Meet the Other Phone. Protection built in.

Meet the Other Phone.
Protection built in.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

11 yo DD taught in class that JK Rowling was transphobic

125 replies

amter · 29/11/2021 21:52

So DD shared with me that in their class the teacher raised the JK Rowling vs Emma Watson issue, and the teacher (and most students) were very much of the opinion JK was wrong and Emma Watson in the right when discussing the issues/Emma taking a stand against JK.

FFS, I was worried about this nonsense, luckily DD and I (and DS) have been openly talking about gender stereotypes not defining sex, and that you can't change sex etc for a few years now. DD firmly believes you can't change sex and we have previously discussed what JK actually has said.

The conversation in class was led by a teacher and it arose from being supportive to gay and trans students. DD was saying to me that she supports her friends who are gay (apparently 3 girls in her class of 30, 2 of whom are saying they are also trans). DD wants to support them however she doesn't feel she can say anything at school about believing sex and gender are different and that gender stereotypes don't do anyone any favours. I knew this was coming but honestly did not expect this in year 7 term 1!

Just wanted to vent...

OP posts:
DdraigGoch · 03/12/2021 20:12

@fournonblondes

Yes this is definitely happening. I hear with concern and please complain because this teacher can’t go about it this way.

So obvious why the left want 16 years old to vote. They come fresh with the ideas and agenda these teachers pushed at school.

Not only that, they've not got the life experience to spot red flags.
Metacat · 03/12/2021 22:43

@SolasAna

I'm inclined to agree - it's certainly not an approach I'd have taken. But, again, I do still think there's some potential for nuance here.

JKR's a public figure, who published her essay in the public domain. That, to me, makes it a valid resource for debate.

As such, the question is, rather, whether the lesson used the essay itself or quotations from it - and, in turn, from Watson - as primary source material, OR whether the focus was, as you suggest, more of a clumsily paraphrased ad hominem approach. It certainly sounds like the latter! But we don't know this for sure.

Tbh, either way, the evidence stacks up to this being badly handled - extracts from the essay should have been used and probably weren't... and if they were used, the material wasn't remotely age appropriate! Lose-lose.

But I still feel that acknowledging all these possible scenarios and allowing for fallibility makes the strongest case - modelling something like the reflective approach Rowling showed, overall, in her essay.

It's hard, though. I really get that.

SolasAnla · 03/12/2021 23:51

@Metacat

I don't think that extracts from the essay can be used fairly. It's like reading one of Shakespeare's plays and ignoring that while the class spoke English they would not understand some of the English used by the characters.

One of the worst things about the whole discourse are the people who rely on other people's "reports". These people have "translated" what they read and repeated their interpretation with a personal bias. Then people tend to listen and accept ideas which reinforce our own personal bias.

Being famous brings it own bias too e.g. has EW ever been typecast into the evil woman role in a film?

KittenKong · 04/12/2021 00:01

I just have to say - her new book title is announced! ‘The ink black Heart’. Out next year. Something else for silly people to pour over to find hidden hate messages .

MsGoodenough · 04/12/2021 07:44

Don't worry about alienating the staff, being 'that parent's exactly what you want to be. We need a whole army of 'that parents' to get schools to see sense. Dd's school are now at the stage of asking for my advice on their pshe curriculum! There's never any need to be aggressive or impolite, but a calm firm insistence not to be fobbed off is so important.

Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g · 04/12/2021 07:54

@KittenKong

I just have to say - her new book title is announced! ‘The ink black Heart’. Out next year. Something else for silly people to pour over to find hidden hate messages .
Oh good. I've really enjoyed all the Strike books. Hoping for another BBC adaptation at some point too.

I can see the media reaction to the new book now.

'I've read this so you don't have to! Trigger Warning: yet again Rowling shows herself as a bigot. In all 1000 pages of this there are no mentions of anybody who might not be cisgender. It's 2021! How can any self-respecting writer or anybody involved in the publishing business claim to be representing the UK in modern times without having gender diverse characters ...'

or

'I've read this so you don't have to! Trigger Warning: yet again Rowling shows herself as a bigot. In all 1000 pages of this there are repeated mentions of someone who presents as cisgender yet is clearly genderqueer and in the closet, but this issue just isn't addressed! The character's name is Robin, FFS, a gender neutral name and Robin steps outside gender norms all the time. It's 2021! How can any self-respecting writer or anybody involved in the publishing business claim to be representing the UK in modern times without having openly gender questioning characters ...'

Snoopsnoggysnog · 04/12/2021 09:07

OP, the Deputy Head - that’s truly shocking. I know you’re taking a soft approach but I’d be going to the governors if you are fobbed off.

