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Written by Kathleen Reeves for RHRealityCheck.org – News, commentary and community for reproductive health and justice.
Last week, Tennessee’s State Senate passed out of committee SB49, the “Don’t Say Gay” bill. The bill’s sponsor, Sen. Stacey Campfield, proposed this bill without luck for six years when he was a member of the House. Presumably too idiotic for state legislators in the past, the bill is now on the floor!
While the bill would technically outlaw discussion of homosexuality in the classroom before the ninth grade, its practical effects are unclear, for many reasons. First, Tennesee’s current guidelines on sexuality education, referred to (tellingly) as the “family life curriculum,” are vague and poorly-enforced. Family life education is overseen by Local Education Agencies, which often receive insufficient guidance from the state. As a result, sexuality education in Tennessee (such as it exists) is shrouded in darkness: it’s unclear what children and teenagers are learning, what and who their sources of knowledge are, and how effective this “curriculum” is.
One clear element of the state’s policy on sex ed is the mandatory promotion of abstinence. Every course on sexual health must “include presentations encouraging abstinence from sexual intercourse during the teen and pre-teen years,” according to the SIECUS report cited above. So Stacey Campfield’s insistence on banning gay talk seems redundant. … Read more
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As the longer version of the article linked to in this diary
explains, the primary concern of this legislation is not so much
“homosexual _acts_” as LGBT identity. Elementary school children
might well have parents in same-sex partnerships. It’s
_identity_ and _orientation_ which are being banned from
classroom discussions, not just sexual acts.
Also, there’s the very ugly question of LGBT-related bullying at
an early age, which need hardly be related to any specific
(mis)informaton about sexual acts, but can do immense harm to
the perpetrators as well as the victims. Sex-role stereotypes,
stereotypes or abusive language about sexual/affectional
preference, and gender identity questions are all things that
can and do come up early and often in childhood development.
Here officially imposed silence in the classroom can equal
consent to bullying, abuse, and destructive ignorance among
students crying out for some life-saving information about
themselves and their peers.
Of course, rather than following an “abstinence-promoting”
policy, the public school system should follow a
“respect-promoting” policy attacking stereotypes and double
standards, emphasizing personal autonomy and the right to say
“No” as well as the serious nature of sexual relationships
(regardless of gender/orientation) and the special
vulnerabilities of teenagers who get involved in such
relationships without fully realizing the implications.
In seeking the legitimate goal of fostering a sexual ethic of
fully informed consent and equal dignity, a school system
offering appropriate preteen education on the topic of the
variety of affectional orientations and partnerships would be
establishing a preventative foundation against teens either
deciding on their own or being induced by others to engage in
heterosexual sex for the sake of “proving that they aren’t
Lesbian/Gay.” In this area, ignorance is not bliss.
Paging ALCU of Tennessee …