http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2013/10/03/comment-australia-not-ready-gay-marriage
“Don’t be a faggot”/”That’s so gay”/“go out with me, what
are you, a lesbian?”
They’re the homophobic slurs that litter the classroom,
playground and online spectrum, and they are not okay. Their pervasive presence
in the classroom has spanned the decades, and rather contradictorily, continues
now in an age where the overall acceptance of the LGBTAQ lifestyle has
skyrocketed- at least in the metropolitan area.
Curtis Campion in the above article points out the very
different implications of being gay when living in the county, versus the city.
“These kids get physically and verbally assaulted until they
are run out of their schools and run out of town. They are disowned by their
friends, their family, their teachers and the community as a whole. These kids
grow up feeling like they are an abomination and that no one is on their side.
Often that's the case. They are, to all intents and purposes, totally alone.
In Australia, according to latest Census statistics, there
are 33,714 same sex couples. Half live in Melbourne or Sydney, with most
residing in capital cities. Just 7,289 do not. Because they can't. If they don't have the financial means, or if
their livelihood is on the land, looking after the family farm, they simply
can't.
Less than 0.3 per cent of people in country towns - pockets
of civilisation surrounded by hundreds of kilometres of bush and farms -
identify as gay, compared to 17 per cent in inner Sydney. I moved 2,000
kilometres to go from 0.3 per cent to 17 per cent. I knew it wasn't safe so I
moved somewhere I would be. Somewhere where I knew I would be accepted. But I
shouldn’t have to flee to Oxford Street.”
On the whole, the issue is symptomatic of a broader intolerance
fed by ignorance, but it is interesting to note the different variations that
homophobia presents itself in. The closest related phenomena, I believe lies in
Julie Minikel-Lacocque’s taxonomy of racial microagressions. While
Minikel-Lacocque is concerned with recording the experiences of a group of
Latino/a students in a predominantly white university, and dividing them
according to subtlety and severity; the system can be transferred to the issue
of homophobia within an Australian context.
Racial microagressions are “commonplace verbal or behavioural
indignities, whether intentional or unintentional, which communicate hostile,
derogatory, or negative racial slights and insults”. Surely then, a Homophobic microagressions
would be a commonplace verbal or behavioural indignity, whether intentional or
unintentional, which communicates hostile, derogatory, or negative slights and
insults on the basis of sexual preference and identity.
A microinsult: a behavioural/verbal remark or comment that
conveys rudeness, insensitivity and demean a person’s sexual preference or identity-
such as “That’s so gay, miss, I don’t wanna read that!”.
A micro-assault: An Explicit homophobic derogations
characterized primarily by a violent verbal or nonverbal attack meant to hurt
the intended victim through name-calling, avoidant behaviour or purposeful
discriminatory actions- “nah you can’t play footy with us, you’re a faggot”.
A microinvlidation: Verbal comments or behaviour that
exclude, negate, or nullify the psychological thoughts, feelings, or
experiential reality of a LGBTAQ individual. – “I didn’t mean gay as in ‘gay’,
I meant it like ‘lame’, you know what I meant, don’t be so sensitive- it’s no
big deal.”
While obviously the idea is not exact it’s clear to see that
the taxonomy is one of general intolerance which works as well for race as it
does homophobia. The question is, how can we implement this notion into the way
we deal with homophobia within the Australian education system. There is so
much to remedy, does the focus need to firstly address larger issues, such as
the ability of private schools to suspend and expel students for coming out
about their sexuality- or do both the insidious and outright expressions of
homophobia need to be examined simultaneously.
The above article contains two letters from gay students to Independent
NSW State MP Alex Greenwich who “is lobbying for the NSW State Government to
change its Anti Discrimination Act so private and independent schools cannot
expel students on the basis of their sexuality.” They reveal several of the
adverse effects than can fall to students who aren’t supported within their
school environment when the matter of their sexuality comes into question.
Clearly,
change needs to occur on the larger issues, but it is clear that like the
battle against racism, the road to combating homophobia within not only the
education system, but larger society is one that will be long and at times
un-ending. It is not enough to target the big issues, but turn the other cheek
while students continue to use gay as a declaration of inferiority, or mistake
such slurs as completely acceptable. No matter how micro, aggression and
discrimination on the basis of either race or sexual preference is unacceptable
and needs to be explicitly addressed.
I look forward to a future in which ‘gay’
might be used as a positive term – “Brad is so comfortable expressing notions
that fall beyond the hegemonic ideal of his masculinity, it’s like so totally
gay of him, how fantastic, I think I’ll ask him out!”
____________
____________
Campion, C. (2013, October 3). Comment: Australia is not
ready for gay marriage. SBS. Retrieved October 28, 2013, from http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2013/10/03/comment-australia-not-ready-gay-marriage
Minikel-Lacocque, J. (2012). Racism, college, and the power
of words: Racial microagressions reconsidered. American Educational Research
Journal, 50(3), 432-465.
Piotrowski, D. (2013, October 1). Letters from gay Australian
students: How our schools tried to 'fix' us. NewsComAu. Retrieved October 28,
2013, from
http://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/real-life/letters-from-gay-australian-students-how-our-schools-tried-to-8216fix8217-us/story-fnixwvgh-1226730816449
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