Emma Barnett and Gillian Keegan.

[heldinadream]

Today prog R4 now - Emma holding GK to account!
16/05/24 8.45 been going on about 10 minutes really worth listening to!

Really???

It was an absolute car crash

She said that transwomen are women and - extremely concerning - that they are medically female if they've had surgery.

She was incoherent and obnoxious

There's such a long way to go. So many Tories don't fully get it (GK offering her own, customised definition of TW?), and every reason to believe Labour pols will be worse.

Thank you for posting this.

I wonder if Keegan has through this through. Would she think it's ok for a male teacher who has been castrated to chaperone young vulnerable girls in single Sex spaces? Would she be happy ignoring the discomfort of the girls?

The way I heard it was EB presented to GK that she'd said TWAW in 2020, then in the interview GK said TWANW, and then later on in the interview GK said TWAW if they get their cocks chopped off.

EB's "aggression" was going after such incoherent and illogical positioning where the goalposts were shifting according to whatever point GK was seeking to make at any particular moment.

In general, it's remarkable that the BBC are giving time to cover "gender identity" but where's the curiosity about what the term might be when it's unclear to just about everyone? Also, where's the interest in why "gender identity" is such a hot topic that discussion of the concept is being restricted? (Clue: it's because of the harms that can come from its application.) Related to this question, a deeper explanation comes from Cass. Why aren't the BBC linking this measure in education to Cass? Obviously, that's somewhere that they don't want to go to.

On the subject of Labour @duc748 , I was very concerned to see Sharon White being trailed in the Guardian as Starmer’s cabinet secretary. It’s a hugely influential position and I assume SW is TWAW given the direction of travel of John Lewis in the last few years.

First of all they are cannot be women. It's impossible.
Secondly very, very few transwomen have been surgically 'reassigned' i.e. castrated. Some might have had breast implants.

Secondly very, very few transwomen have been surgically 'reassigned' i.e. castrated.

I suspect (and I doubt I am alone in this) that Joe and Josephine Public may not be fully aware of this. I think it's a point that needs to be made more often.

What I don't understand from all this PHSE (and this might not be the right place to ask), by why hasn't Ofsted ever stumbled on the "bought in" teaching materials and/or consultants and queried the appropriateness of it?

The interview sounded scrappy, though looked better in the R4 Today film clip tweet.

I do wish R4 would interview somebody who would explain this cogently and had the evidence to hand.

You can't do education properly if you abandon safeguarding, you're mangling English pronouns and destroying critical thinking.

IIRC Ofsted was grading schools down if they did not TQ+ their materials. They were in one of the Stonewall schemes. They realised this was going to shit and exited earlier than otherwise might have done.

They and others need to be held to account. We need a public inquiry.

It's good that they are allowing Emma her head.

And the next stage is to address autogynephilia.

Because there are men who have had genital surgery who are AGP. See Hayton.

Also, the penises aren't removed. They are inverted to look like female genitalia. And these men are told that they will still have sexual arousal. From what remains of their penis, inverted though it is.

So what is the logic of deciding they must be women? Effort?

is Gillian Keegan really saying that if men make enough effort they can access vulnerable women and girls? Even those who get a sexual kick out of it?

I can't wait to find out the answers to those questions.

And if Emma is all over it, she's going to be the person to ask them.

I do wish R4 would interview somebody who would explain this cogently and had the evidence to hand.

Yes, there's no balance - either Safe Schools Alliance, Stephanie DA, or someone like Helen Joyce would provide appropriate balance and be bang on top of the evidence that GK is trying to ignore.

So many organisations and other politicians (Miriam Cates, Kemi B) have been bringing the evidence of competely anti-safeguarding PHSE in schools and the problems with gender ideology to DfE for years, and there are receipts.

I'd personally favour Helen J - as she's so incredibly articulate and clear - plus a safeguarding expert to back her up on safeguarding knowledge (which is not her area of expertise and it sometimes shows).

If you had Helen J plus safeguarding expert they'd wipe the floor with GK. They could have a TRA org that's been pushing overly sexualised RSE / PHSE materials in schools on too (although I suspect they wouldn't come as they know their position is indefensible).

What I don't understand from all this PHSE (and this might not be the right place to ask), by why hasn't Ofsted ever stumbled on the "bought in" teaching materials and/or consultants and queried the appropriateness of it?

Quite.

And how fucking hard is it for the government to supply this material? Age appropriate, and exactly the same for every school.

Have a one off panel to decide what it entails, including teachers, parents, child development experts, etc. And roll it out to every school in the country.

Hell, you could get Safe Schools Alliance to do it.

That way schools wouldn't have to constantly be wondering who to employe, what they're saying, is it compliant, are they expert enough, etc.

Because until now many sure as shit haven't been.

That would be brilliant.

And the fact they didn't come could just be highlighted and speak for itself.

The Tories are going to major on Labour not knowing what a woman is at the GE. It's important to call out the fact that the education secretary is utterly clueless on the issue herself. She sounded like John Prescott stumbling over her words.

I couldn't understand EB's point.

• is she trying to say that self ID is ok and education should include that self IDing TWAW?? That was the impression I was left with.
• I found it odd how she went off on "you don't know"

Exactly. Why aren't these materials absolutely centralised???

Exactly. Why not have fully centralised materials??

I think that if Mumsnetters and some UK newspapers can find examples of inappropriate material being taught in RHSE lessons then the least Keegan can do is have a few examples to give when asked about the subject. She sounded like she was spoofing off the top of her head when asked for examples and so she went straight to gender identity - which is a big problem but is not the only problem with RHSE provision.

If she’s listened to teachers and groups, as she says, then surely they provided her with examples of lessons that had inappropriate material, can’t she remember what she’s been told?

I found it odd how she went off on "you don't know"

That's Interviewing Politicians 101:

Politician: We will apply measure X because of problem Y.
Interviewer: What is the extent of problem Y?
Politician: We haven't checked.
Interviewer: You don't know?!

One would expect any competent interviewer to do this. Remember, EB wasn't there to advocate for or against the Gender Critical position.

Remembering the dice that teachers rolled with their pupils to decide what implement or body part to put into what orifice, maybe the last thing she wanted to do is to let the public know what has actually happened.

To be honest, I found it odd that Keegan didn’t know. I’d expect her to have facts and figures and examples to hand in order to better argue her case for these changes. I think she came across as woolly and badly prepared, like she didn’t do her homework and was hoping to spoof her way through the interview.

Yes, a huge hole in GK explaining her position is that she didn't have examples of the bad teaching materials to hand to refer to when asked about them. This is astonishing when there's considerable amounts of them floating about.

I don't think it's surprising that a politician doesn't want to tell their entire audience that far from sleeping at the wheel they've been practically comatose