Janice Turner "Civil servants are being fed gender drivel"

[Igneococcus]

About training provided by Agender to civil servants. it's quite mindblowing bollocky nonsense:

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/9484c55a-e372-11ec-baab-53d14c642149?shareToken=afe906c71e91a77902ba9c6e98a574db

I don't believe there's a part of the civil service or wider public sector untouched by this stuff. I'd work on the assumption they've all had "the training". As to the senior managers too scared to say no, I say pathetic. Do your job. This is your job:

www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-7-principles-of-public-life/the-7-principles-of-public-life--2

Selflessness
Integrity (especially: Holders of public office must avoid placing themselves under any obligation to people or organisations that might try inappropriately to influence them in their work)
Objectivity
Accountability
Openness
Honesty
Leadership

Just because they go to the training doesn't mean they'd buy into any of it. My civil service friends wouldn't.

I have worked in a central government (Whitehall) dept for 10 years and have never had to do training like this. So it definitely isn't everywhere in the CS. Maybe becuase our dept is small, we have escaped so far?

Thanks, Zeugma - she certainly is busy spreading her and unscientific nonsense.

I don’t believe so.

I think the civil service a:gender network uses their own network members to put on training events.

The chair of the a:gender network, is called Emma and identifies as intersex and female. Someone I know attended one of Emma’s training sessions last year and seemed to find Emma’s account emotional and persuasive. I don’t know any details of what was said in the session. It’s possible of course that there are two different individuals called Emma running sessions. So it wouldn’t be fair to assume that the same person delivered the session that was recorded, as that might not be accurate. Also, it wouldn’t be fair to assume that the person who delivered the session is acting in bad faith, they could be misguided and misinformed - I know someone who apparently genuinely believes there are more than two sexes. Having said that, the use of pejorative terms like “transphobic dogwhistles” in the session was inappropriate. (And I note that there’s never any mention of misogynist dog whistles.)

Imagine this was happening with data protection. And there was a set of lobby groups wanting you to either do more or less than the law says with data, and there there's a civil service network that mirrors this agenda / "a:gender". No one would find that acceptable. This isn't either and in fact, parts of it do mean not handling personal data correctly - for example diversity monitoring that does not follow the law.

Yes I gather it's rife in all parts of the public sector. Good to know our taxes are being put to good use. Not.

No, it's Emma Dunn who leads the sessions. I've never really understood what the I has to do with the T (or indeed the LGB) but clearly it's provided a very useful career for Emma.

So Emma says intersex people need their own toilets but trans people want to use the toilet for the gender they identify as. This is very confusing.

Given that departments have been told to model cuts of up to 40% and all the unions are captured it feels like any resistance is riskier than before.

Good lord, what a load of absolute SHITE! Agree that the bosses need to grow a spine and take charge. This kind of behaviour would be thoroughly unacceptable on any other topic and it is thoroughly unacceptable here, too.

Really interesting website, @Zeugma I've bookmarked it, thanks for sharing.

I've come to the conclusion that all the D&I stuff - in its current incarnation - needs to get in the bin. What we need is a framework to ensure that everyone is treated fairly; balance the rights of the different groups, and work within the law as it is (not how activists want it to be).

Is that the same Emma as does the civil service training?

www.acas.org.uk/the-equality-act-2010-agender-and-me#:~:text=Emma%20is%20intersex%20and%20identifies%20as%20female%3B%20her,was%20a%20pioneering%20moment%20for%20trans%20people%20everywhere.

I think it is a different one.

I'm honestly considering setting up as a trainer based on this, as there seems to be zero quality control and you can go into workplaces and say what you like. I know all the buzzwords, I can identify as what I like - is there anything actually stopping me?

My uncle, some years ago, relayed to me some EDI training he'd had along the lines of race, which included some rather eyebrow-raising terms. (By the white people leading the training, I should add).

Nope! You cay identify as whatever you like if you're angry enough, no one is going to question you

I’m glad a light is finally being shone on this, but I am horrified at the level of capture. Thanks for sharing, OP.