BBC Bitsize - Pronouns

[OhHolyJesus]

I mean I'm not surprised but Bitesize is used by schools through the country as a supposed reliable, unbiased source of education material.

mobile.twitter.com/SafeSchools_UK/status/1319025713475952641?fbclid=IwAR0rTBD2j5PKOeTKvYSSX90c4RUDmJDo7Zg613qnDBXNaAncv3J8epYWLSQ

You can complain here:

www.bbc.co.uk/contact/complaints/make-a-complaint

Or email your MP and cc MPs Safe Schools Alliance on info@safeschoolsallianceuk.

In the tweet thread there are some people already complaining. I'm not a defund the BBC kind of person but I can see why license fee layers are questioning what the BBC are doing with their money (there is a website 'BBC complaints' that's all about biased Brexit coverage).

It's a trap. Endless pronouns, endless opportunities to cause offence and be chastised for doing so.

Nobody knows!

Just another reminder. If you think the BBC shouldn't be peddling this nonsense write and tell them. And let your MP know as well.

you will BECOME the biological parent of that child. In fact, history will be rewritten and the birth parents will no longer exist and you will always have been the child's biological parents and that, in medical situations where it matters, you will not disclose that you are not the biological parent.

Actually that's pretty much what happens from a legal perspective and adoptive parents would not be required to disclose it even in medical situations although hopefully most would.

Oh Hai jj1968

about that 'what's a female gender identity thing'....?

@jj1968

you will BECOME the biological parent of that child. In fact, history will be rewritten and the birth parents will no longer exist and you will always have been the child's biological parents and that, in medical situations where it matters, you will not disclose that you are not the biological parent.

Actually that's pretty much what happens from a legal perspective and adoptive parents would not be required to disclose it even in medical situations although hopefully most would.

Not answering Still waiting.

Doesn't that just prove that it always ends up being followed through to its logical conclusion and how no good can come of it?

Risking someones life by withholding vital information is not kind at all is it?

How far do you go?

If you think the BBC shouldn't be peddling this nonsense write and tell them

Done.

Did my bit and wrote my letter of complaint. Not much more to do right now. Feels useless.

As mother to a gender fluid child I am delighted the BBC have done this. To avoid bias, can you also post the url to congratulate them? - or does that go against your - frankly one sided - views?

What a load of made up twaddle. Disappointed in the BBC. How is this in their remit? I won't be allowing my DC unsupervised access to bitesize now which is a shame.

@Kitfish

As mother to a gender fluid child I am delighted the BBC have done this. To avoid bias, can you also post the url to congratulate them? - or does that go against your - frankly one sided - views?

What is a gender fluid child and how do they differ from any other child who likes to do/wear both typically masculine and feminine things?

@jj1968

She's my mother. In both the sense that she gestated me and raised me. Had I been adopted I would have a birth mother and an adoptive mother

So you can have a birth mother or an adoptive mother, despite biology. Bit like you can have a trans woman and a non trans woman. Either these words and concepts are set in stone or they aren't.

But mother has more than one meaning as I am now pointing out for the third time. It means 'woman who gestated you' and it means 'person who raised you'.. And 'woman' doesn't have two meanings. It doesn't. You would like it to but that doesn't make it so.

I hate this use of adoptive parents as a gotcha. It has nothing to do with this debate. Adoptive parents don't, when asked by a doctor about hereditary traits in their children, answer for themselves rather than the relevant birth parent or start claiming to be triggered by reality and demanding safe spaces - even though it probably is painful to be reminded that you're not genetically related to your child. And they are honest wuth their children about their life stories - even when rhoae stories are terrible.

And that's the parallel, sometimes reality is painful. But it's also important.

Actually that's pretty much what happens from a legal perspective and adoptive parents would not be required to disclose it even in medical situations although hopefully most would.

No, that's not what happens-in this country anyway. A child's history does not disappear just because they have been adopted-and this is made very clear to adoptive parents. The majority of children adopted in this country are older rather than babies/toddlers. They may never choose to call their adoptive parent 'mum' or 'dad'-their choice. They may still have contact with their birth parents (if deemed safe) and refer to them as 'mum' and 'dad' in their adoptive parents' presence-their choice.

The days of adopting a baby and then telling them at 18 that they were adopted and never mentioning it again are over. Adoptive children do not exist to validate their adoptive parents' feelings. In the same way women do not exist to validate the feelings of transwomen.

