“My son wanted to be a dinosaur when he was four. Didn’t mean I’d let him be one.”
“It’s child abuse.”
“How can you condone the mutilation of a four-year-old?”
“ The parents are nuts.”
“The parents are brain damaged.”
“What is wrong with the parents to allow this to happen?”
“The world’s gone mad.”
There is no need to read the thousands of comments on social media today about the news that a four-year-old has begun “transitioning” their gender before attending their first day of kindergarten – they are all basically summarised above.
The reaction has been swift and contemptuous – outrage at these unnamed parents who have made a “dangerous”, “mad” or even “abusive” decision.
The report in The Daily Telegraph has revealed that a wave of children – some as young as three or four – are transitioning their gender in primary schools, with The Children’s Hospital at Westmead saying referrals to its gender services have tripled.
The one case making heads spin, as revealed at yesterday’s NSW state government budget estimates, is that of a four-year-old.
The Education Department’s Deputy Secretary of School Operations, Gregory Prior, said: “Without breaching privacy, we have a four-year-old who is transitioning to kindergarten next year who has identified as transgender.”
Some of the thousands of comments online. Via Facebook.
The school is assisting the family, the family is assisting the child but society is damning them without even knowing their story.
But not all of society.
Top Comments
This is just too much for Karl to understand.
There might be good medical reason for the gender rearrangement [of the sexual part] as the child may be hermaphrodite; then one or the other gender could be chosen depending on the availibility of the sexual organs.
Maybe people should listen to the podcast "How to be a girl" prior to commenting. My family has experienced this issue and these are not whimsical decisions made by parents, we are all human and doing our best with the circumstances we are given and we all deserve love, respect and privacy.
Well said. I am happy that young people are now being given the full consideration to be their happy selves and live a full life. Our identities are ours and not to be decided or denied. Parents and children considering these complex issues deserve all the respect and as you say, privacy.