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How do you ensure that a piece of information is simultaneously public and secret? I have no idea, but I hope that someone can explain a reliable strategy because this story makes no sense in its absence.
EDIT: link to the policy in question.
TL;DR: The government of Saskatchewan just enacted a new policy that affects "preferred names" and pronouns for younger students (along with some other changes, which I'll skip over). It requires that teachers obtain parental consent before using new names/pronouns for students under 16 years old. The criticism is focused on two claims: First, being "out" is important. Second, it can be unsafe if a parent learns that their child is transgender.
The first claim has already been argued to death, and there's nothing new in this story.
The second claim is just bizarre in this context. What do they expect would happen in the absence of the new policy? Everybody starts using the child's new names/pronouns in everything from casual conversations to official reports...and the parents don't notice for >2 years?
If I knew that a child had information that could be dangerous if it got into the wrong hands, I wouldn't encourage them to spread it far and wide. In fact, I'd direct them to a professional that would help them to develop a strategy that minimized the damage from its release, or else cope with maintaining the burden of secrecy.
But maybe I'm missing something, so I'll repeat my question: how do you ensure that a piece of information is simultaneously public and secret?
You should listen to stories from educators who deal with these issues in reality.
Yes absolutely kids ask teachers to use different names/pronouns in class and the parents never find out.
Yes absolutely kids ask if they can use the gender-neutral single-stall bathroom next to the teacher's lounge, or change in bathroom stall instead of in front of the other kids, and parents never find out.
You can't 'ensure' that the parents never find out, but you can maximize your odds.
And even if they find out eventually, buying 6 months or a year or three years of time can be very important for a kid trying to build a secondary support network.
Doesn't that sound suspiciously like grooming?
No?
This feels like you are verging into 'Hitler was a vegetarian so all vegetarians hate Jews' territory here.
It seems closer to "scientologists secretly setting up a 'secondary support network' for children of 'suppressive persons' is deeply suspicious" territory.
Not to me.
If you have an argument, you'll have to make it. I don't share enough of your cultural signifiers for innuendo alone to carry the message.
I don't think it's about cultural signifiers, the analogy is pretty 1:1. Both scientologists, and gender affirming teachers are secretly making an end run around the parents. This behavior is wrong, both inherently, and because it puts children at risk.
It only sounds suspicious because you chose a group that you expect everyone here to be suspicious of, scientologists. This is what I was talking about with the 'Hitler was a vegetarian' thing. You are carrying the suspicion based on the person you chose to include in the example, not the actual structure of the situation which the analogy is to.
For instance, if I said 'a student whose parents are LDS is questioning the existence of god, and the LDS church would require the parents to kick them out of the house and stop all contact with them if they came out as atheist, and when the student talks to a teacher about this for support the teacher decides to not immediately tell the parents but instead help the student find other resources they could make use of if they do end up kicked out of the house', then the atheist portion of our audience here would probably think that is not a hugely suspicious and monstrous thing for the teacher to do.
Again, you are choosing objectionable examples for you analogies to make it seem bad, I can use sympathetic analogies to make it seem good. Both of these tactics are misleading and prey on cognitive biases around affect.
Quite the opposite. I don't find their actions suspicious because they're committed by scientologists, I find scientologists suspicious because of their actions.
It might work if you stayed within the parameters of the original hypothetical. Not immediately telling the parents might be defensible in certain situations, but we were talking about "6 months or a year or three years".
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Add me as a person who is creeped out by the words "secondary support network". How many of us, at age 30, are still in touch with teachers from high school? The idea that they could, or should, replace parents is farcical.
Absolutely, teachers should provide support where appropriate, but never as a replacement to parents, only in addition to.
This is where allegations of grooming come from. Why are these teachers so interested in my child's sexuality? Why are they using my child to fight their culture wars? And who will bear the cost for the consequences?
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