Testimonials

My youngest son is enrolled at a big state co-ed high school. Last year (2020) when he was in year 10, he was kicked out of his Social Studies class by his female long-term reliever teacher for affirming that biological sex is fixed, determined at birth (actually even before, in the womb) and can never be changed and neither can a person’s DNA ever be changed.

The teacher told him he was being disrespectful to trans people and that they were whatever gender or sex they wanted to be. He argued with her that this was misleading, and the scientific fact of biological sex was the reality - he’s a bit Asperger’s so will always stick to his guns to make his point. By this stage she was really angry with him, demanded an apology which he wouldn’t give, as he said he was speaking the truth, so she told him to get out of the classroom.

After class, she lectured him but he stuck to his guns. He said that she was always bringing up what he called “women’s issues” during class and the whole class hated it because she was so angry and forceful about the issues. He bunked this class a lot after this incident.

He is also very annoyed that so many teachers have ‘Rainbow Affiliate’ stickers on their laptops. In his 15 year old mind, he feels that this takes things too far because most of the school do not fit into the rainbow spectrum and are sick of it being crammed down their throats. His current maths teacher tells the class they don’t have to do the problems in their text books that mention boys and girls because it’s not inclusive of the transgender kids (of which there are very few in the entire school).

Furthermore, when at the school recently for parent/teacher conferences, going from classroom to classroom as we met with his teachers, we noticed posters with the rainbow colours and talking points around rainbow issues. These were professional made posters not hand drawn.There were also student made posters all over the place advertising a sausage sizzle for the trans/ rainbow affiliate students at a certain place and time the following week. I can only say we were overwhelmed by this in-your-face approach by a small but very vocal minority for issues that involve such a small number of students.

Please consider all these points as the grass roots attitude of mainstream NZ. Let the expression of thoughts, opinions and attitudes be carefully taught as just that - the thoughts, opinions and attitudes of some in society but not the majority. It is not appropriate for teachers to push their own agenda to impressionable young people who often aren’t yet mature enough to discern between fact and fiction and half-truths. We should respect all people and be kind, courteous and non-discriminatory but please let truth prevail. More than ever, it’s the time to remember the tale of the Emperor with no Clothes.

• After being affirmed at school, my daughter (18) doesn't need anti-depressants or exercise now that she's on T. It has an anti-depressant effect in women. She feels AMAZING. This should last for at least a year, just long enough for the T to cause permanent changes to her voice and her body. Then the anti-depressant effect will likely wear off and the nastier physical side effects will start to kick in. Constant UTIs [urinary tract infections], incontinence etc - the pelvic pain and UTIs have already started. I'm sure a full hysterectomy will fix that. She says with the T she doesn't really feel her feelings anymore. That's one way to fix depression and anxiety I guess. She was a very promising sportswoman until she found trans ideology. It helped her ADHD. Then gave it all up. None of her trans Id'd friends are into sport. Too busy scrolling.

• Secret name change. Our experience of ROGD occurred after our daughter started High School (a special character school) at the end of year 9. We categorically refused to allow her to change her name on the school roll, however mid 2022 (Year 10) we discovered at the parent / teacher interviews that she had changed her name and started using male pronouns informally as a newly qualified teacher called her another name (we had been aware that she was using this name against our wishes with friends). I asked the teacher directly after the interview if our daughter was using another name and he said no, he had mixed her up with another pupil. We then went to see the personal tutor to raise the issue as we had been lied to directly by a teacher and yet had signed a learning contract based on mutual trust, respect and understanding. The school refused to call our daughter by the name on the roll because that would affect their relationship and encouraged her to see a school counsellor which thankfully she did not.

We set fairly strict parameters especially compared to her friend group. We would not consider puberty blockers or chest binders but agreed to buy her sports bras to wear. We have emphasised that we are concerned for her wellbeing and not doing something irreversible that she would later regret. She does not believe that puberty blockers are irreversible because of the information she has been getting from friends and online and won't enter into discussion with us because she believes that we are receiving misinformation and are transphobic bigots. We've tried reasoning that she asks our advice and perspective on many things however we don't seem to get anywhere. We do think that she is looking to "have" something. Her friends have been diagnosed with various conditions and see counsellors. We reiterate that our role as parents is one of safeguarding and trying to be reasonable doesn't always combine very well with teenage hormones.

