She was in year nine when people started to suspect she was gay. At about that time, she says, a lesbian teacher at her Catholic school 'was kicked out', and 'people targeted me even more'. 'The teachers wouldn't do anything ... one actually joined in,' she says. Years later this former student was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and placed on medication.
Such were the experiences of one young lesbian woman, recounted in a senate inquiry submission calling for an end to exemptions which allow religious schools to discriminate against students who are transgender, gay or pregnant.
The Labor-Greens Senate committee has recommended such exemptions remain. Which means that unlike a public school, it may be lawful for a religious school to expel or discipline a student on the basis of gender identity, marital or relationship status, potential pregnancy, pregnancy, religion or sexual orientation.
The senate committee has attempted to find a middle ground. It says it's okay for students to be discriminated against in religious high schools, so long as they know and understand the school's discrimination policies and whether exemptions would operate when they enrol at the high school.
Essentially, the committee has put forward a 'freedom of contract' approach emphasising choice, compromise and pluralism: if you don't wish to adhere to the values of a religious school, choose another school. This 'choice principle' is not without merit. It represents an attempted compromise in a contentious clash of rights, and works to some extent when applied to employment in the religious sector: if you don't like it, don't work there.
But the recommendation overlooks a crucial fact: most students don't choose which high school they go to (let alone whether they will ever fall pregnant or identify as gay later in their schooling life), their parents do. So arguably, the minor isn't consenting to anything. This is an important fact when you consider they are essentially being asked to forfeit their legal rights.
Anti-discrimination law exists in part to protect the rights of vulnerable members of the community. In this regard, it is hard to ignore that first and foremost we are dealing with the legal rights of minors.
Further, some studies suggest homosexual teenagers are 14 times more likely to commit suicide than their straight peers. Transgenderism is viewed a medical and biological phenomenon. In light of this it's hard to view discrimination on the basis of gender identity as anything but cruel in most circumstances.
Dr Tiffany Jones, a former school teacher and now academic at the school of education at the University of New England, submitted research to the inquiry based on interviews she conducted with GLBTIQ (gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, intersex and queer) students at religious schools. She told the inquiry they described having abuse complaints ignored by staff, being punished for reporting abuse or asked to leave their schools.
According to Jones, 'the majority of GLBTIQ students who attended religious schools rated them as homophobic spaces' and many students in religious schools suffered attempts to be 'converted to heterosexuality'.
It's difficult also to dispute the welfare needs of pregnant teenagers who can often slide into poverty and out of the education system. Certainly the overriding principle must be to keep them in school wherever possible — not force them to endure the humiliation of being made to leave.
The impact of discrimination must not be forgotten. Beyond Blue told the inquiry 'discrimination is a risk factor for poor mental health and wellbeing. Discrimination and prejudice can result in rejection by families, bullying, violence ... restricted access to resources, and internalisation of negative stereotypes.'
The right to belief, freedom of religion and the right to practice belief are legitimate rights that must be balanced against the concrete financial and psychological effects of discrimination. State intervention in religion might be undesirable, but too many religious groups have responded to the anti-discrimination debate with one-sided rights-based arguments that are completely lacking in empathy.
Jim Wallace, head of the Australian Christian Lobby, who was personally assured by our PM that the religious exemptions at schools would remain, previously told Fairfax Media in relation to the expulsion of a gay student from a high school: 'I would expect any church that found itself in that situation to do that in the most loving way that it could for the child and to reduce absolutely any negative effects ... I think it's a loving response.'
Wallace may regard this behaviour as loving, but the obvious question is whether the expelled student — almost certainly alienated from his peers, possibly having been rejected by his religious parents, maybe hating his own desires and occasionally engaging in suicide fantasies — would in fact feel loved?
Luke Williams is a freelance journalist who is studying law at Monash University in Melbourne.