.. to think it wasn't up to nursery staff to tell DD this?

[HollyCherry]

Just interested in opinions really.

DD is 4.3 and last night gave me a big soppy hug and said, "I want to marry you when I grow up"

I told her that girls can't marry girls, to which she replied - "Yes they can - x at nursery says girls can marry girls and boys can marry boys"

I have a feeling I'm going to get flamed for even raising the subject - but I really don't expect the nursery to be filling a 4 year old in on these kind of details?

Gawd. Long thread. Have skimmed, so forgive me if I'm repeating (and I must surely be!).

I want my children to grow up understanding that same sex relationships are as much a part of the fabric of life as different sex relationships. So me treating them as a special case - to be explained, and explained by me rather than other people - would not work. It would, I dunno, emphasising them in a way which contradicts that understanding.

FWIW, my children have never required any explanation at all. Very reasonable, children.

It does come up very early in life. As I discovered when DD1 was in Reception. They did some role playing about marriage, which leads pretty quickly (in the mind of an inquisitive child) to who you can marry and who you can't.

On the way home she suddenly asked "can a lady marry a lady, because E's mum says they can't and P's mum says they can." E's mum was listening, which made the conversation flow in interesting directions ....!

yabu

I'm meh about who says it first, it's a fact of life.
Why should it hold any importance whatsoever?

The idea of having to explain it yourself isto me

OK - am rapidly coming to the conclusion I should go with the flow on this one, and not be splitting hairs over the technicalities.

DD has come home a few times recently from nursery talking about some fairly 'adult' topics (not necessarily in a bad way - just things that I would not expect to come up naturally in the course of a morning at nursery), and consequently have been feeling a bit about the nursery in general which has probably prompted a bit of a knee-jerk reaction on my part.

Still don't think I should be pilloried for my religious beliefs though...

Marriage is not an adult topic. Sex is. Well, not adult perhaps, but probably not a nursery topic.

I also have religious beliefs BTW. Is soldgold going on about imaginary friends again? Just smile and nod.

Oops - meant to say...

... and I assume they werent discussing gay sex, just gay marriage. If indeed it can be said that they were discussing it at all....

I'm not that this particular topic came up - it's just the latest of a few things that have come back from nursery recently, so kind of the straw that broke the camels back if you like.

As I've said we live in a small town and DD goes to a v. small private nursery where I am fairly certain there are no kids with same sex parents (I suppose they could know other people in that position and it may have come up that way - hadn't thought of that I must admit) so am (was) puzzled as to how the subject came up.

As for telling DD an outright lie - I don't believe I did. I'll freely admit to splitting hairs over a technicality which is a bit unnecessary at this age, but if you look on one of the first few pages of this topic, someone provides a link to the Govt web page concerning marriage/civil partnerships and there is a clear distinction made between civil marriages and civil partnerships, although I am sure they are both (rightly) equally meaningful to those who have them.

You are protesting too much I think now.

You Are becoming more unreasonable with your comments about civil marriage and civil partnership imho splitting hairs in this sense won't get you or your daughter anywhere.

This is an innocent topic and factually, in a very real sense, girls do "marry" girls.

You don't need to have a same sex parents to understand that they exist.

It's a statement of fact and therefore a non issue.

Sounds like nursery might be doing your child good

I am not claiming that all religious people are bigots, just that all the polite I'm-not-really-a-bigot-I-just-wish-gays-didnt-exist types always seem to have imaginary friends.

presumably because those kinds of people find a higher authority to back up their views appealing. Which is kind of the opposite of how it should work but i can see how it has happened.

SFTS, the OP is right to compare anti-religious feeling to homophobia. On a thread you be anti-religious and you can be homophobic, but in a nursery or a workplace you cannot be.

Discrimination against people on the grounds of sexual orientation and religious belief are illegal, and a nursery could not make negative remarks about religion or sexual orientation.