We have since found a counsellor who is not gender affirming and experienced with neurodiversity and gay youth. We made an appointment with the head of the year 9-10s to ask what students were taught about being safe and safeguarding. We hope that this helped to demonstrate that we are not unreasonable ogres. We firmly believe that as parents our responsibility is to equip our children with love and support and the ability to reason however it is not our role to be their best friends and support them in avenues that are likely to cause them harm and long term damage.

So, where are we now? We hope that we are making progress. I have eternal hope that she will quietly desist. We're acutely aware that when she turns 16 she may try to get puberty blockers. Our view is that in our house there are rules which include not taking puberty blockers. Her fixation seems to have moved onto other areas -investigating if she has autism and being immersed in playing sport.

• Anorexia ignored. Our daughter has had long-standing depression and anorexia as a result of sexual assault when she was young. She is also on the autism spectrum. When she was introduced to transgenderism by a classmate at 13, she embraced the ideas as an explanation for her anorexia. The health practitioners we took her to immediately affirmed that she really was a boy and her school changed her name, uniform and pronouns without our knowledge or consent. Our daughter was encouraged by these professionals to see us as her enemy and now at age 16 she has left the family home to live with strangers who treat her as a boy without seeing that she is using the trans identity to mask her anorexia. She has cut off all contact with us, leaving us heartbroken.

• Transition at school kept secret from parents - read more here

• My 12-year-old daughter tells me that about half her intermediate class is LGBTQIA+. The other half are straight. I’m not kidding. Everyone has been “coming out” this year. At the beginning of the year, they all told the teacher their pronouns. If they change their mind, they just let the teacher know their new pronouns. She knows about four trans kids. When I was surprised and used one girl’s original name, my daughter said, that’s deadnaming, Mum. The kids are all told about gender and sexuality. She said her best mate was gay because another girl told her she liked her. She told me that choosing to be trans was a much bigger choice than being gay or bi or pansexual (yep) because it involved puberty blockers and surgery. She described to me what puberty blockers were, and she was under the impression you could easily stop taking them. She said in 2019, no one was really talking about this stuff, but now they’re all talking about it. They have a Pride rainbow bridge at the school. They are just kids! So naive and innocent and they’re claiming to be nonbinary! I don’t care if my girls are lesbians or bi or straight, but I want them to learn and grow in private, at their own pace. And I am dreading either of them being drawn into the rainbow trans cult.

• Dunedin North Intermediate - My friend’s child had his first day on Tuesday and they were taken to the unisex toilets. I don’t know if all the toilets are unisex or just some. Then all the class had to introduce themselves and share their pronouns. The boy didn’t understand what pronouns were and said he didn’t have any. Later at home his big sister said that not knowing his pronouns meant that he was a nothing. I think she probably meant that he was non-binary but that she is confused about it all too. She has just started Year 9 but went to the same intermediate. Her brother got upset at being called a nothing and shouted that he was a boy. My friend said that he told her that 5 children in his class said they were trans.

My friend was really angry about it and said that the gender ideology is being treated as extra special and cool so everyone wants to be in the cool, trendy gang to be treated as special and it’s being shoved down kids’ throats. She wants to complain but knows that she will be labelled as a transphobe or homophobe if she does and she holds a public position which really means she can’t speak out about it.

• 2025 My daughter is one of those with a ‘vivid imagination’. Quirky, highly intelligent, gifted, ADHD and with autistic traits. Completely and apparently quite easily brainwashed to believe she was born in the wrong body at age 14 - post puberty. Never had an issue with her body or femininity before falling in with a group of friends that were into being trans. Patient Zero - the so-called ‘best friend’ - was anorexic. Convenient way to keep punishing your body - behind the veil of Trans. Social contagion in our schools is very real and is being encouraged, affirmed and supported by all these professionals and organisations. I feel completely betrayed by them and successive Governments that have failed to protect my vulnerable young woman. It’s a modern day tragedy.

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• 2023 My young son is being forced to change for swimming in a shared change room with a male-identifying female child. The son is aware that the other child is female and is at an age where he feels self-conscious about nudity in front of members of the opposite sex. Many parents of the same children are unaware that the child is female and no-one has been asked whether they consent to their sons sharing the purported single-sex change room with a female child. No consideration is made for the cultural and religious requirements of the other families, or the privacy and consent rights of the boys.

At a recent athletics day, sprints and all other competitions were run with boys and girls together, with students receiving individual score cards rather than being able to compare their abilities with others in their age and in their sex class. There was no prior discussion about this with parents and no request for feedback on the merits or not of this entirely new and debatable approach. No explanation or justification was given.

