Category: Education

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Education Men Parent

I was a good ally

I first became engaged with trans issues when I had to teach a unit on queer theory to my A Level class. Having very little knowledge of my own,  I followed some trans accounts on twitter and read some web resources to develop an understanding. It seemed to me that trans people were an oppressed minority who needed help in overcoming societal prejudice in the same way feminist groups, the civil rights and gay rights movements had done before. I read what I could and spoke up for trans students at college when other members of staff misgendered them in front of me. I was a good ally.

I don’t remember the exact moment I realised that something was wrong. In the early days I got drawn into an argument on twitter about whether men could have periods. It seemed self evident to me that they couldn’t but apparently they could and i was hateful for suggesting otherwise. I assumed at first this was just a lone crank, how wrong I was. The penny dropped for me when I listened to Rebecca Reilly Cooper’s remarkable talk “Examining the doctrine of gender identity” on Youtube. This video had a profound impact on me, I still listen to it a couple of times a year.

I am now hugely invested in this issue and my eyes are open to the harm “the doctrine of gender identity” does to women and girls. I am appalled at the misogyny suffered by women online.

I despair of the pressure young lesbians are put under to accept trans women with penises as sexual partners.

I am terrified at the thought that my beautiful gender non-conforming daughter will be sucked in by the cult. But I am heartened at the number of women (and some men too) that are refusing to go along with the lunacy.

I like plenty of tweets and reply to quite a few, often debating with trans rights activists at length but, ultimately to no real purpose. Occasionally I summon up the courage to send an original tweet myself but not often. I comment on Facebook threads now and then.

I am too nervous to go full TERF on Facebook in front of all the people I know in real life. My partner hates me speaking out publicly even though she agrees with me. She’s worried I might get sacked and she’s right to be concerned about that.

It worries me too, although not enough to make me completely silent.

I teach at a college where traces of the transcult are creeping in. Displays in the library, genderbread people on display in classrooms. I’ve only been there a few months so I feel I need to get bedded in more before I speak out. I’m hoping that one day I’ll be asked to deliver a tutorial or take my class to a talk or get some CPD that will give me the excuse I need to speak up. I truly feel that I will have the courage when the time comes.

Have you had any consequences? So far, very little. Some ex students have told me on twitter how disappointed they are with me but I can easily take that. I’ve not lost any friends or been disciplined at work. My gender critical activities are too far under the radar at the moment. I can’t help but feel that because I’m a man I get off much lighter too.

R, Gender Critical Educator

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Education Parent

If someone had told me that in 2020, women would be fighting desperately to hang on to the definition of woman I’d have thought they were crazy.

This matters to me because when I was a student in the mid-1980s, I was a feminist (of course!) but I was confident that most of the major battles had been won, and that we were on a trajectory towards genuine equality. If someone had told me that in 2020, women would be fighting desperately to hang on to the definition of woman, in order to protect our hard-won rights, I’d have thought they were crazy.

I have written to my MP, written in support of gender-critical women who raise their voices publicly, written private letters of support to those women; made FOI requests on sex/gender topics; spent several Saturdays leafleting with other women involved in the Fair Play For Women campaign to draw attention to the proposed GRA reforms; completed the govt’s GRA reform consultation questionnaire; completed Edward Lord’s (shocking) consultation on making all City of London visitor attraction toilets mixed-sex; been active on social media; written a (far too occasional) blog; taken every opportunity to talk to family and friends (and selected colleagues) about these issues; attended WPUK and Let A Woman Speak and other events; spoken at Women Say in Hyde Park on IWD 2020; with others, set up a women’s group in our city which meets regularly (before lockdown); am active in a private Slack group for GC professionals in my sector.

As a consequence I have been frozen out of the friendship group I made when my son was a baby, because one of the mothers has a “trans child”. My son has been asked by other students at school (he attends a school which is obsessively proud about its Stonewall status) if his mother is “still a TERF”.

Rachel Bosenterfer, Adult human female. Mother. Loudmouth

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Education Healthcare Parent

We are not a subset of women

This matters to me because I do not want my daughters to grow up in a world where women’s rights are diminished.  We are not a subset of women. I worry for the teenage girls in the school where I work, where they may lose their right to same sex toilets/changing rooms.

I have donated to crowdfunders. I have emailed notes of support to women under fire who express their opinion. I have spoken to my husband and children.  I would more than likely lose my job if I went public with my opinions and I cannot afford to do that.

I have not spoken up. I feel bad about this but am truly not in a position to do so….yet.

JJ

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Education

I care about actual women

I’m a feminist. I care about actual women.