The whole problem with this thread seems to be that people believe they have the right to decide what state funded institutions can tell their children; they don't (although you can withdraw your child from certain activities).

A state funded nursery has to abide by the law, not by what parents want. If you do not like this, then get the law changed. The protection of religious belief is about equal in law to the protection of sexual orientation; both have less protection than matters of gender, race and disability. The equal standing of sexual orientation/religion has been tested in many court rulings that have arisen from the Equality Act.

Believing in Santa Claus and fairies is not a recognised religion and is not protected by any law.

If you are unsure about anything your child is told by the state, you can phone an equality and diversity worker in the education section of your LEA for advice.

A civil partnership is so called to differentiate it from a marriage. Legally, they have parity, but the names are different because that is what some religious people wanted. We are not a secular state, we have an established church headed by the Queen, and that means Christians do have some power in influencing the making of laws in this country; if you don't like that, fight to change it.

The nursery hasn't said anything negative at all, has it?

Thinking about the distinctions between kinds of marriage I'd have to say that marriage is when two people decide to become a pair. It was happening before christinity and before registrars.

The marriage starts when you both agree. It's customary these days to register a marriage, but that's only about announcing it to your community and for the purpose of tax/inheritence laws. It's not compulsory.

You can if you want have a ceremony in a church. You could also have one in a field or half way up a mountain. I believe someone got married during the course of a free fall parachute jump.

None of these are the marriage. They are the celebration or announcement of it.

I'm sure it's been said (I skimmed a bit) but if a religious person doesn't recognise a civil ceremony than presumably they don't recognise those held in other churches. An awkward position I'd think unless you only ever speak to catholics, anglicans or whatever church you know to be the only true one.

TFN, not it hasn't, but my much earlier argument was that if a child said to another child that a boy could not have a boyfriend, during some playing of house/mums and dads, which is how a nursery mention of sexual orientation could plausibly have come up, the nursery is obliged to say 'yes, they can.' If they do not say this, they are being discriminatory in the same way as if the child had said a black person can't have a white boyfriend.

My argument then being that for the OP to require the nursery to never mention sexual orientation would be impossible.

Onager, I don't think it is really a problem for most Catholics or for most people of any religion. Most people surely think 'a marriage means x, and so I have that marriage. What other people do, or what marriage means to them, is their business and irrelevant to my marriage.'

SFTS, yes I agree. I think that we should be able to disagree with religion, because if I hold a scientific belief, people are allowed to be much more negative about it than if I held a religious one. But I think the law was put in place partly as a response to people being racist but referring to Muslims rather than Pakistani/Bangladeshi etc.

OK - this is my last post as it's clear that no matter what I say now some people are going to of the opinion that I'm a bible bashing, narrow-minded homophobic bigot - which I'm not.

Thank you to those of you who have been able to understand my POV, and also to those who haven't as it's given me something to think about.

And happy new year to everyone - gay and straight alike!

people send their children to prepare them for the big bad world don't they?
isn't it better that children have questions like this?
your job as a parent is to help them make sense of the world, blaming the nuresry is not an option, you will have these discussions with your daughter more and more as she grows older, what you tell her is your business, but be prepared for the thought that she will form her own opinions (hopefully)

MollyCherry , I don't think you are a "bible bashing, narrow-minded homophobic bigot". Everyone has some opinions/thoughts which might not quite fit in with the current general view. It's good to get them out and air them and get other opinions. Sometimes you'll end up changing your mind and sometimes not. Sometimes others will prefer your point of view.

Happy New Year, to gay, straight and yes even religious people

LD - What I meant was from your comment it seemed you were saying you don't see a civil partnership as a marriage cos it doesn't take place before God. But neither do civil marriages does that mean you don't see that as a marriage either? I don't really understand that cos the word marriage is part of it's name so how can anyone not consider it a marriage?

Maybe you should have told her Daughters can't marry their Mums .

Children aren't born bigots they are taught by their parents .