Nash and Browne define heteroactivism as \u201cboth an ideology and a set of practices\u201d used by a broad range of groups and organizations who oppose sexual and gender rights by \u201casserting the supremacy of heterosexual marriage and normative gender roles as the foundations for the best society and the best place for raising children.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIn order to understand their arguments and why they are framed as they are, one has to understand the social, cultural and political contexts that heteroactivists find themselves in,\u201d says Nash.<\/p>\n
Whereas \u201chomophobia\u201d is a term that implies hatred, heteroactivists often sidestep the label by arguing that they are not motivated by hatred or oppression, but rather by apparent attacks on their individual rights, such freedom of religion, freedom of speech or parental rights.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/Catherine-Jean-Nash.jpg\")
Catherine Jean Nash of the Department of Geography and Tourism Studies is the author of a new book on heteroactivism.<\/p><\/div>\n
\u201cWith LGBTQ rights and equalities in place in Canada, the U.K. and Ireland, these groups have had to revise or reshape their strategies in order to find room to have their ideas and position heard,\u201d says Nash.<\/p>\n
Nash and Browne also show in the book that heteroactivism is adapted based on geography. \u201cHeteroactivist ideas \u2018travel\u2019 across national and international boundaries and are taken up, but often in specific, local ways,\u201d Nash says.<\/p>\n
The book grew out of research first begun in 2012 and supported by two Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada grants, following many years of progress in laws designed to enshrine the rights of members of the LGBTQ community.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen this research first started, we were curious about what arguments individuals and groups who opposed LGBTQ rights and equalities could make, given that these rights and equalities are the law of the land, so to speak,\u201d says Nash. \u201cWe saw these groups as quite marginal given the law and policy changes and assumed this would be a small project.\u201d<\/p>\n
However, as Nash began to take a closer look at groups objecting to LGBTQ legal rights, visibility in the media or gender-inclusive language, the research turned up an unexpected result.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe began to notice that for many reasons, including the advent of social media, these groups developed increasingly complex international connections,\u201d says Nash, noting that individuals read and commented on each other\u2019s blogs, published newsletters and attended conferences such as the World Congress of Families.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn many cases, these groups developed similar but specific arguments,\u201d says Nash. \u201cThat is, they might have objections to, say, sex education curriculum in both Canada and the U.K. but have distinctive and specific concerns given the different history of these locations because, as we argue, geography matters.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nash points to the strategy of the Conservative government of Ontario that debated repealing the 2015 sex education curriculum, arguing that \u201ctraditionally minded\u201d minority groups objected to the LGBTQ content and that their views needed to be respected in a multicultural society. By contrast, when some Muslims parents in the U.K. protested the LGBTQ-inclusive sex ed curriculum as well as broader school programs aimed at diversity that included LGBT families, they had to show \u201cthat they understood that LGBT rights were U.K. values which they needed to embrace, so they framed their argument as one of \u2018parental rights\u2019 to determine what is \u2018age appropriate,\u2019\u201d according to Nash.<\/p>\n
Even more significantly, Nash says that as a result of these adaptations, \u201cLGBTQ opposition began to move from what had been the margins to the centre of political debates, particularly around trans rights, teaching sex ed, parental rights and freedom of speech.\u201d<\/p>\n
This observation illuminated a need for careful study of the complex landscape of heteroactivism.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe purpose of the book is to set out in some detail the sorts of arguments heteroactivists make by looking at specific battles in Canada, the U.K. and Ireland,\u201d says Nash. \u201cWe were primarily concerned when we started that academics in particular were not paying any attention to heteroactivist opposition or in developing counter arguments to heteroactivist claims, though academics in Europe and the U.S. are now increasingly focusing on the various types of resistances that are becoming more prominent.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nash and Browne will now continue their research in this area, turning their attention to a multi-year project called \u201cBeyond Opposition<\/a>\u201d funded by a more than $3-million European Research Council Grant awarded to Browne.<\/p>\n \u201cThe project\u2019s goal is to engage with individuals and groups who might be opposed to or are uncomfortable with social and political changes around LGB, Trans or abortion for example,\u201d Nash explains. \u201cThese are people who, in their different geographies, might find themselves in difficulty \u2014 for example, workplaces may celebrate gay Pride while some individuals themselves don\u2019t support it and yet to voice their opposition might cause them strife in the workplace.\u201d<\/p>\n Nash, who will act as co-researcher on the Canadian component of the project with a post-doctoral fellow, says that although this project is just starting out, \u201cthe ultimate goal is to try to work beyond the us\/them binary\u201d to better understand how we might accommodate differences.<\/p>\n