LGBT charities and campaigners have welcomed the Church of England’s new guidance for schools urging them to refrain from making pupils conform to gender stereotypes.
The updated guidance for the church’s 4,700 schools, titled Valuing All God’s Children, and timed to coincide with anti-bullying week, followed advice issued three years ago that covered homophobic bullying. It has now been expanded to include transphobic and biphobic bullying.
The guidance met with outrage in some quarters, drawing sceptical newspaper headlines and furious commentary from some conservatives. But the human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell said the guidance was “big progress for a church that traditionally and historically has been hostile to LGBT rights”.
“The new guidance is positive,” Tatchell said. “It affirms diverse sexual orientations and gender identities, supporting pupils who are different. It acknowledges their right to explore, experiment and express without denigration.”
The church had advised that nursery and primary school should be a time of “creative exploration”. “Children should be at liberty to explore the possibilities of who they might be without judgment or derision,” it said. “For example, a child may choose the tutu, princess’s tiara and heels and/or the fireman’s helmet, toolbelt and superhero cloak without expectation or comment.”
Conservative Christian activists, including Andrea Minichiello Williams of Christian Concern – an evangelical member of the C of E’s parliament – condemned the new rules and accused the church of pursuing “an agenda that runs counter to the church’s teaching”.
On Monday, Piers Morgan, who co-hosts ITV’s Good Morning Britain, also criticised what he called “a new fad”. “I’ve got a six-year-old girl, she doesn’t know what gender identity is, yet teachers are now asking a five-year-old child: ‘How are you feeling today? Do you feel male or female?’” Morgan said. “It’s not about judgment, it’s about having some sort of boundaries.”
Morgan said children needed “boundaries” instead of a “free for all” when it came to identity, to which his co-host Susanna Reid said: “I’m definitely one day just going to come in one morning identifying as something completely different.”
Morgan responded: “You know what, you’re allowed to, you can identify as a giraffe if you want […] You know what, we’re all going to be fluid. We’re all going to be giraffes.”
But LGBT campaigners expressed surprise at the outrage. Paris Lees, the journalist and transgender rights activist, wrote on Twitter:
She added: “Why on earth should a boy be criticised for wearing a tiara if that’s what he wants to do? What is the big deal?”
A Stonewall spokesperson said the charity warmly welcomed the guidance. “All bullying has a profoundly negative impact on children, and it is never acceptable. Our research shows that nearly half of lesbian, gay, bi and trans pupils are bullied for being LGBT at school: a situation that desperately needs to change.
“We would like to congratulate the church for sending a clear signal that homophobic, biphobic and transphobic bullying must never be tolerated. As the archbishop of Canterbury says in his foreword: ‘This guidance helps schools to offer the Christian message of love, joy and the celebration of our humanity without exception or exclusion’. That should be a message we can all get behind.”
In a note on Facebook on Monday, Nigel Genders, the chief education officer at the Church of England, explained why the guidance was part of the church’s vision.
“One in 10 pupils who are transgender have received death threats,” he wrote. “Can you imagine how that can impact on a young life? More frequent is marginalising through social exclusion, cyberbullying, verbal and physical abuse.
“No parent, friend, teacher or governor would wish this on their own and it is incumbent on us as Christians to act to create welcoming schools where all pupils are honoured and respected members of their community. Without this fundamental element how can we enable all our children to flourish?”
Last summer, the General Synod voted to offer special services to welcome transgender people to the Anglican faith. It was the second time in two days that it gave overwhelming support to motions seen as positive towards LGBT people, suggesting to some a significant change of mood.
The motion said transgender people should be “welcomed and affirmed in their parish church”, and that bishops consider whether special liturgies “might be prepared to mark a person’s gender transition”.
Proposing the motion, Chris Newlands cited data from the Tavistock and Portman NHS foundation trust, which said that in 2010, 97 children in the UK were referred to gender identity clinics, but by 2016 the number had risen to 1,400.
In the UK, transphobic hate crime has risen by 170% in the past year, he said.
Tatchell said there was still some way to go, and while the new school guidance was welcome, it failed to resolve “the church’s big failings on LGBT human rights: its refusal to sanction same-sex marriages and its non-acceptance of clergy in loving committed same-sex relationships”.
“The phrase ‘cloaks of identity’,” he added, “may not have been the best language to use, as it implies something additional and artificial that covers the true reality underneath. For many LGBT pupils, dressing to express their sexuality or gender identity is not a cloak but an expression of their true selves.”