Boys Will Be Boys, Or Else

Now that trans-bashing is taking its rightful place as the new queer-bashing, it seems particularly unkind of the Association of School and College Leaders to pester Fishy Rishi for guidance just because they've already been waiting five years; let alone because Fishy Rishi once pledged in an unguarded moment that he would provide it. Torn as ever between the need for stability and the need to ugly-up the culture wars, the Government has developed a sudden squeamishness over tormenting transgender children without proper evidence, or at least without the guaranteed backing of a few more Party baboons; and as one would expect, the minister for equalities is greatly concerned lest certain pronouns be treated more equally than others. The head of the Association of School and College Leaders has demanded, of all things, clear, practical guidance on whether tale-telling and birth gender should be enforced in schools, thereby demonstrating the usual teacherly insensitivity to the dilemmas of real people with helicopters and swimming pools to look after.