Not much of one, the p-value of "observe at least 7 of 28 given a rate of 0.1" is about 0.018. Look at more than a few of those classrooms and chances of finding that get real good.
Not only shades of anorexia. Looked at the recovered memory movement in the 90s where unhappy women decided either on their own or with the help of psychologists that the reason for their unhappiness was that they had been sexually abused as an infant and 'suppressed it.' Articles were being published all over the place talking about this "awakening" with claims 1/4 of all women had been abused in this way. Of course, the money to be made on these women wasn't as much and the movement had a natural enemy in the form of the wrongly-accused parents. Now parents are co-opted, "trans son or dead daughter".
The mind is incredibly flexible and it's easy to convince kids of just about anything. And young women are extremely vulnerable to suggestion.
The whole thing is a total and utter shitshow and extracting ourselves out of this mess is going to be incredibly painful and slow.
> My daughter’s trans identity started when the school taught a module on ‘identity’ during which they told a group of 11-year-olds that, if you feel uncomfortable in your body, it means you are transgender.
Yeah, I don't believe that happened.
Sex ed books explicitly say things like (quoting https://www.google.com/search?q=puberty+%22uncomfortable+wit... ) "As you go through puberty, you may feel uncomfortable with your body as certain parts are growing and changing shape.", "So the next time you have a “fat day” or feel uncomfortable with your body please remember that both men and women ... ", "Puberty causes a lot of changes to happen in a short amount of time. If you're uncomfortable with your body, you're not alone.", "On top of all that—maybe even more important, from a teen's point of view—it's just not fun to feel uncomfortable with your body."
Why isn't this parent complaining about the lousy quality of the sex education in the kid's school? Or covered this possibility long ago when teaching her about what might happen with puberty?
> Their official policy seems to be to just go with whatever the kids say without informing the parents.
Okay, and so? We had a kid in school who went by the nickname "Moose". Does anyone seriously think the teachers informed the parents of that?
> we are trying to protect our kids ... from having radical surgery on their developing bodies.
Just how many minors are getting 'radical surgery' without their parents consent? Who then is paying for it?
It's not hard to believe that an 11-year-old being taught about transgenderism might come away with "if you feel uncomfortable in your body, it means you are transgender" as the message - even if it wasn't intended by the teacher. Humans of all ages love to believe they have more control than they do and it's easy to imagine how a kid might decide to pursue transgender treatments to try and escape puberty.
> Why isn't this parent complaining about the lousy quality of the sex education in the kid's school?
I'm pretty sure the main point of this blog post was complaining about how her child's school handles sex education, particularly in regards to sexual identity.
> Does anyone seriously think the teachers informed the parents of that?
A nickname with seemingly no derogatory implications is not comparable to the sexual identity of a child.
> Just how many minors are getting 'radical surgery' without their parents consent? Who then is paying for it?
I don't think the implication was that their child would attempt to get surgery on their own. Rather, that they are finding it tough to balance the immediate desires of their child with their own concerns about their child's long-term well being - particularly while the school promotes messages which conflict with their own.
> My daughter’s trans identity started when the school taught a module on ‘identity’ during which they told a group of 11-year-olds that, if you feel uncomfortable in your body, it means you are transgender.
Not that the daughter came away from school misunderstanding the lesson.
> The article states: [...] Not that the daughter came away from school misunderstanding the lesson.
How is a parent supposed to know exactly what was taught in a particular lesson other than by hearing about it second-hand through their child? From the parent's point of view, it may appear like that is exactly what was taught even if it wasn't.
It would be best for them to verify with the school before writing about it, but this is a rant in a substack blog post. Details like that are not specified.
> Sex ed shouldn't start after puberty has started.
Hi! Parent of a 12-year-old here. This summer I received an email about the intention of my local public school district to teach a unit on sex education in the fall, in SEVENTH GRADE.
Meanwhile, my daughter has had her period more than a year, as have most or all of her friends. She has multiple friends in her class who express either transgender or gender fluid identities. In fifth and sixth grade, boys and girls were already hugging in the hallways, "dating," and talking about things at a level that would shock most people. Seriously, even her siblings, ten years older, are shocked at how young some of this stuff is talked about, or the details of what is shared. This isn't just "old fogey" expressing shock, my 21-year-old is shocked.
The reason for the delayed instruction is simple: it's the result of a long legal battle that has seen conservative parents in my state trying to eliminate it entirely, and settling (for now) with gender-segregated opt-out instruction several years too late to do much good.
Fortunately, my daughter received good instructions from her parents beginning when she was eight, and professes to understand that whatever sexuality or gender identity one express when she is 12 may or may not be a sexuality or gender expression that they stick with as an adult.
Your observations highlight additional oddities about the linked-to essay.
What school has a pro-LGBTQ stance and teaches a unit on identity, including trans-identity which asserts ' if you feel uncomfortable in your body, it means you are transgender', before teaching a sex ed course?
