Year 8 trans child - in secret

[WoollyMammoth1]

The recent news article about the trans child at a primary school made me think of sharing a similar story at my DD school, big difference being is that's a secondary school.
DD is in year 8, there's a child in her year that identifies as a girl but is a boy. No one at school, besides staff knows, DD doesn't know either as whilst I feel bad withholding the information, I don't want her to keep this secret at school.

The child has a sibling at the school, who calls him by his girl name. They change in the disabled changing room and use the disabled toilet.

I found out through social media, the parent came up as a possible contact, their profile is open and there were many pictures of her children when younger making it very clear. Absolutely no doubt.

When I first found out, I researched and found there is little I can do. The child's rights seem to trump all others.

DD and the child started building a friendship last year, but this went sour. Which I am glad for considering the circumstances.

My issue here is the deceit and secrecy. Non of the year group know the child is a boy which is such an obvious safeguarding risk, and once they find out they'll feel betrayed. Any friendships are based on a lie. And I feel like I am condoning the situation by not saying anything, esp to DD.

The child lives further from school then most other kids, likely to try and ensure there were no other children at the school that might know them.

It feels wrong to keep things quiet, esp for my daughters, and other girls in her year's sake, so hoping that someone here may have some good ideas in where to go from here.

(Long term Mumsnetter, name changed for this post)

As a child I had a physical health condition to do with my genitalia my peers were not informed of. It impacted the way I socialized and would have seen me become the subject of many conversations had it been communicated with other pupils at the school. If someone had chosen to get into a relationship with me, it would have impacted our relationship a lot. I was not trans. At no point did anyone ever suggest that by not broadcasting my personal health information, I was in any way 'lying' to my peers. It was kept a secret from other children in order to keep me safe.

You obsession with the contents of a 12 year olds underpants needs thoroughly scrutinizing OP, and no amount of made up 'but think of the CHILDREN' is hiding your obvious motivation here. Disgusting.

Metabolic- but your situation is irrelevant- these children do NOT have a physical problem. They are simply children who, for a variety of complex reasons, wish to role-play as the opposite sex, and everyone else is expected to join in, regardless of consent, and without their knowledge.

This is a false equivalence.

No-ne is suggesting that this child's personal medical information is made public - just that lies are not told to the other children (or to him) about which sex he is.

You weren't "lying" to anyone - you were being private, and that is a different thing. The consequences of your condition becoming public would have hurt only you, and the consequences of remaining private was putting no-one else at risk, either physically or mentally.

I think we need to stop saying X "identifies as a boy/girl" and we just say "X is a boy but likes to be called a girl". There the truth of it. He's still male and always will be. All the identification is meaningless really. X can ask to be called a girl but he is inherently male.

In what way are the children being asked to 'join in' when they have no knowledge that this child is anything else than the girl they know her as? It's an excuse to out a 12 YEAR OLD that wouldnt wash anywhere else other than batshit mumsnet boards. We don't even know this child isn't biologically female, all OP has to go on is social media photos which i presume show a child dressed in 'male' clothes - i thought feminists rejected the idea that there are 'girl' and 'boy' clothes as part of the basis for the rejection of trans ideology or is that only when it suits a narrative? By the way, I'm a 'TERF' by definition but to argue we should be outing kids to their peers?? Who the hell are we??

My situation is in no way irrelevant - if you can make the argument that other kids should be told the contents of this childs' pants for their own wellbeing in case they form a friendship with them and then find out and are 'damaged' at the thought they've been lied to, then you could make the exact same argument about me.

It’s not about ‘the contents of a child’s pants’ (grim phrase btw). Bring a boy is not just about having a willy. And the others are being asked to join in - to accept the boy in their changing room, sports team, as a ‘bff’, at sleepovers… in a way that they wouldn’t accept any other boy. But you know that, you just don’t think the girls matter.

It's for the school to manage this and not the OP, but a twelve year old grows up into a 14 year old and then a 16 year old. The longer the secret is kept the worse the consequences both before and after it comes out. Either the truth will come out in some horrific way or it will come out quietly leaving the girls to re-evaluate however many years of "friendship" all based on a lie.

OP has said the child has separate toilet and changing facilities (whether that's an appropriate use of accessible facilities is a different debate).

We agree this is for the school/ parents and not for OP or anyone else to dictate at what point this child (if she even is trans) is outed.

I am so very glad that children today are enormously accepting and generally completely unbothered by each others sexuality, genders, sex and anything else. I think you’re right and at some point if this girl is trans, it will come out organically and likely with no fanfare whatsoever.

