Tavistock Gender Clinic to close - it failed vulnerable under-18s

The first whistleblower was 18 years ago. The parents gave their concerns to the board in 2018. Their safeguarding lead took them to court. I think we may have gone beyond 'mistakes'.

I remember how it was shown that physically pre puberty girls are as strong as boys but think they are weaker because of what they see in adults .
Nice one G. So now it’s the girls’ fault for thinking they are weaker.

FarNorth
Instead of validating 'trans' identity by allowing a pupil to wear the 'opposite sex uniform' it would be better if schools had unisex uniform for all*
I agree, except that when there was a discussion about unisex uniform, the uniform was expected to be trousers not skirts-and that’s not unisex when many of the girls wanted mmmmmmm voted for skirts.

- or even a choice of skirt or trousers for everyone.
That’s better, but actually, in many schools that already exists.

How do posters in here envisage a unisex uniform?

How about a kilt or kilted skirt with shirt, T-shirt or and/or fleece in school colours? In Edinburgh we often see the girls of a private school in their uniform kilted skirt - boys could wear a kilt too. It looks good on either sex. The only drawback is the cost! Perhaps an enterprising manufacturer could design and produce a simpler and cheaper version that satisfies everyone, from macho lads to princess girls, and is affordable by all - not an easy commission..

Mollygo

I remember how it was shown that physically pre puberty girls are as strong as boys but think they are weaker because of what they see in adults .
Nice one G. So now it’s the girls’ fault for thinking they are weaker.

It's nobody's fault (why this constant obsession to attribute blame?). It's simply an example of how what children see in adults influences their thinking, even when it is untrue.

A school here had the kilt as uniform, but it was done away with, as the cost was absolutely extortionate.

When did making a comment become a sign of a 'constant obsession?

My children wore jogging trousers with school polos and sweatshirts in primary school. I don't see why they couldn't do that in high schools too, instead of the shirt and tie arrangement that makes the girls look like honorary men.

How do 'a lot' of families raise children without gender norms VS? Do they have to find special (presumably private) schools to help with this? I'd be surprised if many mainstream schools would have time or inclination to use neutral pronouns, possibly separate uniforms, games lessons and so on for them, whilst not making the children seem different from others. Or am I wrong there?

Also, the children themselves will know their sex. Aren't there problems with that, too?

I’ve spent the last hour contacting people I know up and down the England. All bar one say their school (including one all girl school, has a a choice of skirt/pinafore/ trousers or some add shorts. The one missing one had a kilt for girls. I didn’t ask if any had transgender children, but if they did there wouldn’t be a problem.
Re-all wearing a kilt, if cost was not an issue, I wonder if we’d see an outcry of discrimination from boys who don’t want to wear a skirt and objections from girls who want to be seen as boys?

- or even a choice of skirt or trousers for everyone.
That’s better, but actually, in many schools that already exists.

Indeed, our local primary just lists the required items and says nothing further.

A kilt is made from much heavier material than a kilted skirt usually is and is not very washable.

Simply having skirt & trousers listed as uniform or else trousers for all, seems the most sensible.

Have a great time!

Re raising children without any genderising whatsoever. Has everyone seen the video of a family in (I think) Denmark or Sweden, who are doing just that? Someone posted a link on Gransnet. It was very interesting. One genuinely intersex parent was the instigator, (we didn't see the mother at all - maybe shy - but the mother's mother was also living with the family and didn't seem to completely agree). MaPa was very keen not to influence the children's genderisation, but it was noticeable that when he/she laid out clothes for the schoolchild to choose what to wear to school, all the clothes were dresses .

I have found that video about raising children without gender in Sweden, and also the thread on which the link was posted and comments made. The video was very interesting.
www.vice.com/en/article/j5q3kb/watch-our-new-documentary-raised-without-gender

On the www.gransnet.com/forums/news_and_politics/1309546-the-law-as-it-stands-on-sex-part-3?pg=3 thread, lthe link was posted by FarNorth on Sun 24-Apr-22 22:34:09 and there were comments about it after that.

Doodledog

My children wore jogging trousers with school polos and sweatshirts in primary school. I don't see why they couldn't do that in high schools too, instead of the shirt and tie arrangement that makes the girls look like honorary men.

Never thought of that before but you're right - why do girls have to look like half-men?

Surely a polo with the school badge on it would be equally 'uniform' and more comfortable and practical?

I saw one video about 'genderless' children in Sweden.
At one point the mum asks her child "Do you want to be han, hun or hen today?" (he, she, or 'genderless pronoun').
The child answers that they just want to be their name. They are tired of all those words.

