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Epiphanies 2019: TERFs, gender, sex, etc.

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  • Originally posted by Rex Monday:
    I remember Mrs Walsh, the schoolteacher I most admired in my primary school, saying "That means sweet FA" in earshot when I was seven or eight. I was one of those schoolkids, so I said "Miss, miss, what does Sweet FA mean?" to which she replied "Sweet Fanny Adams." I and my pals giggled our heads off, because she said fanny... it was a long time before I realised what she actually meant.

    So, there was my actual teacher using shorthand for the F word in front of her class, and then using a euphemism for the female pudenda to distract from that.

    How we survived, I cannot say.


    Fanny used to be an entirely unremarkable girls' name (e.g. hymn writer Fanny Crosby).

    Fanny Adams was an 8 year old girl who was murdered and dismembered in 1867. Some of her body parts were never found. The expression "sweet Fanny Adams" comes from that. I don't think your teacher was "using a euphemism for the female pudenda to distract."
  • ... the two meanings have rather crisscrossed and mutually absorbed each other over the years.
  • LouiseLouise Epiphanies Host
    I do love a good bit of historical info! :-)

    So venturing forth on another theory, anti-trans sentiment reminds me a lot of antisemitism. Once you scapegoat a tiny harmless vulnerable minority as an insidious threat, things are already being seen through a powerful distorting lens - it's not how things really are and a moment's thought about the power dynamics should flag that up, that it's like an elephant actually being afraid of a mouse. Once someone accepts such a false premise, they're going to have trouble getting back-up for it from sources grounded in reality - so will end up often having to go to the Daily Mail, Sputnik, dodgy Youtube channels etc. and thus be led into an ecosystem of hate, distortion and propaganda where, if their immune system isn't good, they will pick up other prejudices and conspiracy theories and drift right. Something that fascinated me was seeing George Soros conspiracy theories promoted by both extreme anti-trans people and antisemites but they'd both been drinking from the same wells. Embracing anti-trans theories seems to me kind of like embracing the news equivalent of chlorinated-chicken, you have to lower your 'information hygiene' standards so much you're at risk of catching all sorts.

    It's one of the reasons I think it matters - let's be clear, I think it's bad in and of itself primarily because of the harm to trans folk, but you'll often hear people say 'why are you making such a big fuss about a tiny minority when we have issues of health, social security election-winning etc. to think of?' But we've seen where lowering our guard to populism and stuff like Fox News, Facebook and YouTube takes us. It comes not just for the trans folk, it comes for us.
  • Rex MondayRex Monday Shipmate Posts: 4
    Originally posted by Rex Monday:
    I remember Mrs Walsh, the schoolteacher I most admired in my primary school, saying "That means sweet FA" in earshot when I was seven or eight. I was one of those schoolkids, so I said "Miss, miss, what does Sweet FA mean?" to which she replied "Sweet Fanny Adams." I and my pals giggled our heads off, because she said fanny... it was a long time before I realised what she actually meant.

    So, there was my actual teacher using shorthand for the F word in front of her class, and then using a euphemism for the female pudenda to distract from that.

    How we survived, I cannot say.


    Fanny used to be an entirely unremarkable girls' name (e.g. hymn writer Fanny Crosby).

    Fanny Adams was an 8 year old girl who was murdered and dismembered in 1867. Some of her body parts were never found. The expression "sweet Fanny Adams" comes from that. I don't think your teacher was "using a euphemism for the female pudenda to distract."

    I did not know that. Thank you. The seven year old Rex did not know that either, but my inner seven year old still finds fanny funny because back then among my peer group in a small C of E primary school in the rural West Country, fanny most certainly meant front bottom. Older me found out what FA actually meant from a rather different but not unconnected peer group...

    I don't want to derail, but what was 'sweet Fanny Adams' originally a euphemism for? Sweet FA in the modern sense means 'absolutely nothing', which is how Mrs W used it, but I can't connect that with horrific Victorian crimes.

