How to talk about 'trans-girl' in my son's class.

[user1471471849]

Hello,

My son is 7 and there is a 6 year old trans-girl (aka a boy who identifies as a girl) in his school. It's a small school so everyone interacts with each other a lot. When the boy first socially transitioned and started wearing girls clothes and changed their name it was hard to know how to explain this to my son. He's a clever guy who asks hard questions and he was confused about what was going on. I went with the line that the child is a boy but is confused and feels he's a girl and not to bring it up to avoid arguments or hurt feelings.
Just to be clear, I don't agree with the parents' choice to socially transition such a young kid, I feel the kid is being pushed into this.. But it's not my place to say and I'm conscious of the poor kid's mental health and not wanting to make his life harder. To me, sex is binary and immutable but I knew that I'd eventually run into problems. Unfortunately, my son doesn't get on well with this kid and has made comments about him really being a boy. So we were called into the principal's office today saying the boy (or girl in the child's mind) is transgender and is a girl now. I explained what I'd told my son- that the child is biologically a boy but is confused and feels he's a girl and to not bring it up. I also said I wasn't willing to lie to my child and say that you can change sex and I got the impression that they agreed but said it's the school policy ( here and nationwide- in Ireland) to accept this.

Obviously, we don't want our son to be upsetting anyone so we'll make sure he knows to be very mindful of people's feelings but it's such a hard road to navigate (being truthful with him and trying to make sure he doesn't upset the child by passing on his thoughts on the matter- it's not a nice situation for anyone). I know we're going to come up against this again. The parents haven't said anything to us but I reckon it's only a matter of time.
If anyone has any advice on how I could manage this situation better please let me know.

Thanks.

Ah sorry, got confused there!

Well, I had to read it twice!

Sorry, it is confusing. There were two 'girls', one of whom was a trans girl, so one biological girl who didn't win the award.

I would have thought in a school so small that one class has only one girl, it would be time to cancel best boy and best girl in the class.
But also, having some idea of the overall size of the school now, it sounds like it could be much better to move your DS to a larger school where there isn't the chance of 2 or 3 parents dominating everything.

Yeah, the school has about 100 kids in total. Good point about a larger school.

Interestingly enough, I noticed the new classes in the school have much fewer students while other schools are booming. Maybe other parents have clocked the situation and are turned off by it.

We have 2 ET primaries in the town and both are developing a serious reputation for handling bullying very poorly. And both have small intakes. So does the ET secondary now I think about it.
I understand the drive to get away from schools run by religious orders, but the Catholic and CoI school staff seem to be much more mature. And a school of 500 plus will be less influenced by certain families generally anyway.
Spend the next few days on the phone to local schools and see what they can offer. DC were in a huge primary of 1000 kids, but each class was small and the overall experience was excellent.

I can well imagine the sort of school where the HT has clearly lost the plot and not only bullieds children like your son but allows boys to wee into the bushes (WTF!) instead of using the toilet not being popular with parents.

Well, the weeing in bushes was outside school time on a playdate but still very confusing for the kid on the playdate!

It's interesting. I think the reputation of ETs are dropping significantly.

My eldest is 11, in fifth class. When applying, I was very disappointed he didn't get a first round place in the local ET. He ended up in CoI and I'm so glad about that now.

All I hear about ET now are complaints, mostly about lax standards from laid back, hippy dippy young staff, who seem to treat their jobs as afterthoughts to be fitted in around hobbies and socialising.

That might just be the few in our area, but I'm grateful for our school, the ethos and community of which feels a lot more established and grounded.

Sorry off topic. Any of the gender woo stories I'm seeing in Ireland are coming from ET also.

This might seem off topic, but bear with me.

They're have been several PPs who commented how OPs son should just 'be kind' or 'be polite' and likened referring to the TiM as a boy to calling a fat kid fat.

They are not the same. The correct analogy would be if the other kids were being made to say how thin the fat kid is - to not just avoid mentioning it, but outright lie about it.

Victoria Smith has written a really excellent article (as well as her excellent books) that absolutely nails the importance of language, especially wrt this particular subject (Itts also about how women's silence is both expected and not valued until they stop being silent, but I think its relevant here to why children should not be compelled to lie).

https://open.substack.com/pub/glosswitch/p/the-invisible-work-of-saying-nothing?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=1gw285

I hope this is useful and relevant / not a derail - if anyone wants to discuss it in detail i could start another thread.

That's a really good article and very relevant. I was reading through it thinking it's exactly what my son has gone through.
We were told he has 'misgendered' twice and that a 'report' came in from the transgirl's parents. No mention of the fact that he has been quiet on this issue every day for 4 months (bar these two times). I won't go into details but what he said was not directed in a bad way or meant to upset, it was a statement of fact in a particular context. There is no way for him to sidestep every interaction he has with this person to ensure he never puts a foot wrong (in their minds) and they are just waiting, poised with a report card to catch him out and claim he is bullying the child. On the contrary, the parents of this kid and the principal are bullying him and every other child in that school into being quiet and accepting and putting their own needs behind that of one child.

From the artilce:
'A final exchange:
Russell: No-one else complained?
Peggie: No one else has come forward and they don’t want to be in my position
Why can’t you be more like the others, the quiet ones? It doesn’t bother them. Not that we’re thanking them for this.'

I do wonder what will happen now that we're leaving the school and the whole school will be indoctrinated to comply with their way of thinking. I wonder what it will mean for the children. Will any other children say anything and will they just try their usual silencing tactics on them too?

The girls in that school will be forced to share intimate facilities with that boy and possibly lose out or be placed at risk in sports. As they near puberty this will become increasingly problematic, even if they do chemically castrate this poor child. If Sandy Peggie wins the right for women to single sex facilities in the UK on appeal, those girls might one day be able to use that case in other jurisdictions to take those authorities to court for sexual harassment and safeguarding failures. I hope they will one day. A reckoning is inevitable. But there will be victims first. Entirely foreseen, forewarned and yet, seemingly unpreventable.

I cannot believe the parents and school are lying about a SIX YEAR OLD! It's insane. Who benefits from this? I have no idea. Not the other children, who are forced to lie or be disciplined. Not the other parents, who have to lie or keep quiet. And not the boy, either, who, whatever the original reasons for this, is learning that everyone has to bend over backwards to keep him happy, no matter the cost to themselves. That's a very bad lesson for his future life.

We had this when my daughter was small in reverse. We just said it's a little girl who likes to pretend she's a boy. Said little girl grew out of it at around 10. Up til puberty they can play act all they like but it's just play acting and it's fine to make that clear to your DC. If the school and the other child's parents take a different approach that's on them it wouldn't change my attitude.