My work insisting I refer to a 9 year old as they/them

[TheMadGardener]

I work in a British primary school. Just started new term. Long standing pupil, a girl, is starting Year 5 now so she is 9 years old. No issues until now although parents are quite "alternative/new age."

Headteacher has informed staff that according to the child and her parents this girl has decided to be non-binary. Staff are now to refer to her as they/them and she is now using a gender-neutral shortened version of her name (think Alex instead of Alexandra or Jo instead of Joanna).

I am extremely uncomfortable with this and will definitely not be using they/them - I will be referring to the child by her chosen abbreviation to avoid using pronouns (at least it's a shortening of her real name rather than a made-up name).

Serious question: I thought new legislation discouraged schools from getting on board with this sort of thing? Or is it only they can't let children do it without parents knowing?

I'm finding it very hard to keep my mouth shut on my actual opinions in the presence of headteacher. (Colleagues I've spoken to on the quiet all think it is bullshit too)

Gaslighting is a vile crime committed by domestic abusers.

Applying it to a child who uses they/them pronouns? Seriously?

And safeguarding is a process, done to protect a child from abuse.or neglect.

Using these words, associated with violence and abuse, to refer to a child whos done nothing but be different, is a very telling choice.

Even pointing that out feels absurd. This child.is harming absolutely no one. Teachers need to draw a line early to show that they will protect them bullies, and should never engage in bullying themselves.

Children of that age are perfectly capable of understanding difference. They need good behaviour and respect for difference modelled for them by adults.

I understand that you cannot see the harm so you need to deny it.

There is harm being done in many ways to others when those individuals expect and demand that others act as if their subjective reality is the universal material reality when it is not.

I know that you have been on threads where the many harms are discussed in depth so I won’t bother to start to list them again. However, vilifying someone for not agreeing to act as if they believe that a person can be a different sex to their body’s sex category is an act of coercion

FWIW @TransParentlyAnnoyed I think your posting has been consistent re your own child (now a legal adult) and your cousin's child.

From the thread that was linked in this one:

They're second cousins. I went to tell my aunt she had a trans great-nephew, and discovered she already had a trans grandson.

"They're second cousins" seems to be in response to this comment a few before it:

In the mean time, ask yourself if 'trans' is innate, what are the odds that two trans children would appear in your family?

i.e. your child and your cousin's child are second cousins to each other.

I don't share your belief that everyone has gender identity and I think a lot of your posts demonstrate the hyperbole that holds children (who believe themselves to have gender identities that differ from their sex) in a permanent lock of victimhood i.e. they are told by adults that they trust that people like me (who don't believe in gender identity) want to harm them. But that's a different issue.

This ^^

Hear hear

Is thst what thr fuss was about?! Dear lord. I had a quick look but decided I couldn't be bothered in the end. Thanks for saying.

And yes, you're completely correct. My aunt and I hadn't spoken for quite some time as we'd both been busy. Her grandson had been out for a while but she just hadn't got round to telling me. She probably thought I knew.

It was great for my son though - the two became fast friends. They've had such different upbringings but the family bond is there, it's lovely.

As to your question, being trans is often something which often runs in families. Perhaps you've heard of the Wachowski sisters? I am non-binary myself. And in no "permanent lock of victimhood."

Just a mum, who's seen the violent effects of transphobia. Wish I hadn't. It would have been so much easier if he wasn't trans - both of them, in fact. But they are, and I'm going to be someone they rely on, a safe space for them to be themselves, as long as I live.

The Wachowski brothers’ transition is a fascinating tale.

Are they the blokes who did the matrix, and now they claim to be women and the matrix was an allegory for their transition. 🤣🤣🤣. Didn’t one of them just call JKR a “nazi sympathiser” because no one will fund his latest offering so it’s her fault 🤣🤣🤣🤣

Those are the ones, yes.

Didn’t one of them say it was transgender porn that convinced him he “was a woman”.

you’re giving them as examples @TransParentlyAnnoyed ? You’re going with that?