    (To pull things back on track, it's interesting that few parents would worry unduly if their children watched a TV drama about, say, Sherlock Holmes solving the murder of Fanny Adams, which no matter how genteel a way the crime was referred to on-screen would still involve concepts of great cruelty and harm. But put a drag queen in the room and >boom< it's moral panic all the way. I know some drag queens. They are among the very best people in terms of honesty, fearlessness and practical compassion for those who need it. You don't live that life without that stuff.)
  • DoublethinkDoublethink Admin, 8th Day Host
    Sweet fuck all.
  • I think it was a euphemism for "nothing" in the sense that there was nothing left of sweet Fanny Adams once she had been chopped up.
  • Doc TorDoc Tor Admin Emeritus
    As far as I know, it's an example of a 'backronym'.
  • @Louise
    ISTM that one of the main drives of anti-trans is the numbers being so small. One is less likely to have a trans person in the family or as a friend, so they are conveniently othered. As the LG&B become more accepted, Trans is the next "logical" target. Same happened to the queer community as open racism became less acceptable.
    I don't think it has a completely identical mechanism to anti-Semitism. That was much more mainstream and that makes a difference.
  • LouiseLouise Epiphanies Host
    I agree with your point about numbers making it easier to 'other' and I think it can be compatible with mine. Having tiny numbers makes it easier to believe dangerous nonsense about people you're likely never to have met. Having such tiny numbers also makes it hard to portray such vulnerable groups as a powerful threat without needing to go to unreliable sources that purvey distortions and conspiracy theories.

    Someone non-binary who I follow on twitter had a good phrase. They talked about 'co-morbid bigotries'. If you pick up one conspiracy-theory ridden prejudice, then from going to sites happy to host that kind of material, you're at risk of picking up others.
  • RuthRuth Shipmate
    Rex Monday wrote: »
    (Avast there, Shipmates. I was last here many years ago when the creationists were roaming the boards and I found their thinking really rather irksome, and against everything I cherished about being human in a greater cosmos, where love warms us from within as much as the sun from without. Transphobia - any otherphobia, really - triggers me in the same way, and so I stir from my complacency once again. Sorry about that.)

    It's good to have you back!
    Louise wrote: »
    But yeah, this is the point I'm making - it's straight up social conservatism right down to 'won't someone think of the children' smuggling itself back in under a 'progressive' guise.

    What I'm wondering is why we don't seem to see as much of this in the US. At least, I don't. Is it that social conservatism has less need to disguise itself here? The transphobic people here who talk about "real women" think "feminist" is a dirty word.
  • Ruth wrote: »
    Rex Monday wrote: »
    (Avast there, Shipmates. I was last here many years ago when the creationists were roaming the boards and I found their thinking really rather irksome, and against everything I cherished about being human in a greater cosmos, where love warms us from within as much as the sun from without. Transphobia - any otherphobia, really - triggers me in the same way, and so I stir from my complacency once again. Sorry about that.)

    It's good to have you back!
    Louise wrote: »
    But yeah, this is the point I'm making - it's straight up social conservatism right down to 'won't someone think of the children' smuggling itself back in under a 'progressive' guise.

    What I'm wondering is why we don't seem to see as much of this in the US. At least, I don't. Is it that social conservatism has less need to disguise itself here? The transphobic people here who talk about "real women" think "feminist" is a dirty word.

    I went to a meeting at the university where I got my teaching certificate, at which TERFs were trying to influence the university to make some decision regarding facilities (probably to keep trans women out of women's rooms). It was ugly.
  • @Louise
    Co-Morbid bigotry. Yeah I can see that. I've noticed it about conspiracy believers in general. Very few believe only one. In for a penny, I suppose.
    @mousethief
    TERFs exist in the US, but the consensus seems to be that they are a lesser phenomena than in the UK.
  • lilbuddha wrote: »
    TERFs exist in the US, but the consensus seems to be that they are a lesser phenomena than in the UK.

    I never said otherwise. But if one doesn't see them in the US, it's because they're not looking in the right places, not because they don't exist.
  • RuthRuth Shipmate
    My words were "we don't seem to see as much of this," not that we don't see it at all.
  • Yeah, sorry I shared a personal story. Never fucking mind.
  • DoublethinkDoublethink Admin, 8th Day Host
    This report of a previously trans young person getting involved in the judicial review seems to me to be rather misleadingly written. So the argument is were the clinic too quick to offer transition, can children consent etc.

