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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

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My Life CBBC Transgender

88 replies

MrsPatterson2014 · 03/03/2018 10:16

I have been reading these threads for months, never felt brave enough to post. Have been promted by my 7 and 9 year old telling me that people can be born in the wrong body and they are Transgender. They both repeated this as a matter of faith as being 7 and 9 their critical faculties are still very much in development. Hence a conversation with them about how no one can be born in the wrong body etc. Have only watched about 10 mind of the programme ( will watch the rest later) but was presented very uncritically. Am rambling a bit as in a hurry but I think my point is, should CBBC really be presenting this issue as fact to young and susceptible children?

OP posts:
Tinycitrus · 03/03/2018 10:21

Yes I found my three watching this Hmm

It doesn’t help that DD3 is a little girl who
Kicks about in jeans and t shirts, won’t wear dresses and plays football three times a week.

We had the whole ‘there’s lots of ways to be a girl’ conversation and that liking football etc doesn’t mean you are a boy.

ReluctantCamper · 03/03/2018 10:33

is this the episode 'I am Leo?'

I will watch later and decide if I need to write to the beeb about it. I feel a bit like I'm turning into Mary Whitehouse, BUT hopefully the difference is that I don't want to stop people discussing things, I'd just like them to be handled even handedly. So if the programme makes it clear that Leo cannot actually change sex and it's fine for her to wear boys clothes, have short hair etc then I will be completely fine with it.

Can't believe I'm going to spend my valuable post kids bed time watching a CBBC show!

HermioneWeasley · 03/03/2018 10:53

Why are the men who run the BBC so invested in transitioning children?

loveyouradvice · 04/03/2018 15:51

well.... what did you think having watched I am Leo? S/he does come across as very well-adjusted.....

Fairyflaps · 04/03/2018 16:01

Please write and complain to the BBC. It is not balanced and has no scientific basis. And as you have discovered, young children are coming across it on CBBC - which for many parents and children is a trusted channel of information and entertainment - and are swallowing the girl's brain/ boy's brain and wrong body narrative uncritically.

soapboxqueen · 04/03/2018 16:06

My ds(8) with aspergers has watched this. He asked me if I was transgender because I have hairy legs. He also thought one of his teachers was trans because she isn't very girly.

DamnDeDoubtanceIsSpartacus · 04/03/2018 17:42

the movement is based on stereotypes and actively promotes sexist stereotypes. It is deeply sexist and homophobic.

loveyouradvice · 04/03/2018 17:46

I agree with everything said above.... the stereotypes and the blithe recommendation of Lupron.... that said, I also feel enormous sympathy for the Leos of the world.... and am not sure what the solution is

DamnDeDoubtanceIsSpartacus · 06/03/2018 20:48

and am not sure what the solution is

Work together to get rid of gender roles, without these expectations placed on each sex there would be little to feel uncomfortable with. We need to accept feminine men and masculine girls, let people love who they want so long as it's consensual.

DamnDeDoubtanceIsSpartacus · 06/03/2018 20:49

I can see parents enforcing gender roles in future as they won't want there kids to be medicated.

soapboxqueen · 07/03/2018 07:59

That's a really good point damnde

Kokeshi123 · 07/03/2018 08:19

Oh Christ, yes.

I hadn't even thought about that. But you could well be right.

SusanBunch · 07/03/2018 08:39

Watched a few minutes of this just now. Leo comes across as loving and well-adjusted. The thing that struck me was that what Leo was uncomfortable with was gender stereotypes. She felt like she was really a boy because being a boy meant X and being a girl meant Y and she felt more aligned to X. That was the issue- not being born in the wrong body.

If Leo had been born in the 80s when I was born, she would have been a gender non-conforming child and may have grown up to be a gender non-conforming adult, possibly a gay woman. Puberty would no doubt have been difficult for her, but she would have got through it. I had friends who were very similar to Leo when I was growing up. It wasn't anything abnormal at all- they were accepted for who they were, including the fact that they were not typically 'girlie'.

The huge difference between my friends and Leo is that Leo has been offered dangerous drugs that will alter her body irreparably. No long-term studies have been done on the effects of these drugs in children. Adults are often denied similar drugs because of harmful side effects. Leo will be likely to be left infertile with low libido as a result of this. It's completely insane. Kids are being used as lab-rats when they are just behaving like normal kids. I dread to think what will happen in 10 years time when we realise the long-term impact of letting someone take drugs as a child. I started a thread the other day about a really sad story of a boy who thought he was trans but later changed his mind at 14 (which is totally normal and which happens in nearly all cases of gender dysphoria). But it's too late for him because the hormones have permanently altered his body and his bone growth. It's horrific.

Kids need to be told that they cannot put off or change natural processes. We all get older and that brings with it changes. Yes, you might not like growing boobs, but if you get a decent bra, it's not too bad and we all have to go through it. Thinking back to being a child, I didn't want to go through puberty either, but I realised that I had no choice and just accepted it. These kids need support, but they do not need drugs.

