Was anyone else teaching or working with children in the decade 2000-2010?

[BadSkiingMum]

I am resolutely gender critical and one of the things that makes it so tricky for me to believe the 'born in the wrong body' idea is that I was a primary teacher for about ten years (from 2000 onwards) and the question of gender identity never arose. Ever.

To give a little context, I was a full time class-teacher for many of those years (across four schools), spending the whole year with 30+ children (so knowing them extremely well) and then taking on management positions where I was involved in reviewing the attainment, progress and wellbeing of dozens of other children. Yet a desire for a child to identify as a different gender to that of his or her biological sex was just not apparent; many children were facing problems such as poverty, broken families, refugee status, learning disabilities, involvement with the social care system, being a young carer... I worked in schools where a significant proportion of children could be described as disadvantaged; in other schools I also taught the children of surgeons, diplomats and bankers. Huge amounts of time were spent in school on initiatives to support children's wellbeing. There were undoubtedly children who had mental health needs and, at the time, budgets were good so services such as school counselling or play therapy were available for some children where there were particular concerns. As a teacher I worked alongside those other professionals and read their reports, yet the issue of gender identity was never, ever mentioned. Other children were receiving support from CAMHS (even a very well-known clinic in London) and the lack of feedback on this topic was the same. Nor was it ever raised in training sessions, professional development meetings or online teaching forums, where I spent a lot of time.

This lacuna is very puzzling to me, as that same generation of children is now in their mid-twenties and a narrative of having 'felt wrong' from an early age seems to be prevalent. If this was so much the case, why did it never arise? Not once, in the many hundreds of children with whom I had contact? Never from colleagues in other schools? I am confident that it would have been discussed, albeit anonymised. Schools were certainly making time and resources available to explore and support wellbeing, so surely it would have emerged? Or are personal histories simply being re-told to suit current identities?

However, for the sake of fairness, it is important to note that, at the time, mental health was generally viewed by schools in terms of how it was impacting upon a child's progress, attainment and behaviour, rather than being an outcome in itself. I think that shift in perspective has been beneficial - I think that children and young people certainly do get more support than hitherto which can only be a good thing - but I also wonder if a certain 'pathologising' of emotions has taken place...

So, arriving at my original point, were you teaching around the same time and were your observations and experiences similar to mine? If not, when did you first notice gender identity politics becoming apparent in schools?

@ChristabelHolloway how, in their minds, did wearing dresses make you ‘feel like a girl’? Just curious.

Have you ever actually met a trans person, WarriorN? Rather than just reading about them? Perhaps they're fictional.

Also, is there anyone who hasn't had an early experience of sexism?

This is an excellent post. Thank you scaredoff

Those of us who've worked in education for decades and are adults who children chose to confide in, all know that this was not a thing. It doesn't make us transphobic or hateful or anti trans to acknowledge the levels of social contagion that currently exist or to challenge the motivations of those adults and groups pushing this at children.

ChristabelHolloway homosexuality is obviously a matter of which sex an individual is sexually attracted to, so to "believe" people are homosexual requires a belief in the existence of sexual attraction.

The question of whether an individual is inherently transgender requires a belief in gender.

If a person believes that the difference between males and females is their sexed bodies and that gender is a social construct around biological sex, then it is clear why it's logically consistent to believe that individuals are "born" homosexual but not "born" trans.

I think on this thread many of us have met trans people, especially as it's a thread asking for experiences from posters who work in schools. Schools today mostly have girls who wish to be boys rather than the other way around, and it's not hard to see why a girl might feel that way.

Have you ever actually met a trans person, WarriorN? Rather than just reading about them? Perhaps they're fictional?

It rarely takes long for a poster to display their real motivation with an attempted gotcha like this?

@Twizbe i don’t think that’s right about Lego. I was born in the very late 70s, my dbro and dsis in very early 80s. We were all given Lego and most girls we knew played with it. None of the sets were overtly packaged as gendered. Maybe it depended on area, social background, age and occupation of parents?

There are an awful lot of us on this board who have given birth to babies who have grown up and currently identify as trans.

Can you help us understand which of them are actually trans (because GIDS certainly cannot)?