    But, if you unpick the article, you can see that for this young person:
    • Wasn’t referred to GIDS until she was 16
    • Wait time is not given, but it’s usually at least a year (so ? 17 when seen)
    • She had three assessment appointments (not stated over what span of time)
    • She was given puberty blockers for at least a year, after this
    • She felt there wasn't enough investigation or therapy before she reached that stage. For reference, not a perfect comparison I know, a consultant neurologist or psychiatrist, will often diagnose and prescribe after one appointment.
    • Then, after a year of puberty blockers - presumably now 18, she was given testosterone.
    • Three years ago, she had an operation to remove her breasts (so as, she’s now 23, at the age of 20) She describes herself as initially happy and relieved.
    • She decided to stop taking cross-sex hormones last year and said she was now accepting of her sex as a female. (So at age 22.)
    • She also notes that at the time of presenting to clinic “ I would say it was saving me from suicidal ideation and depression in general and at the time I felt it relieved all those mental health issues I was feeling, alongside gender dysphoria.”

    A 4 year reversible treatment path is not rapid.
  • The right wing media love tales of regret about transition. If only someone had stopped me, and so on. Yet statistics on this seem to show low numbers who wish to revert. I smell a rat, but the Tavi are saying they are glad about the court case. If treatment is banned, there will be chaos.
  • Robert ArminRobert Armin Shipmate, Glory
    Not sure I would call it common in the UK. The only place I hear these issues discussed is on the Ship. Then again, I don't get out much.
  • Right now, among some Christians in the UK, (especially if everyone assumes that We All Think The Same,) there is an eye watering level of casual, off hand hatred towards trans people.

    I have been deeply shocked.
  • mousethief wrote: »
    lilbuddha wrote: »
    TERFs exist in the US, but the consensus seems to be that they are a lesser phenomena than in the UK.

    I never said otherwise. But if one doesn't see them in the US, it's because they're not looking in the right places, not because they don't exist.
    Not sure I would call it common in the UK. The only place I hear these issues discussed is on the Ship. Then again, I don't get out much.

  • Ethne Alba wrote: »
    Right now, among some Christians in the UK, (especially if everyone assumes that We All Think The Same,) there is an eye watering level of casual, off hand hatred towards trans people.

    I have been deeply shocked.

    Where?
  • The right wing media love tales of regret about transition. If only someone had stopped me, and so on. Yet statistics on this seem to show low numbers who wish to revert. I smell a rat, but the Tavi are saying they are glad about the court case. If treatment is banned, there will be chaos.

    TL:DR re the article

    The UK is a unique and well served place even as you've problems. But your response is the same problem of being quick to label what's going on and perhaps you don't mean to assume the UK is everywhere.

    What is publicly covered for psychosocial assessment and treatment for your area? Here, almost nothing. It's all family physician in 10 minute consultations. With the very poor public system having a 7 month waiting list for the 6 allocated sessions with a social worker or someone trained in educational psychology for an M.Ed. There's no targetting of any specific issues except those the administrators respond to, currently meth and fentanyl related drug issues and suicide.

    Psychiatrist appointments are through emergency depts at hospitals. They refer out to community psychiatrists. Wait is in excess of the 7 months for a counsellor. They see patients typically once every 3 months.

    Parents with developmentally vulnerable children use employment benefits for (usually) 4 to 6 telephone conversations with someone thousands of miles away who also has only generic training, being also prepared to offer credit counselling and nutritional advice. If people have money $200 (£120) per hour will buy psychotherapy in the private market. A full assessment with psychological testing will cost about $4500 (£2600). This isn't offered publicly.

    Thus: children are taken to GP, who either eventually decides after a series of repeated visits to prescribe or because the parents or child insists. GPs are paid per visits here, with the first 10 minutes at a higher rate than the second. Thus, it's a often mostly a response to patient requests.

    Whatever you have, it's probably better than what exists here.
  • DoublethinkDoublethink Admin, 8th Day Host
    edited March 2020
    Russ wrote: »
    Just because something is not purely biological, does not mean it is not real.

    I would have said that in common usage the opposite of "real" is "imaginary". And "imaginary" describes ideas that fail to correspond with what objectively exists. Thinking of imaginary friends, imaginary countries, etc.

    I don't know exactly what you're meaning to say. Are you using "real" in some other sense ?



    @Russ I mean (or given the distance in time, I meant) biological reductionism is not always useful - you have edited the context out of the post.

    There are many mental and social phenomena that are real - in the sense of not imaginary - but with no specific biological cause. Love, for example. The salient point in my original post was of the fact that taxi drivers consciously choosing a specific course of training - change the structure of their brain as a result. The assumption that a correlation between a brain difference and a given phenomenon is always causal, and the cause is always from the brain to the phenomenon is not accurate.
  • Barnabas62Barnabas62 Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    Louise wrote: »
    hosting
    Please stop this tangent about defining 'real' or 'imaginary' right now. Take it to another board please or stop.

