Child identifies as a wolf ... WTF?

[Portakalkedi]

Just on Radio 4 now, discussing a child in secondary school who identifies as a wolf, and the school is going along with this. AIBU to think the world (or at least the UK) has gone mad? If said child is living in the woods, catching its own prey etc etc, howling and running with other wolves, which I doubt, then why the hell is anyone going along with it? They are also saying that some others identify as dogs or cats etc. And here was me thinking men 'identifying' as women was bad.

OK so for you it's not about surgical interventions and children genuinely believing they are animals. Its about introductions to sexual fetishes and potential for abuse.

To me, part of an effective approach to that is sex education where difficult topics such as fetishes are discussed and teenagers are encouraged to trust their instincts and develop their own boundaries. Parents also need to bring these things up if children ask about furries. Finally Internet providers definitely need to do more to protect children from inappropriate content.

I don't think blaming schools/teachers and parents for being "too soft on kids" and banning sex education apparently from the pure mechanics is at all an effective approach myself.

The teacher has berated the pupil for questioning someone identifying as a "cow or something":

The girl responds: 'I didn't say that, I just said if they want to identify as a cow or something, then they are genuinely unwell, and they're crazy.'

'You were questioning their identity,' the teacher replies.

Obviously we didn't hear the start of the conversation but the logical conclusion (from the first response we hear from the pupil) is that it was a conversation about species identity, before the teacher then pivoted on to gender identity.

She was clearly responding to the start of the conversation that we didn't hear.

She said nothing about "species identity" being valid, that's an assumption by the Mail. They do go on these little crusades to "prove" certain things are definitely happening, despite all evidence to the contrary. It's irresponsible scaremongering imo.

I don't think blaming schools/teachers and parents for being "too soft on kids" and banning sex education apparently from the pure mechanics is at all an effective approach myself.

I've not said that. Not at all. It's knowing that it's a link to online harms and all that that brings.

Banning sex education?!

I don't think blaming schools/teachers and parents for being "too soft on kids" and banning sex education apparently from the pure mechanics is at all an effective approach myself.

Who is trying to ban sex education?!

Unfortunately, Labour managed to position the draft PHSE guidance that was put together under the Tory government as some kind of ban on sex education. Perhaps that's where the confusion is coming from here?

It's similar to how people who advocate for age-appropriate books in school libraries are positioned as "banning books".

We use age classification for films without controversy, so why shouldn't we do so for sex education and school library books?

Here's the draft sex ed guidance that is apparently too problematic, so has been left on the shelf by Labour:

https://consult.education.gov.uk/rshe-team/review-of-the-rshe-statutory-guidance/supporting_documents/Draft%20RSE%20and%20Health%20Education%20statutory%20guidance.pdf

Meh. It doesn't matter how reasonable or evidenced you are. No matter how much experience you have dealing with ND children, SRE in schools, safeguarding or the rest. There are some people who are determined to reframe legitimate concerns as a "culture war", dismiss discussing safeguarding children with sexist tropes like "pearl clutching" and to deny deny deny, no matter how many posters on a thread state their experiences. I've no idea why - perhaps just for the love of being oppositional or a dislike of women who refuse to comply with instructions?

What does matter is that parents have the confidence to challenge safeguarding fails and age inappropriate issues in their child's school and elsewhere. And that Mumsnet remains a place where parents can have these challenging discussions and be treated seriously and challenged (as has happened repeatedly on this thread about the litter tray falsehoods), while recognising that, according to parents, there is a legitimate issue in some schools that needs to be addressed.

Here are some of the things that pupils would learn about (at an age appropriate time) under the proposed PHSE guidance - screenshots below. This is from the section on law, but it's a useful summary of the range of topics covered.

Unfortunately the guidance doesn't mention furrydom but it does have a good section about gender identity belief, and it references out to the Gender Questioning Children guidance too. Given furry identities are apparently part of the TQ+++, these are the relevant safeguarding documents.

Glad the bbc reel on fb is of Lucy from the family trust saying that children need boundaries

www.facebook.com/share/r/42Frwn7wetzD38Za/?mibextid=UalRPS

I've known autistic primary children in send settings who like to dress up (mostly as cats) but it's clearly framed as "dressing up time."

Communicating in cat during maths was firmly discouraged iirc.

Hear hear 👏

I was busy collecting some images from the PHSE guidance when this was posted.

It's madness, isn't it? We can hear things with our own ears (e.g. the audio re species identity) and see things with our own eyes (e.g. draft statutory age-appropriate sex ed content), yet apparently these things aren't true 🤦‍♀️

I'm going through some of the pages I missed on this thread.

This post is particularly useful. I had a read through the linked thread and.... wow...... that comment from the therian!! 😮

Well, it certainly highlights a few things: autism, belief in a species soul, links to anime, links to kink. It's like playing a game of bingo and already knowing you'll get a full-house from the start.

A few posts in...

