Heartstopper: how this joyous teen show contrasts with my bitter memories of school life under homophobic law Section 28
Retrieved on:
Tuesday, August 29, 2023
School, Learning, Department, Male, Gender identity, Depression, Pride, Friends, Anxiety, Teaching, Season, Homosexuality, Fear, Arkansas Department of Education, Research, Government, Kit, Margaret, Fisayo Akinade, Student, Publishing, Homophobia, Section 28, Love, Blue Jean, Queer, Equality Act, Empathy, System, Education, Tutoring, Nursing, Toy
For those who don’t know Heartstopper, it is Alice Osman’s Netflix adaptation of their boy-meets-boy graphic novel.
Key Points:
- For those who don’t know Heartstopper, it is Alice Osman’s Netflix adaptation of their boy-meets-boy graphic novel.
- Charlie (Joe Locke) and Nick (Kit Connor) and their LGBTQ+ friends come of age and fall in love at school.
- This was because almost all my teaching career was spent under a law called Section 28.
Teaching under Section 28
- In my book Pretended: Schools and Section 28, I describe the mandated homophobic silence that descended upon every school in Britain.
- My research with other LGBTQ+ teachers shows that Section 28 profoundly affected those who experienced it.
- My biggest regret as a teacher under Section 28 is that I could not be a positive role model for the young LGBTQ+ people I taught.
- When Mr Ajayi finds romance himself with another male teacher, there is no hint of the fear or shame that eventually drove me and countless other LGBTQ+ teachers from careers in teaching.
Adult influence
- The friends have compassion in abundance as they warmly embrace and accept their differences.
- They show respect, sensitivity and empathy for each other as together they figure out who they are and who they love.
- They are a nourishing presence in each other’s lives, cheering one other on and picking each other up when things don’t go to plan.
- Since my own Section 28 diaries helped inspire the Bafta-nominated film Blue Jean, many of my former students have been in touch.