Has your daughter's school taught about trans-identity yet? If yes, how have the conservative parents in your state permitted it?
If not - which I think is the more likely case - where did her multiple trans and gender-fluid friends learn about the concept?
It seems to me those same external, non-school sources could also have informed the 28 students in the linked-to essay, no matter what the school taught.
Which would undermine the theory proposed in the essay.
> It sounds like you are agreeing with me that the school did NOT teach that "if you feel uncomfortable in your body, it means you are transgender."
I'm saying we simply don't know. It's not hard for me to believe that someone somewhere taught that. It's also not hard for me to believe that a child took away that as the message, even though it isn't what was intended by the teacher, and that the parent took their child's description of the lesson at face value. It's also not hard for me to believe that the parent made that part up.
All of those are reasonably possible scenarios, but I see no reason to just assume the worst from the parent.
> If this was her first sex ed class, and it was about being transgender, then it something is seriously wrong in the pedagogy.
I agree, but we have no reason to necessarily believe that was the case. As a boy, I didn't pay much attention to sex ed until it actually became relevant to me. At the time, transgenderism was still considered a disorder so it wasn't something I was even prompted to consider. It's impossible to say how I or my peers would have responded if that weren't the case.
Assuming that was the case and the child had no exposure to sex ed whatsoever prior to the talk on transgenderism, I can still sympathize with the parent's position. They made a mistake and circumstances have made that mistake difficult to correct. And now they feel like they're in a tug-of-war with the school over the fate of their child.
If I assume the best, and the author's account really did happen that way, then the school (and the parent) have done a poor job of sex ed.
> I didn't pay much attention to sex ed until it actually became relevant to me
It was several weeks after the daughter's first period. Probably pretty relevant. And the signs of puberty start showing up before then.
But note that this wasn't a sex ed class, it was "a module on ‘identity’". Even if we limit ourselves to sexual identity, that topic includes heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, pansexual, transexual, and asexual.
Even P.E./gym should have covered something on how exercise and phyiscal fitness can affect how comfortable you feel in in your body.
> and the child had no exposure to sex ed whatsoever prior to the talk on transgenderism
For the author's theory to be true means at least 6 other parents also did not talk to their children about sex ed -- and that's assuming every single one of those children concluded they were trans, which seems far outside the odds.
If I assume the best, then this sounds like such an outlier that there's no take-home lesson to learn.
> It was several weeks after the daughter's first period. Probably pretty relevant. And the signs of puberty start showing up before then.
It certainly would be relevant, were they actively discussing puberty at the time.
> Even P.E./gym should have covered something on how exercise and phyiscal fitness can affect how comfortable you feel in in your body.
I doubt that. PE in most public elementary schools are focused on helping kids develop physical skills. They might learn the rules of a sport or the steps to a dance, but there isn't much else academic going on beyond "exercise is part of being healthy".
> For the author's theory to be true means at least 6 other parents also did not talk to their children about sex ed -- and that's assuming every single one of those children concluded they were trans, which seems far outside the odds.
This honestly doesn't seem that unlikely to me. The author stressed how they chose to send their child to this school specifically because of how progressive they are. If the schools progressiveness is that exceptional, it wouldn't be a surprise if other parents did the same. Already, we could expect open trans identity to be higher there because of their exceptional promotion of acceptance. And depending on how the lesson in question actually went, it isn't far fetched that other kids may have come away with the same message.
I don't think we should be so quick to dismiss anecdotes like this just because extremist might paint it as a ridiculous plot by schools to turn kids trans or whatever. Trans identity - and especially medical treatment - among children is a complex, delicate subject that our society doesn't have a lot of experience with yet. Scenarios like this, even if it's made up, can teach us a lot.
To surmise what we've learned so far: Parents should teach their kids about puberty and sexual identities long before puberty starts. While teaching, parents should make sure their kids learn how to distinguish between transgenderism and puberty. I never would have considered those lessons before this discussion.
> If the schools progressiveness is that exceptional, it wouldn't be a surprise if other parents did the same.
Then there's another possibility - how many parents sent their kids to this school specifically because their kids already at age 5 were questioning their assigned gender-normative identity, and the parents wanted the kids to be in a safe place to explore that identity?
We don't have a clue, because all of these details are missing from the essay except for the conclusion.
> Scenarios like this, even if it's made up, can teach us a lot.
I would rather spend my time understanding real case histories rather than made up ones.
Even according to this essay, there's no need to teach kids "how to distinguish between transgenderism and puberty", only to teach kids that puberty makes some people feel uncomfortable with their body as certain parts are growing and changing shape.
Which is already what competent sex education does.
That knowledge would have been enough that if a kid hears someone say "if you feel uncomfortable in your body, it means you are transgender" then they can see the conflicting statements.