Reflections on the closure of the Tavistock: Sinéad Watson in conversation with Stella O'Malley

youtu.be/Nr3z34RW_h0
40 mins

Well worth listening to Sinéad who has detransitioned from being a transman.

The idea that gender identity is being imposed on children may be right, but as was shown in a recent TV programme the concepts about gender are so deeply lodged in our society it is virtually impossible to remove them.

I'm not sure what you mean by this. There seem to be two separate concepts here - that gender identity is imposed, and that concepts of gender are embedded in society.

I agree with both of these things, but see them as linked, and I'm not sure whether that is what you are saying or not. I think that gender norms are still deeply lodged in society, but until recently they were breaking down. I don't think that it is impossible to remove them (difficult, but not impossible), but if the response to concepts of gender is to assume that they are unchangeable and that people need to change sex to conform to them in the 'right' way and impose a gender identity onto children (or adults for that matter), IMO that is the wrong way round.

Most people do not conform exclusively to one set of gender norms anyway, and in a lot of cases the external signs (eg clothing) are more of a way of expressing that someone wants to be acknowledged as a member of the opposite sex than anything innate. Clothing norms differ across time and regions, so are not an intrinsic thing.

Well as is being so constantly posted on these threads post puberty men tend to be stronger than women. So little girls watch their mother asking their dad (or some man) to help with a task and draw the conclusion that they are also weaker, although in fact until puberty girls and boys are physically the same. So the concept of her gender develops from an early age and even if she is raised in genderless clothes, she will be aware of that strength. That daddy can carry and lift her longer than mummy etc. And gender norms are established.

I don't consider the tasks or jobs people do as being gender related. I think a lot of younger people have already moved on with those, and men are cooking, sewing and caring for children and women are taking on traditional male tasks. There is a long way to go but it is happening. They change anyway, knitting used to be a male occupation.

I do wonder if some girls are frightened by the displays of perfect female bodies we see in the media and think they will never be like that so decide a male body would be better.

I don't disagree with most of that, and would add that pornography (which is apparently seen by a majority of older children) makes the SM thing even worse.

I'm unsure about the point that girls learn to be physically weaker, but doubt that there is much of a link between that and the desire to transition even if it's true, and in any case the differences are very apparent after puberty.

I agree that tasks are not gender related, which is why I don't believe in gender transitioning, and keep coming back to the question of what people think they are transitioning to and from. If it's not tasks, and it's not clothing, and it's not pastimes, what is it? It can't be biological things, as they can't be reproduced in a fully functioning way, so what is left? I would really like an answer to this question, but have never had anything close to one.

It is Mother Nature who imposes things like comparative size and shape, and the skeletal and muscular differences, not society.

The answer, in every 'trans child' account I've seen, is stereotypes.

Sinéad Watson, in the video upthread, describes how she felt which she now says was as a result of her mental health problems at the time .

Of course, some people would claim that Sinéad was not really trans. Which leads to the question of why were clinicians so quick to enable physical changes for her.

I do wonder if some girls are frightened by the displays of perfect female bodies we see in the media and think they will never be like that so decide a male body would be better.

I recently saw a young woman comment on facebook that, during conversation, she had said she wished she could be invisible so as not to get unwanted attention from men.
She had said 'I suppose I'd have to cut my hair off and wear baggy clothes.'
Then she realised that that must be how a lot of girls start their 'trans journey'.
There were then several comments from other women saying they had done exactly that as teenagers.

Glorianny clearly you understand the differences between females and males, and that stereotypes exist.
Why, then, do you tell us on these threads that people should be accepted as the opposite sex if that's what they say?
Doing that means a huge overhaul of the way society works - and they are not really the opposite sex.
Why can't it be overhauled to disregard stereotypes?

" So little girls watch their mother asking their dad (or some man) to help with a task and draw the conclusion that they are also weaker,"

well not going to be true in a single parent family. the idea of a family having a Dad and Mum is not quite so usual these days.
Also I know of young girls taking pride in being strong physically.

Elegran

It is Mother Nature who imposes things like comparative size and shape, and the skeletal and muscular differences, not society.

It definitely is after puberty, but it is possibly true that this is less so beforehand, and girls accept that they are physically weaker than boys. I don't know enough about that to argue, and I think it's a moot point anyway when it comes to transitioning - sex differences are what they are and won't change because someone 'transitions'.

I agree that 'gender' is all about stereotypes, and as a feminist who feels that so many of these were breaking down in a good way I am not happy that they are coming back so forcefully and with such damaging repercussions.