Young voices - some not allowed

[arethereanyleftatall]

My 15yo DD was invited by her school to go to a 'young voices' event. An event for children to share and discuss their views on a wide range of topics.
She was one of 8 from her school, many other schools attended with same numbers. Hundreds of pupils. She said there were many children their with pride pins etc on display.
She is gender critical and believes sex matters.
Basically her views were not allowed. She was shouted over by other pupils in the discussions and organisers did nothing.
They all had to write on a post it who their inspiration was, and pin in to a board. She put JKR. The board was being manned by the organisers. When she came back to the board her post it has been removed and placed on a 'hate' board alongside terrorist organisations etc.
She absolutely hated the day, said it wasn't 'young voices' at all, but 'young voices as long as you agree with us.'
She is petrified of being expelled/suspended/told off because of her views.

Any advice please on what to do?

This is just a thought but, regardless of what your DD decides to do from now on about her front-line experience, can I suggest that she keeps all the paperwork generated from dealing with this, including her own written account and any complaints correspondence, just in case she wants to follow up the topic in the longer term. Someone, at some stage, may want to collate experiences of GC young people and her story might be able to become visible after she's left school through somebody else's research. Her voice, like many other GC young people's, is being subject to multiple censorship and silencing from many directions and all these GC views need to be heard.

Also, I don't know if she is planning on doing A levels and whether an extended project would be a possibility in one of her subjects, but it strikes me that this would make excellent source material for an original piece of work (law, politics, history, biological sciences, journalism, social work, censorship etc), and it might be much better received as things change in favour of GC beliefs in the next few years.

What soupdragonsfriend says is worthwhile if she does consider journalism...

Transgender Trend have given a voice to teenage girls being silenced in schools. Here's an account from a 14 year old (anonymous for her safety obviously)
Your DD is not alone - this is happeneing countrywide sadly.
https://www.transgendertrend.com/gender-indoctrination-schools-teenage-girls-testimony/

I love this too. I'll make sure she knows this.

My 14 year old would be right there with your DD, for what it's worth, OP. Most of the teenagers I know think this is all bullshit.

I am very angry on your DD's behalf! Your DD isn't broken, when women get angry we cry... As a parent I would want to write a stiff letter to the organisers, and also complain to the school about how your DD was treated at this event.

The event's handling of dissenting voices was appalling. A "hate board" is a
horrific idea. They could have managed it very differently - given each young person the opportunity to justify their choice to the group and then stuck the 10 most popular choices on a "we chose" board. You'd think they would want to teach critical thought not demagoguery.

She is petrified of being expelled/suspended/told off because of her views.

You could even complain to the school without saying who your DD chose or what her views were. That doesn't really matter, it's their handling of dissent that's so appalling - allowing participants to shout each other down, putting
suggestions on a "hate board". Of course some young people might say very
contentious things, goodness knows how badly they handled the other political issues that I'd expect young people to know and care about! Even a deliberately inappropriate or politically horrifying choice doesn't need to be handled like that.

Plus, your DD is a star for trying to put her views across despite all; and yes she might not want to take this further (right now)

If the OPs DD had written ‘Hitler’ or ‘Bin Laden’ as her inspiration would everyone be saying that she’s so brave for fighting the fight? No as you’d be saying it’s indoctrination. It’s a difference of opinion that’s all this is

Well done your daughter. She has done something many many adult women, including politicians who are meant to represent us, are afraid of doing; speaking up. She is absolutely awesome.

Fuck me @GreenYoshi12 are you seriously equating JKR with Hitler or bin laden?? 😳

Abd just to be clear it’s stonewall who captured DoE several years ago & have used them to indoctrinate schools & youth services ever since

If it was her genuine choice then yes. no matter how misguided her choice was and assuming Bin Laden and Hitler are still hate figures among young people as they are among my generation, it would indeed be brave. And a vote for Hitler, Bin Laden or even a modern terrorist leader should not have been handled in the way that this event handled it.

I teach a bit of critical thinking and I am just blooming horrified.

