Speaking Right Speaks Volumes
The new #SpeakingUpSpeaksVolumes campaign launched by the North Western Melbourne Primary Health Network is encouraging schools to avoid gendered terms such as ‘mum’, ‘dad’, ‘husband’ or ‘girlfriend’.
The campaign also explicitly promotes consideration of ‘intersectionality’ – a left-wing school of thought that emphasises the oppression of minority identity groups.
The campaign was developed by The Shannon Company, an Australian Labor Party donor.
The North Western Melbourne Primary Health Network is an Australian Government Initiative, receiving $58 million in grants and is ‘dependent on the [Federal] Department of Health for the majority of its revenue’ according to its 2020 Annual Financial Report.
Western Victoria MP Bev McArthur labelled the campaign “a blatant attempt to indoctrinate schoolchildren with extreme left ideology when they should be concentrating on fact-based tuition”.
“The campaign purports to strive for a reduction in suicide rates among vulnerable teens but aims at the manipulation of our language instead of providing necessary care and services.”
“Taxpayers’ money that goes towards health organisations should be used to improve health, not to police language that has no impact on health outcomes.”
“The organisation seems to be more successful at redefining what ‘healthcare’ is than achieving their aim of redefining ‘mum’ and ‘dad’.”
“Healthcare should remain medical rather than ideological.”
“Parents should be able to expect their children to return home from school with a more eloquent and articulate vocabulary, not one comprised of an aversion to millennia-old gendered language.”
“Gendered terms such as ‘mum’ and ‘dad’ are in no way discriminatory and are extremely useful to society to distinguish to which parent an individual is referring.”
“Language contortion and confusion is no way to deliver healthcare advice.”
“Radical left-wing ideology is increasingly pervading our educational institutions, with no consent from parents or society at large.”
“Whether it be this campaign, the incident at Brauer College in Warrnambool where boys were made to stand to apologise to women, or ANU’s insistence to call mothers ‘birthing-parents’, it is time Australians took a stand against these ridiculous ideas that only breed resentment and confusion.”
“It is a disgrace that any organisation would promote ideology under the guise of a paramount and sensitive issue such as teen suicide.”
“The Federal Government should immediately reconsider its funding of the North Western Melbourne Primary Health Network.”
12 April 2021