'Children are born without judgement': Laura Craik on why we must teach LGBTQ issues in schools

Plus the unjust persecution of Paris Jackson and the hunt for Cher’s T-Shirt
Nathan Westling
Laura Craik28 March 2019

'He looks familiar,’ I thought, upon seeing a photo of Nathan Westling on Instagram.

Duh. Westling has come out as transgender: the reason he looked familiar is that he was previously Natalie Westling, the striking red-haired model who has walked for Marc Jacobs, Prada and Chanel. Westling grew up in Arizona, where he said LGBTQ individuals were treated like ‘freaks’. I’m glad to say that at my elder daughter’s state secondary school, this is not the case. At least two girls identify as boys, and no one bats an eyelid. Thank you, London, for being a more tolerant place to live than most.

"Children are born without judgement, their minds as open as the sky. Any prejudices they acquire are learned”

Laura Craik

Which is why everything must be done to maintain and encourage London’s reputation for inclusivity. In a recent interview about the teaching of LGBTQ issues in schools, Andrea Leadsom was pilloried for saying that ‘parents should be able to choose the moment at which their children become exposed to that information’, an ill-judged turn of phrase. Of course children should be ‘exposed to that information’. Children are born without judgement, their minds as open as the sky. Any prejudices they acquire are learned. The earlier you introduce them to different permutations of sexual preference, the more readily they will accept them.

No one’s proposing classes on gender realignment surgery for five-year-olds, but the idea that being taught about same-sex relationships will ‘make you gay’, or that being educated on gender dysphoria will encourage you to ‘have’ it, as some critics argue, is ridiculous. Nobody would go through the mental and physical pain of transitioning unless they profoundly felt they needed to. ‘It wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows,’ Westling explained of his experience. ‘It wasn’t until I started to see physical changes that aligned with my mental state that I finally woke up and started living. I’m happy.’

Isn’t that all any of us wants for our loved ones? To be happy? Schools shouldn’t need to teach kids that there is no such thing as ‘normal’, or that a person’s sexuality is no one’s business but their own. But if doing so stops even one vulnerable young person from suffering pain and prejudice, then it’s a lesson well learned.

Paris is spurning

Paris Jackson at the Vanity Fair Oscar Party
FilmMagic

If you want a reminder of how much work still needs to be done to combat #EverydaySexism, look no further than the treatment of Paris Jackson in the wake of the recent documentary about her father. Sorry, but I was under the impression that Michael Jackson had three children, not one, yet it’s only 20-year-old Paris who is constantly hounded by paps, her every tear and tantrum written up with vile, distasteful salaciousness as evidence that she is in the throes of some sort of breakdown. Whose mental health wouldn’t be in a parlous state under such circumstances? Whatever her father’s crimes, Paris is innocent, her only crime to be a woman, which apparently makes it open season on conjecturing about her wellbeing. If you really cared about that, you’d leave her alone.

If I could find my shirt…

Cher's famous t-shirt
WireImage

Just when you thought life couldn’t get any worse, it seems that Cher has gone and lost her favourite top. ‘My T-shirt is gone!’ she tweeted to her 3.6m followers. ‘Black studded Rhinestone Shirt with white pirate. Worn it for 30-40 yrs. My favourite piece of clothing.’ We’ve all been there, but some of us have been there more than others. My entire life consists of hunting down the school cardigan, PE kit and ukelele of my eight-year-old, each of which lives perpetually in HaveYouSeenMy… Land (peak visiting hours: 8.35am). Maybe I should take a leaf out of Cher’s book. ‘I’m asking Saint Anthony to get involved,’ she tweeted. ‘He finds everything.’ St Anthony is the patron saint of lost things. Maybe when he’s finished looking for Cher’s T-shirt, he can turn his attention to the Brexit omnishambles. Or does he not do lost causes?

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