Stephen Fry backs P Tatchell's call to revise sex education

[Imnobody4]

www.petertatchellfoundation.org/stephen-fry-backs-our-call-to-revise-sex-education/
I think this sounds reasonable but still some niggling suspicion. IF the quality and calibre of the training and trainers were beyond reproach, if there was a broad consultation beyond just LBGT I might accept it.
I'm pleased to see they acknowledge asexual. What do you think?

For an idea of what this might look like, see the LGBT Foundation's International Masturbation Day program of gender neutral events about wanking (not a joke).

They have sessions on wanking for "anyone who self-identifies as a woman, some or all the time", or a man or non-binary. (so if you're gender fluid I guess you can go to all three?)

Then after they've finished wanking, their sex festival continues... with sessions on fetish, queer sex, bondage and sex work. Biological females get a look in - with a session on period poverty, FFS. (I'm getting increasingly suspicious of this emphasis on period poverty.)

It's a particular view of a particular kind of sex. It's kink as mainstream, but this what LGBT orgs seem to be about these days.

It this what Peter Tatchell means by sex positive?

(Mumsnet thread on the wanking day here).

No one involved in educating children should be taking advice on communicating with them about sex from someone who believes it’s ok for adults to have sex with children.

I remind everyone that Tatchell has previously said that not all adult sexual relationships with children are harmful...

The more I think about this the more uneasy I am. Adults with a significant public profile (and no qualifications) feel able to demand that children must be compelled to undergo compulsory talks about sex. Children of all ages will be forced to undergo these sessions regardless of their personal wishes, any SEN, history of abuse, mental health concerns, religious / cultural issues.

Indeed.

I just cannot fathom how Peter Tatchell is taken seriously after he wrote that fucking disgusting letter about relationships between adults and children. He is an odious creep who shouldnt be anywhere fucking near sex education policy formation.

And why the fuck would any teenager need lessons on how to masturbate? The whole point of doing it yourself is that you figure out what you like. I think there does need to be more emphasis towards girls that masturbation is nothing to be ashamed of - it's not needed towards boys, they are constantly talking about wanking, but for girls it's still quite a taboo subject that many women don't admit to, because of misogyny and patriarchy.

But as to how to actually do it? No, Tatchell can keep his filthy paws away thanks.

As there are a significant number of civil servants and government advisers busy removing the rights of their female colleagues to sex segregated spaces and ensuring that the special interest lobby groups get heard over and above all professionals, I would expect him to be given a seat at the SRE planning table very swiftly. These men have no interest in safeguarding children.

A few people have mentioned the notorious Tatchell letter to the Guardian where he endorses sexual relationships between adults and children.

Let's not forget, either, the obituary he wrote in 1998 of Ian Campbell Dunn:

www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/obituary-ian-dunn-1151494.html

The obituary begins:

"IAN DUNN was a pioneer for lesbian and gay human rights, remaining a central figure in the battle for homosexual equality - in Scotland and internationally - for 30 years."

Strangely, it fails to mention that Dunn was co-founder of the Paedophile Information Exchange.

Odd, huh?

So the two men who are promoting the queering of sex education for children, one thinks children can have healthy relationships with adults, the other is on record as saying women only have sex "because sex is the price they are willing to pay for a relationship".

Even if they totally skipped discussing technique (ew) lessons created by these men, delivered in a mixed sex environment, are a recipe for misogyny and bullying of girls.

What's happened to safeguarding FFS?

If you want young people to have a healthy view of sex, then it’s something that needs to be talked about and normalised. Obviously finding the best way to achieve that is difficult, and there will always be someone that is unhappy, but the most important thing is fully informed young people who can be safe, say no and feel confident doing it, rather than being considered ‘frigid’

Sex and relationship education has been a part of the curriculum since I was of that age in 1970's. It is nothing new, and not something that isn't already being covered.The best way to lean about sex in any other meaningful way is by doing it. That's how we all learnt, surely.

You can't educate people out of poor behaviour and disrespect. Behaviour and respect is learnt through upbringing and what is witnessed around that person.

Pornography is omnipresent as it is, and difficult for today's children to avoid. The solution to that is not to be teaching children about sex in such explicit and inappropriate ways.

Pornography needs to be more difficult to access, for a start - and adults need to take responsibility for what they view. The howls of upset when the government announced tighter controls on access to pornography - suggests that it is adults who have issues around sex - not children.

The howls of upset when the government announced tighter controls on access to pornography - suggests that it is adults who have issues around sex - not children
Yy ^

It really does sound to me as if Peter Tatchell is trying to work through his own sexual abuse as a child. He finds it difficult to frame or name as abuse because even in such circumstances pleasurable sensations can sometimes be experienced. What's more our early sexual experiences stay with us and shape our responses, and our imagination, in adulthood.

Endof I think they know exactly how schools work. They want to pretend parents have an opt-out whilst making it physically impossible for parents to opt-out in practise.

I hope this letter gets lots of publicity. Everyone needs to see exactly what Peter Tatchell and Stephen Fry are pushing here. The current climate is emboldening all the PIE apologists and promoters whilst certain 'liberals' conveniently look the other way.

