Teachers who discuss sex-based women’s rights with transgender colleagues would be considered “transphobic” under a policy proposed by members of Britain’s largest teaching union.

[ChristinaXYZ]

Over-reach by a trades union again - why can none of them get round to defending women?

And if you are still a teacher who is member of the NEU then a reminder that Affinity is a trades union that does not do politics and does cover teachers.

"Teachers who discuss sex-based women’s rights with transgender colleagues would be considered “transphobic” under a policy proposed by members of Britain’s largest teaching union.

The National Education Union’s trans and non-binary network has proposed that anyone who expects trans people “to participate in discussion or debate about their rights and/or identities” is transphobic.

The draft proposal of a transphobia definition, seen by The Telegraph, also cited “propagating ideas, concepts and misinformation harmful to trans people and which erase and ignore trans history, such as trans as an ideology or contagion”, as an example of transphobic behaviour.

The policy neither outlined what it meant by “trans history”, nor what “ideas, concepts and misinformation” would be considered harmful to trans people.
It further defined transphobia as a “rejection of trans identity and a refusal to acknowledge that those identities are real or valid” or the “incorrect use of pronouns”.

A whistleblower close to the teaching union told The Telegraph: “I am extremely worried by this. I’m from a Left-wing background and I hate this nonsense.
“We need free speech. Women need safe spaces. If this definition is accepted, anyone who says ‘You can’t logically self-identify as the opposite sex’, you’ll be a transphobe.”

The source added: “I think it will mean that teachers will be too scared to speak up in schools and they will go along with the NEU policy.”"

Read the full article www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/10/10/teachers-who-discuss-womens-rights-trans-colleagues-could-transphobic/

Have you read this thread @SimpleName83? www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4651945-trans-guidance-for-schools-that-british-fudge-that-so-often-works?page=1

A possible solution being mooted by this Tory government is that whole classes of girls should wait while transgirls use the school PE changing rooms. This shit is happening to girls today because of this fucking Tory shitshow of a government.🤦‍♀️

What is the Labour Party proposing as as alternative?

Is the Labour Party proposing a strict law on single-sex spaces for women and girls? With actual criminal sanctions for men who seek to victimise women by breaching women's boundaries? Can you please give me details on how the Labour Party seeks to protect the rights of women and children against predatory men?

Seriously. I do need to know, and I need proof, that the Labour Party is committed to women's rights and children's safeguarding against male violence and male sexual exploitation, before I'd even consider voting Labour again. I'm a former Labour voter. It wasn't me who changed and did a flip on women's rights and childen's rights and safeguarding.

It doesn't matter what the Labour Party does or suggests. They could get behind everything you've written, tomorrow @SimpleName83. Put it in their manifesto. Shout it from the rooftops. But it wouldn't make a single bit of difference because they're not in power.🤷‍♀️

Meanwhile, due to the Tory policy of Self ID and trans inclusion, child rapists with no GRC are put into prisons with vulnerable women and children, women are not raped in hospitals by not rapist men pretending to be women. And it's being suggested that biological female children wait and lose out if a biological male child wants to use their facilities.

You want to wait 2 years for a possible Labour government that may never arrive, before things are fixed?

Teachers should join the FSU.

The tories may have fucked this up but they're also our best hope of getting out of it. A labour govt would be disastrous for women and children.

Problem is, having wreaked destruction on women's rights, the Tory government, who are the only ones who can fix it aren't bothering their arses. Genderwoo is now woven throughout government policies and with each man in a woman's space, precedent and case law is cemented.

By the time Labour come to power, if Labour come to power, they won't have to do a thing. The Tories will have ended the job they started in 2017.

It sounds to me like a niche group within the NEU focused on trans only has proposed the ideas, rather than them actually being implemented as policy.

I would hope the NEU still has the sense to see the massive conflict of rights and how it would limit teachers' ability to work and will not actually pass the proposal.

I think this is where it gets awkward.

Because I can see them telling a white teacher who wanted to talk about a controversial issue around racism with another teacher who was black that it was harassment. Even if they were talking about something related to teaching practice, say whether certain books should be taught. Or wanting to teach a Thomas Sowell approach to the history of slavery rather than a EDI type approach.

That's not to say I agree with that, but I do think it could happen.

So I am not sure that this is really out of line with the general approach of identity politics.

