SEX education is always a problem. Very few people are in total agreement about what should be taught to children and when.
But if there is one thing that we should be able to agree on it is that children should not be taught lies.
Yet that is what I believe children are being taught.
A new report out this week reveals that teachers in schools across the country are allowing kids to change their names and uniforms without parents being informed.
Children are being allowed — that is, encouraged — by teachers to identify as the opposite sex. That leads to all the other confusions that come along with it.
This includes allowing children to abandon single-sex toilets and changing rooms.
In schools where parents would have to be informed if their child was given an aspirin they are being allowed to “change sex” without parents knowing.
In fact, on some occasions parents may only have been made aware of their child’s “change” when they receive a letter from the school which gives their child a different name and different pronouns.
Can you imagine how upsetting this is for a parent? For the school to think that they “know” the child and know better about the kid than the parents who brought the child into the world?
This madness seems to be spreading. And nowhere is safe from it.
Take Queen Elizabeth II school on the Isle of Man. It was reported recently that a class of 11-year-old children was taught that there are 72 genders.
That is utter madness. There are only two sexes. That is a biological fact.
That a tiny number of people in the population believe they are of the other sex does not change that.
And in any case, where on earth did the number 72 come from? If there are 72 genders then why not 172? Or none? The question gets to the root of one of the madnesses of our day.
This week Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced an urgent review into the teaching of sex education.
It came after an investigation exposed the widespread teaching of “age inappropriate” material in schools.
This included the teaching not only of sex acts which children do not need to know about but — again — the teaching to 13-year-olds that there are in fact 100 genders.
One of the reasons why this is so alarming — and why a review is necessary — is not because of what our society tells children. Rather it is about what it tells us about the adults.
After all, children only get taught what adults choose to teach them. And it is here our society is falling miserably short.
It is perfectly right that teachers should explain some of the facts of life at the right age to pupils under their care. There will always be a debate about what to teach and when.
The problem we have in modern Britain is that the adults are in complete disarray.
After all, sex education is baffling enough for many children and embarrassing enough for many teachers and parents.
Why do we need to make it more baffling still? Why do we need to tell children complete lies? Such as the idea that there are 72, 100 or any other number of “genders”.
Gender is an invention. It is the idea that apart from our biological sex there are ways in which we “feel” about ourselves and that the categories of this are both limitless and capable of being listed.
It pretends that people can be “non-binary”, “two-spirit” and a range of other things which are completely and utterly made up.
It is only because adults in our society pander to such make-believe that they are now imparting these ideas to our children. It is hard to think of anything which could be more confusing.
After all, just last year a journalist asked a prominent gay activist whether he could define what “non-binary” and “two-spirit” actually are, and what the differences might be. He couldn’t answer.
In fact, nobody can. This is the land of make believe.
Adults have invented these categories, largely to draw attention to themselves, pretend they are interesting and make everyone else “respect” them.
This has nothing to do with the rights battles of the past. It has everything to do with a modern mania which has been indulged for too long.
The idea that this mania is now being imparted to children is appalling.
Growing up has always been tough.
Going through puberty has always been confusing and disorientating. Some children find it especially tough.
The job of adults — teachers and parents — is to educate children in the ways of the world. That includes teaching children how to understand their own bodies and how to be respectful to other people.
This is a complex and difficult enough task on its own. So why make it so much more difficult? Why make the lessons about the birds and bees into lessons claiming that bees are anything that say they are bees and birds are whatever you want them to be?
All of this is not just confusing. It is counter-productive.
Children need to be taught the facts of life in order to get on with life. The new gender ideology nonsense does not do this.
It tells them things which are not facts then tells them to spend their lives obsessing about them. All in the belief that we might change “gender” at any time in our lives and whenever we feel like it.
This is madness.
But it is a madness which we can stop. For that to happen the adults need to take back the room. And that starts with taking back the classroom.
