I was recently at a well-known school and talking to the girls and the subject of pronouns came up. The girls had a number of different pronouns, and their reasons were varying, from chosen gender identity to fluidity – all fine. But two of the reasons for rejecting she/her set off minor alarm bells. The first was two of the girls felt that she/her label was “offensive” to their non-binary or newly they/them or he/him friends and a couple of others felt just straight up scared of the she/her label because, and I quote, “being a girl is scary right now” and “she/her leaves you open to being attacked or harassed online and in real life.” When I asked what was creating the fear and who was the source of attacks, all the students agreed it was usually a combination of the right-wing “make us a sandwich, and then bend over, love” brigade and the very left-wing tribe who are making explicitly cisgender female identity, spaces and pronouns, increasingly taboo.
One of the great things about young people is how supportive and open-minded they are about a multiplicity of identities. Whether you are gay, straight, bi, trans, non-binary, cis, or any of the other millions of labels and identities one can be or try, the young tend to be far more receptive and cool-headed about the complexity of identity than older generations. Girls in particular are extremely tolerant of difference, and whilst boys can still be susceptible to some homophobia and transphobia particularly in the uneasy 11-15 years, girls on the whole are not only tolerant but extremely welcoming to all identities.
The problem is, this same open-mindedness often isn’t being extended back to girls with quite flagrant prejudice coming from the right and the left, and the issue of female autonomy, safety and dignity often being picked up and put down, supported and rejected by both sides when it is politically and ideologically expedient. More right-wing figures like Douglas Murray or Ben Shapiro came to prominence extolling male superiority and bringing into questions issues like the gender pay-gap, suddenly became champions of women and girls’ autonomy and rights when they waded into the trans or women’s sports issues ( the latter something neither mentioned until it became a hot-button culture war issue. I’d be surprised if Ben Shapiro has ever attended, for example, a women's soccer match.) On the left, the “Believe all Women” #MeToo champions like Owen Jones and Briahna Joy Gay suddenly didn’t believe all women and girls because they were Israeli and therefore not on “their” side – despite the abundant and harrowing evidence of rape and butchery of thousands of Israeli women at the hands of Hamas, for all the world to see.
Naturally, the effect this has on young women and girls observing all this is devastating and frightening, because how do you navigate a world where on the right they are trying to bring back some sort of Gileadesque version of womanhood, with no body autonomy and lots of washing up to do, whilst over on the left your very existence and identity seems to offend so many?
The sad truth is millions of girls are responding to this by making themselves smaller and quieter and camouflaging their very existence to suit and please others rather than celebrating and just being themselves. So many schools I talk to report girls shying away from debates on gender, sexism, misogyny simply because they don’t want to open themselves up to the abuse or are terrified of “saying the wrong thing.” This is the opposite progress.
Meanwhile, millions of girls and boys are avoiding intimacy and sex, are suffering from serious mental health issues and are sad, anxious and depressed and when you actually talk to them about what’s driving this, the common denominator is always anxiety and fear about the self and self-identity – this sense whatever choices they make, whatever side they are on, they are going to somehow be wrong.
Unless we want to see things get a whole lot worse for young people, it’s time we did something really simple: bring the word ‘and’ back. We are so stuck in this bizarre notion that one group’s existence is at the expense of another or by acknowledging one group, you somehow offend or denigrate another, is doing real damage to the whole of the human race. And while we are at it, can we remind ourselves that no group has the right or any business to be making decisions about the lives and choices of a group they don’t belong to – I’d like to see the global reaction if we put teenage girls in charge of the budget, supply and who gets issued with the world’s supply of Viagra, for example.
Contrary to what is often said, women and girls don’t want to be given special treatment or status, but they do want to live their lives safely, proudly and with autonomy and choices to be who they want to be and are – and if that notion or idea somehow offends or shocks you, you really should ask yourself why?
This is absolutely the reason why so many girls are now identifying as boys, or non-binary. This is only anecdotal but I have noticed the common factor in these kids is a personality that is extremely sensitive to criticism. It also explains what I and so many other parents have observed - an extreme decline in overall mental health and confidence that occurs at the same time a teenager adopts a transgender identity. These kids have been made to feel a deep sense of shame about their very existence, leading them to feel they have to change who they are and how they are perceived by others