I think that if they did, asked some pointy questions in the House, it could go a long way right now in terms of pushing the CP to action.

Whatever the internal battle that seems to be going on in the cabinet is about having the opposition making them look bad about it could decide who wins the day.

The LP doesn't want that to happen though, they want the gender ideologists to win, so they won't do their job.

If it were implemented, wouldn't that policy be entirely pointless given the law and the right to hold GC views? I can't see what that policy would do for the union.

Hasn't Maya Forstarter just set a precedent that disadvantaging women for talking about their rights with regards to gender ideology is discriminatory?

If schools followed this advice, couldn't they be sued?

This.

@TooBigForMyBoots I admire your dogged defence of Labour, but on this issue the Tories are very much the least worst option. They're tackling some of it, while Labour are all gung ho to make it worse.

It's my red line so I'm going to need to see something positive from Starmer and co. Maybe direct your energy towards explaining this to them, not trying to harangue women into ignoring their boundaries.

This is where Labour stand on women's rights.

mobile.twitter.com/ripx4nutmeg/status/1442783035389325313

I haven't defended Labour, mildly or doggedly. I have no interest in Labour. They're not in power and I can't vote for them.

Perhaps instead of uselessly banging on about Labour, unions and a fuck load of other people who can't/won't make a difference, you could direct your energy towards those who can: The Tory Party.

Or perhaps a parent like me had come into the school, worried that the teaching material was teaching the class that my children aren't simply non-conforming, but are actually of the opposite sex?

A quick look at your posting history certainly suggests a determined attempt to paint the Tories as worse than Labour on this issue, but fine.

And I direct my energies to both. I am in contact with both parties (my local Tory MP and the Labour candidates) making it very clear that my vote depends on this issue.

One of those people responds courteously and agrees to take action. Guess which one.

The Tories caused it.
The Tories are still putting male sex offenders in prisons with women and children.
The Tories have reported women to their employers and the police for retweeting JKR.
The Tories have suggested whole classes of natal girls wait if a trans girl wants to use their spaces.
The Tories are in power so they could change it if they want to.

But as long as you get a nicely worded letter @teawamutu.🙄

I don’t think this union has signed up to supporting the ‘Tories’. At the last general election, they paid for an advertisement urging their members and other voters interested in education to vote for the Green, Labour or Lib Dems. This was in direct contravention of the rules of their. ‘Political fund’ .

Did I once say a letter was enough? I did not.

Did I say I was happy with the Tories? I did not.

Do I think there's slightly more chance of them rowing the worst of it back, given Labour is hellbent on making it worse? Sadly, yes.

And if only one party will engage with me at all on the issue, wtf am I supposed to do?

Because these conversations could come up especially for eg in PE, sports, residentials....teachers need to decide who takes part, which staff go, how everyone is accommodated and catered for, how needs are met for staff and students ..

Quite apart from discussing important elements of the curriculum and topics for eg women's suffrage, or primogeniture, or sex based issues such as abortion, or roles in the second world war... These were all part of my education and openly discussed and debated by teachers.

This!

Their policy doesn’t trump the law

Teachers who discuss sex-based women’s rights with transgender colleagues would be considered “transphobic” under a policy proposed by members of Britain’s largest teaching union.

As PP say, I'm not sure how this would come up other than in more general terms.

But if this policy is passed, then I hope there are parallel policies for women, teachers with disabilities, and those with religious beliefs: that we shouldn't be expected to participate in discussions of OUR rights with transgender colleagues.

So we're quits.

Because, as we know, the 2010 Equalities Act says ALL protected characteristics are EQUALLY protected.

TRAs and MRAs need to understand that they're not special. There is no hierarchy.

Now there's a good idea BirdinaHedge.
The NEU need an accompanying policy that states that:

Teachers who discuss / attempt to remove sex-based women’s rights with women colleagues would be considered “sexist” under a policy proposed by members of Britain’s largest teaching union.
The National Education Union’s women's network has proposed that anyone who expects women “to participate in discussion or debate about their rights and the removal of them is sexist.

Fixed it.

This could be an open goal for Labour if they wanted it to be. They should be challenging the government on this scandal because THAT IS THEIR JOB! But they’re not because they don’t actually care about what’s right and are scared of the reaction of their own supporters. The government is weak and the Tories are divided right now. There has never been a better time for Labour to attack but they would have to make a massive U turn so they won’t.