SCP | UPDATING | LGBTIQ+ Multicultural and Faith Project | August 2019

[Edited extract from public address]

Involvement in this project so far has been either via a workshop or interview to benefit the community and the work is ongoing.

So far, over 300 people have been heard during the community engagement phase of this project. There has been a really strong message delivered to organisers about the way forward.

Expressed over and over again that the most important thing for LGBTIQ+ people from diverse backgrounds is the acceptance of their family. Repeated is that love and loyalty for family members is a powerful cultural value that can be a starting point for conversations that change attitudes and behaviours.

Responses include from non-LGBTIQ+ parents and adult siblings speaking about their own journey from fear and ignorance to acceptance and affirmation would be a strong way to engage people and bring them along with LGBTIQ+.

This approach could incorporate messages around the importance of acceptance to keeping families together and harm prevention and mythbusting messages as appropriate for each cultural context.

Also heard was celebrity champions and public allies could play a valuable role in increasing LGBTIQ+ visibility and shifting views. This was a harder area to navigate as there were many different views about who would make a good champion.

There were a few additional messages strongly made from participants, including:

• Families have to 'come out' to their cultural and/or faith community when a family member comes out within the family, often causing conflict/tension due to social pressure from others.
• There are lots of myths about diverse sexualities and gender identities, including that this diversity is an Australian or western 'fashion' that is a threat to culture/tradition.
• Invisibility is a big issue, with many community members believing there are no LGBTIQ+ people in their cultural and faith communities. One of our goals has to be to increase visibility and normalise diversity.
• The marriage equality postal survey and the current debate around religious freedoms were/are very polarising and create an atmosphere of fear and distrust, which makes these discussions harder.
• Family has different meaning in different cultures and the language we use and the people we include in our campaign need to be culturally relevant.
• We can't be afraid to talk about the experiences of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex and other community members, both the good and the bad.
• There is an obvious temptation to run a strong, negative message around prejudice, but there are significant risks of stigmatising LGBTIQ+ people if we link them in people's minds with things like depression, anxiety and suicide.
• Support for parents was identified as a major gap, particularly for parents from multicultural and faith backgrounds
• There was a question raised around the cultural competence of LGBTIQ+ support services and, in turn, around the LGBTIQ+ competence of multicultural organisations.
• Popular representations of 'LGBTIQ+ pride' is very white and very western and there is a lack of representation of diverse ways to 'be LGBTIQ+' for people from different cultures and/or faiths.
• Racism is prevalent in many LGBTIQ+ social situations and that this needs to be addressed by government and community groups.
• All messages, videos, photos and other materials need to be created with language and cultural considerations in mind and members of communities should advise this process.
• Culturally specific communications channels will often be the best for sharing our messages, including radio, print and digital.

In terms of process, plans have not been finalised for the Greek, Chinese or multicultural aspects of the campaign yet. Some guidance is being awaited upon from the Victorian Government, who are the project's funding body, before proceeding to the next stage.

If you are interested in receiving a brief report with more detail on what was heard through the engagement phase or would like to be involved in the next phase of the project, contact organisers.

Thanks again for you involvement so far and I look forward to getting back soon with a further update.

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Social Change Projects
Post: PO Box 303, Carlton South, VIC 3053 Australia
Daniel on behalf of the LGBTIQ+ M&F Team!
Email: daniel@socialchangeprojects.com.au
Website: www.socialchangeprojects.com.au