It’s all a bit ‘cringe’

[lnks]

Has anyone else with teenagers noticed how they seem to think the whole trans movement is just a bit ‘cringe’ — as my 15yo DD would put it?
They’re just not taken in by it at all. If anything, they see it as attention-seeking and I can see my dd and her friend’s inwardly eye roll when they’re talking about it. It gives me hope for the future generations

What a despicable teacher!

My 22 year old DD and her friends think it’s cringe and there’s eye rolling aplenty when it comes up. They’ve encountered a few “theys” and wouldn’t be challenging to them but don’t buy into it at all. They are cool Londoners though!!

I’ve just audited the thread
Of posts that mention specific sexes (rather than my DC or teens)
There are 5 discussing their DDs thinking it’s all ridiculous or words to that effect
And 4 mentioning their DSs doing the same

@napody your bias is showing. I hope you don’t bring that to school with you.

edited to add: 1 more DD since I posted.

Unfortunately an awareness of the manosphere and its influence on many (far from all) teenage boys is essential to doing my job properly.

It's not going to be possible to address this if we parents of boys are so defensive - that's a big part of the problem.

I’m so pleased that this seems to be common amongst teenage kids. All the TRA’s seem to believe it is only us ‘dinosaurs’ that are GC and that we will all die out. DD and her friends are very liberal and fully support LGB people but have no time for the T.

But you’ve literally made up some stuff and are now doing head tilty “oh what a shame, another ignorant parent refusing to denounce their children as vile incels”.
You said the girls mentioned on this thread think it’s an unwise concept but still kind and inclusive, and the boys are laughing and pointing at non gender conforming children because they are misogynistic and toxic. That’s completely not true.

My teenagers think it’s a load of rubbish. My girls are ultra feminine and wear white fox hoodies. However….they play football and are really sporty and like nothing better than their saturday morning games! My boy is also very straight and pretty masculine but is a dancer and wants to work in the arts.
They are very accepting of the LGB but not the T. Furries are on another level!! 😂

I commented on the balance of posts when I posted. The laughing WAS only from parents of boys.

But yeah, you're right- misogyny is no more- the SC ruling has solved all our problems. No need to look deeper about how all this shite got traction for young girls in the first place.

One more thing because I’m a pedant and I don’t like this narrative you’re trying to create
When you first posted there were two posts containing a bollocks/ridiculous vibe that referenced specific sexes. One was mine referencing my DS and one was another poster referencing her teen DD.

Quite a big problem with teen boys is how people in authority write them off, denigrate their opinions and concerns and consider them all dangerous and harmful. They look for people telling them that actually they are not all bad and they end up with Tate etc. Maybe a little look in the mirror is due @napody

You're creating quite a picture for yourself there. That's fine- I've opened up discussion beyond the 'it's all great, no more problems for teenagers from hereon in' that we started from. Have a nice weekend.

Millennial here. A fair few people I know are captured but I do also know a lot who think it's BS. I am from the north but went to uni in London so I bet you can guess which groups of friends think what.

My mum is a private tutor and said this movement has been the number one complaint made by her students.

I think it is mostly gen Z who are captured.

It's tipped into cringe at my DCs school, where it was a lot of kids a few years ago and ahead of the curve.

However, although about 60% have desisted and want to pretend it didn't happen, this move has been bad for the vulnerable kids caught up in it. The little bit of being trendy was all that was holding them up, one has very obviously gone on to have an eating disorder, one is an "animal," and two others are complete school refusers. For a lot of kids(especially ND) the celebrating of their identities replaced getting a ND diagnosis or support, it's actually sad to pull it away without anything else to help them or work through what they were getting from it in the first place. It's almost like it was a sticking plaster, but we need to look at the real problems.

Also, two girls my DD know are stealth and most people believe have always been boys.they can't get back so easily now there isn't a wave of people switching gender each day. It's actually harder for them now if they want to resist, although their parents are the biggest obstacle. I'd always imagined one going NB then back to female but can't see it now.

Working Class Londoners think it’s all bollocks too.

I've heard kids say 'don't be such a they/them'.

They are as a rule very accepting of the LGB - when they describe something cringe as being 'fake and gay', it's not meant in a homophobic spirit, they literally don't mind if anyone is actually gay.

