Girlish and boyish
I hate to use the Daily Mail as a source, but every now and then I do. This story on Saturday reports that an organization called Gendered Intelligence runs workshops in a few primary schools in the UK. Very few – the Mail says “up to 20” schools a year get the workshops. Well 20 is a tiny number. Minuscule. The issue I have isn’t with the quantity but with the content.
In one class, Year Six boys at Hotspur Primary in Newcastle are asked to describe the ‘girlish’ things they like to do, while the girls say what ‘boyish’ pursuits they enjoy.
Gendered Intelligence’s founder Jay Stewart, who is giving the class, asks the pupils if they think ‘life will be hard at school if you’re a boy at school who likes doing “girlish things”?’
See that’s what’s fucked up about this – all this god damn sorting. All this artificial monopolization. Girls don’t have a monopoly on dolls, and boys don’t have a monopoly on adventure games.
Margaret Morrissey, of pressure group Parents Outloud, said four and five-year-olds were ‘far, far too young’ to receive the lessons. She added: ‘We’re in danger of frightening children and making them feel they ought to feel like this.’
Mr Stewart said: ‘It’s so important to be teaching children in schools that they can be anything that they want regardless of the gender that they have been given at birth.
‘Gendered Intelligence delivers age-appropriate workshops and assemblies by working closely with the senior leadership teams of each of the schools we work with. We are proud of this work and feedback is always incredibly positive.’
But does it? Does it teach them they can be anything that they want regardless of their sex? Or does it teach them they have to switch to a different sex if they like the “wrong” things for their own sex?
The title – Gendered Intelligence – is not very encouraging.
That’s utterly appalling. Not so much that they’re learning about transgender, but that they’re just fucking taking for granted that there are girl things and boy things. How does anyone think that reinforcing gender is OK, so OK that you’d go out of your way to make sure little kids understand all about it?
So fucked up.
Also that perhaps what they’re learning about transgender is that if they like some arbitrary judgment of “too many” girly things or boyish things for their sex then they should switch.
Definitely – if they’re actually doing that, rather than stopping at raising awareness, that’s appalling.
It’s a big “if.” I don’t know that they are, and it would be a foolish mistake to trust the Mail to represent them fairly. But if they are…boo on that.
Heh. I might as well come out of the closet and admit that among the toys I had as a kid, there was one doll. As far as I recall (which may not be very far), it was just one toy among many. I played with it a bit, but I also had a lot of fun with my meccano set. More importantly, I can’t remember thinking about one as girly and and the other as boyish. I was a kid, and they were toys. Kids play with toys, period.
Also, my best friend of childhood was a girl. Maybe that is why I did not grow up to enjoy manly pursuits involving the mistreatment of women.
Most of all, I guess I should be lucky I was spared any lessons on girlish vs boyish behaviours. Another girl on our street was much more into rough play and running with the boys than I was. I didn’t think that was strange, either. It was just the way she was.
Perhaps what I am saying is that things were simpler when I was a kid. Which is probably not really true; maybe I was just lucky with my choice of parents.
The program has a website here, so folks can learn more without having to trust the Daily Fail:
http://genderedintelligence.co.uk
Hm, nothing obviously objectionable there. They say, “Our vision is of a world where people are no longer constrained by narrow perceptions and expectations of gender.”
So either (1) that quote accurately represents the group’s mission and the dude in the classroom wasn’t living up to it, (2) that quote accurately represents the group’s mission and the actions of the dude in the classroom were misrepresented in the article, or (3) that quote doesn’t accurately represent the group’s mission. Let’s hope it’s (2).
It appears that the classroom presentation referred to by the Mail is this:
http://genderedintelligence.co.uk/professionals/schools-and-youth-services/creative-workshops
Uh-huh. So they mention a DVD presentation that “hopes to increase understandings around transgender identities as well as exploring how gender can be explored and celebrated in all sort of rich and diverse ways” (emphasis mine).
Which directly contradicts “vision of a world where people are no longer constrained by narrow perceptions and expectations of gender.” They don’t think it does, but it does.
I shut down when the words “rich” and “diverse” and “celebrate” are used. That’s when I know that whatever the topic is, we’re into the bullshit.
I don’t know– I think if all boys talk about liking something labeled a girl thing and all girls talk about liking something called a boy thing, logically (to me) that should get them to question the labels.
I mean, if 5 boys like glitter and 10 boys like cooking and 12 boys like playing dress-up, then maybe those aren’t girl things, actually? And if 7 girls like math and 6 like climbing trees and 2 want to be firefighters and 3 like martial arts and 15 like playing sports, maybe those aren’t boy things?
The kids have already picked up on the labels, whether or not they believe those are right. but talking about it could help break down gendering everything. But maybe I’m too optimistic.
Harald: good parents, good community, and perhaps, like me, you were a child in the 70s? That seems to be the period when there was the least gender-training of kids.
Um…
Margaret Morrissey, of pressure group Parents Outloud, said four and five-year-olds were ‘far, far too young’ to receive the lessons. She added: ‘We’re in danger of frightening children and making them feel they ought to feel like this.’
Does she imagine that 4-5 year-olds aren’t already inundated in ‘lessons’ about gender?