Should children be told about LGBT people?

i have to say yes, it should be taught in schools, as, and i have a confession here. growing up in religious schools in england (protestant primary, catholic high school) my parents arnt religious so they were just the best schools in the area, i had never been told anything about LGBT relationships or what they are, seriously they did the talk in year 8 with a video and everything and pretended LGBT relationships didnt exist and heres the confession bit. i watched a video about the sims 3 and there was a gay couple in it, me being very young and not understanding LGBT relationships at all and what they were, it disgusted me, i was freaked out by this abnormal show of affection but then had the stupidity to post this as a comment! i then get attacked (rightfully so) for saying this as i was incredibly homophobic sounding. this is a result of lack of being told about this stuff. it could have been prevented and i could have seen it as normal if ONLY they taught that this stuff existed and what it was

 

Differences in gender and orientation should be presented as normal to children from a very young age. I have never sat down with my children and listed out different options, as honestly I would consider that othering. To use an example others have used, I've never sat my children down and explained that black people are a thing, or Asians are a thing. They're part of the norm. We've discussed, here and there, the discrimination and oppression some folks have dealt with due to ethnicity or orientation. Anything is addressed as it comes up. When my four-year-old tries to say that boys can't do X, she is gently corrected. When she said that boys have penises and girls have vulvae, I told her that's usually the case, but not always. It's not treated as a big deal in this family because I don't think it should be a big deal. With children, we have the opportunity to help them create the world we want them to live in. I strongly suspect your friend wants to send LGBTQ+ acceptance backwards.

 

They should be...they will still find out later in life about LGBT people. It's a good thing if they learn it earlier on or, IMO, as soon as they start to have questions or get interested about it. Given your proper guidance and avoiding misleading information will help them understand the issue.

 

I'm not sure if I've posted on this thread but yes I think they should.

 

I think children should be aware of LGBT people. One way which I think would be good is something that was proposed in England. Children from as young as four would be aware that LGBT people exist, and understand that they are the same as straight cisgender people. What it basically involves is, where on all maths papers there are questions like:
Jenny, and her boyfriend, Dave go to the cinema...
It would have some questions which say
John, and his boyfriend, Dave go to the cinema...
Questions like these could be incorporated into almost all subjects. I think it is great because it will make kids LGBT aware, without doing what homophobic parents believe is 'pushing the gay agenda' (whatever the hell that means) I think this would be a great way to start, before teaching older children and teens about LGBT people alongside straight people in PSE lessons.
This suggestion, however, caused a lot of controversy as many people thought that rather than the example question above, four year olds would be taught about gay sex in all subjects. I guess it's reactions like this which are why most children grow up thinking LGBT people are weird or wrong.

 

"They will become confused' is a cop-out argument, that no more applies to LGBT issues then it applies to telling them about reproduction, love or relationships in general.

 

For sure! For their own sake more than anything (ie. gender is established at age 2, so if kids don't understand the basic concept of being transgender it's pretty harmful). Doesn't have to be about sex or sexual attraction or whatever, just something as simple as "some men want to marry men and that's okay and normal", etc

 

just yes

 

Children are told when hetero people are married or in a relationship.

 

I think they should but at a certain age, teaching children about sex and gender too young could lead to confusion or misinterpretation, I'd say teach them around when they hit ten or eleven because at that age they should begin to have a basic understanding of different sexes and genders

 

As a mother myself I would want my son to understand that us of the LGBT community are just that people and all we want is to be loved and accepted no matter whom we love and choose as our life mate. Telling children about LGBT related topics when they are young will save them confusion later on. I also feel it is important to stress to them that sexuality and gender identity is not a choice it is how we are all born (regardless of orientation) and there is nothing wrong with being different.

 

My children have been and it's helped them grow as they understand the diversity of people in the world we all share.

Happy days

 

It's important that they know more about LGBTQA people. That way, they are more accepting of others early on which is very important. The only way we can really move forward is to get children to be more educated about. It shouldn't be one of those things kids aren't supposed to know or talk about. Also the "it would confuse them" argument doesn't really make sense. I think most people get confused about their sexual orientation because it's not taught to them early on that they can have many different types of attractions to many different types of people and that's okay. If kids are taught this, they'll probably be a lot less stressed and confused if they ever question their sexuality.

 

I think they should.
I would probably have realized I was trans a lot sooner if I'd been raised in an understanding family.
They would also learn to accept all types of people, and consider LGBT people 'normal'.

 

Of course. Gay is a part of life. It's not cool to brainwash a kid into thinking that "gay" is taboo.

 

They definitely should.

When I was a kid (I must've been about four or five) I used to watch 'Allo, 'Allo! a lot (hilarious old BBC TV series) and there's this male gay character that quite often hits on the main character (also male). Back then my mom explained to me that there are guys who like guys and girls who like girls (but somehow she failed to mention that there are also people who like both, all or no genders). Anyway, even though I instantly thought it was normal almost without questioning anything, I felt a certain dislike in her tone and I thought that perhaps liking people of the same gender is wrong and bad, so I didn't ever tell her that throughout the whole series I secretly hoped that the two characters will eventually get together (which didn't happen XD)

I'm glad my parents started expressing their homophobic thoughts much later, when I was old enough to think for myself, and I believe they had kept these thoughts to themselves in order not to impose their opinion on me. Mostly thanks to the fact that I was informed that LGBT people exist at such a young age I came to terms with my sexual orientation and gender identity quite easily without much of the whole "feeling confused" thing.