    Thanks,
    Louise
    Epiphanies host
    hosting off

    Doublethink

    It's some way back but I reckon you missed Louise's post re this tangent (p8 January 11). Best to drop responses.

    Barnabas62
    Epiphanies Host
  • LeafLeaf Shipmate
    Louise wrote: »
    I know why the term was developed but I've come to the conclusion that TERF is the wrong word for the anti-trans folk. Feminist anywhere in the label just obscures what they are: which is socially conservative populists.

    I've been thinking about this, and I reluctantly disagree. I am willing to grant that TERFs believe they have a feminist position.

    I also think they are wronger than a wrong thing that has crashed the event horizon of wrongness, but there are many strains of feminism with which I disagree while still willing to consider them feminist; radical separatist feminism, for example.

    ISTM that TERFs have bought into some of the misogynistic bullshit about biology that's been flung their way over the years. Being made to feel ashamed of periods or pregnancy or menopause have just been some of the weapons used against women. The terrible irony is that if it weren't misogyny based on those aspects of life for those identified as women, it would be misogyny based on some other theory, such as orders of creation.

  • Where have I heard this?

    Off the top of my head the last two times were casually over coffee. Once after a church service (not at our usual) and once at a geographical gathering.

    On each occasion it was assumed, somewhat oddly, that everyone standing around and chatting held the same view. As if we were being encouraged to be vile.

    Were these sad events challenged?
    Yes.

    As was a dire tirade In A Church Service from the front.
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    Ethne Alba wrote: »
    Where have I heard this?

    Off the top of my head the last two times were casually over coffee. Once after a church service (not at our usual) and once at a geographical gathering.

    On each occasion it was assumed, somewhat oddly, that everyone standing around and chatting held the same view. As if we were being encouraged to be vile.

    Were these sad events challenged?
    Yes.

    As was a dire tirade In A Church Service from the front.

    This saddens me. Our curate is trans but they're moving to a new parish - waved them off yesterday.
  • I cried

    Not ashamed to admit it
  • Louise wrote: »
    The problem is with photos being where any adults can see them when it's not been agreed.

    That is a problem, certainly. But I suspect that if you asked the average parent of a primary-aged child, they would not class a photo of their child's class appearing next to a photo of some prizewinning marrows as being the same problem as their child's class appearing next to a photo of a prizewinning dildo.

    I'll remind you that primary schools go up to age 11, and that half the six-year-olds will have 8-9 year old siblings who will often be happy to help them look up the school entertainer.
  • Louise wrote: »
    The problem is with photos being where any adults can see them when it's not been agreed.

    That is a problem, certainly. But I suspect that if you asked the average parent of a primary-aged child, they would not class a photo of their child's class appearing next to a photo of some prizewinning marrows as being the same problem as their child's class appearing next to a photo of a prizewinning dildo.

    I'll remind you that primary schools go up to age 11, and that half the six-year-olds will have 8-9 year old siblings who will often be happy to help them look up the school entertainer.
    And that is not relevant to this being transphobia.
    If a cis-hetero entertainer had done this, the reportage would be bad person. That the current coverage is bad trans indicates what is actually being condemned.

  • lilbuddha wrote: »
    If a cis-hetero entertainer had done this, the reportage would be bad person. That the current coverage is bad trans indicates what is actually being condemned.

    What should be being condemned is neither "bad person" nor "bad trans" but "bad school". There's nothing in particular wrong with an adult choosing to present a sexually explicit public persona - the problem lies in the choice to invite such a person to speak in a primary school.

    Is there transphobia in the media coverage? Sure. But that doesn't mean that all (or even most) of the complaints are transphobic.
  • lilbuddha wrote: »
    If a cis-hetero entertainer had done this, the reportage would be bad person. That the current coverage is bad trans indicates what is actually being condemned.

    What should be being condemned is neither "bad person" nor "bad trans" but "bad school". There's nothing in particular wrong with an adult choosing to present a sexually explicit public persona - the problem lies in the choice to invite such a person to speak in a primary school.
    The problem lies with the school not giving proper guidelines to it entertainers. In order to get to the explicit persona being a problem, we have to first agree that sex is the naughtiness, the way Christian societies handle sex is fucked up. Separate issue though.
    Is there transphobia in the media coverage? Sure. But that doesn't mean that all (or even most) of the complaints are transphobic.
    And the coverage and complaints here are definitely transphobic because the person being trans is not the problem and yet it is the featured bit of the reportage/outrage. Being trans is as relevant to the issue as whether they are a Rangers or a Celtic supporter.

