Because I realize nuance and humour are difficult to convey and very often outright lost in print, and because I know there are some readers who are just waiting to pounce on any perceived inaccuracies in what I write, please allow me to offer the following disclaimer:
Well put. I found myself agreeing with a lot, and on the points of disagreement, you made me empathize. Trudeau does seem to be taking an unnecessarily divisive tone, but in his defense, you guys do align with extremist nut bags on many issues, so it gets hard to separate the reasonable from the unreasonable on your side of the fence.
There was a slight misrepresentation of the study you provided though. The New Brunswick policy requires schools to get ‘parental consent’, to have their names/ pronouns changed, which actually goes against the wishes of the majority of the parents, according to that survey (except in SK, where it was 50/50)
Currently our school policy is to not disclose student's gender identity to their parents. Most parents don't even know this.
Even if the only number stated here was "43% of parents want to be informed and give consent", that's still almost half. That's a bigger percentage of people than voted for Trudeau.
You only get your news from government-funded foreign-owned National Post? Colour me surprised. Where in the article does Blackwell make the claim that the current policy is NOT to inform the parents? You made a specific claim which is not backed up by the article you've linked. Are you in the business of lying, Ken?
Instead of pointing out that this is from a right-leaning publication, maybe should be asking yourself why the CBC or Global isn't covering this given that it's obviously of interest to a good portion of of the population (even if you don't agree with them).
Also, you obviously didn't read it very carefully because the article linked to the Health Canada's own website:
In case you don't feel like reading this one either, here's the pertinent bit:
Under "What do I do if a student discloses a gender variant identity to me?"
"Do not talk to anyone about their identity, including parents/caregivers, to whom they have not already disclosed their gender identity."
It's not too surprising that you didn't know about this (most people don't). What's a little more discouraging is that you and others seemingly don't want to know about it. So yeah, that's the policy in Canada, even though schools are supposedly under provincial jurisdiction. So you can see why Trudeau's gitch is all in a knot when a province blatantly goes against federal recommendations. And I'm pretty sure there will be more yet.
This whole issue is well beyond my pay-grade. I honestly have no firm position and I find it all too hard to comprehend, but I’ll happily offer some counterpoints. I love a good argument.
Requiring parental consent has some serious potential consequences. Whereas NOT requiring parental consent, allowing a kid to transition at school without their parents permission doesn’t have any serious negatives I can think of.
For that reason alone, I’d say this New Brunswick policy is bad, and the majority agrees with me.
When it comes to simply informing parents (but not requiring consent), I can understand why a school might want the option to not pass that information to a parent.
If there’s a child who feels safe and comfortable to be themselves at school and identify as a different gender, but specifically doesn’t want their parents informed, what then? That puts the school staff in a tough situation, doesn’t it? There are some bigoted parents out there, and you’d have to assume that if the child doesn’t want the parents informed, then there’s likely a reason for that. Does it just come down to parents’ rights? Do the kids have rights?
If the school is going to be assuming anything, why shouldn't they assume that the vast majority of parents have their kid's best interests at heart? That would seem like the natural assumption, don't you think? The only reason this might "put school staff in a tough position" is because it's beyond the scope of their duties.
I'm a little unclear on the "providing consent" thing and what that would practically look like, but the informing part of it is a no-brainer to me. As for whether the kids have rights - parents need to sign permission slips for their kids to do all manner of things at school (joining clubs, going on field trips, etc), so it really about "rights"?
It’s too hard. I’m inclined to agree with you, but my lefty progressive instincts are dragging me the other way. Surely in the vast majority of cases, if a kid has transitioned at school, then they’ve transitioned at home too, so there’s no issue. In the rare cases that a kid is ‘out’ at school, but ‘closeted’ at home (not sure how that would even work), that would signify they don’t feel comfortable/safe with their parents knowing. In such cases, isn’t it best for the school to just stay out of it? Wouldn’t it be “beyond the scope of their duties” for the school to step in?
I would say permission slips pertain to activities that have a physical component in some form or another, covering the school's asses should anything happen. Names and pronouns are of no consequence to anything, so who cares?
Again, maybe you’re correct.
Maybe I’m wrong. There’s a first time for everything.
And there it is folks: to "freedom fighters" like Ken, children are little more than chattel property until they reach the age of majority. That is literally a regression on the limited freedoms children currently enjoy under our legal system.
