Discrimination
Discrimination
Schools should demonstrate that they are promoting gender equality and are proactively working towards eliminating sexual discrimination and harassment.
The rights of individuals should be upheld and everyone should be treated with:
- respect
- fairness
- equality
- dignity
A program in sexual health and relationships should work toward eliminating discrimination. It is important for teachers to be aware that 8-11% of older students are not likely to be exclusively heterosexual. Teachers must be aware of their legal obligations in reference to discrimination and take responsibility for eliminating students’ actions that are discriminatory or are of a sexual harassment nature.
Some teachers may experience difficulties dealing with the homophobic attitudes of students. It is essential that teachers address inappropriate comments that may arise when discussing values or ethical issues.
Successful strategies include:
- Being prepared to respond to anti-gay, anti-lesbian or anti-bisexual slurs as would be done for racist or sexist slurs.
- Being as well informed as possible. Respect the person challenging you. Focus on challenging the negative opinions rather than the person.
- Not expecting to win or lose an encounter. You are there to say things that need to be heard. The main point is getting information across.
- Avoiding a debate of religious arguments. Where a person has strongly held views it may be more productive to discuss sexuality issues in terms of how the person is feeling.
- If students use derogatory expressions such as ‘homo’, ‘poof’, ‘leso’ or ‘that’s so gay’, use the following approach:
- Name the use of the terms as an issue. For example, "That comment is not appropriate. In our class the ground rules are .....".
- Refer to class ground rules established earlier, e.g. no put-downs
- Give the consequences that should have been established along with the gclass round rules.
