Your parents will read this: Reading (as) parents in journalistic coverage of the Safe Schools Coalition Australia controversy

Abstract

This article focuses on the journalistic rhetoric surrounding the Safe Schools Coalition Australia. This rhetoric is significant for two reasons. First, readers have been interpellated as parents by both pro- and anti-Safe Schools commentators. The reader/parent is either persuaded to feel indignation and horror at that program’s attempts to sexualize innocent children (and thus want to oppose Safe Schools), or gratitude that the program is actually benefiting children (and thus want to protect Safe Schools). Second, journalistic rhetoric about Safe Schools is significant because of what it suggests about how gender and sexual diversity in schools have been reported on by journalists.

Inclusive pedagogies for transgender and gender diverse children: parents’ perspectives on the limits of discourses of bullying and risk in schools

“…To contextualise the complex space in which teachers work and GSD students learn, one needs to understand a powerful discursive framing which has been perpetuated by those in strategic positions in Australia, most recently illustrated through the moral panic which was active nationwide from 2015 to 2017 in relation to an education initiative: Safe Schools Coalition Australia (SSCA). The intent of SSCA, which was run on an opt-in basis and was mostly engaged in by high schools (Thompson 2020), was to create safe and welcoming spaces for GSD students, their families and staff. The approach of SSCA transcended the traditional, bullying-oriented focus on homo/transphobic language use by positioning heteronormativity and the gender binary as limiting and not fully representative of Australia's social diversity.…”

“…Central to this moral panic, largely fuelled by high profile individuals and groups, including conservative politicians, organised religious lobbyists and right-wing media (Law 2017;Thompson 2020), were discourses of childhood innocence and parental rights. There were also references to the initiative's supposed indoctrination of students with 'radical' views around the social construction of gender, and allusions to its potency to undermine the heteronormative nuclear family.…”

“…There were also references to the initiative's supposed indoctrination of students with 'radical' views around the social construction of gender, and allusions to its potency to undermine the heteronormative nuclear family. The focus on parents and family and their apparent 'indignation and horror' (Thompson 2020, 3) was central to these arguments.…”

Queering School Leadership Preparation Curricula for Gender Justice in Public Schooling

“…The challenge that educators and educational leaders face now is to refuse to comply with oppressive conditions outlined by harmful educational laws and policies and find the moral courage to defend academic freedom in our public education institutions (Crenshaw, 2022). However, assumptions about parental perspectives concerning gender and sexuality diversity curricula are cited as the central influence of education policies and practices, and the parent subject that policymakers seem to center and be obligated to are believed to be opposed to gender inclusive educational material and who are ultra conservatives who espouse heteronormative values (Cumming-Potvin & Martino, 2014; Ferfolja & Ullman, 2017, 2020; Thompson, 2020). These policy actions impede inclusive gender curriculum development that could support students and school officials who are gender and sexuality diverse (McCabe & Anhalt, 2022; O’Malley & Long, 2017; Payne & Smith, 2014).…”