And here's the speech I wish I gave:
Good morning to parents and representatives of the Ministry of Education. I’m Lim Ya Wen from NUS High School, and I’m cutting straight to the point.
For many weeks, I planned to start off with “Good morning, my name is yawen and I’m a lesbian”, so I could prove a point about how people would react to such taboo and controversy, but I decided not to risk it. I decided against it because I realised I didn’t want my speech to scream “gay rights”. I want it to be a serious discussion about how things could change for the better. I might sound like a certain president of the United States, but don’t tell me words don’t matter.
I propose that our sexual education syllabus be revised to include Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transsexual (LGBT) matters. It is evident that as LGBT pride communities all around the world emerge to strive to bring about equality for all genders and sexualities, we cannot remain ignorant.
Homosexuality has been around for longer than we can imagine. 25th century BC, a tomb is built for two Egyptian men in an intimate relationship. 6th century BC, homosexuality is recorded to be widespread and legalised throughout the Roman and Greek empires. 4th century BC, a bisexual Alexander the Great leads millions into viewing same-sex relationships positively. But centuries later, in 1952, the American Psychiatric Association included homosexuality in its ‘Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders’. What happened?
Currently, homosexuality is covered in only one lesson in the MoE’s sexuality education programme, where it, quoted from the website “seeks to inform students of the definition of “homosexual”, and that homosexual acts are illegal under Singapore law. It does not promote homosexuality, but follows social norms of mainstream society”.
I’ll be frank and tell you how I think it sounds: chicken. It’s a stance that shows fear of backlash, a fear of criticism, a fear of venturing forwards. It is cautious, but it is not practical.
School is stressful enough without having to deal with unnecessarily tedious issues such as coming to terms with sexuality and self-doubt and depression, et cetera. We know that homosexuality remains such a sensitive topic and is withheld in schools only because many parents do not want their children to be exposed to the idea of homosexuality.
I’m not accusing you of bigotry, or of homophobia, but you must see that we cannot hide in ignorance forever. People need to know that there are a few factors that contribute to an individual’s sexuality, and none of them “because God made you wrong”. A lot of mystery is shrouded around homosexuality, and because of this mystery, there are those gays who’ve come to establish themselves as rule-breakers with a “I-can-do-what-I-want” attitude, because being gay is against the law anyway.
Take, for example, a boy called Ed. Ed finds out he’s gay. He doesn’t know what to do. Is there a protocol for this? Nobody knows. His parents are homophobes. They find out. They tell him he is condemned to hell. Ed is scared. Ed desperately tries to cling onto whatever will accept him for the disgrace he is. And whoa. Ed finds a boyfriend. They have sex. Obviously, a man cannot get another man pregnant, so Ed forgoes protection. They break up, but Ed continues to sleep around. Then Ed finds out he has HIV.
This is how the social stigma of “homosexuals spread AIDS” was born. Do you know that when you fill out forms for blood donation in Singapore, they specifically ask you if you’re a man and if you’ve had sex with another man. If you’re a woman, they ask you if you’ve had sex with a man whom you suspect has had sex with another man. I understand that certain precautions have to be taken, but this is ridiculous and bordering on discrimination. We have to put and end to this, and we can.
So how do we?
Through a revised sex ed, we could slowly introduce topics like sexual identity, coming to terms with oneself, opening up to parents, safe sex between same-sex couples and so on. Sex ed packages need not be specifically addressed towards these issues, but it would be great it they could integrate lesson plans with LGBT scenarios as well. It provides a sense of inclusion and acceptance, and lets adolescents know that if they have problems, they can be addressed without being judged.
School counsellors can be trained to be open and accepting and show no qualms when troubled teens need someone to confide in concerning sexuality issues.
We could also lift bans on children’s books that include same-sex couples, so we can relay the message that there is absolutely nothing wrong with being gay.
One of the most banned books in the United States is a children’s book about a pair of male penguins who hatch an egg together and raise the chick as their own, and many adults hate it immensely. Children to whom the book was read raised no queries about the “odd pairing”, and were able to enjoy it as yet another story about a happy family.
Some parents might argue that sex ed like this is going to put ideas into their children’s heads and they’ll end up queer and revolting, but it’s like saying you don’t want your child to learn how to drive because there are risks of them getting into car accidents.
Parents will oppose to these plans because they feel morally disgusted about LGBT. This type of disgust is culturally determined, meaning when one has become accustomed to seeing only heterosexual couples and being exposed to primarily heterosexual romance, it becomes unusual and shockingly foreign. This sense of disgust isn’t due to any rational reason, like being disgusted by rotten food because it’s unhygienic and could kill you if you ate it, but evoked just because it’s different. How is that not senseless discrimination?
Sexual education in this country should not be ‘this is what homosexuality is, but don’t do it because we’ll arrest you’, but it should be a ‘this is what homosexuality is, and that’s okay. You may carry on with your life’. So one day when the ones who have been taught and understand go on to have children of their own, we’ll have generations of acceptance. Nobody will need to be defined specifically by their sexuality anymore.
And just so you know, in 1973, twenty-one years later, the American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from its comprehensive list of mental disorders.
So as Peter Parker’s uncle Ben Parker once said, “With great power comes great responsibility”, and you, with the power to bring about a better education, and with it acceptance and understanding, are responsible to grant it. So grant your children the education they need now. Let them know they can be who they are.
Thank you.
