Interesting how hard the teacher tries with his appeals to the law and authority to force a teen to back down from a stated belief. In a democratic country, the law and authority regulate actions and to an extent speech. But the thoughts and beliefs of individual citizens are not in the remit of the power that the people confer on the apparatus of a democratic state.
Falsehoods the teacher uses to gaslight the boy:
- the law says there are more than two genders (here used in the sense of sex - male and female).
To date no Scottish or UK law exists that states there are more than two sexes. On the contrary, the law we do have specifically refers to only two sexes.
There is also to date no law that specifies that there are more than two genders (in the gender identity meaning of the word).
- that Murray is acting contrary to school inclusion policies by stating there are only males and females.
Inclusion policies normally regulate actions towards and statements about other people. All bets are off here, of course, given the concerning state of its social media posts, but it remains a fact that the boy refers to an option given on a specific, non-school website which asks whether a user is male or female. Please note also that Murray makes no positive or negative statements at all about self-identification of sex or gender.
- there is no such thing as a National School Authority in Scotland. Therefore there is no such thing as a policy held by such an authority that would forbid a pupil from holding the belief that there are only two sexes.
Obviously there is a Department for Education, there is a school inspectorate etc but there is no national school authority because all state schools in Scotland are owned by each local authority who are the only education authority directly controlling a school.
Even more obvious is the fact that Murray's beliefs are protected via three legal frameworks:
- the Equality Act which protects belief and disbelief;
- Article 14 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child which protects a child's right to Freedom of Belief, Freedom of Thought and Freedom of Conscience. A child can only be stopped from manifesting or exercising these rights if this directly interferes with the rights of others (which was not the case here);
- Article 9 - Freedom of Thought, Conscience and Religion - and Article 10 - Freedom of Expression - of the European Convention on Human Rights. (The same caveats apply as per item 2.)
Of course the school will justify the exclusion with its media policy, but the teacher's claim that Murray is not entitled to express his views when he did so without attacking or infringing on the rights of others is contentious.
In light of the number of children allowed to stay in Scottish schools despite displaying far more serious behaviours, I'd be very tempted to seek legal review.