Scottish Union for Education – Newsletter No106
Themes: bad education and the battle over transgender ideology in schools
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Next week we will publish an article by Mark Smith and Jane Fenton based on their academic paper entitled, ‘Sticks and stones: the idea that words cause harm and the implications of this for higher education’. In it, they ask the questions, ‘Are students curtailing their own speech on university campuses and if so, why?’
I’m guessing that most people reading this (helped by the title of the paper, which is a bit of a giveaway) will have a pretty good idea what the outcome of their research will be, but the reasons given for being reluctant to speak are very interesting and deserve some thought. But that’s for next week.
This paper comes at a time when Matt Goodwin has published a book called Bad Education. The book opens with this: ‘In 2024, after more than twenty years teaching and working in the universities, I quit my job as a university professor. Most of my friends, family and colleagues thought I had gone completely insane.’
We’ll hear more from Matt in the coming weeks, and if you would like to review this or other books for us, get in touch and we can get copies sent to you.
Still on the education theme, this May I hope to go to Warsaw as part of a book launch. The book Reclaiming Classical Education has brought together academics and educators from across Europe to explore the meaning, purpose and possibilities of reigniting education across the continent, and I am delighted to have written a chapter for this publication about the work of SUE.
Interestingly, the themes in this publication cross over with the concerns being raised by Matt Goodwin and also by Mark Smith and Jane Fenton, and demonstrate that while at times it feels like Scottish education is going only one way – the wrong way, this need not be the case and there are people across the world who are organising to do something about it.
This focus on education was to be the theme of this week’s newsletter, but with the continuing pressure being applied to the Scottish government about their transgender ideology and the lack of single-sex spaces in schools and elsewhere, I thought I should introduce you to a fantastic group in England called Protect and Teach. This group was set up to challenge transgender ideology in schools in their area. It is quite small, but its members have done some outstanding work and have helped to demonstrate what is possible.
You can check out their website and read about their work below.
Also on the issue of transgender ideology, last week we heard about the potential ‘flood of legal claims’ that NHS Scotland could face from female staff who are forced to share single-sex spaces with men who claim a different ‘identity’. For SUE this is of interest because if this happens in hospitals, it begs the question, what about schools? Will parents decide to do the same thing and sue schools for allowing boys who identify as girls into female-only spaces?
Noticeably, the Scottish Labour Party conference last month rejected a motion arguing that guidance on single-sex spaces in schools should be based on biology. In contrast, the Scottish Conservatives have launched a petition to protect single sex spaces in schools. So the issue is unlikely to go away and looks like becoming something of a battle ground in the months to come.
For Women Scotland have done some excellent work on this topic and about the legislation on single-sex toilets in schools – legislation that many schools appear to be ignoring. You can read their findings about this here. There is momentum around this issue at the moment, so if you want to do something about it, get in touch.
I notice that John Swinney plans to hold a summit on democracy and respect soon, in an attempt to ‘unite’ against the ‘increasingly extreme far right’. As we saw in last week’s newsletter, we currently have a Labour councillor who calls feminists opposed to transgender ideology ‘Nazis’. Perhaps this enlightened individual could do a session at the summit, and then we could have a discussion about whether or not Mr Swinney is going to respect girls’ need for privacy in schools.
Talking of extremism, it was interesting to hear Green MSP Ross Greer last week explaining to the Scottish parliament why more sex education is needed in schools. Here he explained that while he was on the education committee, he received evidence (note the word evidence for what is often an opinion or an anecdote) from ‘queer people in particular who told us that they resorted to watching porn to learn about sex because the education they received in school was so poor’.
Of course, what strikes any normal punter when hearing this is, ‘What are you saying, that sex ed needs to be like porn?’
Greer would possibly deny this, although with the madness of sexuality education, one cannot be sure about anything. However, what struck me, and often does when this issue pops up, is how normal and matter of fact it seems to be to listen to the idea that kids (especially those identifying as ‘LGBT’) want more sex ed from their teachers.