I've heard kids say 'don't be such a they/them'.

Yes, me too.

I spent half a day on a university campus earlier this week and was very struck by the fact that compared with last time I was there there was little in the way of LGBT posters, stickers etc in evidence.
When I was there a few years ago the loos had those irritating stickers that say if there’s someone in there who looks like they’re the wrong gender, stfu because they know better than you. Nothing like that now.

I have to say this thread has been very heartening. My DDs are too old to have been caught up in this and my teenage DS has special needs and literally couldn't care about it one way or another, thank goodness (his special school has a rainbow flag outside but I haven't seen any evidence of any trans stuff). Let's hope it all goes away while sparing a lot of thought for those damaged by it (and a different type of thought for the misogynists and fetishists behind much of it).

I’m sure there is a degree of sympathy for these kids but the ways schools were so quick to make all the toilets mixed sex, give the ‘trans’ and ‘furry’ kids special privileges and assemblies has had an impact on the amount.

Boys can be quite hard on each other in general - I don’t see any disproportionate harshness from them towards the ‘special’ boys. May be girls could learn from them a bit and reject some of their conditioning to put boys needs ahead of their own.

This sounds quite scary for your dds two friends - are you saying that they are being held to a ‘decision’ made when they were too young to understand by their parents? That is horrifying. Are they at secondary school stage?

DD is 18. She has always agreed with me that humans cannot change sex but I counselled her to keep quiet at school to avoid upsetting people (sad that I felt I had to do that but I did). There is a non binary teacher who goes by Mx and an LGBTQ club. All the toilets are gender neutral full length cubicles anyway which she says everyone is fine with. A few of her friends are gay and in lesbian relationships but none are trans. One has always been quite masculine presenting from a young age and I feel so glad that she is able to happily exist as a lesbian women rather than being forced to think she is really a man.

I do feel as though it was a bit of a thing for kids who felt they didn’t fit in to latch onto where in the past they might have been goths or EMOs or something. That’s fine and harmless to a degree but this was hitched to a whole lot of dangerous ideology which could ultimately lead to permanent physical and psychological damage. I hope we can find a way to celebrate diversity without needing to ‘identify as’ something

5 years ago my junior colleagues in their twenties were the ones lecturing me about it, pressuring for pronouns in signatures and gender neutral toilets. There is much less talk of it at work these days.

Yes same here with 2 teens. They roll their eyes at their attention seeking behaviour. I'm glad they're not brain washed by it all!!!

I'm not sure I agree with your last statement. The main way I see it being 'big at universities' is because academics desperate to be cool and on-the-right-side-of-history are invested and still wanging on. And also because the academic union has got a hard-on for trans stuff.
But it's been quietly creeping out of student interest for a few years.

I teach some stuff on women's health.

At the peak of trans madeness in 2020, I'd say 15% of students wanted to do their assessment on trans stuff. That decreased year on year. This year (2024/25) and last (2023/24), zero students opted to look at this.

I've seen students pull back from using trans-approved language in class too. They now just very happily talk about 'women'.

Based on DC's friends, it's very similar. There was a wave of sudden-onset genderism in Y7 which I suspect came about after some BeKind Glitter Rainbow PSHE lessons. The girls who got caught up in it all seem to have other issues, obviously we don't know the details but was common knowledge that there were eating disorders, school refusals and self-harming.

Despite the other issues, most of the NB girls have desisted in the last few years. One (close friend of DC) who identified as a boy was fully affirmed by parents and school, binders etc all the way through secondary - I can't see how she could go back if she ever had doubts. Another, a couple of years below DC, started as NB and then identified as a boy, but according to DC is really full-on demandingly activist and people are avoiding her because it's like walking on eggshells.

DC are essentially in the BeKind Glitter Rainbow camp, scrupulous with preferred pronouns, etc. But also very clear that sex is binary and immutable.

It seems to me like the school needs to

(1) Suggest to the 7 NBs that the group is renamed "T". Point out that the LGB kids do not feel the LGBT groups represents them and that the LGB needs dropping.

(2) Ask the 3 same sex attracted kids if they think a LGB group would be useful.

Another DD to add to the pile. 16YO DD is resolutely GC, as are her friends.

She is also considerate of other's feelings, but won't be emotionally blackmailed into agreeing with their ideology.