Jenni Minto. Dearie Me.

Why do our politicians continue to ignore the stampede of elephants in the room? Let's talk about self id in Scottish education

Last week I recorded my first podcast ‘The Pink Elephant’ under the premise that there are ‘elephants’ in the room we NEED to discuss. Week One looked at the implication of the UNCRC (United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child). My latest podcast “Self Id in Scottish Education” is now LIVE.

In this podcast I look at how self id is being implemented in education specifically in Glasgow nurseries.  I tell a story of a 4 year old who comes home from nursery distressed about a 'man woman' in the pre-school and her mother told they will 're-educate her' to adjust.  Are basing laws on a lie a good way to legislate? There are worrying moves as EIS (Scotland's largest teaching union) voted (unlawfully) to support a policy of self-id in schools. You can read more of that below.  Yet Jenni Minto MSP for Public Health states 'there is no gender ideology in Scottish schools'.  We are living in cloud cuckoo land over here, and children are the victims.

Ok ok Ms. Minto maybe they are not taught technically about gender ideology, I’d liken it more to gender ideology being RAILROADED into their lives. Teaching it’s not. Forced compliance/submission/conformity/surrender etc etc etc? THAT’s for sure. You can see my letter below in response that I have written on behalf of the

Scottish Union for Education

in my role as Parent and Supporters Coordinator. Feel free to write to her yourself and express your concern that she is SO out of touch to know what has infiltrated Scottish schools and is harming children.

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Following the letter below, I am reposting the story I did on the EIS motion to ignore Cass. How are teachers supposed to operate ethically and in the best interests of children when forced compliance is de rigueur?

We will see how she responds. In the meantime following is a post I wrote in late spring in response Scotland’s leading teacher’s union voting to adopt a policy of self id in schools (unlawfully) and what implications that holds.

Could the EIS be considered a terrorist organisation?

With their latest motion to promote self-id in schools they are grooming children for known harms

The Educational Institute of Scotland is the largest teacher’s union in Scotland. With a membership in excess of 56,000 members it holds considerable sway in education and educational policy in Scotland. Their recent AGM seems to indicate they are more interested in activism and less in education. Could this driver put the union in the category of a terrorist organisation?

Weaponising children against the wishes of their parents is not a new concept. In the decade between 1966 and 1976, China was in the throes of a passionate cultural upheaval. Under the guise of purging the Communist party of bourgeois attitudes and complacency, Chairman Mao Zedong mobilized the youth to reassert his power in China. His plan worked. Young people in military uniforms and red armbands dragged their teachers and their neighbours into the streets and publicly beat and humiliated them in an attempt to eradicate the country of traitors to the party. The youths went into ancient temples and smashed sacred relics in order to bring China into a new age free of old ideas. They waged a war against what they believed was the creeping presence of the bourgeoisie — all in the name of Mao.

This past weekend the EIS held their Annual General Meeting. In addition to five (five) motions on Gaza (?)(*nothing addressing the poverty of the children in Scotland in case you were wondering) their Equality Committee put forth and passed unanimously Motion 26:

This AGM reaffirms:

• Its support for a self-declaration system for gender recognition and for the process to be made more accessible, recognising the detrimental impact of the current process on transgender people's mental health and wellbeing.

We are not talking about ‘people’ we are talking about ‘children’. Children whom are entrusted by their parents into the care of teachers to be safe.

One would hope in the light of The Cass Report which categorically states that ‘social transition is not a neutral act’ that the union may have had a period of reflection (at the very least)? That they may have paused given the vast number of detransitioners coming forward? Detransitioners who are irreversibly damaged for life.

Detransitioners are growing in number. All share the same story, they were vulnerable & groomed to believe that they had been born in the wrong body. Now they are irreversibly damaged.

Or the WPATH Files - the ‘gold standard’ for ‘trans medicine’ acknowledging that it’s “one big experiment” with children as the test subjects. And that it is most often the most vulnerable children who have co-morbidities such as autism, sexual abuse and psychiatric conditions which are ignored as they are led down devastating pathways.

