Schools Guidance Consultation closes 12 of March - can we collate ideas for responding?

[ValancyRedfern]

Hi All,

I'm concerned people (including myself!) may lost track of time and forget to respond to the schools guidance. I thought it would be useful to create a thread collating and discussing ideas for responding. I know there are still some response guides to come from SSA and Sex Matters. I'm posting in a rush right now but I will be back with any links I can find. This is so important as all the Usual Suspects will be responding, and many Unions, charities, MATs and individual schools are currently saying this is only draft guidance so can and should be ignored. We need to ensure our voices are heard.

Link to consultation:

https://consult.education.gov.uk/equalities-political-impartiality-anti-bullying-team/gender-questioning-children-proposed-guidance/

Link to draft guidance:

https://consult.education.gov.uk/equalities-political-impartiality-anti-bullying-team/gender-questioning-children-proposed-guidance/supporting_documents/Gender%20Questioning%20Children%20%20nonstatutory%20guidance.pdf

Thanks for the nudge. That's this evening's project then.

If anyone cares to read the response to the consultation which BACP, the UKs biggest professional body for counsellors, has promoted to all of their members via their weekly email bulletin, it's here:

https://www.bacp.co.uk/news/news-from-bacp/blogs/2024/blogs-and-vlogs-2024/07-march-schools-guidance-on-gender-questioning-children/?_cldee=LI3ubpIBIEcdpAsW82fxJ83fRrkgpQ6eXgUG0vmeblkNXXE0m9bcrc4zCjFTyykg&recipientid=contact-15091fe42990e71180ec3863bb34db00-c65deba1836c4118a57a74fa17ea3894&esid=a80120fb-27dd-ee11-904b-000d3adda0df

It's got it all - affirmation of a gender identity is lifesaving! Reading government guidance causes damage! Human rights! Authentic selves! It might as well have been written by AI it's so clichéd.

How utterly depressing.

Thanks so much everyone. I'm up early as can't sleep so trying to finish mine off now. Finding it quite overwhelming as so much to put in. I know several staff at my school will be filling it in from a very different POV to me!

Done! Morning cup of tea thoroughly earned!!!!

Done.

Thank you for collating all this. I'm finding the Sex Matters guidance a bit frustrating. They keep saying 'answer yes', but then fill in the text box as if you answered no! The survey specifically says 'if you answered no, blah blah blah' so I'm not convinced that if you answer yes your written answer will be looked at....

Personally, I agree with you! I ticked no whenever I wanted to put comments.

I used the Transgnder Trend example as my guide but using my own professional experiences of working in schools.

Yes the T Trend response is helpful and actually clearer than Sex Matters!

It's illegal for anyone to ask to see a GRC, so in practise it becomes anyone who claims a gender identity.

The guidance is about how schools should respond to gender questioning children, so trans teachers aren't within its remit.

That's what I did, although I worry that the civil servants (possibly captured ones) who have to collate the data will just log it as "here's another person who disagrees with the proposals" rather than seeing the nuance. Also pissed off that I had to say whether my gender identity was different to my sex at birth. I always hear that question like "is your flooflribit the same as your ffgidnmu?" Or something Douglas Adams could have satirised much better than I'm able to!

Yes @Pluralism I saw someone else say it’s like asking an atheist if their religion assigned at birth is the same as the religion they follow now.

Regarding whoever analyses the responses, I think the other side will be ticking ‘No’ as much as we are.

So some qualitative analysis is going to be necessary.

I just hope we don’t have to wait too long until the final guidance is produced. Then we can really take schools to task.

For the handful of people here who support young transgender people, here is another approach to answering the questions:

https://www.stonewall.org.uk/our-work/campaigns/support-trans-youth-respond-government-consultation

The idea that women (many of us mothers) don't support confused and mentally vulnerable children who've been socially groomed by toxic adults into believing that their developing bodies are somehow wrong and can be fixed with drugs and surgery is a nonsense.
If organisations like Stonewall left children alone to grow and develop into maturity we wouldn't need these consultations. Because children would be able to reach maturity in safety. Then they can make decisions about their future sterility, poor medical health, limited dating pools and negative impacts on their future sex lives as consenting adults.

Children need these organisations and dangerous individuals out of their lives.

Yes they do. Well said. Adults are failing them by pushing gender ideology.

Well said @MrsOvertonsWindow

Brava

Absolutely right.

That whole argument seems to have been copied verbatim from the teenage habit of screaming "you don't love me!" When parents try to stop them smoking/getting paralytic/getting someone pregnant etc etc. And that in itself is disturbing.

@DadJoke is, sadly, completely uninvested in the protection of children.

For anyone who hasn't submitted their response yet, the Transgender Trend example is the clearest way to get to the nub of the key issues.

Also, I'd consider two further points:

1. Although they've accidentally forgotten that "straight" is a sexual orientation (🤦‍♀️), this letter from the LGB Alliance is important when considering how to avoid an accidental over-pivot back to Section 28:
   https://twitter.com/AllianceLGB/status/1766438843723432145?t=B8a0W-m3LjcIK0B3D8wOow&s=19
   Screenshot below for anyone not on X.

2. For anyone that is confident enough that they know enough about the details, it's worth mentioning both the WHO descoping of children and young people from their "Gender Affirming Care" guidelines, owing to lack of evidence base (this significant change was quietly slipped in in January - there is a thread with more info) and the recent WPATH files. The summary version of both is that the harms resulting from the belief in gender identity are beginning to be recognised in healthcare. The ripple effect of these significant milestones will be huge.

To add, this is a key "frontier" that is being fought on X at the moment.
Several high profile accounts, including Katy Montgomerie, are heavily pushing the idea that Section 28 is coming back in. I haven't seen explicit mention of the guidance deadline date yet but it feels like that's what will come next.

I have no doubt that this emotional string-pulling will persuade several teachers that they don't need to look any further in to what's happening and should continue to fight the new guidance.

(Ps I'm enjoying my lie-in catching up on all of this, having been brought an almond croissant and pot of coffee in bed. Lovely! Hubby and eldest - my autistic daughter that I have spoken about on this board - are on their way to her football match and I'm contemplating whether or not to get up yet 😁 Happy Mothers' Day to those that are enjoying their day too and hugs to those who are thinking about their own mum's who are no longer here. My mum died in 2021 and it's also a day to think about her ❤️)

I've just completed the consultation and submitted it. The Sex Matters suggested response ideas are good in that there is a 'If you've only got 5 minutes' version, where you just have to re-write a sentence or two in your own words. The other organisations' ideas (eg TT, LGBA) outlined above also look excellent.

I wrote my response very much from the perspective of having worked with children and young people with autism, and safeguarding them as per the law from pretense and ideologues.