Queen’s Park should reopen sex-ed dialogue
Ontario’s sexual education reform has brought to the surface serious tensions between the province’s diverse communities. Rather than dismissing these differences as personal choices, Premier Kathleen Wynne should take the hard road and facilitate an honest dialogue on inclusion that Ontarians badly need.
The premier’s current response avoids dealing with the fundamental issue. The planned sex-education reform is not simply about updating the health information given to students in today’s cyberbullying and sexting age, as the government claims.
The reality is that — like all education — sexual education establishes social norms and the current reform seeks to change what norms will be taught.
Education has always been a place of struggle where the shared values that underpin our society are negotiated. This is especially true of sex education, which communicates beliefs about the most intimate relationships an individual can have — the relationship with oneself, one’s parents and family, and sexual partners. It is impossible to separate this very personal education from students’ and parents’ personal beliefs or to expect common ground to exist from the outset across the spectrum of religious, cultural, and sexual diversity that makes up this province.
Rather, common ground has to be created, and this is where the premier is failing.
Parents have called on Wynne to reopen consultations on the reform. These consultations may or may not result in changes to the planned curriculum. What is more important is that they might provide the necessary space for common ground to emerge by setting the boundaries of debate and allowing genuine concerns to be heard.
Firstly, reopening consultations with parents would provide the premier with an important opportunity to directly tackle the latent and blatant homophobia underpinning the current debate — and confront the clear disinformation partisan groups have spread for their own political gain.
Gay and transgender students have a right to be a part of the school curriculum, to see themselves and their families reflected in their education and to attend schools where being gay or transgender is not something they have to explain at every turn but rather something that is understood and respected. It is surprising that Wynne has portrayed the reform as a mere upgrading of health information delivered to students rather than as an effort to correct the historical marginalization of gay and transgender students.
Secondly, renewed dialogue would allow parents with genuine concerns about the norms underpinning the reform and the age-appropriateness of the curriculum to be heard. Not all parents opposing the reform are homophobes or religious fundamentalists. For many parents, the debate is not about disliking the teaching of respect for difference, but rather about addressing the fear that their children — in learning about difference — will be encouraged to adopt values diverging from their upbringing.
Ontario’s multiculturalism is possible because parents try to pass on their religious, cultural and social values to their children while living in diverse communities. This fear is not one to be mocked but addressed through dialogue.
Instead of pursuing renewed consultations that might lead to partial consensus, the premier has advanced the opt-out mechanism as the only alternative for parents with reservations. But is this really an acceptable solution? Thousands of students across the province will simply miss out on critical sex education information that is mixed in with the more controversial facets of the program. Moreover, opting out undermines the long-run goal of building more accepting schools. Students will effectively be separated from peers whose parents hold different views from their own, losing the chance to engage in a manner critical to developing empathy for others.
Rather than advocating for opting out as the only alternative for parents, the premier should reopen a process for general consultation and establish public hearings on the reform. Whether by merely engaging with communities’ concerns or, in some cases, by addressing them with reforms, the government can promote important buy-in.
Wynne claims the curriculum consultation process that resulted in the new policy was extensive and that 4,000 chairs of parent councils across the province participated. But many parents — especially from new Canadian communities — do not have the same degree of access to the legislative process as others, due to language barriers or simply a limited understanding of how the system works. That a significant number of parents are now coming forward to speak to their MPPs should not be regarded as participation coming too late, but rather as an opportunity to address viewpoints that will make the implementation of sex education more successful overall.
There is no point pretending that the current debate is only about updating sex education for a world with Internet and cellphones.
This is a debate on contentious values that should be had openly and courageously. By reopening consultations that invite honest dialogue and set clear boundaries on respect and tolerance, the premier could take the lead on bridging differences rather than letting the conflict fester.
Renewed dialogue would allow parents with genuine concerns about the reforms and age-appropriateness of the curriculum to be heard