Teacher brands schoolgirl 'despicable' after she refuses to accept classmate's claim that she 'identifies as a cat'! A teacher has called a teenage student "despicable" after she did not accept a classmate's claim to identify as a cat. The teacher, at Rye College in East Sussex, said she would report the girl, 13, to school leaders after a row sparked by the student's questioning of her fellow pupil's identity. The argument took place on Friday afternoon in a class on 'life education', where students were told that "who you want to be and how you identify is up to you”. One student asked a classmate: "How can you identify as a cat when you’re a girl?" During the row, of which an audio recording was made, the teacher is heard to say: "How dare you – you’ve just really upset someone" by "questioning their identity". The pupil hits back: "If they want to identify as a cat or something then they are genuinely unwell – crazy." The teacher then asks the girls: "Where did you get this idea from that there are only two genders", adding that this "is not an opinion." According to the Telegraph, the teacher tells the class that "gender is not linked to the parts that you were born with, gender is about how you identify, which is what I said right from the very beginning of the lesson." She adds that "there is actually three biological sexes because you can be born with male and female body parts or hormones" and "there are lots of genders – there is transgender, there is a gender who are people who don’t believe that they have a gender at all".
When I was at school if someone identified as a cat they wouldn't get to the end of the week without being force fed kitty cat
Personally I think people can identify as anything they want. If someone wants to identify as a king prawn or a hover fly that's entirely up to them. Doesn't affect me or anyone else particularly. Nothing wrong with challenging it of course but people should chill out a bit.
give over, stuff like this is asking for chaos, all you need is a class of smart arses and it will easily become chaos and untenable from a teachers point of view.
no but she called the other lass despicable which is equally out of order, she could have taken them both outside and had a quiet discussion to assess the situation.
If I was a teacher (which I was) I'd much prefer to have a class of Labrador retrievers than a set of nasty vicious human thugs. Might not get a lot done but the class atmosphere would be friendlier. Mind you, I'd get hammered by OFSTED for my results I suspect.
Do we indulge people who hear voices or cut themselves? No we show sympathy and try and get them help. Calling someone crazy isn’t helpful, but most 13 year olds don’t have the intellectual foresight to use other language, but we should not be indulging someone’s fantasy that they are a cat either, and neither is is down to me or anyone else to validate it.
Which is a amusing response but the original point is still valid if we go too far kids will just take advantage of it and potentially hold back the ones who want to learn.
While I don't agree with the identifying as a cat, it's probably a good job times have changed then as that's bullying in my book. Simple as that.
If people genuinely want to identify as something else I really haven't got a problem with it. Some kids will take advantage as some kids take advantage of anything but over time anybody who's not genuine will realise how stupid and pointless their pretense is wont they? And identifying gender-wise with a cat I dont think would make you any less likely to understand maths or physics would it? I identify as a bloke but I can have views about anything I want... Really doesn't worry me.