Girls and Boys

Conceiving a non-woke, Winston-approved Sex Education.

Girls who are boys who like boys to be girls
Who do boys like they're girls, who do girls like they're boys
Always should be someone you really love

Songwriters: Damon Albarn / Graham Leslie Coxon / Alexander Rowntree David / Alexander James Steven.

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Last month, I wrote about the Birds and Bees being cancelled. Winston Peters had identified that teaching students about “consensual, healthy, and respectful relationships” could make people angry - with the right framing.

Consulting is now underway to create a new, less informative, less woke curriculum from which to inform the nation’s children about sexuality and relationships, although not as well as previously.

Last year, an Education Review Office report showed that 91% of students and 87% of parents supported Relationships and Sexuality Education (RSE).

53% of parents said they wanted RSE to stay the same, compared to 34% who wanted a change and 13% who did not want it taught - at all.

So why are we doing this again? Given all the things being defunded, why are we wasting money redefining something that most people were happy with and replacing it with something less comprehensive?

It’s due to something that is a higher priority than the country's needs—the sacred document that underpins our nation and defines our present values—the Coalition Agreement!

You can jeer now if you like.

Winston Peters declared the previous framework for teaching about relationships and sexuality was “woke” and “out of touch”.

Winston Peters. Photo: RNZ / Angus Dreaver.

Now, I don’t want to appear ageist here, certainly not towards a group who lived through the swinging sixties, but seriously, an 80-year-old man declaring that the framework for teaching sexuality was “out of touch”?

I guess he must’ve become more enlightened since this…

Peters claims that he voted to keep homosexuality hidden and outlawed due to the danger of AIDS. This is not a man who should be determining what we teach children about sexuality.

I’m sure I’ve written about that day in 1986. I was in the fourth form, and my art teacher was so jubilant when it passed—it’s one of those memories that sticks.

It only just passed, and this is the 80s - not the 50s. The vote was 49 to 44 to legalise consensual sex between men aged 16 and over. Winston wanted it to remain illegal.

Forty years later, the NZ First-National Coalition Agreement requires “the removal and replacement of the gender, sexuality, and relationship-based education guidelines.”

Good, oh, so who’s going to decide the guidelines for this new framework?

Who better to frame the conversation with our young people than an angry conservative octogenarian, a bloke who married his childhood sweetheart - not that there’s anything wrong with that; it’s the only thing about our PM that makes me smile, and a chap who thinks taking his socks off counts as a walk on the wild side?

I imagined the scene…

Winston Peters, Christopher Luxon, and Simeon Brown are seated at a small table and chairs, as you would find in a primary school. In front of them, Erica Stanford stands ready to write on a whiteboard.

Image: BeFunky.

Winston begins: “I've two requirements: first, we don't mention sex; second, we don't mention storks. Oh, and Casey asked if we could mention that some people enjoy a cigarette after a bit of How’s your father? The donors would be delighted.”

Christopher replies, “I know we’re trying to keep this simple for your er…, without discussing any of the um… alternatives, but don't you think we have to mention sex?”

Winston responds, “Not sex, you idiot. I said sexes—genders, whatever you call them, you know, those new ones that are causing all the problems.”

Erica sarcastically asks, “Would it be acceptable to say, 'When a man and a woman love each other very much...'?

Is that fine? What else could we call it? Maybe we should avoid people altogether. Let Simeon write them a nice story about the birds and bees?”

Image: BeFunky.

Simeon blushes, making him look like a tomato with ears, and says, “Can’t we call them the mummy and the daddy? That’s what we do. I mean, will do, once our children are ready to get married.”

Christopher responds, “I like it! Mom and pop, that’ll sound like apple pie to voters.”

Erica stares at Christopher as you would over the top of glasses, although she isn’t wearing any.

“You think teaching kids to imagine their parents? Sorry, cover your ears, Simeon. Imagine their mum and dad having sex is a wholesome family image? Good lord, now I’m thinking about that stupid movie.”

“What movie?” says Winston, suddenly interested. “Shane said if there were any videos to bring him one.”

Erica turns to face the whiteboard and tries to clear a hairball.

“Why can’t we talk about the storks, Mr Peters?” simpers Simeon.

Winston: “Shane says they’re protected or some nonsense, so there should be no birds. Then we both laughed cos Shane said, ‘How can you have sex without birds?’”

Christopher began nodding and shaking his head, eyes wide, laughing and saying he couldn’t possibly comment, all at once. Simeon looked confused and a little queasy.

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Okay, enough of that. Jokes aside, Erica Stanford goes to great lengths in the article to point out that New Zealand First is not involved in writing the framework. However, the Coalition Agreement clearly defines the scope, the whats and whens that get included - and those that don’t.

The draft framework covers what the minority who want this change probably consider to be “normal” sex. However, anything outside of that is barely covered or avoided altogether.

There is little coverage of other types of relationships. Just an awareness that “Some people are sexually attracted to people of the opposite sex (heterosexual or straight), the same sex (homosexual, although preferred terms usually include lesbian or gay), or both sexes (bisexual). Some people may not experience sexual attraction towards another person (asexual).”

So I hope any kids who aren’t straight don’t miss that particular lesson. Otherwise, they might not know they exist.

We’ve time-warped back to an era of ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’. And they certainly ain’t telling. Never mind that kids have free access to the internet and other topics that exist, whether schools talk about them or not.

The draft is now open to public consultation, which worries me. I have concerns about what has been excluded, but what the experts at the Ministry have provided looks good otherwise. I don’t think it will help to have the masses have their say on when topics should be covered.

“We're going out for consultation to say, is this the right time to be talking about these differences … Is it okay that we're talking more to boys in upper secondary school about consent?”

YES, Erica. The answer is most definitely yes. We need to talk more to boys in upper secondary school about consent. Have you seen what’s online? They sure have.

I’m not talking about pornography; I’m talking about creeps like Andrew Tate, who are teaching young men to see young women as pieces of meat - and they are sponges. I don’t want some group deciding that talking more to boys about consent is all a bit woke - do you?

I have confidence that the Ministry's subject matter experts and teachers will do their best, but their hands are tied by the conservative values of a party that only received 6% of the vote.

In my view, our kids deserve better than having an angry old man, and those who support him decide what and when they are taught about relationships and sexuality.

What do you think?

Have a great day, all you lovely people. To end, a 90s classic, Blur with Girls and Boys…