“That Would Never Work Here”: Overcoming ‘Context Paralysis’ on Behalf of Gender and Sexual Minorities Worldwide

Heteronormativity and cisnormativity are dominant perspectives ensuring that social structures, including educational systems, operate with a bias for heterosexual, cisgender people. Gender and sexual minority (GSM) children worldwide attend schools where they are excluded and harassed because of their gender identity and/or sexuality. While many education professionals would not tolerate such discrimination perpetrated on the basis of minority ethnicity, race, or religion, relatively little attention is given to the marginalization of GSM students. The term ‘context paralysis’, coined here, describes a reluctance to engage with issues when the cultural context may make doing so difficult. Gender and sexuality are indeed sensitive and provocative topics, deeply connected to cultural norms and customs. However, to dismiss discrimination against GSM people in the name of local traditions is to be complicit in a tradition of bigotry. This chapter calls upon comparative and international education (CIE) scholars to employ their aptly nuanced training and expertise to elevate the visibility of issues barring GSM students from equal participation in school, to disseminate findings about effective interventions and policies that protect and support GSM students, and to interpret and adapt this research for application across cultural and geographic settings. Indeed, it is those in the field of CIE who may be best suited to carry out the sensitive implementation of educational research across borders and are, thus, particularly well-positioned to overcome context paralysis on behalf of GSM children worldwide.