This has led some parents to assume that this was done in order to avoid the need to confront the issue of sex categories in school sports. It is felt that these categories are being abolished by stealth, without robust, open debate about the merits and disadvantages of this.

If this is being done in the interests of 'inclusion' for children questioning their gender, then this needs to be balanced with the needs of girls to have access to safe and fair school competitions that allow them to shine in a level playing field within their sex category.

• (During Pride week) So at our local NZ high school you are to wear pronoun labels of your choice. He or she is not encouraged, however. They or theybe is acceptable. Not kidding. Mine have prior arrangements this week so will be home.

• At the end of Term 2, 2022, an Auckland intermediate school had a Rainbow Pride mufti day and each child in every classroom had to write down their name and beside it put down what rainbow colour they were wearing so that there would be a wide mix of rainbow colours all over the school on the day. The Year 7 class I observed didn't have a clue about the deeper sex and gender issues involved. They just thought it was cool, fun, and exciting to dress up in bright rainbow colours. This emphasis on rainbow imagery to capture youngsters, seems to be a form of brainwashing and grooming.
  

• My friend has requested her 7 year old not participate in any more Pride activities this week. As a result, her daughter was sent to a different class three separate times today. Sarah (not real name) was taught all about pride today, shown the flags and how they represent: boy loving a boy, girl loving a girl, or you may have been born a little girl but actually you think you might be a boy but there is a flag for that too. Then coloured in the flag and put it on a t-shirt. No notification given to parents at all. PS The teacher makes a big show of excluding Sarah from the class every time they do a “diversity” activity.

• My daughter (aged 10) has a trans girl in her year group. This child did a presentation to the year group. My daughter said it was a slideshow - she thinks it was a children’s book as it looked like proper illustrations. All about a cat that wanted to be pink. At the end the child urged everyone to use the pronouns people prefer. Around that time my daughter went into the principal’s office and she had a box of pronoun badges (they/them, he/she etc) but my daughter says she hasn’t seen any staff member wearing one. I had already asked the school to tell me if my kids were going to be taught that anyone was “born in the wrong body” a year earlier.

• A few of my daughter’s teachers (year 11) asked at the beginning of the year which pronouns each girl would like to use among themselves (ie with the teacher), and which pronouns when in front of their parents. When I asked my child if she thought there was anything wrong with this separation, she did not think there was anything wrong. I put to her the view that teachers conniving with children to keep secrets from parents on such an important matter is totally out of line with the purpose of a school and what teachers’ responsibilities are (ie education), vi-a-vis the responsibilities and rights and duties of parents. My daughter agreed.

• Trident High School - This video was shown on 16 June 2021, to over one thousand 13 - 18 year old secondary students. It is propaganda for the unscientific idea that people are born with an innate ‘gender identity’. Range of Gender Identities

• Here is a poster from Hutt Valley High School (a large coeducational school in the Hutt Valley), inviting students to a regular trans and non-binary student meetup.

2023

• I am a secondary science teacher. I was forced into a role last year to teach a health unit to a year 10 class and that is where it came to my attention the movement of gender ideology. I used curriculum resources that were given to me to teach the students on "gender identity" which came as a new experience for me when my background is in sciences and I usually teach sciences - biology, chemistry and physics.

I also have become exposed to more students expressing the need to use opposite gender pronouns and names. I have been supportive, collegial and accepting throughout this time when working through these new changes, however deep down something has not been sitting right with me. Upon investigation of the world-wide gender ideologies, I have now begun to form a more educated perspective on the situation and it has confirmed the doubts and concerns I had for my role as an educator and for all my students.

I have become increasingly uncomfortable in my role as a science teacher and as someone who cares deeply for our tamariki in light of the progression of gender ideologies filtering into our education system. I have felt I have had no guidance or consultation regarding this and in a sense feel 'coerced' to use pronouns and names of a child that is not in alignment with their original. I feel it is causing confusion in our students and staff and I am fearful that this will have long-reaching effects on our students, including the ones who are wanting to transition under the age of 18 and have not gone through puberty yet.

I am finding the blurring of truth and also the back-lash of student response when other students do not use the pronouns increasingly hard to manage and my open public apology to a whole assembly when I have misused them as well makes me feel I am walking a dangerous line of falsity. I am wondering what protection is in place for teachers who may be feeling like this because it is leading to a creation of a fear-controlled environment.

