You can make a difference by…
1. Alerting other parents to what is being proposed
You can do this by sharing leaflets and information by social media or in person, and by organising meetings to raise public awareness. As this is a grassroots camapign by concerned parents and teachers, we are dependent on local people around the country to raise awareness in their own local community.
2. Contacting all your local TDs (see www.whoismytd.com) to request that they respect parents’ constitutional rights and do not support Fine Gael’s rush to change the Education Act (1998) to try to impose this extreme and compulsory on all schools and children.
A sample, fact-based email / letter to a TD could look like this:
Dear Deputy
I write to you to express my concern about proposed reforms of the Relationship and Sex Education (RSE) programme taught to children in primary and secondary schools.
While the NCCA has yet to devise a curriculum, its recent report ‘A Review of RSE in Primary and Post-Primary Schools’ builds on the recommendations of the Oireachtas Education & Skills Committee’s report on Relationships and Sexuality of January 2019.
The committee’s recommended changes include teaching children about the full spectrum of gender identity, informing them about LGBTQI sexuality, promoting pornography literacy and the idea that abortion is a form of reproductive healthcare.
I am strongly of the opinion that none of these topics should form the content of lessons to be delivered to children in primary or secondary schools. These are matters that belong in the adult sphere and are entirely unsuitable for young minds. Parents know their children best and it would be a reckless abandonment of their parental duties to trust complete strangers to educate their children about such sensitive aspects of adult life.
It must be up to the parent, having regard to their inalienable right as the “primary educator” under Article 42. 1 of our Constitution, to decide if, when and how such advanced and graphic information on sex and sexuality is brought to the attention of their children.
Particularly troubling is recommendation no.14 of the Oireachtas committee’s report which states that the Education Act (1998) should be amended to remove ethos as a “barrier” to the teaching of a reformed RSE curriculum. This is nothing more than an attempt to circumvent the parent's right to opt their child out of RSE lessons. It is telling that the press release accompanying the Oireachtas report notes that any such legislative change should happen before the end of 2019.
Throughout this process there has been much talk about “consent” being at the centre of any new RSE curriculum.
I expect you as my TD to defend my right as a parent to have the choice to withhold my consent for my child to receive instruction in sexually graphic lessons. If other parents are happy with these proposed changes then it should be opt in. If, on the other hand, you join the consensus and attempt to legislate away that right on the spurious grounds that agenda-driven “experts” and NGO lobby groups know better than me what is good for my own child, then you should not expect to receive a vote from me at the next general election.
Yours sincerely,