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School children need to be educated about the queer community feel experts
While the country was celebrating the 70th Independence Day, The LGBTQ community was discussing ways to increase awareness about the community especially among the young generation. A panel discussion called the ‘Acceptance Meet’ was held by the Humsafar Trust and Love Matters in Bandra, Mumbai.
While the country was celebrating the 70th Independence Day, The LGBTQ community was discussing ways to increase awareness about the community especially among the young generation. A panel discussion called the 'Acceptance Meet' was held by the Humsafar Trust and Love Matters in Bandra, Mumbai.
The panel consists of eminent psychiatrist Armaan Pandey, lawyer Kranti K and education expert Jayshree Murali. One of the key points of discussion was of the importance of educating not only the queer community but also others.
Pandey, who is a veteran of several workshops conducted for children, said it is not enough to only educate adults about queers but also such education it should start right at the school level. Only when we tap young minds will they become mature adults. Right at a young age, children need to be made aware of the realities of life. Simply explaining good touch and bad touch is not sufficient, they need to be taught acceptance of themselves and others as they are.
Jayashree Murali, core management team member at VIDYA, explained the importance of conditioning. She said when a child observes in his surroundings that the idea of a man, a woman and a child is a 'normal family’; he accepts that to be ‘normal’. It is important to temper this acceptance with the reality at that age itself. So that when some of these kids become teachers in their lives later, they don’t carry that rigid thought process with them. This is why teacher training is an important cog to encourage acceptance and understanding in the classroom besides stopping the bullying as well.
Elaborating about bullying and ways to stop it, she said it is already too late to curb bullying of LGBTQ members in college as students have no knowledge or experience in accepting a queer member through their younger years or school. So the anti-ragging or anti-bullying forms, though well intentioned come to a nought.
Speaking on the anti-ragging Act, she added: "The anti-ragging Act doesn't blanket children in schools. If there is an incident that occurs, it is dealt at the principal level and not in a classroom which too needs to be catered too."
Dr Anjali Chabria, who launched the 60-page Strengthening Bridges – a manual for counsellors to support parents of LGBTQ, said: "The very basic acceptance that parents need to be educated about is that homosexuality isn't a disorder and their child doesn't need to be changed. He is 'normal'."
* Read the original story by Forum Gandhi on www.dnaindia.com