Girlguiding UK's cognitive dissonance on IWD

[JessicaLangoustine]

GGUK's theme for IWD2020 is "Help Girls Bust Gender Stereotypes". Blog attached below.

Extract:

The idea that girls should be emotional and caring, with a love of all things sparkly, while boys are more active and practical, creates cartoon-like versions of what it means to be a girl or a boy.

This sounds pretty harmless, but for a girl who wants to play football, or a boy who hates team sports, it makes them feel they can’t express who they really are. Gender stereotypes try to put limits on what you can do and who you can be.

Are they fucking kidding? They have told us that girls who display "masculine" interests need to be managed out of Guiding. They have told us that we have to accept boys who think they are girls (presumably because they like pink and sparkly things), let these boys share tents, showers and toilets with girls and not tell parents that this is happening. They have told us to accept these "cartoon girls" or be thrown out of Guiding.

The cognitive dissonance blows my mind.

GGUK IWD2020

We should be all over them saying bravo for finally saying something sensible.

I agree with Jeaux

OP I don't understand this bit

They have told us that girls who display "masculine" interests need to be managed out of Guiding.

Can you explain it to me please?

Girl Guiding's campaign is brilliant.

OP's final paragraph about it and a wonderful organisation is just bile.

I though UKGG didn't have a place for girls who were masculine - masculine as defined by stereotypes. And that there is a place for boys who are feminine, as defined by stereotypes.

What they're saying now is good, but how on earth does it tie in with what they've been proudly saying the past few years?!

Girls who say they are boys are not supposed to be in guiding, which continues to call itself a single sex institution. What do girls who think they are boys base this belief on? Gender stereotyping. What do we do with a girl guide who thinks she is a boy? We have to invite "him" to leave.

If I remember correctly, a year or so ago, weren't two women who were Guide group leaders removed from their positions for objecting to boys being able to join if they said they were girls? Isn't there a legal case in progress about this?

Girls who are non binary are also supposed to be advised to join a more fitting org, I remember from s thread ages ago.

GG is for self identifying girls only.

Agree with OP the cognitive dissonance is amazing.

Are they tweeting this?

Do they still think that tomboys should be kicked out and boys who self ID as girls be welcomed and parents not told (including on residential trips)?

It is hard to avoid stereotypes when you have converted a single sex organisation to a "single gender organisiation", since stereotypes is all that is left once you remove biological sex from the definition.

I had this email earlier and thought exactly the same.
Perhaps they would like to start by defining what is a girl.

Thank you Regina perhaps I'll take my "bile" and stop breaking my back running a Guide unit.

None of my girls - in fact no girl I know - even thinks twice about playing football, climbing a tree, doing the hardest maths challenge, writing a programme or any other pursuit that has been the preserve of the male sex by tradition. That's come from 100+ years of women busting these stereotypes. GGUK have jumped into bed with Mermaids and Gendered Intelligence whose sole purpose is to reinforce every gender stereotype there is. That's the cognitive dissonance between the IWD campaign and GGUK's own policies.

And by the way, this "wonderful organisation" is using my subs to pay expensive lawyers to pursue one of their dedicated leaders through the court for caring about safeguarding. If that's not "bile", I don't know what is.

I think I can see a ferret trying to run backwards.

Can ferrets actually reverse?

Daria yes, Katie Alcock is the Brownie leader in question; Man Friday's Helen is the other.

• I got this email earlier, and was pretty furious about the hypocrisy. IWD has brought on a lot of desperate gesturing from organisations who've been busily telling everyone female to shut up and be nice for the past five years or so. Or firing them, suing them, no-platforming them, refusing to allow them to meet, signing petitions to get them to shut up, etc.

And apparently, yes.

Thanks Jessica. I now remember donating to that campaign to raise funds for that legal action. It seems a long time ago but I think it was only last year. What GG has done horrifies me. And thank you for being a Guide Leader.

They're not very bright are they? How sad that they can't see what they're saying contradicts what they said before

This information may be relevant here:

uncommongroundmedia.com/the-2010-equality-act-is-being-undermined-by-official-guidance/

I think GG actually does mean the above but have been led into developing into trans friendly policies on the basis of inclusion. Which is another thing that the organisation really values.
Interestingly, they are doing a huge push on safeguarding training for all Leaders. I was at one of these recently. Several Leaders discussed (confidentially) examples dealt with in their unit. A recurring theme was where a vulnerable child poses a risk to the other girls in her unit. I got the impression that they are becoming more aware (in my area, not sure if that translates nationally) that there are sometimes conflicts between Inclusion and safeguarding which current policies are not fully addressing.
I would watch this space.

Thank you, Daria . I do enjoy it, even though it is a huge amount of work on top of my day job. However, I will not accept any male bodied person into my unit.

Katie's case is ongoing, she was posting on this board a couple of weeks ago. I will see if I can find the link.

Just an additional remark to "Avocadohips" about the "managing out". It is not my view that anyone can change sex, let alone a girl who is possibly going through puberty and having to cope with potentially distressing changes to her body, leading her to hate it (I deal with 10-14 year olds). However the policy of Mermaids and Gendered Intelligence, with whom GGUK are in partnership, is to validate and accept anyone who asserts that they are the opposite sex, no matter what their age. Therefore, under their policies and guidance, I have to accept that this girl is now a boy because "he" now says he is so. So I must expel "him" from my unit, which, like all of Girlguiding, is single sex.

Also, GGUK sees it as a gender stereotype that girls should have to be "emotional and caring" . And yet, what is the trans lobby and its supporters constantly telling us? To put aside all our logic, reasoning, science based knowledge of sexual dimorphism and experience based reservations about allowing the male sex into women only spaces....and to be kind .

Like Jessica, I love being a leader but I'm incredibly dismayed at GGUK and I'm really resentful at paying the subs for them to use them to fight battles in the court for something I totally diagree with. I feel GGUK are out of touch with what happens on the ground. Thankfully my girls, the other leaders and the parents are fabulous making the actual sessions a pleasure.

Baemur I am sorry, but I wish I had your confidence. Did any of those leaders at your training raise safeguarding issues regarding a trans girl? In the current climate, where any question about anyone trans results in pitchforks and accusations of transphobia, will the average volunteer want to place her head on the block? Look what is happening to Katie Alcock. GGUK have done nothing to address her concerns, just gone on a witch hunt against her.

Also, Beamur , girls from some faith groups cannot be in the presence of men. Male bodied trans women will not be accepted as women or girls by the parents of these girls. Therefore, their girls will be excluded from Guiding. The consequences of GGUK's brainwashing by Mermaids to include a tiny number of male bodied people is to exclude a much larger number of natal females. And whilst we should not conflate religion with nationality or skin colour, the exclusion of girls from ethnic minority groups is inevitable. How is that following a policy of inclusion?