That the EIS upon seeing that children “who are affirmed” are more likely to pursue these medical pathways such as puberty blockers, cross sex hormones, and irreversible surgeries.  That knowing that healthy children are left infertile, sexually unable to function, with stunted brain development, liver cancer, osteoporosis, dementia and with worse psychiatric conditions then they started with would bring them pause?  These medical interventions shorten lifespan with the disruption of healthy endocrine systems. Gender non-conforming children who would otherwise grow up ‘to be gay’ are told they are the opposite sex and not to be happy in their healthy bodies and emerging sexuality?  One would think teachers would do their homework.

In medicine there is a concept called ‘open future’. ‘Open future’ refers to leaving children options as adults when making decisions about child healthcare (ie. not choosing something for them which will inhibit them from other choices as adults). This approach protects children from themselves, as developmentally they are not able to understand consequences of their actions.

They may be flippant about their fertility (‘I’ll just freeze my eggs’! ‘I don’t want to have kids’! ‘I don’t care’!) that is a feature of youth - a certain laissez faire attitude to risk. It is up to us adults to provide the grounding and boundaries for them to keep them safe… and intact. As I have often said - my child (when younger) would have eaten jelly babies for every meal of the day with no concerns. This speaks to his lack of maturity, which is appropriate, children learn to navigate risk through the interaction with the adults around them, parents first and foremost.

Here Joe Burgo psychotherapist explains succinctly why, from a child development perspective, gender ideology (or any ideology in my opinion) needs to be counterbalanced in the context of delivery in schools.

It is no wonder that teachers are falling foul of this trend, because they have been let down by their own training. As noted in my expose on the failed RSHP curriculum teachers do not get any instruction in child development during their teacher training anymore. As far as the training is concerned (with it’s language of ‘rights’, ‘consent’ and ‘student voice’) - children are merely adults in small bodies.

The other thing I find quite troublesome about the EIS motion is the lack of acknowledgement of the parent. There is no sense the union (and the teachers by association) consider the parent who (by and large) is the most invested in the well being and safety of their child. In this (perhaps?) we find the ground source of For Women Scotland’s expose on trans ideology in schools.

And this is where we see the fracture in all it’s glory. In May there was a cross party meeting held in Holyrood providing crucial and distressing evidence of the impact of transgender ideology on vulnerable children in care and in schools. The Scottish Union for Education substack provides two first hand accounts of the meeting - from Maggie Mellon, Social Worker, and Dr. Jenny Cunningham, retired paediatrician and specialist in autism.

Dr. Cunningham says:

“What was so telling were the similarities in the parents’ testimonies. First, all the young people were vulnerable in various ways: as well as childhood trauma of abuse and being in care, they were autistic or had mental health conditions, and in one case was caught up in a friendship group of ‘trans-identifying’ girls.”

It is clear that vulnerable children are being groomed and exploited and harmed by ideology. LGBT Youth Scotland and TIE continue to play a horrifying part in the radicalising of children.

And in ALL of this. There is absolutely NO acknowledgement of parental rights.

Scottish Union for Education has created a useful pamphlet outlining parent’s rights. Perhaps this should be in every teacher’s desk in the country as a reminder. It certainly should be provided to EIS, as they (in pushing through ideology) need to be certain that they are in alignment with parent’s wishes. I do find it quite frustrating given that 1 in 3 children in Scotland are leaving school struggling to read, that I am forced to remind the TEACHING union what it is there for.

You can download this pamphlet here

EIS seems to be leaping over all these laws, knowing the harms and choosing to ideologically forge ahead anyway. They are using our children as fodder to an ideological drive. In my opinion to make a comparison to Mao’s China would not be remiss. I think EIS could be classified as a terrorist organisation. They are endangering all the children of Scotland through the promotion of an ideologically led agenda. This is explicitly against parents wishes (also flouting the law for their ideological aims) and brings known harms to children.

Home Office Policy Paper on Terrorism

I am aware there are good teachers out there who *think* they are doing the right thing. I would encourage all those who read this with horror to take a step back, do your homework and do right by children. When I was asked to be part of the Primary 4 Disco at one of the local primary schools I said no. But I knew the teacher who was organising and I knew she *did* have the best interests of the children at heart. She just hadn’t considered the bigger picture. There are activists and ideologues out there in our classrooms and they need to be kept in check but mostly it’s just regular folk caught up in the flow. That said that’s how bad shit happens.

Scotland needs good teachers to inspire and provide our children with foundational knowledge and experiences for them to grow into the adults they choose, when ready. We don’t need Mao’s Guard.

Do not make children into activists. Let them have their childhood.

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