FindTheTruth · 04/12/2021 09:36

Turns out it was the Deputy Head who runs these classes.
I sent a fairly innocuous email asking for the lesson information and additional context. I am still waiting for a response from the school but will chase up next week.

OP, if you speak or write to them again, would discussion of these definitions help?

Bigoteering
Falsely accusing someone (or someone’s opinions) as istor phobic. A Bigoteer elevatesthemselves by accusing people of being bigoted.This is a manipulation to exploit the stigmas accompanying such labels and force the opponent to spend time and energy explaining “why he/she is not a bigot”. certain litigious trans activists: deny, accuse, block, repeat, don't get pinned down in an open fact-based discussion.

e.g. telling students that JKR is transphobic

Second Order Bigoteering
someone will side with one party in a conflict without investigating the source of the problem or the nature of the dispute, then spin arguments to explain their support. An ‘Ovine’ unquestioning 'herd'

e.g. asking students to put their hands up against JKR

Pedophrasty
Definition:Argument involving children to prop up a rationalisation and make the opponent look like a bigot, as people are defenceless and suspend all skepticism in front of suffering children: nobody has the heart to question the authenticity or source of the reporting.

E.g. The mermaids pedophrasty that 48% of trans children are suicidal, sourced from 13 responses in a flawed survey.

Nabothizing
Production of false accusation

Partializing
Exploiting the unsavoury attributes of one party in a conflict without revealing those of the other party

Identitarian
A supporter or advocate of the political interests of a particular group

Evade and hide
efforts to dismiss or discredit serious concerns about a service or clinical approach typically are driven by those seeking to evade accountability and shield their methods from criticism. Such a defensive, self-serving approach would be dangerous

OhHolyJesus · 04/12/2021 10:12

@MsGoodenough

Don't worry about alienating the staff, being 'that parent's exactly what you want to be. We need a whole army of 'that parents' to get schools to see sense. Dd's school are now at the stage of asking for my advice on their pshe curriculum! There's never any need to be aggressive or impolite, but a calm firm insistence not to be fobbed off is so important.
I second this. It's exactly what worked for me, 3 or 4 different individual parents approaching the school with concerns and all communication was reasonable and friendly, nothing aggressive.

You start there and escalate with the complaints procedure/governors if you need to.

I didn't want to be 'that parent' either, but we are parents and able to protect our children, that takes priority over everything else.

Keke94LND · 04/12/2021 10:25

@SirSamuelVimes

They had a vote?? I bet it wasn't an anonymous one. That's appalling.

I would absolutely be complaining about that. A teacher told them that X view was Right and Good, Y view was Wrong and Hateful, and then asked them to (most likely) put their hands up to say if they were X or Y? How the fuck is that ok??

(Ex-teacher & head of department - I'd have been having very serious words with any of my staff who'd set kids up in that way.)

Yeah aren't teachers not supposed to impose their own views but allow the class to come up with their own opinion on things?
KittenKong · 04/12/2021 10:49

A decent teacher wouldn’t bring this hot topic up anyway - but if they did, they’d split the class into groups to argue sides.

FindTheTruth · 04/12/2021 11:32

OP, another angle is that students remember teachers who taught them 'how to think'. It's a life skill. This is from the MP for Redditch:

TWEET
Rachel Maclean MP @redditchrachel
@RichardDawkins probably doesn't remember me but as his former student, he taught me a lot about how to think and reason. Means a lot that he makes this statement that I fully agree with.

Quote Tweet
Richard Dawkins
@RichardDawkins
Kathleen Stock is a brave hero of reason. Chapter in Material Girls on total immersion in fiction & need to keep hold of reality is truly excellent. You can feel genuine, heartfelt, deep sympathy for Ophelia, but you snap back to reality when you need to find the theatre loo.

Bosky · 10/12/2021 23:05

@FindTheTruth

Turns out it was the Deputy Head who runs these classes. I sent a fairly innocuous email asking for the lesson information and additional context. I am still waiting for a response from the school but will chase up next week.

OP, if you speak or write to them again, would discussion of these definitions help?

Bigoteering
Falsely accusing someone (or someone’s opinions) as istor phobic. A Bigoteer elevatesthemselves by accusing people of being bigoted.This is a manipulation to exploit the stigmas accompanying such labels and force the opponent to spend time and energy explaining “why he/she is not a bigot”. certain litigious trans activists: deny, accuse, block, repeat, don't get pinned down in an open fact-based discussion.

e.g. telling students that JKR is transphobic

Second Order Bigoteering
someone will side with one party in a conflict without investigating the source of the problem or the nature of the dispute, then spin arguments to explain their support. An ‘Ovine’ unquestioning 'herd'

e.g. asking students to put their hands up against JKR

Pedophrasty
Definition:Argument involving children to prop up a rationalisation and make the opponent look like a bigot, as people are defenceless and suspend all skepticism in front of suffering children: nobody has the heart to question the authenticity or source of the reporting.

