This is a Family Matter
i’m an artist and a facilitator
so it only feels natural for me to ask
you to do an activity i’m going to need
you to trust me so that i can take you
on a little journey
if you feel comfortable to do so please
can you close your eyes
keep them closed for me and all i want
you to do is imagine a family
really picture them there who’s there
who are the people in this family what
do they look like what clothes are they
wearing
how are they interacting do they look
happy
and where are they are you picturing
them outside in public in this moment
and if so is there anybody walking past
wondering how they’re all related
you can open your eyes now thank you
on the screen is a stock photo family
and i’m assuming
that this is what most of you were
imagining dad
mom two children and they look happy
enough
they look like they were designed to fit
together as one unit
but this this is my family
i have a mom and a dad who i’m really
close to i have a brother and a sister
both older than me so
who’s that at age 11
my mom sat me down to tell me that she
was in a new relationship
mum and dad hadn’t been together for a
while at this point so i guess i thought
this was inevitable
what i hadn’t expected was that my mom’s
new partner would be a woman
and that now at age 11 a whole world of
inequality and homophobia would be
directed at me
and my family that every time we went
out together i knew there would be
people looking at us
wondering how we’re all related
at school i’d hear homophobic insults
thrown around like tennis balls
each time they’d land into my sense of
self with a thud
denting my identity i didn’t know how to
find myself in the maze of belonging to
an unconventional family all i could see
were judgments and otherings and
this didn’t only come from the students
it was five years before i ever told
anybody that my mom was in a same-sex
relationship
and i just want to shout out that the
friends that when i did tell them
treated me exactly the same and have
supported me ever since
they’d known the whole time anyway but
every monday morning came the same
routine of lying about what i did at the
weekend
yeah i just didn’t really get up to much
i went to stay with my dad
my mum’s friend visited
in reality i was being loved and cared
for by all three of my parents
they were teaching me about the world
and building the values in me that i
still carry today
but i’d created a web of lies that often
got tangled and confused
i was desperate to be anything but the
girl with two moms
i wanted to be judged for who i was and
not who my parents are
and maybe we all feel some sense of not
wanting to be judged on the families
that we’re born into
and we definitely all keep some family
secrets
but what does it mean when the heart of
who you are as a person is being called
into question
when your very existence is being called
unnatural
damaging and disgusting
i can probably count on one hand the
times i’ve seen this part of my life
represented in the media
but every day for a month in 2019 i
watched as a school in the city
that i work in had parents protesting
the no outsiders programme
a school in birmingham began teaching
the night outsiders program to open up
conversations about inclusivity and
equality
this included using a storybook about a
family of penguins
with two male parents almost like mine
a group of parents found out about the
programme and in outrage began a protest
they removed their children from the
school halted their education
and harassed the staff it wasn’t long
before this became a national news story
with some of the biggest platforms
giving airtime to the protesters
myself and other people with lgbtq plus
parents had to sit by
and listen to those protesters tell the
world that they didn’t want their
children to know
that we existed
we sat by knowing that there might be
children in that school with queer
parents like ours
fearful that every time they walked into
the school gates their parents would be
villainized
it felt like my experience at school and
my childhood thoughts were playing out
in real time and on national news
i’m now 25 i work as an artist and a
facilitator
i work with young people every day and i
used to go into schools to teach a
couple times a month
every time i did i can guarantee i’d
feel those tennis balls third against my
identity again
each morning i’d brace myself for it do
up my armor
and use my creativity as a racket to bat
them away
it still hurts but i’ve never been more
proud of my story
i remember the one time listening to a
student on one side of the room tell his
friend that
if he was ever prime minister then he’d
ban gay people
whilst on the other side of the room
being told by a student that he was
scared to come out to his family and
friends
i’d see myself in those classrooms every
time i’m there
and yet i’ve never heard a stupid a
student openly admit that any of their
family are queer
and now maybe it’s because of my age but
i’m noticing that my friends have been
beginning to talk about becoming parents
and yet nothing sticks out in my head
more than the time a friend asked me
that she just wanted to know
how to love her children in a world that
hated
the way she loves what she meant was how
can she consciously bring a child into a
world that’s homophobic
i’m watching as people that i know have
more love to give than most
question whether they could successfully
raise children
for queer people parenting isn’t just a
decision of yes or no
but a continuous cycle of questions and
considerations
how can i ensure that my child will be
brave enough
will people always wonder how we’re all
related
will there be enough people to support
my child
and what will happen to them what will
happen to the children who have to hide
their family lives
who have to tell lies to fit in and who
have to watch their existence being
protested
so how do we delete the current outdated
and oppressive ideas about what a family
should be
we can start by reading the storybook
about two male penguins raising their
chick
to our children and in the same way that
conversations about queerness in all its
forms are opening up
we can bring those conversations into
our schools our homes and our
communities
queer people have been choosing their
own families for years
and it’s time that we started to choose
them
the dictionary tells us that a family is
two parents and their children
living together as one unit in reality
it’s a group of people
with a shared connection to place people
and past
and the dictionary also tells us that a
community is a group of people with a
shared connection
to place people and past
family and community are one in the same
a group of people whose lives are
intrinsically linked
their connections are woven together to
create a nest of commonality
a net that should be making our children
feel safe and loved
and yet they’re slipping through
we have to start treating our
communities like they are family
and recognize that the role of raising
children belongs to us all
the no outsiders protesters shouted let
kids be kids
so let kids like me be kids by allowing
them to grow up in a world where they
don’t have to carry the burden
and fear of being othered let kids
be kids of their communities
i’d like to ask you to close your eyes
one last time
this time i want you to imagine your own
family
really picture them there maybe you can
see your parents
your siblings even your own children
but i also want you to imagine all of
the people that have ever had an impact
on your life
it might be a teacher a friend or
someone you’ve only ever spoken to
online
but they’ve taught you about the world
and helped you build the values that you
carry today
that’s family i want you to know that
this
matters that we matter and that my
family
matters and that the world
it’s a family matter thank you
you