Meet the secretary of state for trans indoctrination

There is growing concern among parents and teachers about the ideological nature of what is being taught in British schools. They are concerned that children, some as young as five, are being taught about controversial issues such as “gender fluidity” and “structural racism”.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like Gillian Keegan, the Secretary of State for Education, shares her concerns.

The fact that Pink Messages praised her appointment in October – which described her as a “rare LGTBQ+ ally” – which should have set alarm bells ringing. After all, this is a news outlet that has been shamelessly promoting transgender ideology for the past few years.

It’s not difficult to understand why Pink Messages is pleased with Keegan as education secretary. In July 2020, she sent a letter to the Chichester LGBT Forum, stating in no uncertain terms that “trans women are women”.

But it was her appearance before the Department of Education’s selection committee last week that was most troubling. Conservative MP Miriam Cates drew attention to the recent YouGov poll, which finds that 75 percent of children were exposed to “critical social justice theories” in school, with 68 percent reportedly being taught that such theories were fact or alternative views are are not acceptable.

Keegan’s first reaction was to dismiss any problem. Cates pressed them, pointing out that teaching children such controversial theories amounts to “indoctrination” – which, of course, is “illegal”. Keegan seemed amused and asked rhetorically, “Is it indoctrination?”.

Conservative MP Caroline Ansell reached out to Keegan and said she spoke to teachers who were concerned about what to teach at school. Ansell told the story of a grandfather whose five-year-old grandson came home one day and told him they had been taught “to be born in the wrong body” — which is a highly problematic notion at best.

Keegan was dismissive again. She claimed not to have seen or heard anything like it herself when she was in schools. As for teachers worrying about what to teach, Keegan denies there’s a problem. “I have not found a free speech issue with any of the teachers I work with as constituency MPs,” she said.

In fact, Keegan denied there is any problem with the ideological nature of what is currently being taught in schools. This is despite the YouGov poll and a recent Policy Exchange report clearly showing there is a problem. “I haven’t seen the report,” Keegan said after Cates turned her attention to the Policy Exchange report, before adding that “there are some sides of this debate that matter, so I’ll look at how.” great concern is being educated’.

In other words, Keegan seems to think that any report or evidence that purports to show that there is a problem in the schools at this time is a product of self-interest, a product of prejudice — a product of these, that is, with “Skin in the Game”. ‘. Which is ironic, since Keegan himself was only too happy to parrot the talking points of trans-activist groups like Stonewall in Parliament.

It is one thing for a minister not to know an issue until it is brought to her attention. It’s a whole different thing when she’s made aware of a problem and continues to ignore it.

Parents should be able to entrust their children to a school, safe in the knowledge that they will not be subjected to political and ideological indoctrination. But that doesn’t seem to be the case at the moment. As Secretary of State for Education, Gillian Keegan needs to face the reality of what is going on in schools before it’s too late

James Essen is co-founder of Thoughtful Therapists.