If you argued ten years ago that schools would be inviting drag queens to teach children that there are 73 genders, you would have been called a crazy person. This argument would be deemed so extreme and unbelievable that you wouldn’t be taken seriously - you would be dismissed out of hand. Yet that is exactly <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/02/27/drag-queen-teaches-11-year-olds-anal-sex-tells-73-genders/?li_source=LI&li_medium=liftigniter-onward-journey"><strong>what happened on the Isle of Man</strong></a>.
According to the <em>Times</em>, these 11 and 12-year-old children were “also shown how a skin graft could be taken from a girl’s arm to create an artificial penis. Others said their children, in their first year of secondary school, were traumatised by being taught about anal and oral sex, and masturbation.” This is an absolutely grotesque attack on the dignity, humanity and innocence of children.
For once, parents had enough and pushed back. As a result, “sex education has been suspended at schools on the Isle of Man after an outcry by parents about inappropriate lessons”.
Eliza Cox, a commissioner (equivalent to a parish councillor) for Marown, told <strong><a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/sex-education-suspended-on-isle-of-man-after-drag-queen-row-jnlc7w2m6">the <em>Times</em></a> </strong>that problems started when the island adopted a new model based on the Scottish sex education syllabus last September.
Cox was contacted by families she had known for years whose children had just started at Queen Elizabeth II High School in Peel. One said her daughter was upset at having to put a condom onto an artificial penis with a group of boys; another said her son had refused to talk about what had happened at the school because he was so upset.
A third child, “who told the drag queen that there were two genders, not 73, was told that he had hurt the speaker’s feelings and to leave the room”.
This is yet another attack on the dignity of children. You don’t have to be Catholic or even Christian to object to this kind of stuff. In fact, I hazard a guess that most of the parents involved were not. You only have to be a decent human being to know this is wrong.
Jesus reserved his greatest warning for those who sought to harm children. In Matthew 18:6, he said, “But if anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it would be better for him to have a large millstone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.” If you harm a child, which includes attacking his or her natural innocence, then you are better to drown in the sea.
These poor children were also groomed into early sexual activity, as it was also reported that “one teacher …. had to teach a group of boys and girls in years 7 and 8 how to masturbate”.
This teacher should have refused to do this outright – this is an obvious breach of safeguarding, if nothing else. If that wasn’t bad enough, the use of a drag queen to push the lie that there are 73 genders is there to confuse children. Children seek guidance and clarity from adults not confusion. They should be always taught that there are two sexes, “male and female he created them”, one for the other.
It is the responsibility of every Catholic parent whether their child attends Catholic school or a secular one to check what is on the PSHE curriculum and to object if there is anything that goes against their faith. We want to be sure when we stand before God that we can say we did everything we could to protect our child from this material that is not only contrary to Catholic teaching but goes against common decency itself. “I didn’t want to rock the boat, or cause a fuss or I was too busy to do so,” is not going to cut it.
Luckily, as Catholics we fear the judgment of God more than the bad opinion of others. We know it is our job as parents to protect and nurture our children, to give them the time and space they need to develop into young women and young men. No one said parenthood would be easy. And it certainly isn’t these days.
