Should the LGBT agenda be included in the Department of Education's curriculum?

For posterity’s sake, I’m pausing my Maria Clara at Ibarra series so I can comment on the Department of Education’s (DepEd) inclusion of the LGBT agenda into the Grade 10 Araling Panlipunan curriculum (social studies), pages 61-62. The question that we must resolve is, “Should the current guide on contemporary gender identity issues be retained in the DepEd curriculum?”

My answer is a resounding “NO!”. Let’s discuss why.

Reason # 1: The role of educators is to teach students the different aspects of a given issue so that the latter may learn to FORM THEIR OWN CONCLUSIONS. It is not within the teachers’ authority to impose on children any ideology, whether left-wing, right-wing, or center.

The guide states that the learning competency to be achieved is the acceptance of same-sex marriage (SSM) and the promotion of various gender identity expressions. Under competency # 5, the DepEd wrote that students should be able to express views that support SSM in the country. Competency # 9 states that students should develop creative means of advocating for different gender identities.

This means that a student is considered to not have attained the learning objectives if he rejects the LGBT agenda. Talk about brainwashing!

The competency that students should acquire instead is the ability to formulate arguments that are for and against the LGBT agenda, not solely the acceptance of it. Then let the students make up their minds about what their stand ought to be.

Reason # 2: The opportunity to discuss conservative and libertarian views of sexuality is absent from the guide.

How can the students decide for themselves whether or not they should support the LGBT agenda if the teachers will only argue in favor of accepting it? The guide states under “Content” that the teachers are supposed to discuss the privileges of same-sex unions. But nowhere does it say that the students must also learn the disadvantages of state-licensed same-sex unions or marriages. (HINT: There are valid reasons why non-religious heterosexuals avoid state-licensed marriages.)

Under “Performance Standard”, the guide also states that students should be able to advocate for all gender identities in order to promote equality (“Ang mga mag-aaral ay nakagagawa ng mga malikhaing gawain na nagsusulong ng pagtanggap sa iba’t ibang uri ng kasarian…”).

Really, DepEd, are you sure about that? Don’t you know that certain groups, like the NAMBLA, are pushing for the acceptance of pedophilia as a sexual orientation like heterosexuality and homosexuality? Will pedophilia then be just another gender identity expression that you will demand students to tolerate? Where do you draw the line between acceptable and reprehensible sexual orientation?

# 3 The content promotes the idea that there are “LGBT children”.

Whoever drafted the guide is priming kids to adopt gender identities that deviate from their biological sex during a time wherein it’s natural to have questions about one’s sexuality. Because the brain is still maturing during childhood and adolescence, it’s typical for young people to experience gender confusion. But that doesn’t make them gay!

This is crucial to understand because many helping professionals now encourage kids to get sex reassignment surgery to cope with the feeling that they have a gender identity that’s different from their natal sex. Many of these children will eventually regret it.

Educators should be teaching kids how to make decisions based on facts, not on emotions. And the fact is that children either have the XX or the XY chromosomes. The fact is that there are so many safety risks in acting out a gender orientation that’s different from your biological sex. So until they’ve reached legal age and can financially sustain themselves, teachers should be telling kids to label themselves as either male or female.

I can’t imagine my parents recommending that I get sex reassignment surgery as a 4-year-old girl just because I thought back then that I was Shaider, a male Japanese superhero. During that time, I hated wearing skirts and playing with dolls. I often ran around the house wielding a plastic sword, claiming that I was Shaider. I screamed at people for telling me otherwise.

Everyone in the family just ignored that phase. A few years later, I discovered Sailor Moon and forgot about Shaider. When I was 11 years old, I underwent a phase of finding girly outfits icky, so I preferred huge T-shirts that the lesbians at my school loved to wear. I thought back then that acting boyish was a sign of strength that would prevent people from hurting me. My mom told me that I looked horrible in those big shirts and demanded that I wear tight-fitting blouses.

I obeyed, of course. The cute outfits and the crushes on biological males eventually made me realize that it’s more fun to identify as my biological sex.

So thank you, mom, for not making me transsexual. Because of you, I now sing better than Jake Zyrus! Who would’ve thought?

(Photo by Katie Rainbow)