Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by the author(s) do not represent the official position of Barbados TODAY.
Barbados is at a critical juncture. In terms of some new laws and social policies, the country is on a path to internationally-assisted social suicide.
It has to do with ‘the modern world’ and the abuse of language. Early in our descent, The Remote Employment Act, 2020, and the Employment (Prevention of Discrimination) Act, 2020 turned on the red light.
In these pieces of legislation, the word ‘spouse’ was replaced by ‘partner’ and the term, ‘domestic partnership’ was introduced, tacitly normalising same-sex relationships. Months later, via the 2020 Throne Speech, the Government announced its intent to recognise same-sex civil unions. Then, in November 2021, the Charter of Barbados was rushed through Parliament retaining the non-scientific, purely ideological term ‘sexual orientation.’ Having bought into the non-negotiable ‘sexual rights’ package, the new Republic was up for ransom. Now, in response to multiple forces pressuring Government, ‘Comprehensive Sexuality Education(CSE) threatens to be part of the Health and Family Life Education (HFLE) curriculum in schools and pre-schools.
And what exactly is CSE? Basically, it is sex education that teaches that humans are sexual from birth and should therefore freely engage in sexual pleasure from birth and throughout their lifetime.
Since such sexual indulgence carries risks of disease and pregnancy, the answer which CSE provides is to teach children and youth how to minimize the consequences of liberal sexual expression by accessing various contraceptive methods and treatments for sexually transmitted infections.
In CSE, girls are taught that they have a right to terminate an unwanted pregnancy because ‘It’s your body.’ In sexual rights jargon, all of this is subsumed under the term, ‘sexual and reproductive health’.
CSE revolves around the notion of ‘sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI). SOGI is a concocted delusion that there are sexes other than male and female, and that gender is a matter of how a person feels about their sexuality, who they are attracted to, and what sex they believe they are or would like to be.
According to CSE teachings, this matter of gender identity is ‘fluid’; a person can be male today, female tomorrow, both the next day, and neither the day after.
Such ignorance would be laughable if it did not have the weight of the law behind it.
Unfair dismissals, males entering and dominating female sports, contentions about who uses which bathroom, litigation due to ‘misgendering’, heavy fines for being true to one’s conscience – all of these are loaded onto the SOGI bandwagon.
This institutionalised folly is a serious matter. It is time that all concerned Barbadians, particularly parents and teachers, familiarise themselves with the content of CSE curricula and raise strenuous objection to CSE being part of any syllabus that is mandatory for their children.
It is also time for Government to choose to honour God by not sanctioning CSE in any of its many disguised forms.
If that is too much to ask, then at least our elected leaders can apply the COVID-19 approach in deciding whether to introduce CSE in Barbadian schools and pre-schools: Simply, “Follow the science and act out of an abundance of caution.”
Dr. Veronica C. Evelyn