Has anyone written a petition or joint letter espousing the view that Tatchell and Fry should be kept as far away as possible from sex education for children?

Lilliths I was just thinking the same. I haven't read the whole thread, just the link - last year I would have felt confident that this attempt from PT would have been swiftly dismissed by Dept. education, now I'm not so sure.

I was going to write to D Hinds and cc my MP and Min of Families and mention that no such inclusion of trans ideology should be taught. A petition would be better instead. How to phrase it though?

I agree with you justhadathought at 16:05 .

Anyone thinking of writing to their MP - this is an excellent impact assessment of some of the dire guidance around at the moment that removes the rights of children, in particular girls, in favour of the rights of certain groups of adults to gaslight and groom children

www.transgendertrend.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/CRIA-Allsorts-Toolkit.pdf?fbclid=IwAR2Ncm9WWoc-ikaW0XJV79w4rzaREgVqr_-aWa_xgS6MhL3hncjUqFVGu1g

How did we all manage to grow up and have loving relationships and sex lives without creepy Peter Tatchel to tell us how ? Amazing.

I have also just clocked adults who sexually exploit youngsters often get away with it because the victims feel embarrassed or guilty about sex and are therefore reluctant to report it
Rape is not “sex” . Exploited and abused children don’t report it for a multitude of reasons, mostly put in their heads by the abuser. Not because they feel guilty about sex
Then there is the whole sex is a human right trope.
Plus the don’t kink shame trope.
God the whole thing is so deeply creepy. I feel actually freaked out now I have read it in full. I had only read half of it yesterday.

I have also just clocked adults who sexually exploit youngsters often get away with it because the victims feel embarrassed or guilty about sex and are therefore reluctant to report it
Rape is not “sex” . Exploited and abused children don’t report it for a multitude of reasons, mostly put in their heads by the abuser. Not because they feel guilty about sex

Yes very much this^

Apologies if my next bit is distressing, it is just that I think these things need talking about much more in order to protect children.

As a women who was sexually abused for many years of my childhood I can say that one of the last things that would have helped is teachers educating me about my desires and pleasure etc.

I don't really want to write the things that here that my abuser would say to me but they would fit right in to the programme that PT is proposing. All the talk about pleasure and desire in children is wrong and harmful, especially to children who are being abused. Even the stuff PT writes about consent seems wrong in the the way it is written in his proposals, mixed in with the stuff about pleasure and desire and explicit teaching. My abuser would often imply to me that I was consenting and that I desired the abuse and rapes.

I didn't speak up about my abuse for many reasons but it wasn't because I thought that sex between two consenting adults was shameful. However rape of children and also incest is shameful, even if it wasn't my shame to carry. Even admitting to what has happened to you, as the abused one, carries stigma.

Other reasons for not speaking up include fear of not being believed, fear of hurting other family members with the truth, fear of appearing stupid or people wondering how I had let this happen to me (even though my earliest memory is from when I was 7).

What I needed and what I think that most other children need are contained within PT's proposals although I do not believe that they are his original ideas, and that is teaching about body parts and the basics of sex and also boundaries. Also what grooming and sexual abuse looks like, alongside how to get help and reassurance that a child will always be believed and that adults can handle the information (the other stuff in PT's proposals would, I think, significantly comprise this information). I can't say that this would have made me speak out but it would have given me the best chance to feel able to.

Obviously as a child matures, they should receive more information, but what I expect negatively impacts on most people's sex lives is either bad past experiences or being in a relationship that is not mutually giving and loving. Tackle that stuff most importantly, especially teach older children and young adults the confidence to express boundaries about sex practices and also about the way they are treated within a relationship. I am sure that if a relationship is good and respectful, then most young adults can enjoy figuring out the different ways to enjoy sex themselves.

I really do find PT's proposals deeply concerning and, as I said, some of them fit all too comfortably with the words of my abuser. I think PT's proposed relationship and sex education will make children much less safe.

Great post Chicken you have articulated it so well

Will a Challenor help Stonewall form their policy?

@SirVixofVixHall

Lots of people don’t manage to successfully have those things, often due to a lack of education surrounding choice to express what you do and do not think you’ll enjoy, and a lack of choice in saying no due to the pressures around sex in society and the lack of people talking about sex.

Obviously not suggesting this program is at all suitable, but more does need to be done, it’s just finding a way to improve sex and relationship education is of course very difficult.

some will still be virgins.

I’m concerned about the children who have been sexually abused or assaulted for whom some of PT’s proposed content will be very upsetting and/or triggering. The idea that they’d be forced to endure this at all, let alone in a mixed setting, is abhorrent.

I’ve just caught up and seen Chicken’s important and articulate post, which expresses the abused child’s perspective. Chicken

Placemarking.

Nothing useful to add. Except a man who advocates for paedophilia and writes a sex guide for children should be arrested not endorsed.

And what the hell is Stephen Fry thinking? I thought the man was supposed to be smart. He, unlike Tatchell, as a career to destroy.