A 13-year-old girl and her friend were recently called “despicable” by their teacher at a Church of England school in the U.K. after asking a classmate how it’s possible for her to identify as a cat.
According to The Telegraph, the schoolgirl and her friend were criticized by their teacher at Rye College in East Sussex towards the end of their eighth-grade “life education” class, where they were told they could “be who you want to be and how you identify is up to you.”
Following the “life education” lesson, one of the students asked a classmate, “How can you identify as a cat when you’re a girl?”
The teacher told the students they were being reported to school administrators and would no longer be welcome at the school if they continued to express the belief that only boys and girls exist.
A girl is called despicable & potentially homophobic by her teacher and told to go to another school because she questioned another pupil who identifies as a cat.
The “life lesson” inadvertently being taught here is-don’t question the ideology with facts https://t.co/U9SRpWw6QQ— Nicky Clark (@MrsNickyClark) June 19, 2023
In a clip taken by one of the students, the teacher opens by saying, “How dare you, you’ve just really upset someone” by “questioning their identity.”
The student replies, “If they want to identify as a cat or something then they are genuinely unwell – crazy.”
The teacher then asked the young girls where they found the idea that only two genders exist.
“Gender is not linked to the parts that you were born with, gender is how you identify, which is what I said right from the very beginning of the lesson,” the teacher said.
The teacher added that there are “three biological” genders because a person can be born bearing both male and female body parts. She said, “There are lots of genders – there is transgender, there is a gender who are people who don’t believe they have a gender at all.”
The students disagreed with their teacher, saying that a person with a female reproductive system is a girl and a person with a male reproductive system is a boy.
The teacher then interrupted the students, raising her voice, to say that although the students might consider cisgender the “norm,” it is not the law. She called the argument of an individual identifying as a gender because of their organs “despicable.”
The teacher then suggested that the girls were “homophobic” or confused. The girls denied such a suggestion.
“If you don’t like it you need to go to a different school,” the teacher said, adding that she would be reporting the students. “You need to have a proper educational conversation about equality, diversity and inclusion because I’m not having that expressed in my lesson.”
Teachers at the Church of England schools were reportedly told in early 2023 to “re-educate” students that use “negative language” such as “that is mental,” and “stop acting like a girl.”
A spokesman for Rye College, where the incident occurred, said, “We are committed to offering our pupils an inclusive education. Teachers endeavor t ensure that pupils’ views are listened to, and encourage them to ask questions and engage in discussion. Teachers also aim to answer questions sensitively and honestly.”
“We strive to uphold the highest standards across the school. We will be reviewing our processes and working with the relevant individuals to ensure such events do not take place in the future,” the spokesman added.
