It is difficult for people who do not identify as same-sex attracted or gender diverse to understand the daily struggle endured by some members of the LGBTI community.
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In their homes, in their schools and in their workplaces, many men, women and gender-neutral people face discrimination because of the person they are predisposed to love, and the person they were predisposed to be.
So when something tries to lighten the burden on these marginalised people, like the Safe Schools Coalition does, it is a cause for celebration.
Efforts to disband homophobia and transphobia in schools are especially powerful because they have the potential to establish respect as a bedrock value of the next generation.
That's what the Safe Schools Coalition is: a way to teach respectful relationships between people, regardless of their sexual identity.
It's not groundbreaking stuff.
But for young queer people, it might be life-changing.
For LGBTI adults who once felt the barbs of homophobic schoolyard slurs, who were taught to hide who they were and diminish themselves, it is an assurance other people will not face the same inhumanity.
However, no school inside the City of Greater Bendigo has signed up as a Safe School.
Principals say their institutions already have meaningful programs in place to foster respectful relationships and teachers are already advised on how to create an inclusive environment.
It’s for this reason they have defended their decision not to sign on to the Safe Schools Coalition.
They say they are always open to ways in which their schools can be more inclusive, and suggest any program aimed at students be accompanied by professional development for teachers who deliver it.
Then why don’t they make the symbolic gesture of joining with the 500 institutions already part of the Safe Schools Coalition?
It would send a powerful message to LGBTI people, who are six times more likely to take their own life than their heterosexual peers.
It would forcefully say to its school community that intolerance is not welcome inside its gates.
And it would be a reason to take pride.
- Mark Kearney, journalist