E.g. The mermaids pedophrasty that 48% of trans children are suicidal, sourced from 13 responses in a flawed survey.

Nabothizing
Production of false accusation

Partializing
Exploiting the unsavoury attributes of one party in a conflict without revealing those of the other party

Identitarian
A supporter or advocate of the political interests of a particular group

Evade and hide
efforts to dismiss or discredit serious concerns about a service or clinical approach typically are driven by those seeking to evade accountability and shield their methods from criticism. Such a defensive, self-serving approach would be dangerous

Fantastic!!

Came back here to find out if there was any update from the school yet.

Echoing Metacat - "who provided the lesson plan"

  • and what was the lesson plan? It would be "helpful" to see it in order to understand what the teacher (Deputy Head FFS!!) was hoping to achieve - and did she think that she had achieved it?

On voting by a show of hands -

Abhannmor - "Show of hands votes are illegal for trades unions

Not in the UK they are not.

Show of hands voting is the norm in union meetings, starting with the very first "show of hands" in determining whether to even accept a motion for debate, when the Chair asks for a "Seconder" for the motion. (That is a very strong, open declaration of voting intention.)

Asking for speakers "For" and "Against" the motion requires further "showing of hands" as well as the more challenging task of speaking "For" or "Against".

I would not suggest that Citrine is appropriate for a classroom debate for young children but it is the standard for Trade Union meetings in the UK.

"Citrine's "The ABC of Chairmanship" has long been the bible of the Labour movement: the basis on which standing orders have been drafted, arguments resolved and procedures defined. It is frequently quoted in public meetings and referred to in sub-committees. This edition was updated and revised by Michael Crannell and Norman Citrine, to improve the book’s readability while maintaining the essence of the original.

This is a book that can be used for all groups and not just for trade unions; it is as handy for secretaries and lay members as it is for chairs. It remains an essential pocket book for all attenders at meetings, whether they have to keep order or want to use the procedures effectively and correctly."

fabians.org.uk/publication/the-abc-of-chairmanship/

Secret Ballots DO have their place in Trade Union business but they are the exception rather than the rule.

Secret Ballot Voting is also covered in this short, practical handbook:

"Counter Wokecraft: A Field Manual for Combatting the Woke in the University and Beyond."
Pincourt, Charles; Lindsay, James. November 2021

"The second part of the book (Wokecraft) analyzes the collection of principles, strategies, and tactics used by the Woke to entrench their perspective — in other words, wokecraft.

The success of the Woke relies primarily on three things:

  • First is the weaponization of positive-sounding, commonly understood words that have double meanings, or Woke Crossover Words. These words (e.g., critical, diversity, inclusion) are brandished like Improvised Explosive Devices. They are slipped into documents and decisions, justified by their commonly held meanings, but are later used to justify Woke interventions based on their radical Woke meaning.
  • Second, there is a general insistence on informality, which is then exploited to manipulate decision-making by preventing, for example, secret ballot voting.
  • Third, there are a number of woke bullying tactics that are used to prevent people from resisting Woke advances. These range from coercion through consensus to cancel-culture attacks. Together, these tactics are used to exaggerate support for, and quell dissent against, Woke advances."

Relevant Sections from Part 3 "Counter Wokecraft"

3.8 Strategies to Facilitate Dissent from Wokecraft
3.8.1 Allowing Anonymous Input

3.9 Secret Ballot Voting to Counter Wokecraft
3.9.1 Secret Ballot Voting Ideals
3.9.2 How to Institute Secret Ballot Voting

3.10 Making Sure Secret Ballot Votes are Transparent, Free and Fair

3.11 How to Win A Vote

www.mindingthecampus.org/2021/11/26/counter-wokecraft-why-i-wrote-it-and-why-you-should-read-it/

======

Now, I have got my fingers crossed that the OP has had a constructive response from the school 🤞

Ides · 07/01/2022 21:06

"A learned woman? What’s one of those when they are at home?"

You tell me. I said 'educated', not 'learned'. ;) You don't need a PhD, but you do need to read some stuff. Take up your argument with your straw man. ;)

JKR has never seemed to me to be on top of the debate about transphobia. She's no idiot - she's just never seemed to feel the need to understand it beyond what her 'common sense' tells her.

I'm baffled that, in this day and age, people are still wont to value their 'common sense' as much as they do. Common sense - that form of knowledge that, a century ago, produced the kind of belief parodied by Harry Enfield (as one poster has seen, but whose implications they've not quite grasped, with their citation of Enfield's hilarious 'Women, know your place'). And opposed to such 'common sense' is always, always, always, 'ideology'. A bit over a century ago there was the 'common sense view' that women wouldn't have it in their delicate brains to vote intelligently, versus the 'ideology' that they could.