Genuine question, Kitfish. Does your child have to repeatedly tell their friends/teachers/peergroup/family what pronouns they wish to be used on a day to day basis? Or do you all take your cues from how your child presents on any given day?

It sounds exhausting all round to be honest

@Kitfish

As mother to a gender fluid child I am delighted the BBC have done this. To avoid bias, can you also post the url to congratulate them? - or does that go against your - frankly one sided - views?

JFGI

HTH

No need to duck.

@Malahaha

Duolingo tells me that it's correct to use 'es' (it) for a girl, because the word for girl (das Madchen) is neuter. So it appears to be correct for German at least.

Not quite right. True, it is "das Maedchen", but only because it has the suffix "-chen" which is always neutral, like the other diminutive, "-lein". Die Frau, the woman, can become "das Frauelein" and der Mann, the man, can become "das Maennchen".

This is one of the things which confuses me about languages which have genders for all nouns. I was going by what I found on this page (but obviously input from a native or fluent speaker would be better). But there is a bit of discussion about whether 'es' or 'sie' is correct even there (the consensus seemed to be that 'es' was grammatically correct).

Bit like you can have a trans woman and a non trans woman.

Yes definitely, in the sense that female people exist who identify as the the opposite sex (male), and I would think of them as a "trans woman". Because I view that person as a woman.

@Kitfish

As mother to a gender fluid child I am delighted the BBC have done this. To avoid bias, can you also post the url to congratulate them? - or does that go against your - frankly one sided - views?

No need to duck, but did you know that the BBC is going against Department for Education guidelines by doing this? Are they one sided too? I hope they are, on the side of children's safeguarding.

Telling girls to do this destroys their boundaries. See Pronouns are Rohypnol it explains this very well.

@Kitfish

As mother to a gender fluid child I am delighted the BBC have done this. To avoid bias, can you also post the url to congratulate them? - or does that go against your - frankly one sided - views?

What does that mean? Genuinely, I have no idea.

@jj1968

you will BECOME the biological parent of that child. In fact, history will be rewritten and the birth parents will no longer exist and you will always have been the child's biological parents and that, in medical situations where it matters, you will not disclose that you are not the biological parent.

Actually that's pretty much what happens from a legal perspective and adoptive parents would not be required to disclose it even in medical situations although hopefully most would.

That would be appalling parenting in which the child's health is being put before the emotional needs of the parent (where have I seen that before?) Also the parents would have been asked in their assessment what they would do in this situation and would have had to have lied to pass.

So yes, the reality you want to inhabit is best exemplified by, 'this happens in this situation where a parent puts themself before their child and lies to assessing social workers and medical professionals in order to obfuscate reality'. Well done.

@Kitfish

As mother to a gender fluid child I am delighted the BBC have done this. To avoid bias, can you also post the url to congratulate them? - or does that go against your - frankly one sided - views?

How do you, and they, know they are gender-fluid?

What does that mean?

@jj1968

So when you say "gender" you are talking about something you only know by asking a person?

You can probably usually make a good guess, but asking someone if you're unsure is fine.

But that's what the young man who asked the PCSO did, and got taken to court for it.

So it's obviously not fine to ask someone what sex they are, but you're saying it would have been OK to ask the PCSO their 'gender'. What could he have said that was acceptable? I don't think using pronouns 'are you a he or a she?' would have gone down any better.

Such nonsense. Sex is not in a "state of flux" for human beings. Dig up a 2,000 year old skeleton and if it belonged to someone whose sex was female at conception it will still be female now. Anyone who tries to make something so basic and obvious into "flux" is a Trump handmaiden, regardless of their sex (which I think we could all hazard a guess at umpteen pages in!). It's all part of this constant blurring of fantasy and reality that's supposed to make us dazed and compliant.

They are educating about people who identify as trans and use different pronouns - and how to be inclusive towards them. This aligns with the PSHE curriculum which is supposed to encourage young people to be tolerant and non-judgmental of different lifestyles and identities.

What is the issue? Your attitude is like when parents protest about sex education because they think it will encourage their children to have sex.

Feminism is the defining ideology of my life, and I take issue when women's safe spaces are compromised but I don't understand how Bitesize is threatening women at all here.