A new menace is stalking Britain: transphobic toddlers.
Yes, incredibly, according to the Telegraph, data from the Department for Education (DfE) show that a three- or four-year-old child has been suspended from an English state school for ‘abuse against sexual orientation and gender identity’.
Further details on this specific case have not been provided. All we know right now is that the nursery-age child was suspended during the 2022-23 academic year, supposedly for either transphobia or homophobia. The DfE statistics also show that a total of 94 primary-school pupils were either suspended or permanently expelled from state schools in the same year for the same supposed offence. The toddler was among them, along with 13 other children between the ages of five and seven. The oldest that any of these 94 children could have possibly been was 11.
All this raises a number of questions. What did the ‘abuse’ supposedly inflicted by this toddler consist of? Did it relate to a teacher or a fellow pupil? Was it during a classroom discussion about gender identity or sexual orientation – something that has since been banned for the under-nines? Children can be suspended for multiple reasons in combination, but the allegedly hateful aspect must have been significant enough to make it into the official records. What on Earth could he or she have done that was so offensive?
Any sane person would have a hard time believing that a toddler is capable of even understanding what it means to be ‘transgender’, let alone discriminating against someone on that basis. At that age, they can barely speak in full sentences. The idea they could grasp the concept of ‘gender identity’ is frankly ludicrous.
Even without knowing the full details, it is deeply troubling that children as young as three are being confronted with trans ideology in the first place. As Sex Matters’ Helen Joyce suggests, ‘teachers and school leaders involved in this insanity should be ashamed of themselves for projecting adult concepts and beliefs on to such young children’.
The Department for Education has tried to defend the decision, saying that ‘all pupils and staff should feel safe’ at school and that it is committed to ‘making sure every child gets the best life chances’. But not if the child questions, or is confused by, the notion that men can magically become women, it seems.
A three- or four-year-old is just about learning how to tell fact from fiction. He or she will be playing make-believe games with friends, pretending to be animals or playing as families. Obviously, telling children at this stage that a person can literally change from one sex to the other, just by saying so, is going to be hugely confusing for them. It is beyond ridiculous not only to expect toddlers to understand what transgenderism is, but also to punish them for failing to understand it.
We shouldn’t be teaching gender ideology as fact to any age group, let alone to toddlers. Schools – and especially nurseries – should not be treating kids like mini activists, who must absorb and repeat the party line. Let kids be kids. Even the ‘transphobic’ ones.
Lauren Smith is a staff writer at spiked.
