Watch: ‘Don’t Respond To Homophobia With Xenophobia’ – San Ġwann Teacher Stefan Vassallo
Teacher Stefan Vassallo clarified that those telling the parents, who withdrew their children from his school over concerns about his homosexuality, to “go back to their country” are not speaking in his name.
After publishing a heartfelt letter he sent to the parents, Vassallo appeared on ONE TV’s Bil-Fatti to discuss the situation.
“I had a choice to either cry myself to sleep or fight back in my own style,” he said. “I still respect the powerless children and their parents, and I don’t justify hate comments to the parents.”
“You don’t respond to hate with more hate but with education.”
“I don’t like these comments saying the parents should go back to their country, these people are not speaking in my name.”
“If I was judged 100 times in my life, 99 of them were by Maltese people, so the issue isn’t that the parents are foreigners. You don’t respond to homophobia with xenophobia.”
Vassallo said this was the first time he experienced such comments about his sexual orientation at school during his ten years working as a teacher and he admitted that they hurt him on a personal level.
“Apparently the mother had seen a rainbow flag on my bag and assumed I was gay. I could say that it didn’t impact me but the truth is that it hurt.”
“Her child didn’t know me, she judged me before she even knew me, and it just shows how behind we are. The laws and policies are in place but we still have an issue with certain mentalities.”
“I will be blunt, we can’t allow more people to die. These mentalities are killing people. People like me know how much we pray that this is just a phase and that we’re not really gay. I know what I went through, and others understand me.”
“If I manage to spark a conversation, it’s more than enough, because we need a conversation and a lot more awareness, especially in schools.”
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