a risk to others - which was very difficult to manage. It emerged that there wasn't a protocol for removing a child (themselves in need of inclusion) where they were putting other children at risk. The trainer was going to take this back for consideration.

But Lemon they wouldnt need a private room if it were just female bodied people. Its discrininatory against girls.

If children need their own room for private reasons nobody would insist on prying.
I can't think of a residential I've been on recently where we could have offered this, except where we could have asked them to bring (or borrowed) a one-person tent. There are rules on smaller girls sleeping in tents too, I'm not completely up to date (partly because it's impossible to find anything on GG website, ha!) on what would happen if we were going to a large single-area hall with outside space (can think of a couple we've used) and one Rainbow wanted a single room. I wouldn't be putting her in a tent on the grass opposite my old unit hall, anyway, as it's across the road!

(Again, @Lem0nZest thinks all units are like the ones they know about - if in fact they do know anything at all in a practical sense about youth movements).

The girls shouldn't have to ask for single room just in case they're allocated sharing with a male. Being with your friends is part of the fun. Why should a girl be excluded from the group on the basis of previous trauma or religion or just straight out not wanting to sleep in the same tent as a male?

If it is decided to continue including males in girl guiding at all, tick box on the permission form would be a nice solution without embarrassing anyone. (Except possibly the leaders if it turns out that actually all the girls wanted a single sex space.) Leaders wouldn't need to know reason, no intrusion into anyone's privacy, trans child wouldn't need to know who'd ticked the box.

Excuse my lack of knowledge but is it actually legal to have a single gender rather than single sex group? Is there a single gender exemption parallel to the single sex exemption? What would the justification be for the need for a single gender group? All the justifications I can think of for a single sex group would also exclude a male bodied child who was trans.

Or could guides get sued for gender identity discrimination by a male identifying boy on the grounds that he would be able to participate if he stated he identified as female?

GG bangs on in all their publicity materials and on their website about the importance of girls and young women being able to develop skills and confidence in a female environment

Nowhere do they say “by girls and young women we also mean boys and young men who self describe as girls and young women”

@Lem0nZest

If you care that much you look up policies on sites, the same as if you have issues with schools. All the policies are there. If GG sent out bundles of policies they’d go straight in the bin.

Nobody has to leave.GG seem to have quite a balanced “bespoke” approach. On weekly sessions I see zero issues Re trips which aren’t a frequent occurrence they’re all involved with the planning and any child can request alternative sleeping arrangements.

“We recommend that you involve all young members in planning residentials, so each young person has the chance to explore their individual needs and a balance can be found that works for everyone.”

“Any young member can request an alternative accommodation arrangement. “

“If any young member feels uncomfortable sharing accommodation, an alternative option should be provided where reasonable and practicable to do so.”

Zero need for scaremongering.

So as a young sexually abused girl I would need to ask for separate sleeping arrangements, which would probably mean admitting what my home life was like, and miss out on the group fun of all sleeping in the same hall/sharing a tent with my friends. If i can choose one friend to share with me then how do I choose? What if she wants to sleep with everyone else. How do I explain to her why I need to be apart from whichever member it is without either appearing transphobic or telling her about the abuse? Its more likely I would have pretended I didn't like pack holiday/overnight trips and would have not gone. Which I would have hated as they were actually one of my favourite things about GG. (Partly because it meant I wasn't with my abusive brother for a few days/nights)

Re private rooms, quite a bit of digging found this.
From "Brownie Residentials" and I can't see anyone making it less restrictive for Rainbows.

"If Brownies are staying in separate buildings (such as chalets or static caravans), there must be at least two leaders, helpers or young leaders present in each building."

So unless you have lots of separate bedrooms for one girl within your main building, you can't put a Brownie (or a Rainbow) in a tent or separate building on her own if she needs a room of her own.
And this would apply to transgirls too. Any that were shy or didn't want to share would have to have a whole bedroom in the same building as adults, to themself.

I have come across this being arranged in the past, and it's not without the bounds of possibility, but it's hard to do. For example, a girl with disabilities that needed turning in the night was in a room with her carer and another adult and no other girls.