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UK School District: “Boys” Can Also Have Menstrual Periods

December 17, 2018

In a move one member of Parliament has called “insanity,” schools in Brighton and Hove in East Sussex, England will now teach elementary-age students that menstruation is not “gender-specific.”

This follows the institution of the Red Boxes program, which will provide “period products” for children in all schools. The Red Boxes program is a “national voluntary organization” specifically aimed at addressing “period poverty,” or the inability of some girls due to limited financial resources to acquire things like tampons and absorptive pads needed to manage menstruation.

The measures were approved December 3 by the “Neighbourhoods, Inclusion Communities & Equalities Committee” – or NICE – of the Brighton & Hove City Council.

According to the NICE guidelines available online, schools are to speak in an inclusive manner to all students about periods or menstrual cycles.

The guidelines include these statements:

• “Language and learning about periods is inclusive of all genders, cultures, faiths and sexual orientations. For example; ‘girls and women and others who have periods.’”
• “Trans boys and men and non-binary people may have periods.”
• “Periods are something to celebrate and we can see this in ceremonies and celebrations across the world.”

The Telegraph reports that the city council stated that by “encouraging effective education on menstruation and puberty, we hope to reduce stigma and ensure no child or young person feels shame in asking for period products inside or outside of school if they need them. […] We believe that it’s important for all genders to be able to learn and talk about menstruation together… Our approach recognizes the fact that some people who have periods are trans or non-binary.”

MP David Davies told the Daily Mail it is “insanity” to be to be teaching the “concept of transgender boys having periods to eight-year-olds.”