The Quote
Lilly Wachowski described the experience with these words: 1, 2]
"The first images I saw that struck a chord with me were trans images in pornography. It was something that unlocked in my brain and I saw these wonderful fearless performers becoming desirable.

sunk costs fallacy with parents.
They’ve invested years buying into it and believed the false information spread by activists groups whilst choosing to ignore the scientific reviews and factual data.
Parents became activists themselves, willingly colluding with their unwell children. To admit at any point that they should have even gently challenged their child’s beliefs, is to admit to themselves and others that they’ve damaged their child. Ignoring the facts and listening to fetishistic men online and the ranting of activists, instead of doctors and scientists, has led to irreversible harms in many cases.

Indeed.

It was posts like this that really bring out the cynic.

TransParentlyAnnoyed ·10/01/2026 04:28
I am, yeah. Mum of three kids, relative of two trans kids who were both bullied our of school by transphobia.

That, and the highly irrational, ridiculously hyperbolic posting. Plus all the TRA talking points.

edited to add, and one can't help but notice how often the posts stray into the sexual.

Yes, this appears to be the sibling relationship we’re supposed to take as an example of genderist families.

Exactly this. It’s a truly desperate situation and I have a degree of sympathy for all concerned (beyond the fetishistic men who started it all).

But the rest of us cannot be held hostage by the parents who affirmed this and now can’t admit the harm they’ve done.

What @datun said

I think you misunderstood.

Teachers telling other children to disbelieve their own eyes and knowledge that a child is a a boy/girl and tell them that the child is really a girl/boy is a form of gaslighting. It is telling children that their pretty fundamental knowledge of human sexes is incorrect. I am not referring to the child when I refer to gaslighting, I am referring to any adults who impose this belief onto other children.

That then leads to safeguarding problems. There are separate sex toilets from juniors. If a child can be backed up by adults they are of the opposite sex then where does that child go? When the children grow up to secondary schools parents may wish to ban mixed sex sleepovers. How can parents do that if a child's sex is obfuscated? These are Going along with a child pretending to be opposite sex potential safeguarding issues.

Children can understand difference. They can and should be taught not to pick on someone for being different. But children should not be taught that their knowledge of human sex is wrong, nor to be told off for using correct sex pronouns.

'X is a boy but prefers a girls name and to wear girls clothes' is fine. Even 'X would prefer if you used she/her' is OK.
But 'X actually is a girl and you will get into trouble if you use he/him to refer to X' is NOT OK.

'Respect for difference' is not the same as 'everyone has to pretend to also believe someone else's belief'

Wow. You ok? There’s help you know.

For someone so focussed on the correct use of names, surely you’d be aware of Jesus’ preference for his name not to be taken in vain…?

And again.

TPA is the relative of two trans kids though? I don't see the confusion, unless it's the term "trans kids"? I don't like the term myself, but it seems a short way to mean "under 18s who define themselves as transgender".

I'm going to be someone they rely on, a safe space for them to be themselves, as long as I live.

I’m trying to do the same for my daughter by standing up for her single sex provision, but people like you, insisting that people “be themselves” (when in fact it’s the complete opposite) are trying to take that away from her. She’s not allowed to “be herself” apparently.

It's the distinction between being a mum of 'three kids', and the relative to two 'trans kids'.

If your kid was trans, you would not make that distinction. In my opinion, of course.

Thanks OP for the update. Doesn't it highlight how when allegedly responsible adults stop pushing this at their children, they become comfortable in their birth sex? I'm reluctant to criticise parents who fail to safeguard their children from this adult ideology given the bullying often handed out to them by TRAs - though the Wachowski brothers as role models for children was a bit of a WTF moment!

Hopefully in the UK the fact that the govt has located the needs of these vulnerable children in safeguarding guidance will mean that these mentally confused children get safeguarded more readily. And no longer referred to the adult trans groups waiting to recruit them.

There is some ambiguity about the language because ‘relative’ has a distancing effect straight after mentioning children.

Technically correct language but it does invite confusion.

Don’t read too much into this. TPA’s experiences of transgenderism, relationships with trans-identifying children, and the number of children varies from thread to thread. The less posters engage with TPA, the more extreme TPA’s stories become.

The hyperbolic, catastrophic accusations just keep coming. It is like seeing those social media posts that are written off as ‘the unreasonable extreme’ being mirrored here in real time.