"You can be a girl but feel like a boy inside"
“Gender is something you feel on the inside”
“You can’t tell if someone is a boy or a girl by looking at their genitals”
"It's possible to change sex"
“Sex is a spectrum”
"There's more than two sexes because of new research into chromosomes"- Family Planning Tasmania Educator statements to Tasmanian primary school students 
Supported and paid by the state government of Tasmania to deliver 'The Growing Up Program' and 'Secondary Comprehensive Sexuality Program' to students in Tasmanian schools, Family Planning Tasmania (FPT) ironically remains a closed shop to parents wanting to know any detail about what they present to Tasmanian students in their FPT Programs when they visit schools.
Family Planning Tasmania's game of hide and seek
Though on the surface, the idea of students being aware of their growing bodies and how to safeguard themselves is a great thing, problems arise when parents ask to actually see and read the materials delivered to their child.
Schools, both public and private tout ‘inclusion, safeguarding and tolerance’ as reasons to allow the teaching of FPT’s programs on campuses despite parents being excluded from knowing the exact content of programs. FPT ‘educators’ regularly express sexual paraphilias (autogynophilia and transsexualism) in front of students when teaching: male FPT educators claiming to be women and dressed up in women’s clothing are currently employed by FPT to deliver content to primary school students. But why would FPT employ men who pretend to be women to teach young children about identity?
A google search quickly shows why and how organisations like FPT get away with teaching junk science about sexuality and identity in schools.
Ducking and weaving to get answers about their schools programs, it took weeks to get any sort of answer from this organisation. Emails, phone calls and finally an opportunity a face-to-face meeting in 2023 with FPT’s CEO, I was questioned why as a parent ‘would you want to know?' and bluntly refused access to material by the CEO and 3 educators who unexpectedly were also in attendance at our '1:1 meeting’. My queries were scoffed at and met with 'of course people can change sex' , 'there's new research into chromosomes' and the cherry on the cake platitude to me 'this is an issue like the same-sex marriage debate: there’s initial community resistance to the idea but then eventual acceptance'.
My mentioning to the CEO of established child development theories around gender such as Kholberg's sex constancy theory, was met with blank stares and wry smiles. I was soon shown the door with no answer to 'could I please just read your materials?'.
Parents have no right to know
Didn’t the Tasmanian Education Act and Welfare Act enshrine that parents' values were suppose to be respected and parents themselves seen as partners in their child's education, especially when parents and caregivers might like to give their perspective on what Family Planning Tasmania teaches: which is that girls can have a penis and boys a vagina?
As it trickles out - and not from Family Planning though - they do not teach the reality of sex and gender, but that sex is a social construct, as well as gender. They tell students they can change sex and that sex is not binary, despite humans being mammals.
How do they justify this logic? “Intersex conditions, new chromosome research and that stereotypes are harmful”.
There can be no discussion about this, because parents are not supposed to know the details of what they teach: no parents are allowed in the classroom when this junk science is delivered.
Just like in 'Toy Story' Tasmanian students are being taught the equivalent of the song,
I Believe I Can Fly!
Family Planning Tasmania teach political ideology as fact. They do not teach science, but ideas around sex and gender based on queer theory not prescribed by the HPE V8 curriculum to be taught in this way. Instead FPT have privileged theoretical gender ideology and are teaching it as fact to students: they have spun their own curriculum, using imported agendas and using their own interpretation, hiding behind the mantra ‘we teach content inline with the Australian Curriculum’.
Resisting Gender Ideology and Telling the Truth
Family Planning Tasmania use a 'parent information session' to placate parents and teaching staff. Their magic words allowing them access to all schools are that they 'adhere to the ACARE HPE V8 curriculum'. But ACARA’s HPE scope has ‘identity’ as a broad topic, however, gender identity ideology and stereotypes is FPT’s sole focus.
In a cost of living crisis, no teacher who oversees FPT's sessions, will speak up and risk losing their job.
It seems school communities are more than happy to accept this spin and farm out their responsibilities to third party groups like this to come in and teach 'the tricky stuff'.
Any effort to press Family Planning Tasmania to allow parents to read their materials is met with aggressive push back. I should know, I tried.
Lalla Mackenzie, CEO of the organisation, refuses such requests, on the grounds their materials are 'commercial in confidence' though this is inherently a conflict in interest because of child safety and a parents right to know, something which she refuses to acknowledge.
All safeguarding and sexuality teaching materials must work in partnership with parents and caregivers as set out in the National Safeguarding Principles (which Tasmania schools tout they adhere to) but this conflict is never acknowledged by her.
It all leads to a dead end
Parents and caregivers might be surprised to know that their teachers and principals have also not read the teaching materials created by Family Planning Tasmania and that they’re happy to go along with this charade.
Assurances are given by school staff, that a teacher is in the room with students as the program is delivered to students. But what actual guarantees does this provide about anything?
Is this good enough?
Tasmanian public schools proudly acknowledge to families, they act within the National Safeguarding Principles which promotes transparency and keeping no secrets from parents. It acknowledges secrecy is a powerful weapon of groomers: between those in positions of power and those who are vulnerable. Yet they allow this situation to occur between FPT and school students.
The UK government now bans the teaching of gender ideology .
Why is Australia so far behind?
Family Planning Tasmania is involved in a grooming dynamic, stridently refusing parent/caregiver access to their materials and placing themselves as the secret custodian of knowledge only shared between themselves and children.
No one seems to worry about this oversight, including my locally elected representatives.
Questions no-one wants to answer or ask
Should Tasmanian schools allow an organisation to deliver such safeguarding programs, if the organisation itself refuses ironically to adhere to National Child Safeguarding guidelines?
Should parents not know that the organisation teaches ‘identity’ not through science but predominantly through the prism of 'gender identity ideology' presenting it as scientific fact?
How can parents give informed consent to their child participating in such programs when its content is ‘commercial in confidence’ and therefore cannot be perused?
As I write, there are no Tasmanian politicians willing to ask a 'constituency question' in parliament on my behalf about how Family Planning Tasmania can contravene national safeguarding guidelines, whilst being allowed into schools to teach students about safeguarding.
The Tasmanian Parents Association and Director of Independent Tasmanian Schools, is also unwilling to follow up my questions.
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