“Yes – we have a responsibility to help the confused Gaela’s of this world, but we also have a responsibility to the thousands of children who will be harmed by teaching them the completely false ‘fact’ that they can choose their own gender. “
Imagine the scene. You are a delegate at a packed SNP conference – with thousands of others. On a high because the SNP is still riding high in the polls and on target to become the Scottish government again. The SNP youth come forward with a motion that the SNP should support the Time for Inclusive Education (TIE). One delegate, teenager Gaela Hanlon declares
“I have seen first hand 13 year olds who have been bullied to the point where they hate themselves so much they want to kill themselves. It happens all the time. How long will we turn a blind eye to this? How many kids have to die?”
She receives a standing ovation. But you feel a little unease amidst all the euphoria.
Given that TIE wants to prevent such bullying, and the motion states that the purpose is to “Promote a safe, equal and accepting environment for all of Scotland’s young people” – who could possibly be against such a warm, compassionate, inclusive proposal, except the most heartless, bigoted fluidophobe? That of course is the atmosphere in which delegates found themselves at this weekend’s SNP conference/rally. It would have been a brave person who committed political suicide by daring to challenge the motion.
So what’s the problem?
First of all the motion itself is meaningless. It merely expresses a series of platitudes that are almost impossible to disagree with and yet commits the Scottish government to no particular course of action. This allows the SNP to engage in ‘virtue signalling’ (‘look how wonderful we are, we care’ – my phone for example was filled with tweets from SNP MSPs and officials who were virtue signalling ad nauseum!), whilst preventing any meaningful or intelligent discussion and allowing the TIE people to claim it as a great victory. The conference decision is meaningless, but the on-going TIE campaign is not.
So what’s wrong with it?
The aim of TIE is not ‘inclusive’ education. It is exclusive indoctrination. TIE do not want there to be a wide variety of opinions and views on the nature of sex and sexuality, they want there to be only one position – theirs. And they want to exclude anyone who dares to disagree. Their main aim is to ensure that the LGBTI+ agenda is forced upon every school, every teacher and every pupil in Scotland. There must be no opt out. It is not about respect for particular individuals as human beings, but government enforced state indoctrination about one particular theory of human sexuality.
They have a very simplistic way of putting across their case. And like all simplistic doctrines it is very dangerous – especially when it is combined with emotion, lies and political cowardice. This is about bullying. If you don’t agree with this, you are supporting bullying. It is emotive and irrational, but effective. TIE are not concerned about those who are bullied or discriminated against because of their faith, class or race. I have come across many forms of bullying in schools, including Christian pupils who have been bullied as ‘Bible Bashers’ and whose faith has been openly mocked in class by teachers. But are the SNP or indeed any other politicians demanding that ‘ a safe, warm and accepting environment’ be provided for such pupils? Or that all pupils and teachers should be taught from a Christian perspective? Can we be allowed to re-educate pupils and teachers into what Christianity really is? By the way let me point out (and it is a sign of how irrational the times have become that I even need to do this), I am totally against any kind of bullying and I believe that people who genuinely suffer from gender dysphoria need help not mockery.
But there is another problem. Gaela Hanlon identifies as gender fluid. She said:
“It wasn’t easy for me to get up here to speak today, not just because I get nervous just speaking in front of my English class. But I struggled to fill out the speaker sheet. A speaker sheet has two boxes to be ticked, labelled male and female. This one had me stumped. See, I’m gender fluid. In simple terms this means I can not tell you that I am 100% male or 100% female, so to tick either of these boxes felt like a lie to me.”
Now you have to stop and think about that for a moment. Here is a teenage girl who says that she is not 100% female and not 100% male and so could not identify as either. According to one report of the speech she went on to say that her school allows her to use either male or female toilets (presumably depending on how she feels any particular day). You see the equation that is being made here, and that was, at least outwardly, accepted by her/his fellow delegates? If you don’t accept what I am saying then you are responsible for bullying, depression and suicide.
