Proud of who we are, yet no respect from our peers

Our schools are accepting baseless discrimination even while being ordered to comply with non-discrimination policies towards queer youth. Bullying towards the queer community is still prevalent in British Columbian schools, this in spite of the Ministry of Education requiring all school districts to create codes of conduct that enshrine non-discrimination against queer persons. The BC Liberal Government prefers to wash their hands of the issue, claiming that there is ‘no evidence’ that school boards aren’t working to comply with the Ministry order. This is difficult claim to make when fewer than ten of the sixty school districts in British Columbia have complied with the order, and why should they? The Government has shown that it’s not interested in actually doing anything to aid queer youth in the schools; there are no penalties for failing to update the district codes of conduct to reflect the new policy, and the results speak for themselves.
Just in British Columbia, over sixty percent of self identifying queer people admit to facing verbal abuse from their peers because of their sexual orientation, while anywhere between thirty and fifty percent face other forms of harassment at schools. In addition to these startling numbers, over seventy-five percent of queer youth report feeling unsafe in our schools, and shockingly, twenty-five percent admit that they have been physically harassed because of their sexual orientation. Children are in our schools to learn, and they cannot learn when they fear for their safety. This is an issue that is far beyond simple divisive politics, this is about making sure our children, all our children, are able to grow and learn in a safe environment without fear of being attacked because of who they are or who they are perceived to be. This harassment doesn’t come without substantial emotional and physical harm to the children that it is inflicted upon. Queer youth who report harassment are over two hundred and fifty percent more likely to intentionally harm themselves, three hundred percent more likely to seriously consider suicide and are four hundred percent more likely to attempt suicide.
The BC Government has made a good first step, allowing the elective Social Justice 12 course to be taught in BC schools. But this is not an issue that should be elective for students to avoid until their last year of public schooling. Even when we don’t see them in the classrooms, there are queer students all around us in the school system. How do we as a society accept that we are a fair and equal society when we refuse to teach our children that the myriad sexual orientations and gender identifications are not only natural, but are just as ‘good’ and ‘proper’ as heterosexuality? What is equal about celebrating the child with heterosexual parents and then going silent when meeting a student’s two fathers? If this government is truly dedicated to aiding queer students and erasing the pain and suffering they face in our schools, they will enact legislation and policies that not only make queer friendly literature available to all students in an age appropriate manner, but they will make sure that it is not as an elective, but as a requirement to graduation, just like non-discrimination lessons are required for racism and sexism.
It is long past time that we stop ignoring the signs as juvenile teasing and start accepting that homophobia is still a prevalent part of school society. British Columbians pride themselves on how open and accepting we are, so now it is time to start backing up our words with action, and end homophobia in our schools.