I’ve objected at staff training events, emailed colleagues, posted on media.

Any consequences? Snidey comments from colleagues, rejected for promotion for this

Persephone, Teacher

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Education

I see the dismantling of women’s hard fought for rights

I care because I see the dismantling of women’s hard fought for rights and I care about young people’s mental health as a secondary school teacher

I have done very little online as worried about professional consequences. Have spoken with friends, family and colleagues. Have complained to Greenpeace and Amnesty International by email

Any consequences? No because haven’t dared speak up

AM

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Education Parent

It is hard to see doublethink happening in real time

It is hard to see doublethink happening in real time and doubting my own common sense.

I have ensured school’s policies do not conflate sex and gender

Have you faced any consequences? Not yet

L, Left wing school governor, parent to girls

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Education Parent

I worry that we cannot speak our minds without being called bigots.

As a mother to three daughters and a teacher, this really worries me.  I worry about the girls’ safety when using public toilets and changing rooms. I worry about competitive sport – will they be competing in fair competitions? I worry that we cannot speak our minds without being called bigots.

Mostly I worry about my middle daughter who is a “Tom boy”. If she is gay – will she be convinced that she was “born in the wrong body”? Will she want to transition? How will I possibly handle that? Will she be taken away from me? This terrifies me. 

What have you done? Very little. I’m too scared to.

The bravest thing I have done is share something on Facebook saying “Happy International Women’s Day all you adult human females” alongside a Team GB montage of amazing sports women.

I have begun to boycott products and services that I feel do not support women. Nike, Flora, Audible, Always.

I like pages and stories on Facebook. I have donated to LGB Alliance.

I rant to my husband but don’t say much to anyone else in case I am branded a bigot or get into trouble at work. I have not been brave enough to speak up.

PP, Mother of sporty girls

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Education

I was forced out of a voluntary role as domestic violence safeguarding coordinator

I care because I understand, through my own experience, that women are oppressed, harmed and killed for being female.

I have posted on social media, written to MPs, renounced my membership of the Labour Party, been to events, spoken out in real life.

I was forced out of a voluntary role as domestic violence safeguarding coordinator for my church because I tweeted about DV, its impact on women and girls, and why we must fight for our right to name ourselves and our oppression. I was doxxed and was dragged in front of the Diocesan safeguarding team so they could “assess my suitability” for the role. I resigned.

Vicky Miller, Teacher and trade unionist

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Education Healthcare

I could not be complicit in socially transitioning a very young child at my school

This matters to me as a parent, educator and former mental health professional.

I don’t want children who don’t conform to rigid stereotypes of dress or personality to feel they don’t fit in and are therefore ‘trans’. I could not be complicit in socially transitioning a very young child at my school (after a trans charity trained senior staff).

I think that much better attention should be paid to children’s social adjustment and mental health, and to tackling bullying and gender stereotypes,  before taking such radical steps, based on what I consider to be a belief system. I don’t understand how Safeguarding can be so easily discarded.

I have written to newspapers and contributed to BTL comments, donated to crowdfunders, campaign groups and signed petitions, communicated with my MP and members of the House of Lords. I have attended meetings and a court case. I have become a feminist because, in middle age, I hadn’t fully understood how a concept so dismissive of women (the idea of innate gender identity; the idea that being a woman is a nebulous ‘concept’ that is up for grabs) could have gained so much traction.

The negative consequence has been that I resigned from my job – a job I had loved and been effective in. It’s had a chillling effect on my sense of security and justice to feel that something so unproven and potentially damaging to the rights and wellbeing of women and children has had so little scrutiny.

I have become aware that certain people feel themselves to have an unviolable sense of having the ‘correct’ views, based on the way they vote, and how unwilling they are to listen once they have placed a label (bigot) on others.

Gemma, Adult human female

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Education

Trans’ no longer seems to mean ‘transsexual’ but anyone who ‘cross-dresses’

I care because I am concerned that changes to the GRA could result in predatory males having easier access to hurt women and girls. I am concerned because ‘Trans’  no longer seems to mean ‘transsexual’ but anyone who ‘cross-dresses’. I am concerned because women can no longer say ‘woman is adult human female’ without being accused of transphobic and biological sex classes are now up for debate. The whole gender identity issue is full of men hating on women and women being forced out of their jobs for speaking about their sex based oppression.

I have donated to crowd funders. Tales to friends. Communicated on Twitter in a Locked account.

I refused to deliver LGBTQ sessions in my place of work which conflate sex and gender. I discuss the issues with work colleagues

I have had arguments with others and have blocked people on Twitter and FB.