LangCleg · 07/03/2018 09:12

OP - the friend of a child (aged 10) also was led to sincerely believe that humans could literally change sex by CBBC. I think there must be many kids around the country who think the same and their parents have no idea.

Ineedacupofteadesperately · 07/03/2018 14:49

I am appalled that CBBC has included this in a service that is meant to encompass kids from age 6 up - so many that will not have been taught about sex yet. Without an understanding of sexual reproduction, no-one could possibly decide about whether they want to be a boy or a girl - even if it were possible to change sex. A poster on another thread said you don't know who you're attracted to until after puberty - this is also true and we know that the brain develops through puberty. Putting kids on puberty blockers just because they like hobbies associated with the other sex/gender is child abuse.

FencingFightingTorture35 · 07/03/2018 16:18

I'm just watching it now. The thing that horrified me was Leo trying to explain gender and how it's something that you feel on the inside that is separate to how you are on the outside. They had an animation of a conveyor belt with crude pictures representing pink girls and blue boys. They showed pink brains going into the girls and blue brains going into the boys before demonstrating a blue brain going into a pink girl.

I am completely horrified to see the BBC supporting the idea of lady brains and man brains as being separate to your body. Where is the science demonstrating this?

NoqontroI · 07/03/2018 16:24

I used to dress as a boy and be called by a boy's name when I was a child. Friends and family were happy to accommodate this and didn't make any fuss about it. But I most definitely grew up to be a woman and as an adult I wouldn't want to be a man. Had I been a child these days no doubt I would have been guided down a path that as an adult I most definitely wouldn't have wanted. But it's too late by then.

Ineedacupofteadesperately · 07/03/2018 16:31

Yes, I wear literally no make up and spend no time on my appearance really ever. I'm a scientist. But the best experience of my life has been being pregnant and having children. Love breastfeeding too. I like being a woman, but I was never into dolls or dresses.

OldCrone · 07/03/2018 16:33

Has anyone written to the BBC about this? They are supposed to be impartial, not peddle bad science to children who are too young to know any better. I might have to watch this just so that I can write a complaint (and I don't even have children).

loveyouradvice · 07/03/2018 16:37

I too adored imagining being a boy as I grew up - the freedom, the anything possible.... and now I love being a woman and believe anything is possible, and that we are actually luckier to be less constrained by gender constructs than men....

I am surprised there hasn't been more of a BBC backlash - the pink/blue images were shocking...

It does seem 80-95% outgrow the desire to change sex and its impossible to tell which when young so yes, it terrifies me... while i having huge sympathy for those who do trans late and wished they'd been able to do it earlier (and more successfully) .... but if one cannot know which, it has to be better for all to wait given the impact it has on one's body

VaguelyAware · 07/03/2018 16:41

I can't see it on iplayer - has it been removed?

LangCleg · 07/03/2018 16:57

This is what I keep banging on about on the Guides thread. We are bringing up a generation of kids who sincerely believe that human beings can change sex. At the same time, institutions with safeguarding duties towards minors are putting them into overnight accommodation together. It's a recipe for utter disaster.

53rdWay · 07/03/2018 17:01

They had an animation of a conveyor belt with crude pictures representing pink girls and blue boys. They showed pink brains going into the girls and blue brains going into the boys

Fucking hell, BBC.

I’m another one who was not at all ‘girly’ as a child. Didn’t play with dolls or Barbies, zero interest in clothes or makeup, liked being outside and getting muddy, did not AT ALL want to grow up into a woman. Was bad enough being bullied for this as a child in the 80s for not being a ‘proper’ girl, and it must be even harder for non-girly girls now childhood is more gendered. WTF is CBBC thinking putting out material that supports the idea of pink and blue brains?

(I am fine being a woman now, although I am pretty sure that if transgender and nonbinary had been a big thing when I was a teenager I would not have defined myself as a girl. Fortunately i discovered feminism first!)

FencingFightingTorture35 · 07/03/2018 18:05

The programme is if you want to watch it.

There is a segment about puberty blockers and how they are completely reversible. There is even a 'Dr Polly' from Tavistock clinic talking as if they do no harm at all and kids can come off them and resume puberty just like that should they so wish. I thought the Tavistock clinic was better than that. Leo's mother talks about how Leo went on them at 12 but she'd happily have let Leo take them from 9 had it been allowed.

RemainOptimistic · 07/03/2018 19:51

I'm horrified. I cut my hair short and was happy being mistaken for a boy for a big part of my childhood/teens. Always been interested in science. Never been much of a chatter. I'm definitely a woman though!

Puberty is a tumultuous enough time without someone telling you you are in the wrong body and need drugs and surgery to fix you.

This is sexist beyond belief! How has no one at the BBC noticed how horrendously sexist this is?

There was that Twitter storm a year or two ago about that man who claimed women shouldn't be allowed in science labs because they were distracting the menz, since women are apparently so prone to crying and men are so distracted by crying. The debunked myth of ladybrain and manbrain is what that entire ugly mess was resting on. Time to get rid not double down!