Transgender

[Llani Boy]

[QUOTE=Fellbeast;668274]The not being able to use the showers is surely a covid measure? We're no longer able to use the showers at my gym either.

Afraid not. He's in his third year and its been like it since he started!

[Mossdog]

Do you consider yourself homophobic?

Urgh! I don't think Llani Boy mentioned anything about being scared of the Simpsons!

[Hank]

Not at all. I don't hate anyone.

Just not my cup of tea!

Hate to break it to you, but stating that being homosexual is not normal lands you pretty squarely in homophobia territory. You might not think of it as "hate", but how do you think your attitude would come across to a gay person?

[Fellbeast]

Afraid not. He's in his third year and its been like it since he started!

I just googled the guide lines. The is no specific rule set for schools on showering after PE and sport and schools are asked to come up with their own policies. Given the responsibilities that entails, I imagine some schools feel obliged to just not do it. Have a look at NSPCC best practice factsheet on it ->https://www.icmec.org/wp-content/upl...ging-rooms.pdf

[Travs]

What makes you think a school's approach would be imbalanced? As in do you think they're e.g. promoting homosexuality? Encouraging gender reassignment? From my experience it's more along the lines of encouraging children to understand the different lifestyle choices that are out there, be that religion, sexuality, whatever.

Re. your point on parents, I agree in as much parents should also be talking to their children about this stuff, and they may well have a different perspective. And that's fine. Kids will take in what school says, what their parents say, what their mates say, etc. and reach their own conclusions. Also worth remembering that some kids' parents won't educate their children in this area, so without school's input those children will potentially have a very limited understanding of choice, tolerance, etc.

I don't necessarily think it will be imbalanced... more incompetent... i see my nephew who is shooting ahead in academic terms, and it's mainly because his parents spent time teaching with him well before he even started school (i'm well aware that not all kids are fortunate enough to have parents like that).

My nephew could throw three darts in a board and add them up no problem, can recite his times tables, and can count in Spanish. Yet when i ask him what maths/numbers work he's doing with his class, it appears they are mostly still struggling with the "two times table".

As i mention above, this is not always the school's fault... but you only have to look at the average academic levels of people coming out of secondary school/college/university (i see CV's of graduates who can't even spell).

With all that in mind, there are obviously problems in the entire national curriculum, and i would rather this was given a higher priority than perhaps more "complex" issues such as homosexuality, gender issues, etc. And it's quite clear that a cover-all policy that when someone reaches 13 years old they should be taught these issues, is completely wrong. Unfortunately parents need to start taking some responsibility for the social (and academic) education of their offspring. My nephew is already aware that sometimes "boys want to marry boys" and that one of his friends has "two mummy's" rather than a mum and dad.

I do also sympathise with the worries expressed by Llani Boy... whilst everyone should be free to live as they like, without prejudice, i'd be slightly worried that schools may be pressing these kind of lifestyles as "normal" when rightly or wrongly they are still very much a minority. Kids should be made aware they exist, and leave it at that.

[Witton Park]

Hate to break it to you, but stating that being homosexual is not normal lands you pretty squarely in homophobia territory. You might not think of it as "hate", but how do you think your attitude would come across to a gay person?

Brexiteer Tories have to put up with that all the time, especially on this forum. It gets even worse if they are mask averse lockdown sceptics.

[Hank]

I do also sympathise with the worries expressed by Llani Boy... whilst everyone should be free to live as they like, without prejudice, i'd be slightly worried that schools may be pressing these kind of lifestyles as "normal" when rightly or wrongly they are still very much a minority. Kids should be made aware they exist, and leave it at that.

Those people are normal. They might be in the minority, but they're not abnormal. I think it's absolutely normal to expect X% of a group of people to be, for example, homosexual or bisexual. Almost certainly a considerable majority will be heterosexual, but that doesn't render the minority not normal.

[Mossdog]

Yet when i ask him what maths/numbers work he's doing with his class, it appears they are mostly still struggling with the "two times table".

As i mention above, this is not always the school's fault... but you only have to look at the average academic levels of people coming out of secondary school/college/university (i see CV's of graduates who can't even spell).

whilst everyone should be free to live as they like, without prejudice, i'd be slightly worried that schools may be pressing these kind of lifestyles as "normal" when rightly or wrongly they are still very much a minority. Kids should be made aware they exist, and leave it at that.

Hate to break it to you Travs, but in some woke-Taliban minds Maths and Science are considered inherently racist now.

Regarding your latter point, I think teaching tolerance of different life-styles and choices is important. Sadly, it's not tolerance that's often promoted but rather coerced acceptance (i.e. forced approval). Coerced in the sense that whatever stands in its way appears not as mere obstacle, but as a hateful enemy (and ironically, intolerable).

[noel]

Brexiteer Tories have to put up with that all the time, especially on this forum. It gets even worse if they are mask averse lockdown sceptics.

It's funny, if I had grouped brexiteer tories with homophobia, I think you (and many others) would have been offended. Or am I missing your point (not deliberately, this time)?

[Travs]

Those people are normal. They might be in the minority, but they're not abnormal. I think it's absolutely normal to expect X% of a group of people to be, for example, homosexual or bisexual. Almost certainly a considerable majority will be heterosexual, but that doesn't render the minority not normal.

I think it's quite clear from my post that I am referring to "normal" as in a common form of lifestyle in the eyes of a child, where someone has a "mummy" and a "daddy".

I shouldn't really feel the need to explain that I clearly wasn't calling anybody abnormal, as the other paragraphs in my post would back up...