Public school teachers in one state of Australia have been prohibited from teaching gender theory after an independent review of the state’s health and sex education program.
Students in New South Wales will no longer be taught that gender is a “a social construct”, or that sexuality is “non-binary” and “constantly changing”, The Australian reports.
A policy designed to “de-gender” language in the classroom will also likely to be abolished, together with sexually explicit case studies and teaching resources such as the “Genderbread Person” – which promotes a view that there are “infinitive possibilities” of gender identity.
The review was announced back September, after reports that a widely-used sex education resource, the “Teacher Toolbox”, had broken legal guidelines.
One of the toolbox’s sections, portrayed as an LGBTI anti-bullying campaign, teaches gender fluidity to 11-year-old children. Critics of the scheme described it as “compulsory gender-bending sex education,” and “destructive of the natural family”.
The revelations about New South Wales’ compulsory sex education program for Years 11 and 12 called “Crossroads,” also sparked a review by the government into the scientific underpinning of material used in classrooms.
The results of the review were provided to teachers, providing a list of resources that shouldn’t be used.
The list includes the 17-page Teacher Toolbox resource, the Affirming Diversity unit for students at Year 10, and three of the sexual and gender diversity activities within the “Crossroads” program.
One of the activities, called “Opposite Ends of the Pole”, asks students to consider various sexually explicit case studies, including “Joseph”, a man married with three children who “masturbates [and] fantasises only about men”.
Another case study is about “Alex”, who had sex with girls as a teenager but later started a relationship with a man.