There is an enormous difference between objecting to trans ideology on the whole and debating whether to cause harm to a 12 year old you’re not in any way responsible for and connected to only through a school community.

I am so very glad that children today are enormously accepting and generally completely unbothered by each others sexuality, genders, sex and anything else.

What makes you think that? Most 12 year olds are very bothered by each other's sexuality, genders, and sex, and are strongly influenced by each other.

And if the other children weren't likely to be bothered this child and the child's parents wouldn't have been keeping it secret.

Yes indeed, @AmaryllisNightAndDay How dare these entitled teachers carry out this bizarre experiment on other people's kids. It's a re-run of the John Money experiment.

Amaryllis- children & teens are very of each others sex! Have you never met any? The one thing they are less bothered about is sexuality and kids who don’t follow stereotypes. But that is far from universal and the trans fad is causing real harm as girls who aren’t considered ‘girly’ enough or have short hair are now assumed to be ‘trans’.

Sorry that was meant for metabolic not amaryllis!

I'm glad you said that 😀I was well confused.

It's an excuse to out a 12 YEAR OLD

I object to this being equated to homosexuality and the terrible ways people would out gay men and lesbians who then ended up in jail.

This 12-year-old is male and keeping that hidden means others around him are acting in ways they would never if it were known he is a boy. And that's not bigotry-half of children are boys and that is perfectly okay (obviously) but we expect every single other boy to follow social norms, policies and legal rules when sex matters!

There are other things that cannot be kept private because they put others at risk: communicable diseases for one. No one thinks a child who has the measles should be allowed in school and their disease kept hidden if in contact with others!!!

A social climate where an out and visible trans girl was murdered last year by schoolmates for being trans isn't the slightest bit relevant to another trans girl's decision not to disclose her past for safety?

Until men stop committing 90% of violent crimes and 99% of sexual crimes, men have no right to trick the public into thinking they are women.

Perspective is important!

4000% of how many referrals?
To how many referrals?

It was almost impossible to find out there even were services available back in the 90's, and the stats only reflected those who:

-were able to work out, from base principals, what they were experiencing and how to communicate it
-found out the service existed and thus knew to ask for a referral
-were allowed by their parents to ask their GP for a referral
-were successfully referred by their GP

The first trans people I ever learned about were trans boys.
The first trans person I ever met was a trans boy.
We were well aware of the apparent numerical skew in the stats and how they didn't reflect actual population distributions over a quarter of a century ago.
We were also aware of non-binary trans people though we didn't use that terminology at the time. I first heard the term 'binary' used in relation to gender somewhere around 2000:

"God made them man and woman; male and female made he them. Spare a thought for the outliers and the in-betweens who exist between the extremes of male and female. In a binary world, they are analogues."

The words changed over time as our understanding improved and we realised we were only glimpsing a small part of the picture.

4000% of how many referrals?
To how many referrals?

Read the thread Butterfly. The figures have been posted on this thread.

I am well aware of the actual figures. That is why I asked the question the way I did.

Thankyou for sharing your experiences and providing a very helpful and necessary sense of perspective from an angle that is rarely seen in these kinds of discussions.

It sounds like school was a tough ride - hope things worked out for you as best they could.

The figures about children are completely distorted by the way that trans lobby groups have been allowed to freely gaslight children that their developing bodies are flawed and can be fixed via drugs, surgery and sex change with #nodebate silencing all challenges. Everyone who's a parent of older children or who has worked with children for some years knows that this is a new phenomenon based significantly on social contagion.

This is a massive social experiment on children where too many adults have turned away for a variety of reasons in the last decade, leaving proponents of queer theory free to push an adult ideology at children and young people who are ill equipped to make such complex life long decisions.

Provided I was certain, I would tell my child, because I value having an honest relationship with them as hugely more important than having to prop up the lies another parent may choose to tell their own child. People cannot change sex, and telling children that they can is quite evil in my view, for the poor kid with dysphoria most of all.

@ButterflyHatched I have quoted my post with a link to the Scottish GMT publication which should contain the academic rigour you are seeking in relation to the 4000%.

I completely agree. I have frequently made the point that the data collection and analysis is extremely poor or absent. TRAs do not want the quality or quantity of the data collection to be improved.

Professor Alice Sullivan has thankfully been appointed to lead in this area. She contributed to the Scottish gmt sessions and is referred to in the report.