• As a teacher, I am just disappointed that there is no discussion about the impact on teachers and school staff working at the schools who are being forced to deny the truth, deny science, forced to lie and to pay lip service to something they do not believe in - because they have a job that they love doing, earn a salary that they need to support themselves and their families - and they have to live with their own consciences knowing that they are denying science and are lying/not telling the truth every day.

• I am a NZ school teacher. I also taught for more than two decades overseas. Without a doubt, purportedly "Rainbow" materials are embraced and referenced by the teacher in charge of RSE (Relationships and Sexuality Education) at my own school. The materials are more about queer theory and gender ideology rather than acceptance of difference.

As with all high schools, this aspect of the curriculum is taught by specific teachers and is in the 'black box' of the classroom...what one teacher covers is largely unknown to most others. However, in my own institution, I am fully aware the focus is gender identity and self-identification. This is seen as natural, progressive, and a form of social justice. Personally, I see it as a potentially serious safeguarding issue: through such curricula, we risk students questioning their biological sex, encouraging body dysphoria, and making students believe the axioms of an ideology. The end of such pathways is of course potential use of puberty blockers, hormone treatment and so on. As some may know, those most at risk are young gay and lesbian students and autistic children. It is, deeply ironic that this amounts, therefore, to a type of conversion therapy for some LGB students. InsideOut resources and their incorrect statistics and concepts around self-harm, intersex, and 'innate' gender are embraced without critical questioning. These materials are in our school and the RSE teacher seems to embrace them.

Most shocking for me in these materials was the InsideOut (and therefore Ministry of Education endorsed) suggestion that schools might or should actively use new names, pronouns, and identities for students but hide this from parents should the student request it. To me, this is taking a stance of being actively dishonest - as well as not acting in the students' best interests. That is, to have such a policy is to have a policy of dishonesty. I understand the argument that this is for safeguarding itself, but this is based on the ongoing use of incorrect statistics surrounding self-harm.

My children have all left school and I am very glad this is the case. I think most parents do not have any idea of the way the gender ideology has become embedded in RSE and schools more generally. As a teacher, just to raise questions on the topic put you in danger of accusations you are transphobic. My own views are that there are strong risks in presenting such materials to young people. It is a form of ideology which has no place in education - except if exploring it as an example of an ideological thought system. That is, it could have a place for careful analysis in high level social sciences classes - or in history classes comparing it to propaganda and authoritarianism.

• From the mother of a five year old: I’ve recently been into the school loo near my daughter’s classroom. They’re the usual unisex, fully enclosed toilets and I’m not a fan of girls having to share. More than once I found wee all over the seat. Not a little bit – a proper clean-up job. Not altogether surprising as they’re used by young boys. But it got me wondering how often my daughter encounters this, so I asked her, and she confirmed that there is often wee all over the seat. I asked her what she did, and she said she just cleaned it up each time. This makes me quite annoyed really. I never had to deal with that – the odd drop sure – but nothing like the state I’ve encountered in there. How many other schoolgirls are just routinely cleaning up a seat covered in wee? If schools are going to insist that girls share toilet facilities, then they need to ensure girls aren’t cleaning up after the boys.

2022

• From a teacher: One Year 11 student at a girls-only school in the Auckland region told me that the girls who want to have any sort of discussion or ask questions about trans and gender ideology, are silenced by being labelled ‘transphobic’. According to her, this whole issue of gender ideology taking hold in her school has only emerged in recent months. She told me that two of the senior girls now maintain they are really male. They insist on being referred to as he/him. When she has unwittingly used the wrong pronouns, she has been verbally abused so she now keeps silent. She is confused because these two girls continue to wear the girls’ uniform, have kept their long hair and still share female only facilities. She is unaware of them wearing breast binders or taking testosterone. She cannot understand why they remain at a girls’ only school if they now identify as male. One of the allegedly transitioning students has attempted self-harm and has ongoing mental health issues.

• Kaiapoi High School. There is a male student identifying as female who uses the girls changing room and they were made to feel they weren’t allowed to object. Parents were not consulted and are not actually even supposed to know about the student.

• My granddaughter, who is 13, has just moved from Christchurch to the North Island. Her 1st day of high school has been a shocker. The first thing she was asked by the kids in the class is what pronouns she goes by is she non gender, lesbian, or trans. She had no idea what they were talking about and can't relate to anyone in the class.

• Rolleston College. The kids are having sex in the unisex toilets. I think all the toilets are unisex. Basically, because everyone can go in together, stalls get used for sex.