It would be interesting, for example, to go around the parliament and ask the MSPs, ‘Who was the great teacher you remember who really taught you how to have sex and have an intimate relationship?’ I doubt you’d find many – if any – who could answer this question. Which is amazing, given that I assume they have actually had sex at some point in their lives. How did they manage it without Ross and his army of explicit sex educators?
Rather than celebrate the LGB and ‘T’ children who Greer believes crave more sex education, we should be asking, ‘Why do teenagers, any teenagers, think that the state and schools are there to teach them how to have sex?’ This was never normal, and it isn’t normal. In reality, I suspect very few children even now feel that the invasion of their developing private lives by teachers is what they need when growing up. That a cohort of kids have been educated to give up, to the likes of Ross Greer, their rite of passage and to develop a private life as they mature should concern us.
It is perhaps an irony of our times that our ‘betters’ are all about ‘being the real you’ and yet the space and time for individuals to develop their own sense of themselves, often with their peers, away from the gaze and influence of ‘experts’, seems to be decreasing with each new version of the RSHP curriculum. This colonisation of the emerging private lives of adolescents is what the French political scientist Oliver Roy describes as the Crisis of Culture.
Once again, it seems that we must remind at least some of our MSPs that this is not what school is for, and this is not what being a teacher should be about. This, to coin Goodwin’s term, is part and parcel of a bad education and a very bad and confused education system.
Finally, it is worth noting that James Esses is threatening a legal challenge to the UK government over their extremely troubling plan to carry out puberty blocker experiment on kids.
Following the UK government’s previous indefinite ban on the use of puberty blockers for the treatment of ‘gender incongruence’ in the under 18s, there are fears that these drugs will now be prescribed to children who identify as transgender if they are recruited as participants in a £10.7 million clinical trial carried out ‘to establish a clear evidence base for the use of this medicine’, according to Wes Streeting.
This was one of the mistakes in the Cass Review, as SUE’s Dr Jenny Cunningham explained here. Because Cass accepted the subjective idea of ‘gender incongruence’ as a genuine condition, it left the door open to future experiments on kids; in fact, Cass even suggested this as a possibility, even though, in her own words, she recognised that puberty blockers may ‘permanently disrupt the brain maturation of adolescents, potentially rewiring neural circuits that cannot be reversed’.
Alongside Esses, Keira Bell, a former patient of the Tavistock Clinic who was given puberty blockers, explains that ‘Giving life-changing, damaging drugs to confused children in mental distress is an obvious recipe for disaster. It is completely unethical and unjustifiable to proceed with a trial for these drugs that have not indicated any benefit, only detriment, and facilitate no return. I suffered after taking these drugs at 16, and the damage to even younger children would be even greater and more scandalous.’
One way that this ‘scandalous’ damage to children is arguably encouraged is, of course, through the promotion of transgender ideology to very young children. For example, this week, in Fintry, one of the poorest areas of Dundee, the notorious drag queen Miss Peaches was paid by the council to carry out a story time reading in the local library.
One wonders, at a time when the council is axing all sorts of services – including closing down Caird Park, the only council golf course in the area and one that has existed for over a hundred years – where the money for this came from. Miss Peaches, a biological man said, in his defence, ‘If you find the way I looked to be sexual then that says more about you. Also, I’m a woman. It’s she/her.’
I’m not sure many drag queen acts would describe their attire as non-sexual, but perhaps Miss Peaches has a particularly poor wardrobe. But at least the very young kids will have learned the vital lesson that a man is actually a woman!
For the next generation of children in Scotland, we need to ensure that the fantasy of 100+ genders is challenged and undermined. Sex is real, it is biological, and whatever your activist teacher says, and whatever MSPs like Greer and the activist zealots say online, that is a fact that children need to be taught.
Stuart Waiton
https://zoom.us/j/99296677812?pwd=pZPgfRQC4tak7rBirrcbDgLdC7LfiX.1
Meeting ID: 992 9667 7812 Passcode: 903127
Protect and Teach: how to challenge gender ideology in your schools
Cathy Mudge is retired and now works tirelessly to carry out research and expose the level of transgender ideology in schools. This is her story.