I havent read the whole thread, Ive been working with children (and their parents) in social services since 96 across a number of authorities. I did come across it before, but really only a handful, always girls in terms of the children and they had been presenting as boys since very very early years.

In terms of parents or adults around the children there were a few transexual male parents (men who had gone through transition to become women) who had all the medical and surgical interventions but there werent huge numbers either.

The last few years this has really increased and now has the pronoun and misgendering thing alongside it which I wasnt working with before. Most are still girls, there are a few boys but not as many as girls. The pattern with the girls is still that predominately its a recent thing in their lives, they havent been presenting as boys since their early years. A few have but the majority havent. They nearly all have ASD or other disorders and the majority have also suffered sexual abuse by males.

I came across one young person with gender disphoria pre 2000. This young person would have been born around 1984/5 and they were like Georgina in the Famous Five books. Tomboy who refused ever to wear skirts, very short haircut, refused to answer to their own very feminine first name let’s say Felicity (it wasn’t) and would introduce themselves as a boy - “I’m Alison’s brother, Nick”. I’ve made up these names obviously.

Just to say as well the diagnosis for kids back in the late 90s and early 00s was gender dysphoria.

I'm talking about primary, which was completely different. I had an older DD who would have been 15 when you were in 6th form and she was very emo and had been for a couple of years - but her younger sister was experiencing the pressure of expectations in KS1 and KS2 from the early 2000s onwards (it was largely ignored in Nursery other than trainers were all white and pink for girls and black or blue for boys, started being a thing in KS1, really ramped up by KS2 from 2005/6 until the force of expectations was fully embedded by 2008/9).

They then needed to reach mid teens - just at the point where it became an internet thing. Add on a couple of years for the cohorts just a bit younger to have a full cultural expectation of gender presentation from the moment they were old enough to have consciousness and throughout school, then those born around 2003 were reaching puberty with all its questions about 'who am I?' just as it all appeared on the internet and use of phones and laptops became something everybody did.

I played with lego as a child, my mum always mentions that I never liked dollies and would play with cars!!!!

Im a boy, Im a boy! (Some like it Hot)

I never wore skirts or dresses once out of primary school, have never been particularly girly, but not really a tomboy either, too unfit lazy and clumsy!!

It never occured to me to confuse what I liked and how I like to dress and what Im into, with my sex.

The young person I knew had siblings and someone has recently mentioned that one of Felicity/Nick’s siblings now themselves has a child dx with ASD. So there is a definite ASD nexus in that family which may be relevant.

Yes I was and also no I never once came across it. I had lots of children who were what might be called now ‘gender non conforming’ but they were perfectly content to be boys who liked pink and girls who enjoyed rough and tumble. I trained in a very feminist place and it would have been considered very poor to sex segregate toys or interests. Those were all thought to be social constructs and damaging to reinforce in any way. It was indeed a very different time.

Um, girl here, born in the 80's, had loads of Lego as did all my friends, girls and boys? And I didn't have 'girly' Lego sets I just had a huge box of assorted bricks in all different colours.

At secondary school, boys did their work experience at the local RAF base. Girls did theirs in shops or at local schools.

Boys did football and rugby. Girls did rounders and hockey.

It’s interesting that as the gendered stereotypes have gone DOWN in adult life as a result of being legislated away in employment law etc (and as a knock on, schools have shifted towards a more equal offering across a variety of subjects) the gendered stereotypes in toys and games, so childhood life, has gone UP.

it would be conspirational nutbag stuff to imagine it’s been done on purpose to silo girls back into a lifetime of aesthetically pleasing subservience before they are old enough to consciously reject it but even as an accident is does seem like a way for male supremacy to reassert itself in a world where it’s getting harder and harder to argue that men are superior to women by any sort of intellectual measurement (obvs still, on average, bigger, faster and stronger because: mammals)

I'm troubled to hear about these other teachers sharing all this sensitive personal information with you, too. Where was the privacy and protection for the families you worked with?
@ChristabelHolloway
They were sharing this information as part of professional conversations around a child’s educational or well-being needs. For example, a child’s class teacher sharing information or concerns with me as their line manager/key-stage, or as a member of SLT. All entirely appropriate.

