U.K. Orders Schools Not to Teach “Gender Identity”

The transgender cult just took another beating as the United Kingdom’s Department for Education (DfE) announced new proposed guidance prohibiting the teaching of “gender identity” in schools and giving parents the right to review curricula.

“Parents rightly trust that when they send their children to school, they are kept safe and will not be exposed to disturbing content that is inappropriate for their age,” Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said in a press release. “That’s why I was horrified to hear reports of this happening in our classrooms last year.”

Sunak was referring to an incident in which MP Miriam Cates challenged him over what she called schools’ “extreme” and “age-inappropriate” sex education.

“Graphic lessons on oral sex, how to choke your partner safely and 72 genders — this is what passes for relationships and sex education in British schools,” Cates said.

Sunak ordered a thorough review of the Relationships, Sex and Health Education (RSHE) lessons being taught in schools. With input from an independent panel, the government crafted “updated guidance that will ensure content is factual, appropriate and that children have the capacity to fully understand everything they are being taught,” wrote the DfE.

“Parents will have the right to see the resources that are being used to teach their children about relationships, health and sex in all circumstances and new age limits will be introduced so that children are not introduced to content they may not have the maturity to understand,” the announcement continued.

“Sex education will not be taught before Year 5, and at that point from a purely scientific standpoint.”

And, perhaps most significantly, “The contested theory of gender identity will not be taught.”

This monumental change in the U.K.’s public-education guidelines owes much to the April report from Dr. Hilary Cass that eviscerated the medical community for pushing novel, untested “gender-affirming care” on minors. The Cass Review led to an immediate halt on such procedures by the U.K.’s National Health Service (NHS).

According to the DfE:

In light of the Cass Review, it is important that schools take a cautious approach to teaching about this sensitive topic, and do not use any materials that present contested views as fact, including the view that gender is a spectrum. This is in line with the Department’s gender questioning guidance, which also takes a cautious approach to assist teachers in ensuring they are acting in the best interests of children.

That guidance, issued in December and based in part on the then-in-progress Cass Review, ordered schools to involve parents in their children’s gender decisions, not to allow primary-school students to change their pronouns, and to reserve single-sex spaces such as restrooms and locker rooms for students of the same biological sex — in other words, to do what everyone in human history had naturally done until the trans cult took over.

Thursday’s proposed guidance, which will become final after a nine-week consultation period, also “includes additional content on suicide prevention,” “rationing time online,” “and the serious risks of viewing content that promotes self-harm and suicide,” the DfE stated.

“I will always act swiftly to protect our children and this new guidance will do exactly that, while supporting teachers to teach these important topics sensitively and giving parents access to curriculum content if they wish,” said Sunak.

Education Secretary Gillian Keegan echoed those sentiments.

“This updated guidance puts protecting children at its heart, and enshrines parents’ right to know what their children are being taught,” she said. “Parents can be reassured once and for all their children will only learn age-appropriate content.”

Advocates of parental involvement in education were pleased by the announcement. Jason Elsom, chief executive of Parentkind, a nonprofit network of U.K. Parent-Teacher Associations (PTAs), said in the press release that his organization “fully support[s]” the new guidance.

“As the first educators of their children, parents deserve full transparency and access to the curriculum and resources used in schools,” he averred.

“This initiative to strengthen the partnership between schools and parents will foster a collaborative environment, ensuring that children receive comprehensive, balanced, and well-informed education while respecting parents’ roles and concerns,” he added.

Of course, not everyone was happy with the change of direction. According to Politico Europe:

Teachers’ unions gave the new plan a frosty reception Thursday.

Daniel Kebede of the National Education Union said teachers already considered sex education in “an age-appropriate and phase-appropriate way.”

“The government appears to be seeding doubts that this is not already being done and thought about carefully by school leaders and teachers up and down the land,” he added. “This is yet more culture war noise from an ill-informed and out of touch government.”

On the contrary, it is a government very much in touch with both the people it serves and plain old common sense. If schools filled with unionized teachers were not pushing the trans agenda on kids, including by keeping students’ gender changes a secret from their parents and then siccing social services on parents when they find out and object, there would be no need for the new rules. The “ill-informed” ones are those who persist in “holding on to a position that is now demonstrated to be out of date,” as Cass put it in an interview with The New York Times.

U.K. parents owe Cass a great debt of gratitude. If her report manages to have similar effects in the United States, so will American parents.