August 2024
Newsletter
School Docs corrects itself
The fact that school policies mandating ‘preferred pronouns’ is in conflict with the Bill of Rights Act (BORA), which protects freedom of belief and expression, has belatedly been recognised by School Docs, a private company that sells ready-made policy documents to many schools.
In August last year we published a substack, Fishhooks in Inclusive Education Policy, in which we explained that the School Doc’s policy (below) was at odds with the BORA because it was forcing those teachers and students who do not believe in the concept of gender identity to behave according to a belief system they do not hold.
We wrote to School Docs in September 2023 asking it to revise the policy because forcing the use of ‘preferred pronouns’ is no different from, for example, requiring someone to pray at the beginning or end of a class, and is a clear interference with personal opinions.
We received no response, but are pleased to learn from a supporter that, a few months ago, School Docs quietly changed its Inclusion Policy so that it now reads, uncontroversially:
This is a big improvement on the previous policy but still raises questions about how school policies are determined. We understand that this policy change has taken place in about 2000 schools without any notification to parents. Even some schools, when answering our recent survey, didn’t seem to know about the change because they quoted the earlier policy!
Parents want to know why such a major change has been made unilaterally, when schools claim they consult with parents about everything. Although the new policy now complies with the BORA, how did the old policy come about? When parents are not consulted at all, unethical policies like that one can be brought in under the radar and not be noticed until after the damage has been done.
We hope our September letter played a part in School Doc’s change of mind, but of course we will never know because the usual gender ideology tactic of ‘no debate’ was deployed.
Most parents have never been asked, “Do you want your children to be taught to use wrong-sex pronouns and to pretend a classmate has changed sex?”
Letters to the library
We recommend this substack from Katrina Biggs (A B’old Woman) in which she shares the letters a contact sent to her local library complaining about the permanent LGBTQI display, saying in part:
“A library is a public space where all who go there should feel welcome. As such, no preference for any one group, or people, should be visibly displayed as a permanent feature.”
The letter was successful in having the permanent display altered, and follow up letters were sent about other rainbow features at the library.
There are many good points in the letters Katrina has shared that could be used in letters to your own school or local library.
Plastic surgeons see sense
At last, the first major US medical organisation has questioned the primacy of “gender affirmative medicine”. The American Society of Plastic Surgeons, which represents 92% of the profession, has acknowledged that there is “Considerable uncertainty to the long-term efficacy for the use of chest and genital surgical interventions” and that “The existing evidence base is viewed as low quality/low certainty.”
Cass endorsed by hundreds of doctors
Dishonest criticism of the Cass Review continues, including some using the name of Yale university to give credibility to a non-peer reviewed white paper written by US gender activists.
Hannah Barnes reports, however, that many doctors are speaking up in support of Cass. After the British Medical Association Council (its governing body) voted to challenge the Cass Review, 870 of its members, including 57 professors and 22 former or current presidents of medical colleges or other clinical leaders, wrote to the chair to express their “dismay and disappointment” and to ask the BMA to follow the evidence-based medicine.
Travesties of ‘gender affirming’ medicine
Transgender activists routinely claim that ‘gender affirming’ care for children is always very carefully considered and that no treatment is provided without a long, careful evaluation on a case-by-case basis. The latest evidence again proves the lie.
Australia
Bernard Lane reports on the Minister of Health for Victoria admitting that, although the Royal Children’s Hospital, Melbourne, does not provide on-site surgery for minors, it does refer children under 16 to private specialist care to “consider the appropriateness and need for surgery.”
Moira Deeming, a Liberal MP, said mainstream Australians would be “outraged” by this news, “especially when they have it explained to them that there is absolutely no evidenciary benefit for this.”
United Kingdom
The Telegraph has reported that teachers, school nurses, and counsellors were responsible for directly referring 160 children to the GIDS clinic at the Tavistock in London and that at least 30 of them were under ten years old.
United States
A report from the Manhattan Institute has revealed that even more young girls in the US are having double mastectomies than previously thought. Between 2017 and 2023, 5-6000 girls under 18 had the procedure and at least 50 of them were aged 12 or under.
Don’t forget to submit on the HRA
The deadline for submissions about providing specific protections in the Human Rights Act for “transgender, non-binary and innate variations of sex characteristics” is 5pm next Thursday, 5 September.
In case you missed it, here is a link to our last substack that includes RGE’s full submission and tips for making your own individual submissions.
Good news that the "preferred name and pronouns" got taken out of the School Docs, but it's a bit concerning that schools have so much regulation and policy to stay on top of that they simply can't do it.