The challenge of changing times and changing attitudes

Well said Grankind.

For those who doubt there were cross-dressers in the past here's Jane Gomeldon. In the 1700s she left her husband, dressed as a man, is said to have tried to elope with a nun, and was a writer

I taught children across the whole primary range for 38 years and it makes me sad to see that so many adults now think nothing of drawing small childrens' attentions to subjects that are just not appropriate because of their own attention seeking behaviour. They can't seem to wait until the child matures and has formed some opinions of their own. As children of the 1950's my brother and I spent a carefree childhood. We were out climbing trees and yes we dressed up, but that was a vital part of imaginative play. No one tried to label us. That is the problem today. Everyone has to be labelled. If I saw a litte boy putting on a dress in the home corner when I was an infant teacher it didn't even deserve a comment. Please let children have a childhood. Let them be happy, because the time when they realise that there are many huge problems in our world will come round all too soon. Parents should use their common sense and stop finding new problems to give to our children and grandchildren.

What difference does it make to anyone whether the boy wears girls' clothes one day and boys' clothes another day? It seems to me that a lot of pressure is put on girls and, perhaps more particularly, boys to conform to certain gender stereotypes. The recent TV programme with little children demonstrated how damaging to healthy and respectful relationships and limiting of aspirations these gender stereotypes can be. I think these issues are more important than a boy or girl making choices about what they wear.

I may be mistaken but I watched most of the Victoria Derbyshire interview with the parents and I seem to recall that the mother said something like "it might be upsetting to our son if he called the child he instead of she and vice versa and got told off for it". Victoria Derbyshire then enquired whether that had actually happened and the mother said no. It seemed to me like the parents were raising all sorts of problems that might arise but which hadn't actually happened.

Kirbygirl
100 years ago there seemed no gay men. The dare not come out as gay. Same for transgender. They've always been here. Just not prominent until newspapers publish something every five minutes!!

Willa45 - absolutely agree.

My 7 year old daughter wears trousers and shorts to school, because they're practical and she feels more comfortable running around and playing in them than she does a skirt. Other girls wear dresses or skirts but with shorts underneath 'so boys don't see our knickers.'

Frankly I find this far more concerning than a boy wearing a dress.

Apparently there are15,000 identity persons in the uk according to article on line in the Independent .

My granddaughter refused to wear dresses until she was about 14 or 15 - except at school when she wore school uniform, which for girls was skirts. She didn't particularly like it but no-one thought of indulging her or suggesting she was 'really' a boy. She is now nearly 19 and seems quite happy in her skin though she doesn't often wear skirts, but then I never do either.

I do wonder what the actual percentage of 'transgender' people is. And why there seem to be so many now. I can remember April Ashley hitting the headlines when I was young, and then Jan Morris when I was heading for middle age but that was all, over a period of about 50 years. Does anyone know?

If the parents (who pulled their son out of school), claim to be good Christians, they should not have squandered a teaching opportunity about kindness and unconditional love. They chose instead to teach their son intolerance and how to shame a six year old boy simply for trying to be who he is.

Sexuality is a completely different thing to gender. Being transgender is not about a dysphoria with your sexuality, how could it be in a child so young? It is a belief their body does not belong to them. They do not identify with the body they live in. Not all young boys wearing dresses will transition, but who has the right to say that they can't explore with how their feeling in a safe, non judgemental environment ?
As for explaining to other children? Children are so easy going, present facts, not a biased judgement - if people truly believe in God, then surely who has the right to judge? We are all unique individuals trying to find out way in this ever complex world.
Sadly now this drama will forever high light for a vulnerable family how unbending society can be.
Can children be tainted by a boy wearing a dress?
Or is this more a disgust of a so called religious family who just want to stamp a difference out?

Yes Gillybob, I thought just the same. I fully support transgender people and sympathise with the difficulties they face but there are some odd parents about and Sometimes wonder about their motives.

I dont understand how someone (a child) who possibly feels they are physically the 'wrong sex' would change what they wanted each day. Surely they would want to wear clothes appropriate to the gender they felt they were?
Its bloody ridiculous to expect everyone to chop and change to accommodate.

Possibly Paddyann, but life is full of situations that cause mental stress, that's what I'm saying really , perhaps just perhaps sometimes we are just a little too quick to react to a little persons wishes .

but would it cause mental distress norose4 my friends son who is currently transitioning says being forced to wear the "wrong" clothes caused him a lot of stress even as young as 4 or 5 .Unless you've lived with it you cant know or understand the level that stress was or how it affected the girl she was and the young man he is becoming.He is a lovely happy well adjusted boy ,doing great at school and all his activities including the Duke of Edinburgh awards ,and thats mainly down to the people who were willing to listen and support when it was needed

I wonder what happens in families, who do not have the time & energy to pay so much attention to the changing wishes of their offspring. This is not to say as parents we shouldn't take our children seriously. But it isn't necessarily a good idea to act upon their wishes immediately, as an example if a child wanted to dress as a super hero everyday to go to school , would that be allowed? Would we feel we're doing them harm if we didn't let them do so? If it eventually becomes clear that this child needs to transition , I'm sure no mental harm will come to this child by wearing trousers in the mean time. I think it is totally over the top for the parents of another child to remove their own child from the school because of this situation .