And, honestly, do you think kids would hear a statement like that and believe it? Repeated lessons on "Don't do drugs" and "Don't have sex outside of marriage" didn't work, yet this one somehow does?
It will be Interesting to see how the kids who get irreversible surgery will grow up. Will some number of them grow to resent the influence their parents and teacher?
There have been numerous documented cases of transition regret. I wonder what the impact will be when that number is multiplied 10x or 100x.
Kids have a lot of information at their fingertips these days. I don't think that I heard about "transgender" until maybe highschool. Kids also can see the extra duties, requirements for behavior and dress, discrimination and harassment that end up on girls and women.
My thought is that if a child sees all this, and that they'd be subject to it, why wouldn't that child avoid those extra expectations, burdens, duties, harassment and discrimination by saying "I'm not a girl"?
21 comments
[ 2.4 ms ] story [ 23.1 ms ] threadIs this an all-girls' school?
Yeah, I don't believe that happened.
Sex ed books explicitly say things like (quoting https://www.google.com/search?q=puberty+%22uncomfortable+wit... ) "As you go through puberty, you may feel uncomfortable with your body as certain parts are growing and changing shape.", "So the next time you have a “fat day” or feel uncomfortable with your body please remember that both men and women ... ", "Puberty causes a lot of changes to happen in a short amount of time. If you're uncomfortable with your body, you're not alone.", "On top of all that—maybe even more important, from a teen's point of view—it's just not fun to feel uncomfortable with your body."
Why isn't this parent complaining about the lousy quality of the sex education in the kid's school? Or covered this possibility long ago when teaching her about what might happen with puberty?
> Their official policy seems to be to just go with whatever the kids say without informing the parents.
Okay, and so? We had a kid in school who went by the nickname "Moose". Does anyone seriously think the teachers informed the parents of that?
> we are trying to protect our kids ... from having radical surgery on their developing bodies.
Just how many minors are getting 'radical surgery' without their parents consent? Who then is paying for it?
It's not hard to believe that an 11-year-old being taught about transgenderism might come away with "if you feel uncomfortable in your body, it means you are transgender" as the message - even if it wasn't intended by the teacher. Humans of all ages love to believe they have more control than they do and it's easy to imagine how a kid might decide to pursue transgender treatments to try and escape puberty.
> Why isn't this parent complaining about the lousy quality of the sex education in the kid's school?
I'm pretty sure the main point of this blog post was complaining about how her child's school handles sex education, particularly in regards to sexual identity.
> Does anyone seriously think the teachers informed the parents of that?
A nickname with seemingly no derogatory implications is not comparable to the sexual identity of a child.
> Just how many minors are getting 'radical surgery' without their parents consent? Who then is paying for it?
I don't think the implication was that their child would attempt to get surgery on their own. Rather, that they are finding it tough to balance the immediate desires of their child with their own concerns about their child's long-term well being - particularly while the school promotes messages which conflict with their own.
> My daughter’s trans identity started when the school taught a module on ‘identity’ during which they told a group of 11-year-olds that, if you feel uncomfortable in your body, it means you are transgender.
Not that the daughter came away from school misunderstanding the lesson.
Sex ed shouldn't start after puberty has started.
How is a parent supposed to know exactly what was taught in a particular lesson other than by hearing about it second-hand through their child? From the parent's point of view, it may appear like that is exactly what was taught even if it wasn't.
It would be best for them to verify with the school before writing about it, but this is a rant in a substack blog post. Details like that are not specified.
> Sex ed shouldn't start after puberty has started.
I never said it should.
> I never said it should.
The daughter "had just had her first period two months prior to this class." She's definitely hit puberty.
If this was her first sex ed class, and it was about being transgender, then it something is seriously wrong in the pedagogy.
Why didn't sex ed start earlier?
Why didn't the parent teach the daughter about puberty already?
Meanwhile, my daughter has had her period more than a year, as have most or all of her friends. She has multiple friends in her class who express either transgender or gender fluid identities. In fifth and sixth grade, boys and girls were already hugging in the hallways, "dating," and talking about things at a level that would shock most people. Seriously, even her siblings, ten years older, are shocked at how young some of this stuff is talked about, or the details of what is shared. This isn't just "old fogey" expressing shock, my 21-year-old is shocked.
The reason for the delayed instruction is simple: it's the result of a long legal battle that has seen conservative parents in my state trying to eliminate it entirely, and settling (for now) with gender-segregated opt-out instruction several years too late to do much good.
Fortunately, my daughter received good instructions from her parents beginning when she was eight, and professes to understand that whatever sexuality or gender identity one express when she is 12 may or may not be a sexuality or gender expression that they stick with as an adult.
What school has a pro-LGBTQ stance and teaches a unit on identity, including trans-identity which asserts ' if you feel uncomfortable in your body, it means you are transgender', before teaching a sex ed course?
