Equality For All

When I saw the headline: "Trans teen banned from exam reads teacher her rights", I genuinely assumed it was in the USA. I associated this kind of discrimination with schools in red states, and was shocked to read it was in the UK. I stand corrected, America - we've got our fair share of douchebags too.

I'm troubled by this:

According to her mum Miranda, a senior teacher told her daughter that gender dysphoria didn't exist, while another imitated her walk in front of other pupils.

Teachers should never do this. It's unkind, uneducated and unprofessional. Sometimes a minority of unsuitable characters give the rest of us a bad name.

I'm also unimpressed by the highly biased and rather snooty Torygraph article (don't read the comments if you are easily upset by what utter bastards human beings can be), which refers to the student, Ashlyn, as "he" throughout. Also wrong. Ashlyn is "she". She wishes to be known as Ashlyn, not Lewis, so she is identifying as a young woman. She should bloody well be treated as such. What she has been through to get to that point doesn't bear thinking about, but I expect her life has been hell. It is reassuring to see that her mum is loving and supportive - many transgendered people don't have that.

I hope that, when Ashlyn goes to college in September, she finds it a more inclusive and diverse institution, and that her teachers are less bigoted. I hope she finds lecturers who welcome her equally with the rest of the students, who can support her and help her to come back from this rotten experience. I hope her GCSE grades have not been adversely affected. And I hope she and her mum take this rotten school to the cleaners.