Personally (based on my own experience of a therian niece) be concerned. She was older when she started but fully believes she has an animal spirit inside her. She will be changing her name to therian name by deed poll and her entire personality is now her animal spirit. We have essentially lost our old niece, she has no therian friends in real life, her entire day is spent making content for social media and talking to her online "therian" friends. Some of which are men in their mid 30's. (She's just just turned 18). Her real life social group are a mixture of self diagnosed autistics and non-binary types with blue/pink hair.

So yeah from my experience be concerned. There are a lot of adults in the online therian community and it's another area of the internet where child grooming is hidden in a "wholesome hobby" type way

Fkn ell.

Sorry, I wasn't referring to you, I meant the many posters on here saying parents are "pandering" to children identifying as furries and schools are enabling it in PHSE.

That's too absolutist for me, I think teenagers are best educated through open discussion and being supported to learn how to identify and set their own healthy boundaries. In my opinion that requires discussing controversial topics and teachers ensuring all voices are heard ( so not allowing students to insukt each other for e.g.)

supported to learn how to identify

No teachers should be helping or supporting children to learn how to identify as anyone or anything.

Gender identity (including cat gender, therian identity and any other species identity) is a belief. Teachers should not bring their personal beliefs in to school.

being supported to learn how to identify

This is now the tricky area as sexuality has been hijacked. It's not L G and B.

As "pride" now includes transgender (a mental health condition as requires medication ) and all ranges of fetishes such as "furries" (if it's a sexuality it's beastiality), discussions with children about this is very problematic.

Pretty certain I identified as a cat at one point. Adults and teachers just assumed (correctly) I was playing same daft game (“oh you’re a cat are you? That’s nice”)

Simpler times.

That Vice article. Have American parents' brains leached out their ears entirely?

My job as her mother is to support her purpose and joy...

Let me stop you right there! Your job as a parent is to be the adult in the room.

Very true @WarriorN . Managing boundaries, enabling our children to grow and develop in safety is critical. It's reasonable to express the view that allowing something like furries to be uncritically explored in schools is pandering while still accepting that parenting (& teaching) involves ensuring respect for children, that they know their views will be heard while establishing firm boundaries.

There needs to be a clearer understanding of what controversial issues are and what's age appropriate / acceptable for a mainstream classroom. There used to be but that's been undermined by some of the queer theory groups who've produced porn soaked materials for schools.

There's a reason teachers plan lessons - especially when teaching controversial subjects. There are times when you don't allow a free for all and teachers use techniques for enabling / guiding discussions. Try teaching sex ed to a class of 13 /14 year olds and you quickly understand how important it is to ensure safety in discussions and have boundaries. It's not easy but it's what good teachers do - provide a safe learning environment so that all children can thrive.

Insisting that teachers must discuss all these aspects of sex / sexuality is naive. It's what led to Warwickshire Council having to withdraw some dire SRE online materials that were completely age inappropriate, deeply hostile to women and girls with the examples of porn and probably illegal in terms of breaching the Sexual Offences against Children Act.

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/3795892--All-about-me-Sex-Relationships-primary-education

I absolutely was a cat ….when I was four.
Of course that was silly, I’m actually a seal 🦭

“being supported to learn how to identify ”

no no no.

This presupposes that a person can “identify” as something other than that which they objectively ARE ie male or female and human.

Who is going to provide this “support”?
Someone who has already adopted a magical belief system that boys can become girls and humans can become animals?

That’s pushing fairytale fantasy on impressionable youngsters and has ZERO place in education.

Absolutely.

Children are being told that they can identify as lesbian, gay or bi - or that they might identify as one of these things when they are older.

It's a complete highjacking of LGB. Nobody needs to identify as L, G, B or straight. You just are one of these 4 possibilities. And it can take time to figure yourself out in this respect.

When they are framed as an ever expanding range of "identities" it's very confusing for children. Identities come with rules about what constitutes the identity - if you don't fit that one, perhaps you're a different one or you're gender-fluid etc etc. Blending sex (male/female) and sexual orientation (LGB/straight) into "identities" and having children learn about them during the emotional turbulence of adolescence is a recipe for chaos and distress.

Wolves in school should be banned like peanuts

Wolves in school should be banned like peanuts

This is what happens when you replace "the three little pigs" with "the drag queens go swish swish swish."

Or, perhaps more in line with the furry theme, story-telling led by a colourful monkey.

How wholesome 😍

Obviously my only issue with it is that the monkey's name is incorrect. Looking at that costume, the dildo is the only bit that isn't a rainbow. Other than that, where's the harm? 🙃😬

https://www.spiked-online.com/2021/07/13/the-rainbow-dildo-butt-monkey-is-no-laughing-matter/

Oh bonfire, that ticks off so many of the LGBTQ+ rainbow award and the Artsmark at the same time 😍

*satire

It certainly does!

Happily, the article also covers the joy that drag queen story tellers can bring to children too 😍

I'm looking forward to our crayon-wielding poster from earlier doing me a nice and simple drawing to explain how teaching children to twerk is enriching. Or perhaps there's another poster who could help me understand how Rainbow DBM could support the children to learn about their own identities?