Sounds like normal team-working good practice to me!

Particularly important in safeguarding issue situations.
No one adult, no matter how well intended they are, should be keeping concerns about a child’s well-being to themselves.

What if say, school counsellor x was the only adult holding important, sensitive information about child y and they had a car accident on the way to work and spent 6 weeks in hospital?

What would happen to child y in that time period? What if counsellor x didn’t return to work for 6 months, or a year?

Child y could be moved out of school or out of area with no appropriately trained and professionally engaged adult looking out for them at all.

It doesn’t bear thinking about it.

Thank fuck the UK has a proper framework for disclosing, reporting and for multi disciplinary input.

I believe it’s far more variable in the US as it’s a state by state provision. I know our system is far from perfect but we do hopefully learn a new lesson every time a system fails a child, in order to minimise further failures moving forward.

Thanks @ChristabelHolloway
Please (anyone/MNHQ) don't be put off by the title of the vid I am linking here.
It's a personal/subjective story and not by any means as inflammatory as it sounds!

Your description Cristabel, reminded me of a video I'd seen ages ago and have just managed to find it again. It's a young man describing, bravely, and with huge self awareness his experience that sounds very similar to the 19 year old you spoke about.
The very understanding comments under the video are worth reading too.
I can totally imagine his experience is something that pre dates the current climate and can see how hard that would be disclose.

I'm a seeker type and am really trying to understand the root and reality of issues and found this much food for thought.

How understanding of this fits in with the debate all round I'm not sure, but would be interested on yours and anyone else's thoughts?

I hope its viewable!? I think the title might be stopping it from being shown but hopefully the link works.

ChristabelHolloway you ask, "...if you believe that some people are born homosexual, but nobody is born trans, then please explain the basis for that belief.

The difference between being homosexual and being trans is clear. As follows.

A claim of a particular sexuality is self-validating because if (for example) I, a man, sincerely claim I am attracted to another man, I am in fact so attracted. This is because of what 'attracted' means, or if you like, because of what being attracted is.

However, if I, a man, sincerely claim I am a woman, my claim, far from being self-validating, is simply false, as there are no human hermaphrodites.

A claim such that, if sincerely made, must be true, is clearly different in kind from a claim such that, (even) if sincerely made, must be false. No?

Have you ever actually met a trans person, WarriorN? Rather than just reading about them? Perhaps they're fictional.

Yes. One is v honest about their past and it's v clear to see, to them too and they discuss it freely, what was the cause of their dysphoria.

Also, is there anyone who hasn't had an early experience of sexism?

No but it's not rocket science if you work with young children and teens that we are all v different in terms of personality and experiences. As you should know, some children are more vulnerable to peer pressure, impact of stereotypes, social anxiety, media and social media, perfectionism, mental health challenges, trends and everyone has their own personality.

I note that you've neatly evaded my queries about similarities to body dysmorphia and anorexia.

I'm doubting your claimed credentials tbh.

Even on Reddit they know that psychs will explore the "root cause" of their gender dysphoria. (The below happened to come into an email suggestion on reddit in transgender U.K.)

To do the same and compare to homosexuality would be outright conversion therapy.

I saw a post recently asking about a particular U.K. consultant who rejected the patient as they didn't think they had gender dysphoria.

Homosexuality isn't a medical condition.

But anorexia and bulimia are and both are known to have a mix of social pressures, peer / SM influence, and often particular personality types including very intelligent yp and some with autism.

@ChristabelHolloway The fact that none of the kids you worked with told you they thought they were trans is NOT evidence that none of them were.

The fact that I have never seen any evidence of God doesn't mean he doesn't exist.

Yours is a faith-based dogma, and it's dangerous nonsense.

Also, anyone trained in safeguarding knows that one cannot offer children total confidence. However, despite that, I had several students come out to me as gay all that time. Why? Because I am a lesbian (it's obvious to the gay kids - they have gaydar). And no, I wasn't gender critical then because I had no need to be. No one was going around pretending we can change sex, and nor were they nodding along as physically healthy teens said they wished to be surgically altered so as to make their feelings go away.