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https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/3/31/2160057/-Trans-Bans-and-Elephants-Oh-My-A-Discussion-With-a-4th-Grader>
"A couple of nights ago, I had a discussion with my daughter, who is in 4th
grade. It started because she had heard about banned books (which mercifully
isn’t a thing in her school library because we live in a place where those who
write the rules are sane). She was wondering what it was about these books
that would make people so upset that they didn’t want anyone to read them. So
we looked at a few examples, and LGBTQIA themes kept emerging. So she wanted
to know what all of those letters stood for.
So, I started from the beginning, with lesbian being a woman who is attracted
to women. She knew what gay means, and thought it was interesting that gay men
are just called gay, but there’s a specific word (lesbian) for gay women.
Bisexual wasn’t much of a leap for her, because understanding that some people
like men and some like women, it didn’t seem so strange that some people might
like both.
When we got to the T, I thought it might be interesting to see what she might
already know, so I told her that T stands for transgender and then asked her if
she knew what that meant. She said she did, and went on to explain that being
transgender is what happens when your body doesn’t match what you know inside
you really are, like your body looks like a boy but your brain knows you’re a
girl.
I learned that this knowledge came in part from a book she read at school, and
in part from talking with others. It seemed like a pretty solid understanding,
so we moved on to the Q, which I explained as a broad term than can apply to
any number of sexual identities or orientations that are not exclusively
heterosexual. My biologist brain used the analogy that cats are mammals, but
not all mammals are cats, just like gay people are queer, but not all queer
people are gay."
Via Kevin O'Brien, who wrote "I believe that children are the future…"
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
