800 schools sent book on being "assigned at birth"

[ResisterRex]

This is in The Times and also has been picked up by the Mail. The latter states you can check if your school has been sent what sounds like unscientific nonsense.

We must push back on this. If children are abused and they cannot be clear with anyone - including the police - that they tell which sex the abuser actually was eg because of features of the abuse, then abusers will get away with it. They have to be able to know which body parts belong to which sex.

And that's before you get to the damage we know is being done to mostly young lesbians, being encouraged to become unanchored from their sexed bodies. Helped along no doubt by lies like this. And it is lies to tell children they're "assigned at birth".

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/99226a02-cd58-11ec-bb1d-4e283d8ec187?shareToken=d7b627d0f12641b797e0354b0993a534

"What Does LGBT+ Mean? was published in October and is described as an educational book for children aged between 8 and 11 and written to be easy to use in the classroom. Its author is Olly Pike, director of the LGBT+ educational resource Pop’n’Olly; Mel Lane, a diversity campaigner; and her son, James Canning.

The book claims “people feel happier and included when their pronouns are respected” and includes definitions of those who identify as transgender, non-binary and intersex. On pronouns, it adds: “We can’t just assume pronouns. If you are not sure about another person’s pronouns, it is OK to politely ask.”

The book features all the LGBT+ flags, as well as suggested activities for pupils to try in school."

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10792297/Book-sent-800-primary-schools-teaches-children-persons-sex-assigned.html
"On its website, the non-fiction book which was first published in October is described as being aimed at children aged eight to 11, upper KS2 and lower KS3 pupils.

'This book explores identity, assigned sex, gender, love, sexuality, discrimination, privilege, allyship, pride and more,' the website says.

'This is going to be a book that will make a big difference in the lives of countless young people.'

Helen Joyce from advocacy group Sex Matters said that nobody is 'assigned' a sex: 'I've given birth twice and both times I knew what sex the baby was at 20 weeks. It's just absurd,' she told The Times.

'How did we get to a place where teachers feel they can sit and say to some primary children, "Some people feel male, some feel female, some feel both and some feel neither"?'

Pop'n'Olly is also encouraging people to donate the LGBT+ book to primary schools across the UK and are offering a two-for-one deal on the donations.

You can even search for a primary school on their 'school finder' feature which lets you check if it has been sent a book already."

I've just come back to this. I'm glad Transgender Trend is on it but I'm still thinking an email to my MP is in order. It's lies to tell children their sexed body was "assigned". Just full on lies with dangerous consequences.

If I was in a more "ugh whatever" mood, I'd think of this mob as shameless marketing on steroids.

Read this book on the website. It is a sexist pile of crap. You can scroll through the pictures to read the content.

www.popnolly.com/product-page/jamie

Jamie should have just told her brothers to fuck off and repaired her own clothes 🙄

Didn't need to be a boy to do that

Yes. What a bloody awful book.

I had a look at the database list, just looked at the schools in East Midlands. In some areas eg Nottingham and Nottinghamshire every single school has at least one book.
I hope Transgender Trend do a letter to send to schools.

The stories are such shite versions of fairy tales. They could have been empowering like a poster said above Jamie could just tell her brothers to fuck off it's not the 1950s! When you can't write original content and just shove a load of sterotypes in it really doesn't work.

Transgender Trend took a good look at 'Jamie'. Olly Pike has a problem with lesbians alright - the short haired mannish ones are basically all transmen in waiting aren't they Olly?

Seeing as the massive and suspect rise in trans treatment is down to non conforming girls I think any school supplying this is grossly irresponsible.

Propoganda targetting vulnerable children being used to push an agenda. F####ers.

Thanks for that. Luckily none at my kids school.
And why is the book described in the DT article as 'non fiction' 🤔 ?

OMG that Jamie story 😂😂So the only way this girl who's being bullied by her older brothers can change the situation is to become a boy. This of course implies that it's to be expected to be bullied and made a handmaiden while she is a girl. Oh My F God.

I am silent and don't talk about gender critical but if this ever found its way to my dc's school I would out myself as GC and fight this to the bitter end.

The story is imbecile and the sexist message behind outrageous.

My DCs school is the only school in our town to have those picture books. I will be checking out the other parents at pick up time to identify who looks rainbow unicornish so I know who to blame. However, as they have no literary merit whatsoever and are written in a style that is far too young for the recommended age group they will no doubt sink without a trace and so I am unlikely to complain. I mean, picture books for 8-11 year olds? My 9 year old is reading Harry Potter and my 12 year old is reading Maze Runner.

I'll eagerly await book 2 where Jamie finds the girl of her dreams but she's not prepared to re define herself as straight so they break up. And Jamie's friends slowly stop asking them to come out with them because they find it too hard to keep pretending they really see Jamie as a boy and it makes hanging out too stressful. And how Jamie spends all their time alone In doors because they can't walk very far as the drugs made her bones hurt and the cracked ribs from binding make it hard ti breathe properly.

I'll happily donate that book...

This attitude that females who don't have the sense to identify out of the slave class deserve all they get and have consented to embrace it is really concerning.

This bullshit has no place anywhere near schools, any more than any other evangelical zealotry.