Has your daughter's school taught about trans-identity yet? If yes, how have the conservative parents in your state permitted it?
If not - which I think is the more likely case - where did her multiple trans and gender-fluid friends learn about the concept?
It seems to me those same external, non-school sources could also have informed the 28 students in the linked-to essay, no matter what the school taught.
Which would undermine the theory proposed in the essay.
I'm saying we simply don't know. It's not hard for me to believe that someone somewhere taught that. It's also not hard for me to believe that a child took away that as the message, even though it isn't what was intended by the teacher, and that the parent took their child's description of the lesson at face value. It's also not hard for me to believe that the parent made that part up.
All of those are reasonably possible scenarios, but I see no reason to just assume the worst from the parent.
> If this was her first sex ed class, and it was about being transgender, then it something is seriously wrong in the pedagogy.
I agree, but we have no reason to necessarily believe that was the case. As a boy, I didn't pay much attention to sex ed until it actually became relevant to me. At the time, transgenderism was still considered a disorder so it wasn't something I was even prompted to consider. It's impossible to say how I or my peers would have responded if that weren't the case.
Assuming that was the case and the child had no exposure to sex ed whatsoever prior to the talk on transgenderism, I can still sympathize with the parent's position. They made a mistake and circumstances have made that mistake difficult to correct. And now they feel like they're in a tug-of-war with the school over the fate of their child.
> I didn't pay much attention to sex ed until it actually became relevant to me
It was several weeks after the daughter's first period. Probably pretty relevant. And the signs of puberty start showing up before then.
But note that this wasn't a sex ed class, it was "a module on ‘identity’". Even if we limit ourselves to sexual identity, that topic includes heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, pansexual, transexual, and asexual.
Even P.E./gym should have covered something on how exercise and phyiscal fitness can affect how comfortable you feel in in your body.
> and the child had no exposure to sex ed whatsoever prior to the talk on transgenderism
For the author's theory to be true means at least 6 other parents also did not talk to their children about sex ed -- and that's assuming every single one of those children concluded they were trans, which seems far outside the odds.
If I assume the best, then this sounds like such an outlier that there's no take-home lesson to learn.
It certainly would be relevant, were they actively discussing puberty at the time.
> Even P.E./gym should have covered something on how exercise and phyiscal fitness can affect how comfortable you feel in in your body.
I doubt that. PE in most public elementary schools are focused on helping kids develop physical skills. They might learn the rules of a sport or the steps to a dance, but there isn't much else academic going on beyond "exercise is part of being healthy".
> For the author's theory to be true means at least 6 other parents also did not talk to their children about sex ed -- and that's assuming every single one of those children concluded they were trans, which seems far outside the odds.
This honestly doesn't seem that unlikely to me. The author stressed how they chose to send their child to this school specifically because of how progressive they are. If the schools progressiveness is that exceptional, it wouldn't be a surprise if other parents did the same. Already, we could expect open trans identity to be higher there because of their exceptional promotion of acceptance. And depending on how the lesson in question actually went, it isn't far fetched that other kids may have come away with the same message.
I don't think we should be so quick to dismiss anecdotes like this just because extremist might paint it as a ridiculous plot by schools to turn kids trans or whatever. Trans identity - and especially medical treatment - among children is a complex, delicate subject that our society doesn't have a lot of experience with yet. Scenarios like this, even if it's made up, can teach us a lot.
To surmise what we've learned so far: Parents should teach their kids about puberty and sexual identities long before puberty starts. While teaching, parents should make sure their kids learn how to distinguish between transgenderism and puberty. I never would have considered those lessons before this discussion.
Then there's another possibility - how many parents sent their kids to this school specifically because their kids already at age 5 were questioning their assigned gender-normative identity, and the parents wanted the kids to be in a safe place to explore that identity?
We don't have a clue, because all of these details are missing from the essay except for the conclusion.
> Scenarios like this, even if it's made up, can teach us a lot.
I would rather spend my time understanding real case histories rather than made up ones.
Even according to this essay, there's no need to teach kids "how to distinguish between transgenderism and puberty", only to teach kids that puberty makes some people feel uncomfortable with their body as certain parts are growing and changing shape.
Which is already what competent sex education does.
That knowledge would have been enough that if a kid hears someone say "if you feel uncomfortable in your body, it means you are transgender" then they can see the conflicting statements.
And, honestly, do you think kids would hear a statement like that and believe it? Repeated lessons on "Don't do drugs" and "Don't have sex outside of marriage" didn't work, yet this one somehow does?
There have been numerous documented cases of transition regret. I wonder what the impact will be when that number is multiplied 10x or 100x.
My thought is that if a child sees all this, and that they'd be subject to it, why wouldn't that child avoid those extra expectations, burdens, duties, harassment and discrimination by saying "I'm not a girl"?