Government Funds Children’s Game Promoting LGBTQ
Students as young as 13 are rolling dice as part of a U.K. school program designed to be a “fun, interactive, engaging and inclusive sexual health toolkit.”
The game, called aGENDER v2, was developed by The Proud Trust “to create LGBTQ+ positive resources for schools, colleges and other youth settings, to equip them in being fully inclusive in their practice, policy and curriculum.” It’s being used in the U.K. and is for sale internationally online for $96.06 U.S.
The dice game asks students to roll a die that has various body parts on each of the sides. The die is rolled twice, and the student is asked to describe and discuss an explicit sexual act involving those body parts.
The toolkit itself tells teachers to hold their nerve because some of the combinations “might seem impossible” for children to talk about.
The toolkits can be used by schools to help to meet statutory requirements to teach relationships and sex education classes as part of new academic requirements. As part of the resource, teachers are told to encourage children to talk about sexual activities, drawing criticism from parents.
Tanya Carter, a spokeswoman for Safe Schools Alliance, told The Times, a U.S.-based news service: “This ‘resource’ clearly breaches safeguarding. The tampon tax should be used to educate girls on their rights—not prematurely sexualize them.”
The tampon tax is a tax on sanitary products. While some states and countries are moving away from taxing these products based on their being a necessity of life, other countries continue to carry high taxes on them.
The Tampon Tax Fund issues grants to nonprofit organizations “supporting women and girls,” up to more than $19 million annually. Turkey, for example, maintains a 27% tax on sanitary products. In the past year, countries like Poland, Czech Republic and Lithuania have lowered the tampon tax to 5%.
In the United States, 35 states continue to charge the tax. In January 2021, the tampon tax will cease in the U.K., a change made after Britain left the European Union.
The government grant funding aGENDER v2’s development totaled $127,945.30 U.S. {eoa}
