HOMOPHOBIC BULLYING IN CHILE

HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT

Abstract

The article is the result of an investigation which aims at setting the historical record of discrimination based on sexual orientation and / or gender identity, and the subsequent violence expressed by homophobic bullying toward students LGBTI, sexual dissidents, in various schools in the country the last three decades. Information sources are basically: complaints of discrimination based on sexual orientation at the MINEDUC, interviewing victims and witnesses of homophobic bullying of those acts of violence, and media reports. Through analysis of these sources, we conclude that although discrimination and violence have nuanced, especially in the use of physical violence as a deterrent, in the last decade, homophobia and invisibility of the dissident students remains virtually unchanged. Situation that, somehow, is reinforced by the assumptions of some current plans for sex education, which continue standardizing homosexuality as an illness, or appealing to a moralistic paternalism that denies any possibility of erotic-affective fulfillment for these students; besides the lack of preparation that show teachers and pedagogy students to address educationally or deal with such students. Probably the most significant change is that it has gone from complete rejection and repression of dissidents to a “tolerance of the inevitability” where resignation appears to be its distinguishing mark.