Interesting that it’s someone from the Gay Men’s Press who gets thanked for providing “support, inspiration & friendship”. Susanne Bösche is credited as the author of Jenny Lives With Eric And Martin but the publisher also gets a mention; whereas the fact this twaddle literally couldn’t exist without Susanne Bösche apparently doesn’t merit an expression of gratitude 🤨

The summaries of the text of Kenny Lives With Erica And Martina (I’ve not read it myself) are so SO problematic.

Fetishising “the exotic” using the word “colourful” is incredibly common (& all sorts of wrong); ghettoisation is a phenomenon that some children will be intimately familiar with (& an adult should have had the nous not to reference); people of colour do not exist to amuse, entertain, educate (unless, obviously, that’s their literal job) or “brighten” the lives of white people; & the frankly sinister vanishing of a walled-up family will be hugely distressing to many children.

The breathtaking arrogance of these people, barrelling in to teach about equality, diversity and acceptance as if that’s something new & radical 🤬 What is new is that their privilege has enabled them to get into the right places; & allowed them to spread the myth that they are brave campaigners in an uncharted wilderness full of dragons. In fact, they are treading over a well-worn path made over decades by marginalised people who they’re only too happy to step over or indeed on.

Writers like Trish Cooke, Lesléa Newman & Jon Roberts produce high-quality books on subjects they know - & care - a huge amount about. There are loads of “one-off” books about diversity, where again, the author[s] care(s) greatly about the story they’re telling; & they have lived experience of it - though Tango Makes Three was written by humans, not penguins.

Children don’t need badly-written poorly-illustrated books about diversity. Especially when it’s clear they don’t understand all the bases they’re trying to cover in their cynical moneygrab. There are so many truly brilliant & beautiful books about diversity - those are what schools should be provided with. They aren’t all gathered together onto one order form, admittedly. But I cannot stress enough that children deserve to have the adults in their lives make that little bit of effort.

I clicked on the list of schools in my area and it wasn't even my area. It was Bedford, Bedfordshire, not Southwest at all. What a mess.

All of this.

All of it.

Applauds NitroNine

Thank you.

Can somebody tell me where to find the school finder please? I want to search to see if one was sent to our school, and had a look at the Pop and Olly website but couldn’t find anything. Is it on that website or another one?

With the crucial difference that the school wouldn't normally teach what the bible says as all being literally true!

www.lgbteducation.co.uk/schools
Thankfully very few in my area - an advantage of living in the sticks!

@Artichokeleaves · 07/05/2022 18:35
This is getting to be the bloody equivalent of all schools being sent bibles..

It isn’t really. It is more insidious. People for the most part know that religion is not the same as everyday physical life, there is a choice as to whether or not you believe it, or in what way you interpret it, and it is a private matter.

The King James Bible also has some of the most beautiful English ever written and is part of our culture.

This is putting forward something as a fact to children when it isn’t, in an appalling use of language.

"Ideological bollocks" would be even more appropriate.

I am glad my children are no longer at school because this would make me feel pretty apoplectic, and I am generally a pushover.

OMG that Jamie story 😂😂So the only way this girl who's being bullied by her older brothers can change the situation is to become a boy. This of course implies that it's to be expected to be bullied and made a handmaiden while she is a girl. Oh My F God.

This vaguely reminds me of a current story on Casualty at the moment. I hadn't watched it in years, but happened to see it last weekend. A non-binary or trans paramedic who was a girl at school and was bullied, then 'came out' as whichever - non binary I think, with awkward 'themself' type pronouns. Various things happen in the show that bring the fact that they were bullied into the open (and that they reacted violently to it), and everyone is incredibly sympathetic, talking about how hard it must have been, etc, really emphasising that they were a victim and that everyone needs to be extra kind as a result.

I think that is the message that a lot of these stories are trying to push, so that the sympathy factor is increased in cases like this, and then everyone assumes that anyone who is trans or non-binary or identifies as something else must also have an euqally sympathetic and difficult story behind it. Whcih then opens the doors to everything and everyone else...

Ta!

The summaries of the text of Kenny Lives With Erica And Martina (I’ve not read it myself) are so SO problematic.

Fetishising “the exotic” using the word “colourful” is incredibly common (& all sorts of wrong); ghettoisation is a phenomenon that some children will be intimately familiar with (& an adult should have had the nous not to reference); people of colour do not exist to amuse, entertain, educate (unless, obviously, that’s their literal job) or “brighten” the lives of white people; & the frankly sinister vanishing of a walled-up family will be hugely distressing to many children.

It really is very problematic. I did a brief summary on page 1 which I gleaned from half watching with the close captions on. Today I had the sound on, it was not good. We have verbal abuse, assault (pushing the couple back in the house), imprisonment and driven out of town. But it is ok because there is a nice shiny rainbow painted at the end.

I mentioned that one had been sent to dd's school, it has 40% of pupils who do not have English as their first language, what a great message to send to the pupils. Either you will be shunned or you will be the one doing so. How that is supposed to foster inclusion I have no idea. I am thinking of writing to the school with my concerns, but I am also hopeful that they would realise how totally inappropriate it is.

NitroNine thank you for such an articulate, insightful post. Actually, can you just forward that to the nutjobs responsible for this appallingly tone-deaf book?