• A child requested to me, (I am a teacher) that she wanted her teachers to not call her a girl and to use ‘they‘, but also said I wasn’t to tell anyone. I pointed out to her that if we couldn’t tell anyone, nobody could comply with the request. Not knowing what to do I convinced the child to talk to her dean. The outcome was that I was told to use a different name for her and the pronoun ‘they’ for a 13 y/o child and not to mention it to said child’s parents yet. I was never given any directions on which cross country group boys/ girls or kapa haka group girls/boys I should direct said child to whenever the school separated for those types of activities. Nope you just get left to flounder with that. Because no one really knows what to do.

Imagine the politically correct tangle you’d get into - don’t want to upset Māori community by putting a born female child who identifies as diverse into a traditionally male role within Maoridom , but not wanting to upset a rainbow community by forcing her into the unwanted female role within kapa haka. What a PC nightmare! Perhaps let them sit it out? Now you’ve got singling out a child which might cause them shame and / or teasing.

I feel that a teacher’s belief system should be respected too. It's interesting that if a primary school decides to allow religious instruction, the ministry advises it to have an opt-in system and for the topic to be taught by volunteers. In the sense of gender identity, perhaps the same advice should apply? Certainly, there are teachers who might feel uncomfortable about teaching it on the basis of their religion and/or personal beliefs and I feel that maybe you could argue that the NZ Bill Of Rights Act protects their freedom of belief.

As a parent, exploring gender identity is something I would much prefer to discuss with my own child and with the timing that is right for them. It's not a subject I would want school to discuss. Especially without informing me as to exactly what was being said and how it was being presented.

I am on the board of trustees of a public, co-ed primary school board in the Wellington region. We are finding it difficult to reconcile the rights and interests of parents, with the rights and interests of teachers, within a system that should place child welfare at the centre. Some of these rights and interests are colliding with others.

Recently some parents wrote to the board to express their concerns about Navigating the Journey (the sexuality education resource that is informed by the 2020 Ministry of Education RSE guidelines) and its delivery within our school. Their concerns were:

• That there had been inadequate consultation on the programme (we aren't due to do our two-yearly consultation until next term, so newer families to the school would not have had a chance for consultation yet)

• That parents had not been notified of upcoming sexuality education topics, thereby depriving them of their right to opt out

• That material is being shared with students in a way that is not age appropriate.

As a board we accept these are valid criticisms. They have come about due to the behaviour of some teaching staff, who have unilaterally decided that placing limits on discussion of sexuality or gender ideology, for the purposes of the school curriculum, interferes with their right to freely express themselves and that this constitutes discrimination against them. They have also used the s51(3) exemption (that teachers have a right to respond to a child's question in the classroom) to skirt around the requirement to ensure that parents can exercise their opt-out rights in respect of the sexuality curriculum.

The Human Rights Act allows the provision of separate facilities for each sex (s46), which is particularly important for females. How can we as a board, satisfy that expectation of privacy and sex-segregated facilities, when the Ministry of Education guidance encourages children to use the bathrooms and changing spaces that 'aligns with their gender identity'?

Allowing males who identify as female access to female only spaces risks excluding girls from sports and school life. All girls are affected but in particular girls from religious backgrounds such as Muslims, who have strictures against girls sharing private spaces with males. Many of our refugee families come from Muslim countries and policies like these discriminate against and exclude these already marginalised communities.

Navigating the Journey also dictates that schools should 'use people's preferred pronouns'. Using different pronouns is effectively a way of signalling to others belief in gender ideology. As such these 'preferred pronouns' policies run afoul of the rights to freedom of thought, conscience and belief, as enshrined in the Bill of Rights Act.

As a board we are also concerned that there is no risk assessment that has been done by the Ministry on affirming children in different gender identities as the best therapeutic approach for children suffering gender dysphoria. Studies (including evidence presented in the Keira Bell case https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Bell-v-Tavistock-Judgment.pdf), show that many of the young people presenting at gender identity clinics have co-morbid conditions such as anxiety, depression and autistic spectrum conditions. In addition, a number have histories of past trauma, including sexual abuse, and the reason for their discomfort with their bodies deserves better investigation.

In addition, of course, many gender-non-conforming children grow up to be gay. By encouraging affirmation–only approaches, we are, ironically, running the risk of taking part in gay conversion therapy.

The lack of clear guidance from the Ministry of Education in these areas makes us worry that these issues can only be resolved through the courts. That would be a waste of school time and resources, that could be better spent educating our rangatahi and encouraging them to accept themselves and each other, as they are.