Greens to fight homophobic bullying
A day after making her inaugural speech in the NSW Parliament, new Greens MLC Cate Faehrmann has spoken out about homophobic bullying.
“I draw to the attention of the House the disturbing issue of homophobic bullying in schools,” Faehrmann told the Legislative Council.
“Most teenagers will not be surprised to hear that best estimates suggest that close to half of gay and lesbian young people experience verbal abuse or bullying because of their sexuality or gender identity.
“However, I am concerned that many other people in the community do not understand the scale of what is going on in our schools and communities, nor the immense pain that even verbal bullying can cause.”
Faehrmann read from a letter a young man had sent to her about the anguish he felt as a result of homophobic bullying at school.
“I felt that if I came out at high school then it would have been just as bad as putting a target on my face and telling everyone to have their best shot,” the man wrote.
“I … had no one to talk to about it. No friends, no family, no one. I felt so alone and just wanted to scream and cry but couldn’t.”
Faehrmann told MLCs they had a responsibility to examine the issue and to listen to young people so that long-term responses could be developed.
“Addressing prejudice when it rears its ugly head is an enormously complex task,” she said.
“To address this we need to look at many underlying factors, including cultural norms shaped by religion and ideology.
“Just as this Parliament has shed light on the issue of domestic violence, sexual violence and child abuse in the past, it is time this Parliament shed light on the extent of homophobic bullying in our schools.”
Faehrmann told Sydney Star Observer she was beginning a consultation process on the issue and was calling for input from members of the GLBTI community.
“Over the coming weeks and months I’ll be talking to as many people as I can,” she said. “I have a number of meetings scheduled with stakeholder groups already.
“This is an extremely complex issue and it requires a lot of planning and discussion across a whole range of people and organisations.
“But I know that many of the answers to the problem of homophobic bullying are with the people who have experienced it and I want to hear from you.”
With my recent experience with my own daughter had homophobic comments directed at her and attacked by a known school bully. Zero tolerance policy means that both the offender and the victim get expelled / suspended. I warn people not to fall into catchy glib cure alls that get popularise by do-gooders and miss informed academics trying to push a research paper that they put together with little actual real world trials. These issues need real solutions that can not be solved by a blanked approach but actual investigation and hard work to bring about a resolution on a case by case basis. I think at time our school system and administrators are either under funded and or educated to do this.
Thanks to the star observer for reporting on this.
Bayne MacGregor,I understand your comment and respect that.But on a personal view I strongly believe that “Counciling” to bullys will be a complete waste of time.
Bullys only understand PAIN,and like is always the case 99% of the time,when attacking an Individual they ALWAYS have back-up.
As an adult now if ever get hit,you quickly learn to hit TWICE AS HARD BACK! The do-gooders will cringe about hearing this and quickly hug a tree for moral support,But to battle Bullys you best face them on their own turf,they retreat and slip into disbelief.
I totally respect your comment Craig,I suffered a similiar fate at School.The Schools Bully,A Notorious Basher,Sick & Twisted,I saw him a few Years ago,He’s a Pathetic Junkie,His choosen career path,Yep karmas a bitch,good isn’t it.
“homophobic….schools”? Macquarie Grammar School tries to comply with the Anti-Discrimination Act by staffing its Stalls at Fair Day; participating in IDAHO Events, the Gay Games; presenting at the “NSW Anti-Homophobia Interagency Conference”, etc.
“expensive school”….I hear anonymous bloggers tap away at their keyboard; we offer scholarships and bursaries.
“located in the back o’ Bourke”—yep, it’s easy to be critical, when being anonymous; we’re located in Sydney’s CBD.
Our ‘transgender’ student didn’t experience any bullying at our School or at our Social Events—eg Floats in the Mardi Gras Parade—to me, she looked like she was quite enjoying herself; as Principal, it is my duty of care, to ensure that the School is answerable to taxpayers, if we are to be in receipt of State and/or Federal funding.
“You can lead a horse to drink but you can’t make it water”—Joh Bjelke-Petersen.
I hated school. Being a dancer in the Western suburbs I was constantly bashed & depressed. I even got it from a teacher in a catholic school (beign called a poofter in front of other kids in the class while I was absent) before moving to a public school where it got worse. I was living in fear every afternoon the school bell rang. Something must be done. It’s horrible. At least I got out of the area & school by working a the age of 15 & all those thugs grew up to hang out at the pub & got into drugs. Well suck shit to all of them Karma’s a bitch & she’ll get you real good.
mark of sydney, the solution to a threat is to fight it not to give in to it. Plenty of people get tormented at school despite being closeted, the merest imaginary hint can be enough. People got used to mixed-race schools and mixed-sex schools and kids whose mums had educations and whose mums had jobs. How? By having it happen in front of them. If we give in to the threat of terror we have no solution, just a retreat that will keep retreating. Some kids will have gay parents even without adoption. So the answer is not to give in to the threat of bullying by disallowing adoption it is ti have a zero-tolerance response to bullying, mandatory counselling for bullies, investigation of bullies parents (in case the bullying of others is a result of the bully being abused) and other sensible ways of ending bullying.
I suffered plenty of bullying and assualts at school. I had around 10 years of frequent nosebleeds from one assault on the bus in year 6. In the 90’s at highschool the Victim was sent to counselling and told to ‘conform and act like everyone else’ and the bully not dealt with at all. Thats a recipe for more bullying. Yet what happened to me if done by an adult to an adult would be a criminal offence, assault, which could be punished by jail.
The answer is not submitting to threats of violence and harassment, it’s ensuring that every bully (and their families) is investigated, every one is given therapy, that there be no tolerance whatsoever for harassment of anyone or violence towards anyone. Oh and US studies show Transgender kids are far more at risk than Gay and Lesbian kids and thats pretty much certain to be true in Australia considering the recent Queensland violence and harassment study. Gender expression and Identity is very often the aspect that attracts homophobic violence the most, so lets be sure that the most vulnerable get the most protection and defence.
In the US media today is the sorry story of a teenager who shot and killed himself because of the continued homophobic bullying that he received.
It is abysmal that such bullying goes on – and is tacitly supported through Government inaction in removing open discrimination against homosexuals; discrimination that tacitly supports these bullys by confirming their opinion that “poofs don’t count”
Excellent Story,Tells the truth on what happens to gay kids to Mainly hetro parents in schools.
Faehrmann spells it in Black & White how much grand the Scale is of Verbal Abuse and Immense Pain gay students go through.
My question is imagine if a Student who Is straight tells or someone finds out that they have two Dads or mums?
I know i,ll get crucified for this,but Im not for it,Being able to adopt children,Unless…
The kid gets private tutoring from home as although this being 2010 that Kid in a Public/Private School will go through Hell for years,and theres no escape.
“You have two dads? You must be a Poof too,BASH HIM!!”
Run to the teacher,who knows they could be a Homophobe and turn a blind eye.
I saw what happens to openly gay kids in High School,Now as an adult Im reading that School Kids,Abuse Each other through Facebook,My Space,SMS EVEN Film Attacks on their Mobile Phones then Place it on the Internet.
thanks