If parents want to subject their children to dangerous experimental medical treatments - or no medical treatments at all - contrary to the child's wish, is that child abuse?
If by "dangerous medical treatments" you're referring "gender affirming care", then yes, I believe that is child abuse. But I wouldn't blame the parents because they're being told it's okay by doctors authority figures. Those are the real criminals.
Gender affirming care in young people is a very complicated and tricky issue. If there ARE doctors, parents, or others who push a child towards some form of irreversible treatment that the child will later regret, then I hope there’s a hell and those people go to it and they burn and suffer for eternity.
I suspect, however, that such instances are exceedingly rare, and more right-wing folklore than anything else. Data seems to show that the vast majority of gender-affirming care is a positive, helps people live better lives, and indeed saves many lives.
Jewish people were approximately 0.7% of the German population in the 1930s. In some senses Judaism was a fringe ideology; would you say Hitler "won" that battle... or?
What battle do you think is being fought here? No private citizen has ever been "required" to believe or say anything in Canada since her inception.
It takes less than 10 minutes to read one of your pieces. There's rarely much to digest. Interesting, however, that you've avoided my questions... If your ideas are too weak to defend, why bother publishing them?
The battle being fought here is for our kids that are being encouraged to believe they were born in the wrong body and only a lifetime of pharmaceuticals and surgery will make them happy. It's the most abusive thing I've heard of in modern civilised culture. And when schools insist that parents should have no right to know what's going on with their kids inside the school walls, you can bet your ass parents are going do something about that. The days of this shit are numbered.
Where did you read that children are being "encouraged" to believe anything about themselves? Again you refuse to answer my questions and go off on some diatribes about how "the days of this shit are numbered". What are you referring to by "this shit" because you seem deeply uninformed about what does/does not happen in Canada.
Well put. I found myself agreeing with a lot, and on the points of disagreement, you made me empathize. Trudeau does seem to be taking an unnecessarily divisive tone, but in his defense, you guys do align with extremist nut bags on many issues, so it gets hard to separate the reasonable from the unreasonable on your side of the fence.
There was a slight misrepresentation of the study you provided though. The New Brunswick policy requires schools to get ‘parental consent’, to have their names/ pronouns changed, which actually goes against the wishes of the majority of the parents, according to that survey (except in SK, where it was 50/50)
Currently our school policy is to not disclose student's gender identity to their parents. Most parents don't even know this.
Even if the only number stated here was "43% of parents want to be informed and give consent", that's still almost half. That's a bigger percentage of people than voted for Trudeau.
Really it's just about informing the parents.
That's incorrect.
No, you are incorrect.
https://nationalpost.com/news/schools-consent-transgender-gender-transition
You only get your news from government-funded foreign-owned National Post? Colour me surprised. Where in the article does Blackwell make the claim that the current policy is NOT to inform the parents? You made a specific claim which is not backed up by the article you've linked. Are you in the business of lying, Ken?
Oh, Symon, what will we do with you...?
Instead of pointing out that this is from a right-leaning publication, maybe should be asking yourself why the CBC or Global isn't covering this given that it's obviously of interest to a good portion of of the population (even if you don't agree with them).
Also, you obviously didn't read it very carefully because the article linked to the Health Canada's own website:
https://www.canada.ca/en/public-health/services/infectious-diseases/sexual-health-sexually-transmitted-infections/reports-publications/questions-answers-gender-identity-schools/gender-identity-schools.html
In case you don't feel like reading this one either, here's the pertinent bit:
Under "What do I do if a student discloses a gender variant identity to me?"
"Do not talk to anyone about their identity, including parents/caregivers, to whom they have not already disclosed their gender identity."
It's not too surprising that you didn't know about this (most people don't). What's a little more discouraging is that you and others seemingly don't want to know about it. So yeah, that's the policy in Canada, even though schools are supposedly under provincial jurisdiction. So you can see why Trudeau's gitch is all in a knot when a province blatantly goes against federal recommendations. And I'm pretty sure there will be more yet.
I never pointed out the partisan nature of PostMedia, but I appreciate your transparency in this regard.
Schools are not under federal jurisdiction so I'm not sure what kind of point you're trying to make up here.
That's a link to Health Canada, which has nothing to do with education...