No I’m not equating them. They are also controversial figures just like JKR (some people love them and some hate them)

Is that really the best you can do? 🙄You need to find some reasoned adult arguments if you want to engage with parents discussing bullying, political impartiality and the importance of free speech for schools.

Seriously?

She wasn't allowed a difference of opinion, which was to state her admiration for someone who by many objective measures is highly admirable.

Whereas you're talking about the leaders of proscribed extremist/terrorist organisations.

Ffs

Quite! Clear by previous fatuous answer they have no reasoned adult arguments

It’s my opinion but I’m sorry if it’s not adult enough for you
JKR is a divisive figure whether we like it or not - we don’t know what anyone else in that room was going through

Are you fucking kidding me?

OP's daughter has 'gender critical' views, which are worth of respect in a democratic society.

It is risible pish to suggest that an author who has publically expressed feminist views is in any way similar to someone who organised the systematic murder and genocide of millions of people, or that she's in any way comparable to a terrorist leader.

Absurd. Fucking absurd.

Oooh, if it was BYC, they are… I’ve not had any dealings with them for a while now, but it was always a weird set-up, frankly. Overly convinced of its own importance; & really not good at representing the demographics it purported to.

It will have been beyond saturated it GenderWoo for absolute donkeys years though because the “big name” member organisations certainly are - eg the NUS, Scouting & Girlguiding. (Can’t think of more off the top of my head other than Woodcraft Folk, & not sure they’d count as a “big name”, with apologies to their [former] members.) They’ll have been passing ridiculous motions at the AGM for perhaps a decade now about transphobia & validity & being non-binary & things. An absolute echo-chamber.

It sounds like an incredibly badly planned & executed session. Facilitators should never allow participants to shout each other down, no matter what is being said. Were groundrules set at the start of the session by the participants? For this sort of thing they should have been - lots of stuff about allowing everyone the chance to speak; respecting other people’s views & ideas; not swearing… these days it probably includes respecting pronouns 🙄… but anyway, rules like that should have been set & participants referred to them when they started getting aggy about OP’s DD not conforming to the groupthink.

Your poor girl OP: she was so brave to stand up for what she believes in; & she was treated very badly in return. When you signed the consent form for the event did you also sign a photographic consent form? If so, they might have photos - check their social media channels & if there’s nothing doing, make a request to be allowed to view them (though frankly I’m pretty sure they’d get deleted).

"(some people love them and some hate them)"

No they are not "just like JKR" and it is about a lot more than just being "controversial" though in a social media world actions do get flattened out and I guess a lot of people really do fail to see the differences. But I would expect people holding an event like this to understand and respect those differences.

Actually. It just suddenly struck me that you are possibly a child.

Mea culpa, I always assume anyone posting here is an adult and that's remiss of me.

Can MN check this, does anyone know?

I AM NOT COMPARING THEM - JUST GIVING AN EXAMPLE OF SOMEONE ELSE WHO IS CONTROVERSIAL ffs

I shall put away my potty mouth and apologise, Green Yoshi. The things you are saying are enormously offensive - I expect you don't even begin to understand how bad they are, and indeed what libel or defamation even means.

hitler oversees war, genocide and murder of millions of people

bin laden oversees terror attacks including deliberately flying planes full of people into buildings

jkr expresses view that trans people should be allowed to live their lives free of harassment and present as they choose but that sex is real and at times sex really matters

TRA - these 3 ppl are totes comparable. I mean honestly it’s fucking embarrassing

Go to the school and make an official complaint

Complain to the governors at the same time

Complain to the council at the same time

Go to the local news paper at the same time

Fight fight and fight some more and do not back down.

Also go to the Free Speech union - https://freespeechunion.org/ they will be all over this

Why not, say, JKR, the Pope & Jesus? 🤔

You are creating a group of 'controversial people' and including JK Rowling, Hitler, and Bin Laden in that group.

compare
/kəmˈpɛː/

verb
gerund or present participle: comparing
1.
estimate, measure, or note the similarity or dissimilarity between.

Saying that all people are in a group (of, say, 'controversial people') is noting the similarity between them. This is a comparison.