When we first met in the pub, cautiously chatting about our concerns about gender ideology, how it has affected our lives, and with some, how it has affected their children, little did I know then that my plans for a quiet beekeeping and gardening retirement were about to dramatically change.
That day’s organiser of Standing for Women Locals spread a colourful collection of stickers and postcards on the table like candy, asking us to help ourselves and stick them where people can get the message. Another organiser had a basket of painted pebbles for us to place where truth could be read. ‘Non Binary is Nonsense’, ‘Transwomen are men’. I was hooked. Three of us lived within a few miles of each other and never knew, and two others had travelled from Dorset and Cornwall to find like-minded people, who confirmed they were not alone.
We started meeting; travelling around the country; standing up to antagonistic trans rights activists (with our earplugs in as they screamed abuse); allowing women to speak about their rape, about violence, about the loss of a child to the trans cult. All as men and very hairy ‘women’ chanted about how their lives mattered more.
The trigger for our joint action was the local council’s announcement that the gym was going to build ‘inclusive’ unisex changing rooms for all. We objected, we questioned the council, we tried to find out where the notion that women want this came from. Our investigations led us to an LGBTQ group; they had held a meeting for councillors, using Sport England’s Guide for Transgender People, which states if men ‘pass’ they can go anywhere. Funnily enough, they say women must wear appropriate clothes until they have had gender-affirming surgery, so no topless ‘men’ till the operation then.
Who was this LGBTQ group? They were access all areas, had members on all boards, health groups, community support, housing and finally schools. Not just teaching gender ideology to teachers, but also to children, and even having clubs in the school lunchbreak for ‘LGBTQ+’ pupils. It was a shocking moment; we saw how deeply the roots of this destructive ideology and queer theory had penetrated into our school’s curriculum. The sums of money involved in these groups were eye watering; they are funded by government, the lottery, even the Ministry of Defence and Ministry of Justice. Through our ever-expanding networks, I was introduced to Stephen, also concerned; he had looked at schools in Bath and Bristol, reviewing their policies, and was shocked to find the level of indoctrination.
Up to this point we only had anecdotal evidence from parents: ‘Two years after my child had been transed by the school, I only found out when they used her new name in front of me by mistake.’ ‘The lesson was ‘What are your pronouns?’ My son was asked; he said he didn’t have any, the teacher kept pushing, he kept saying no, then became really upset in front of the class and is now being bullied. He’s 12. I only found out later as his behaviour at home declined. I challenged the school, they said he made it up.’ ‘Our 5-year-old came home talking about the awful life Caitlyn and Laverne (traditional Cornish names!) had till they became women. I challenged school; they picked it up in the playground, the head said.’
We were so ignorant ourselves of how deep this ran. There was no oversight from any authorities or safeguarding leads, and the school websites appeared to show no signs of this activity; yet in Devon, Dorset and Cornwall, local parents were telling us stories or sending screenshots of what they had found.
We were so lucky that the five of us were really committed to finding out what was going on. With guidance from Stephen, we decided the only option was to research the schools ourselves. Only one of us was a retired teacher; the rest of us had worked in the council, law, the NHS, pharma and the prison service. A few had young children or grandchildren. We decided school policies and websites were the way to go.
With an Excel spreadsheet, we would concentrate on documents they have to publish for parents: equality policy, safeguarding, bullying, uniform and health, also parent newsletters. We wanted to build a picture of the problem. It was after Christmas, so cold and dark, perfect laptop weather. Two of us took Devon and Dorset. We only had one person in Cornwall, but we would join her once we had finished. I started my first schools expecting a quick check, then moving on to the next – wouldn’t take long. In 250+ schools, maybe I would find ten or so. By the end of a few hours, I wanted to cry; it was hard to find any schools not pushing transgender ideology. The city schools I expected, but small village schools, on the moor, a photo of an old building with smiling little faces. We messaged each other; we all had the same stories to tell.
So our main questions were as follows.
