“I am outraged at ‘teaching gay sex to infants’ claims” - Dr Atkinson
September 18th, 2008
Dr Elizabeth Atkinson of the anti-homophobia project No Outsiders has spoken exclusively to Lesbilicious about her disgust at claims that her organisation is planning to teach the pleasures of gay sex to infants.
A story originally published in the Daily Mail earlier this week and then repeated in the Daily Telegraph, the Daily Star and other newspapers around the world claimed that No Outsiders was planning to teach primary school children about homosexual pleasure and desire.
The claims were made after papers were made available of a recent academic seminar at Exeter University which discussed queer sexualities and bodily activities.
The Daily Mail story alone has attracted 116 comments on its website.
Outrage
Dr Atkinson said she is outraged out how her work has been misinterpreted. “The academic analysis which was the focus of the Exeter seminar is quite separate from the classroom practice of the primary teachers in the No Outsiders project,” she said.
“I am outraged and horrified by the further misrepresentation today by the Daily Star, which claims that we are using puppets and picture books to teach the pleasures of gay sex to infants.”
“This couldn’t be further from the work we are doing in our project’s participating schools! This project has nothing whatsoever to do with sex education - it is about preventing and challenging homophobic bullying through the use of highly-acclaimed picture books, such as ‘And Tango Makes Three’ by Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson, which demonstrate that not all families are the same, and that some young people (or penguins - this is a true story!) have two loving parents of the same sex.”
“We are also developing school policies to create a more robust approach to preventing homophobic bullying, as well as working across the curriculum - for example, in literature, drama and the visual and performing arts - to explore issues of identity and the significance of caring relationships.”
“It is about recognition, respect and human rights, and the resources we are using have no more to do with sex than Cinderella does. They are all wholly age-appropriate and have been warmly welcomed by the teachers in the project.”
It hardly surprising that the fundies cannot see the difference between children that families other than they male/female model exist and gay sex. For a group of people so concerned with keeping sex out of the conversation they certainly do bring it up a lot.
Renee ∼ September 19th, 2008 8:17 pm