  • May I ask, that over some years, some words used included androgynous and metrosexual. What change occurred do you think for these to not be used much now?
  • Not even going to try to guess the relevance of that
  • metrosexual

    I don't think that word means what you think it means.
  • Louise wrote: »
    Nobody normally gives a damn what any het adult coming into contact with kids has on their twitters and facebook and instagram that is about consenting adults - so yes straight up homophobia, treating gay people differently as if they're a menace to children. And if your early primary age child - too young even to have a phone even these days - has unfettered computer access and is roaming social media looking at explicit stuff then the problem is definitely yours.

    But yeah, this is the point I'm making - it's straight up social conservatism right down to 'won't someone think of the children' smuggling itself back in under a 'progressive' guise.

    I didn't see anyone protesting about Mhairi Black being there or treating her differently. (She's a lesbian for those who don't know.) It is simply an assertion that the reaction was driven by homophobia. But it is a convenient thing to try and turn it round and appeal to the moral high ground.

    You are probably right that there is social conservatism involved. But you assume that it is inherently a bad thing. For example, would it be appropriate for a porn actor to be invited to read stories to primary school kids? And no, I don't see the comparison between a panto dame and a drag performer whose entire persona revolves around sexually driven and explicit material.
  • Missed the edit window. I would not want say Roy Chubby Brown going into schools either.
  • Being a lesbian is a lesser sin than being trans. Transphobia is certainly being displayed in the coverage and reactions.
  • lilbuddha wrote: »
    Being a lesbian is a lesser sin than being trans. Transphobia is certainly being displayed in the coverage and reactions.

    Lesser sin to who? A lot of the feminists labelled as TERFs are lesbians for a start.

    The comment was that it was specifically a homophobic response. That is what Mhairi Black said too. (It seems similar to when the NSPCC said it was homophobia driving people to object to the employee filming explicit material in their toilets and posting it online.) In any case, the Scottish Education Secretary (who is pretty progressive on these things generally) and local council have both said that it wasn't appropriate.

    There could well be transphobia involved in how some (many? who knows exactly) people respond, but that doesn't mean that the initial decision to invite Flow into the school was correct.
  • "quantpole wrote: »

    .... For example, would it be appropriate for a porn actor to be invited to read stories to primary school kids? ....

    Who would be the best babysitter, Stormy Daniels or Donald Trump?



  • Who would be the best babysitter, Stormy Daniels or Donald Trump?

    It's not babysitting, it's coming into a primary school expressly to talk about their life. In that situation I don't think Stormy Daniels would be appropriate either.
  • quantpole wrote: »
    lilbuddha wrote: »
    Being a lesbian is a lesser sin than being trans. Transphobia is certainly being displayed in the coverage and reactions.

    Lesser sin to who? A lot of the feminists labelled as TERFs are lesbians for a start.
    The general public. Lesbian TERFs weren't the only complainers.
    quantpole wrote: »
    The comment was that it was specifically a homophobic response. That is what Mhairi Black said too. (It seems similar to when the NSPCC said it was homophobia driving people to object to the employee filming explicit material in their toilets and posting it online.) In any case, the Scottish Education Secretary (who is pretty progressive on these things generally) and local council have both said that it wasn't appropriate.
    Homophobia and transphobia have an overlap. Terms are often misused, but I'm will to accept that there is homophobia in there as well as transphobia.
    quantpole wrote: »
    There could well be transphobia involved in how some (many? who knows exactly) people respond, but that doesn't mean that the initial decision to invite Flow into the school was correct.
    Whether an adult entertainer is appropriate for that school age is a secondary issue to how the event is being reported.
    The trans and cross dressing aspects of the person are not relevant to the discussion of appropriateness of their behaviour.
    If a white, cis-person does something, the reportage is: Person did something. Irrelevant descriptors are rarely included. If anyone else does, the reportage often is: (Adjective) Person did something even if that adjective is irrelevant to the something. That places an emphasis on the adjective and implies it is relevant. The genesis of which is very likely prejudice.
  • Doc TorDoc Tor Admin Emeritus
    When I was a teaching assistant, I was very aware of the adult nature (language, violence, gore, extreme peril - but not sex scenes because I can't write those) of the books I write. We kind of elided that for the 8-9 years I worked there, even though the kids sometimes asked me "are you famous?" and almost definitely looked me up on the web. Parents seemed to accept that I had a life outside of school, and as long as I didn't bring that specific part of it into school, that was okay.