What's with this girls' clothes and boys' clothes rules? There are clothes, in many shapes and fabrics. Many men wear 'skirts' in this country, hang around outside a mosque or church and you will see them, with their sons, enjoying the freedom that not having their legs enclosed can bring. The boy in the story was wearing his boy's dress.

We've had some schools declaring that their uniforms will be gender neutral, by insisting all students wear their uniform trousers. They have it wrong. There should be a range of clothes that the students can choose from. By insisting on trousers for all they have as usual thrown girls under the bus. The boys' uniform has become the norm.

There is a lot of confusion and anxiety emerging which could have a positive outcome as informed discussions happen. It's the difference between trying to get rid of gender as a hierarchy - the work that feminists have been doing forever - and accommodating the needs of the tiny minority of people who have a medical desire to gender transition (no-one can 'change sex'). There are many young people now who are refusing to fit into gender norms, the 'correct' feminine and masculine roles, and some are calling themselves transgender.

This new word is very wide-ranging in what it includes - from those who breach the old gender norms but have no desire to transition, through those who have a fetish about wearing opposite-sex clothes (transvestites) to those who use opposite sex hormones, to those who end up having surgery to change their body's appearance to what they desire. Gender as a social construct, something that is not 'real' and will vary from place to place and across time, is fluid and how people perform it should not matter except when it's a way to oppress others. Sex, female and male, is fixed (except rare intersex examples), to date that difference has brought problems for women as a group. Chucking out fixed 'gender' ideas is happening, in many cultures. Places where this is forbidden are not doing great for women. Saudi Arabia, anybody?

As a child I lived next door to a family of 4 children whose parents were very relaxed (disorganised) as parents. The children dressed themselves from a very early age and they just put on whatever they could find, so if all that was around was a dress then the boys wore that. Needless to say my mother was horrified, not about the boys wearing dresses, but about the 'slovenly ' mother!

Well said lilyflower I have to say I thought this myself.

Pushing identity politics onto six year olds who want to think about Lego and 'Frozen' is a step too far on the part of one side of the political divide in my view.

Rename the problem as a school uniform issue and the solution is clear. The child wears the school uniform as stated in the policy. Then parents can choose schools with the policy they support.

I suspect this is actually going to be another class issue where the middle classes rigorously and sanctimoniously support the rights of poorer people to become victims while sending therir own kids to strict, traditional schools, either single sex or with 'proper' school uniform. Their children will not be playing rugby in dresses!

My GSs and GDs all go to school dressed in uniform trousers and sweatshirts. In the hot weather many of the little girls wore gray shorts which are quite trendy at the moment so I do wonder whether these parents are set on making a point.

I've no idea if it's true or tabloid speculation ..... but it's very unreasonable, to put it mildly, for the other children in the class to get into trouble for mis-identifying their classmate, depending on what he's wearing that day.

Wearing a dress or 'girls' clothing does not make you female.

I heard it on Radio 4 the last 2 mornings.
These things do happen quite often & it is usually just a phase. We have friends whose son decided he wanted to wear girl's clothes & weird things he 'designed' himself- he was about 5 or 6. They let him at weekends but insisted on school uniform. He is now 22 & a real 'blokey bloke' for want of another word & is not gay. Although if he had been it would not have mattered to them of course.
I just think 6 is too young to decide these things- I desperately wanted to be a cat when was 6. Mum very sensibly bought me a mask & made me a tail. A few days later she then offered me KiteKat for dinner instead of the lovely chicken pie she had made & I decided that being a girl was not all bad!

If these parents want to be strict about "boys' clothes" and "girls' clothes", what period of history do they want? It isn't that long ago when all young children wore petticoats. Now most children wear trousers. If men should wear trousers and women should wear skirts or dresses, then why is the mother wearing jeans? It's all hypocrisy.

Is it school uniform? If it is I suppose he can wear it however, I find it repugnant that children so very young are being versed in all this trans stuff. Yes they may know early on, who they really are and we do have the 'skills' to transform them, often into miserable humans. My son's friend died recently having made the change from male to female and then killed herself.

If only a bit of dressing up were the answer.

Attitudes are diferent in other places, I think it was a Canadian specialist who recently fell foul of the PC aspects of all this.

I wanted to be a boy for years when I was a kid, reached puberty, discovered boys and have never lookd back.

Just because we can provide some options, doesn't mean we must or that they will be satisfactory in solving all the issues.