I find myself in the odd position this morning of supporting the Allans.

[Monty92]

No. You can teach children about contraception without telling them it is a good thing or how they should feel about it. The problem here is that the agenda - while perhaps well-meaning - has no place in the classroom. It is the attempt to indoctrinate that I find wholly repulsive because there is nothing to prevent the state from doing the same with other - less benign - beliefs.

For instance, I take it you would object - as do I - to much of the pro-Islam teaching of comparative religion that is going on in our schools. In doing so, you would be standing on the same principle as these Allan parents - that the wish of the state to encourage a given mode of thought should not be allowed to go unchecked regardless of the parents' wishes.

Ultimately, I do not believe it is the place of the state to dictate to children what their beliefs should be.

Are you sure you know enough about what this Brummie school has been teaching to describe it as "indoctrination"?

I'm really not sure lessons about contraception come with any less of a value judgement. Even if these lessons focus on the utilitarian benefits of contraception, rather than the perceived moral ones, this would still be abhorrent to someone who considers contraception to be morally wrong.

Yet presumably you'd have no truck with such a person, which seems wholly inconsistent to me.

[Burney]

Are you sure you know enough about what this Brummie school has been teaching to describe it as "indoctrination"?

I'm really not sure lessons about contraception come with any less of a value judgement. Even if these lessons focus on the utilitarian benefits of contraception, rather than the moral ones, this would still be abhorrent to someone who considers contraception to be morally wrong. Yet presumably you'd have no truck with such a person, which seems inconsistent to me?

Yes, because its mere existence is indoctrination. It is a programme called 'No Outsiders' that 'interrogates and challenges heteronormativity in primary schools' (consider the sinister nature of that for one moment). It is specifically designed to teach that there is nothing abnormal about alternative sexual or gender categories. Now that is by definition untrue, since those things are patently abnormal - something it is perfectly possible to agree with without implying anything pejorative. So what you have there is an attempt to teach a lie to children. I think I'd call that indoctrination.

And, as a Catholic, I can tell you that it is perfectly possible to teach the utilitarian benefits of contraception while accepting that for some those benefits are outweighed by the doctrinal prohibition of the practice.