    I did have a qualifying connection to the school - it was where my own children went - so that probably smoothed the path, too, as I was present every day in the playground.

    But my public persona as the writer of gritty, often sweary, sometimes violent books could, potentially, have got the school into trouble, had someone decided that was what they wanted to do.

    And that's what I think happened here. The schoolchildren were perfectly safe around Flow. But Flow was not safe around their parents.
  • LouiseLouise Epiphanies Host
    Who to believe? Two LGBT people who were subjected to masses of abuse online or those who think slut-shaming people who work in schools is a healthy sort of 'social conservatism'. The school also say they have been subjected to 'truly awful abuse' which doesn't sound healthy to me.

    Plus associating push-back against homophobia with 'explicit' filming in toilets at a children's charity (details that it was someone who didn't work with children filming only himself in a rubber suit have somehow been omitted - cynical people might wonder why.) After years, nay decades (or should that be 'neighhh! decades!') of dealing with it in Dead Horses I think people around here can spot the age-old hobby of trying to find ingenious ways to link LGBT people to 'danger to children'.

    Anyway this is exactly what I'm talking about - does it walk and talk and quack like feminism? My answer to that is no and time we stopped giving it a feminist fig-leaf.
  • lilbuddha wrote: »
    Whether an adult entertainer is appropriate for that school age is a secondary issue to how the event is being reported.

    I think an MP inviting someone without them or the school doing basic checks on whether it is appropriate, and then shouting down anyone objecting is the primary issue.
    The trans and cross dressing aspects of the person are not relevant to the discussion of appropriateness of their behaviour.
    If a white, cis-person does something, the reportage is: Person did something. Irrelevant descriptors are rarely included. If anyone else does, the reportage often is: (Adjective) Person did something even if that adjective is irrelevant to the something. That places an emphasis on the adjective and implies it is relevant. The genesis of which is very likely prejudice.

    A lot of the behaviour that people are concerned about seems pretty intrinsic to their drag persona. The whole point of them being invited was because they are a drag act and to raise awareness of LGBT issues. Not sure how you can then say it is irrelevant.
  • quantpole wrote: »
    lilbuddha wrote: »
    Whether an adult entertainer is appropriate for that school age is a secondary issue to how the event is being reported.

    I think an MP inviting someone without them or the school doing basic checks on whether it is appropriate, and then shouting down anyone objecting is the primary issue.
    The trans and cross dressing aspects of the person are not relevant to the discussion of appropriateness of their behaviour.
    If a white, cis-person does something, the reportage is: Person did something. Irrelevant descriptors are rarely included. If anyone else does, the reportage often is: (Adjective) Person did something even if that adjective is irrelevant to the something. That places an emphasis on the adjective and implies it is relevant. The genesis of which is very likely prejudice.

    A lot of the behaviour that people are concerned about seems pretty intrinsic to their drag persona. The whole point of them being invited was because they are a drag act and to raise awareness of LGBT issues. Not sure how you can then say it is irrelevant.
    Straight people post sexually suggestive images of themselves all the time. Sex is an intrinsic part of the identity of most people, regardless of orientation/gender/etc. Straight cis-people behave "inappropriately" with children all the time. More by number than LGBT of any sort.
  • Doc TorDoc Tor Admin Emeritus
    edited March 2020
    @quantpole - what basic checks would you expect the school to make, and what findings would you expect to cause them to withdraw their invitation? And that wouldn't have applied to me also?

    (Eta, I don't know what checks the school had already made. My assumption is that they would have some, and Flow passed. If it was anything like my school, they didn't allow randoms to just wander in off the street and speak to the kids.)
  • 18mths ago there was a not dissimilar story in Norfolk

    Link

    The head teacher had a second job as a drag artist.

    The story was reported in the usual range of ways by the usual range of suspects.

    The school backed the head, no parents complained, the story went away.

    ...still taking bookings....

    Asher
  • LouiseLouise Epiphanies Host
    The Daily Record which is a hostile source which would be really interested if this was not the case, quotes Flow as having done the 'full disclosure' checks which schools require- that would be with Disclosure Scotland. This wasn't hard to find either.
  • Doc TorDoc Tor Admin Emeritus
    In which case, the parents can do one.
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