This whole issue is well beyond my pay-grade. I honestly have no firm position and I find it all too hard to comprehend, but I’ll happily offer some counterpoints. I love a good argument.
Requiring parental consent has some serious potential consequences. Whereas NOT requiring parental consent, allowing a kid to transition at school without their parents permission doesn’t have any serious negatives I can think of.
For that reason alone, I’d say this New Brunswick policy is bad, and the majority agrees with me.
When it comes to simply informing parents (but not requiring consent), I can understand why a school might want the option to not pass that information to a parent.
If there’s a child who feels safe and comfortable to be themselves at school and identify as a different gender, but specifically doesn’t want their parents informed, what then? That puts the school staff in a tough situation, doesn’t it? There are some bigoted parents out there, and you’d have to assume that if the child doesn’t want the parents informed, then there’s likely a reason for that. Does it just come down to parents’ rights? Do the kids have rights?
If the school is going to be assuming anything, why shouldn't they assume that the vast majority of parents have their kid's best interests at heart? That would seem like the natural assumption, don't you think? The only reason this might "put school staff in a tough position" is because it's beyond the scope of their duties.
I'm a little unclear on the "providing consent" thing and what that would practically look like, but the informing part of it is a no-brainer to me. As for whether the kids have rights - parents need to sign permission slips for their kids to do all manner of things at school (joining clubs, going on field trips, etc), so it really about "rights"?
It’s too hard. I’m inclined to agree with you, but my lefty progressive instincts are dragging me the other way. Surely in the vast majority of cases, if a kid has transitioned at school, then they’ve transitioned at home too, so there’s no issue. In the rare cases that a kid is ‘out’ at school, but ‘closeted’ at home (not sure how that would even work), that would signify they don’t feel comfortable/safe with their parents knowing. In such cases, isn’t it best for the school to just stay out of it? Wouldn’t it be “beyond the scope of their duties” for the school to step in?
I would say permission slips pertain to activities that have a physical component in some form or another, covering the school's asses should anything happen. Names and pronouns are of no consequence to anything, so who cares?
Again, maybe you’re correct.
Maybe I’m wrong. There’s a first time for everything.
And there it is folks: to "freedom fighters" like Ken, children are little more than chattel property until they reach the age of majority. That is literally a regression on the limited freedoms children currently enjoy under our legal system.
If parents want to subject their children to dangerous experimental medical treatments - or no medical treatments at all - contrary to the child's wish, is that child abuse?
If by "dangerous medical treatments" you're referring "gender affirming care", then yes, I believe that is child abuse. But I wouldn't blame the parents because they're being told it's okay by doctors authority figures. Those are the real criminals.
Gender affirming care in young people is a very complicated and tricky issue. If there ARE doctors, parents, or others who push a child towards some form of irreversible treatment that the child will later regret, then I hope there’s a hell and those people go to it and they burn and suffer for eternity.
I suspect, however, that such instances are exceedingly rare, and more right-wing folklore than anything else. Data seems to show that the vast majority of gender-affirming care is a positive, helps people live better lives, and indeed saves many lives.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-the-science-on-gender-affirming-care-for-transgender-kids-really-shows/
So you're saying the State should have ultimate authority over children, not the parents?
Jewish people were approximately 0.7% of the German population in the 1930s. In some senses Judaism was a fringe ideology; would you say Hitler "won" that battle... or?
What battle do you think is being fought here? No private citizen has ever been "required" to believe or say anything in Canada since her inception.
As usual, you've gotten it completely wrong.
As wrong as I apparently am, I'm surprised at the amount of time you spend reading and commenting on my stuff.
Bravo!
It takes less than 10 minutes to read one of your pieces. There's rarely much to digest. Interesting, however, that you've avoided my questions... If your ideas are too weak to defend, why bother publishing them?
The battle being fought here is for our kids that are being encouraged to believe they were born in the wrong body and only a lifetime of pharmaceuticals and surgery will make them happy. It's the most abusive thing I've heard of in modern civilised culture. And when schools insist that parents should have no right to know what's going on with their kids inside the school walls, you can bet your ass parents are going do something about that. The days of this shit are numbered.
Where did you read that children are being "encouraged" to believe anything about themselves? Again you refuse to answer my questions and go off on some diatribes about how "the days of this shit are numbered". What are you referring to by "this shit" because you seem deeply uninformed about what does/does not happen in Canada.