The first use of the word is attested in French around the year 1000. Coming from the Greek “mêtêr”, it will give rise to madre (Spanish), maïre (Occitan), mare (Catalan), matir (Celtic), mutter (German) and mother (English). In 1650, the grammarian Gilles Ménage even argued that the word “mama” would have been formed “by nature itself in the mouths of children” since, everywhere, they “begin to speak by pronouncing lip letters”.
But what could 2000 years of history weigh on the little gray men of the Zurich administration? They recently “decreed” the banning of the terms “dad” and “mom” from the administration’s vocabulary and advised parents against their use. As if, to please the ambidextrous, it was necessary to eliminate the left and the right.
Hardly a day goes by without us noticing how these ideologies previously reserved for a few militant sects and which we refer to as “gender theory” have infiltrated all administrations. Even sexuality classes intended for primary and secondary school children are no longer spared. My colleague Jean-François Lisée recently demonstrated that the Guide for schools on diversity issues integrated certain concepts from these radical theories. This is the case with the sex which would be “assigned” at birth and no longer observed. The feminine and masculine are nothing more than pure intellectual constructions that can be infinitely modified without the slightest material foundation – such as the necessity of reproduction, for example.
It is not only in Quebec that parents have made this discovery. In French-speaking Belgium, some have not taken off since a decree obliges students in 6e year of primary and 4e secondary school to follow Relational, Emotional and Sexual Life Education sessions (Evras). Some even vandalized and set fire to schools.
There as here, the media made much of the participants in these demonstrations which included orthodox Catholics, fundamentalist Muslims and even “conspiracy theorists” opposed to vaccination. The problem with these condemnations by association based solely on the reputation of the opponents is that they do not advance the debate in any way.
In spite of the fact that some crazy people may evoke a plot by the World Health Organization (WHO) to introduce children to masturbation and pornography, that does not change the fact that, like the Quebecois, the Belgian program wants to be also fighting against the idea of a sex “assigned” at birth. Throughout the 300 pages of the guide, we suggest discussing with the student (from the age of 5) the importance of “consolidating your own gender identity”. From the age of 9, they are taught that a trans person must feel free to “adopt a different approach (or not), change the way they dress (or not), take hormones (or not), resort to surgical operations (or not)”.
The myth of self-made-sex would it have replaced that of self-made man ? The essential thing would indeed be to “become aware that gender identity can be identical or different, come closer, move away, correspond, not correspond, differ, oscillate… from that assigned at birth”. A preliminary version of the guide even explained to children aged 9 to 11 that exchanging sexts and intimate photos could be “exciting” and “a source of pleasure”. Until the Minister of Education apologized.
If we are willing to put aside the approximations and exaggerations of social networks, the criticisms of this program go well beyond the echoes that have reached us. Thus, child psychiatrist Sophie Dechêne launched a petition signed by very serious professionals. This nuanced text calls for not cluttering “the child’s psyche with an adult frame of reference”. These experts in fact accuse the authors of defending “an ideological vision of sex education […] where each child juggles with their gender and sexuality, according to their wishes, as long as there is consent between partners (from 9 years old). » As if the only law was “feeling”.
Sophie Dechêne particularly calls for respecting this “latency period” in children between 6 and 11 years old where sexuality is on hold and which, she says, would have a crucial function for their socialization. In a world that already suffers from hypersexualization, she denounces a program that imposes on children “themes for which they are not ready.”
Here two opposing visions confront each other. That of a world where children should be freed from this terrible division between men and women imposed for millennia. That of a world which, on the contrary, would suffer from what the essayist Éric Marty calls the “almost manic verbalization of sexuality” otherwise called “the injunction of coming out “.
Perhaps it would be time to admit that a certain number of these radical theses, most often defended by militant organizations, have no place in school. Let us recognize that the controversies they arouse are far from being reduced, as people would have us believe, to a fight between enlightened elites and a bunch of monocles. The least we could do would therefore be to take the time to seriously debate it.