These sorts of arguments are feeble, folks. Yes, you really do need to be more than just a woman, or a man, or anything else in order to understand an issue. You need to educate yourself about it. That means at least learning enough to accept that what you consider common sense - or fact - could be just downright, radically, wrong - just as it was, regarding women and their supposed mental limitations, a century ago. (And supposed racial differences, etc, etc ... well, right up to the present day.)

So much blather - no doubt most here will say 'yeah, yeah, I've heard it all before'. I'm well-used to that. But one thing I really do have to spell out: the bulk of 'Ideology' - indoctrination - whatever you want to call it - doesn't happen as a result of formal education (by, implicitly, lefty lecturers at uni), or by reading fanatical works. That's a complete subversion of the truth.

This truth is that ideologically-based views come about as a result of the drip, drip, drip of opinion presented as fact, over years. You pick it up as a result of stuff being shoved at you with your critical faculties either not switched on ... or absent, because you've not been taught about how to develop such critical faculties.

Yes, it absolutely does take more than just 'being a woman' to understand what transphobia is, just as it took more than just being a woman to know what sexism was (and still is). And it takes more than being just a human to know what humanity is.

People need to learn stuff. In particular they need to learn stuff that is counterintuitive. That is: anti common-sensical. So that they can at least entertain the notion that a woman may, just possibly, be able to get into a car and engage the correct gear, so as not to reverse it into a gatepost. (God that Enfield sketch was funny! Though not as funny as the one about women getting educated and growing beards and going mad. 'Look at these harridans. Hard to believe they're all under 25, isn't it?' Superb!)

One last note: I've got say - the debate about transphobia here in the UK is strangely right wing, stuffed up and kind of old fashioned here in the UK, by western standards. Even in the USA - notwithstanding all the lunacy there over e.g. gun-rights, religion and most recently the covid pandemic and ridiculous reactions to it from anti-vax Trumpists - the standard sort of consensus of the subject on the issue of transgender issues is more advanced. We're looking kind of stuffed up and behind the times here, I'd suggest. Time to move on. Bit of education required, sharpish.

Theeyeballsinthesky · 07/01/2022 21:20

No thank you

Next!!

Olderbadger1 · 07/01/2022 21:30

Same thing happened with my 12-year-old granddaughter - an introverted kid, passionate about social justice and a big JKR fan. They were told by a supply teacher to write about their heroes and she was going to write about JKR until she was told that wasn't appropriate since JKR was transphobic. It worked out ok for her since that gave me the oppertunity to show her the tweet posted above. But it's infuriating in the wider context.

Igneococcus · 07/01/2022 21:31

That's an awful lot of words without saying anything of any substance other than JKR is wrong in your opinion.

Waitwhat23 · 07/01/2022 21:38

@Igneococcus

That's an awful lot of words without saying anything of any substance other than JKR is wrong in your opinion.
I'm amazed you could identify a point within that waffle. Critical thinking was utterly devoid in that self congratulatory, pseudo intellectual screed.
bordermidgebite · 07/01/2022 21:41

I have learnt that men and women differ in a few but notable ways
Those differences are immutable
I have learnt that sex sometimes matters
I have learnt that transwomen are not women
I have learnt that women ( sex) experience harm because of stereotypes and being physically smaller and weaker than men
Does that help?

It's always reassuring when common sense and learning and data analysis all align -suggests a very good accurate understanding of the world

Igneococcus · 07/01/2022 21:42

It must be that goddess energy that is surging through me waitwhat though I have not yet mastered "to be more than just a woman"

Anactor · 07/01/2022 21:42

@ides

You said ‘learned’ in your post on the 1st December 2021 at 00.08.32

bordermidgebite · 07/01/2022 21:45

I think learned is a bit more than educated

Educated is from others -what others tell you

Learned implies taking and building on that education -critical thinking about what you have picked up from education

TurquoiseBaubles · 07/01/2022 21:55

JKR isn't interested in being "learned" or "educated" about transphobia, because she isn't giving any opinions on trans rights (apart from saying she supports them).

She is, however, very well educated on women's rights, and that is what she is expressing opinions on.

Georgeskitchen · 07/01/2022 22:05

Abigail Shriers book "Irreversable Damage" is a must read for parents of teenagers especially daughters
Prepare to be shocked

RufustheFloralmissingreindeer · 07/01/2022 22:52

[quote Anactor]@ides

You said ‘learned’ in your post on the 1st December 2021 at 00.08.32[/quote]
So they did

New posts on this thread. Refresh page