Was the Equality Act correctly stated in the policy?
Have they made any new additions to the Equality Act protected characteristics (e.g. transgender or non-binary) or mention transphobia etc.
Was there evidence of gender ideology in other documents and curriculum?
We would note any LGBTQ+ groups we could find. Were they doing lunchtime clubs? Which outside agency was supplying their teaching, particularly for PHSE?
As we worked, we contacted other groups for help: Transgender Trend, Our Duty, Safe Schools Alliance, Parents for Education, Sex Matters, Don’t Divide Us. We were networking. We found an article that an independent investigative reporter had written about Devon schools and spoke to him.
We completed Devon first. The results were stunning: 72.8% had misquoted the Equality Act; 61.7% had added different genders to the Equality Act, with the words that children as young as 5 years can be transgender; and 51.6% had extended gender ideology into the curriculum. We asked a contact for a link, and Hayley Dixon of the Telegraph looked at our research; she thought it was a fluke, perhaps one of us was overzealous. By then, Cornwall was nearing completion, with slightly worse results, and Dorset was the third confirmation.
We provided Hayley with our evidence, and made up packages for individual schools and trusts with highlighted examples of the policies and website stories. They were contacted by the paper.
Our work resulted in an expose in the Telegraph. It was titled ‘Schools defy ministers to let children change gender behind their parents’ backs. Analysis of more than 600 school equality and trans policies reveals that up to three-quarters misrepresent laws protecting sex and gender.’
We needed a name for our group and spent ages mulling over options. One of our members said it really just needs to say what we want to do: protect and teach the children. Thanks, Jenny; the name was born.
What happened next? Well, I cannot believe what we have done in a year. We will continue by taking a closer look at what is an LGBTQ+ group, what are they doing, and the very important task of let’s follow the money.
You can watch or listen to an interview with Cathy on UK Column and YouTube.
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News round-up
A selection of the main stories with relevance to Scottish education in the press in recent weeks, by Simon Knight.
https://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/news/14402343/drag-queen-story-dundee-library-miss-peaches/ Stuart Patterson, 'DOWNRIGHT WEIRD' Fury sparked over drag queen story time for toddlers at Scots library. Activists claimed performer Miss Peaches wore ‘stripper’s shoes’ for the show. 26/02/25
Dave Clements, Families are havens in a borderless world. An unapologetic defence of an old institution in the face of new threats 26/02/25
https://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/news/14007860/mixed-gender-toilets-school-fears-john-swinney/ Conor Matchett, LOO FEARS John Swinney admits girls are scared of using mixed-sex toilets over ‘fear of being photographed’. It comes after Scottish Tory leader Russell Findlay claimed the drop in teacher numbers has led to a ‘collapse in discipline’. 12/12/24
https://www.ukcolumn.org/video/taking-action-to-remove-dangerous-indoctrination-from-english-schools Diane Rasmussen McAdie, Taking Action to Remove Dangerous Indoctrination from English Schools—with Cathy Mudge of Protect & Teach. 27/02/25
Dave Clements, The best devices are books. As World Book Day approaches, we and our kids need to read, read, read. 28/02/25
https://www.scottishdailyexpress.co.uk/news/scottish-news/quarter-scots-schoolchildren-cant-read-34779946 Douglas Dickie, Quarter of Scots schoolchildren can't read, write or count when they leave school amid shameful SNP failures. Nicola Sturgeon promised to make education her top priority but under the Nationalists, progress has stalled with many children lacking basic numeracy or literacy skills. 02/03/25
https://substack.com/home/post/p-158251532?source=queue Claire Fox and Carrie Clark, Detransitioners deserve to be heard A guest Substack from Genspect UK director Carrie Clark argues that the NHS is still ignoring the people who know most about puberty blockers. 03/03/25
https://academic.oup.com/jsm/advance-article-abstract/doi/10.1093/jsxmed/qdaf026/8042063 Lewis, JE. et al- Examining gender-specific mental health risks after gender-affirming surgery: a national database study. 25/02/25
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