Students instructed to proclaim to be the 'product of a heterosexist and transphobic culture' in LGBT 'Safe Zone' training

Adelphi University in New York is offering “Safe Zone Training” sessions to educate students on how to be more inclusive. A goal of the program is to teach participants the “forms of oppression and discrimination faced by [LGBTQIA] community members, and skills and strategies for allyship.”

The once-a-month training provides participants with a “Safe Zone Participant Manual,” which “has been designed to help you learn more about lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer issues.”

[RELATED: EXCLUSIVE: Include LGBTQ ‘Safe Zone’ sticker in syllabus, university tells professors]

Participants will find a “Free to Be Me” statement located toward the beginning of the manual. The statement asks participants to affirm the proposition, “I am a product of a heterosexist and transphobic culture and I am who I am. I don’t have to feel guilty about what I know or believe, but I do need to take responsibility for what I can do now.”

Another statement participants are asked to sign off on is that they will ”[s]truggle to change [their] false/inaccurate beliefs or oppressive attitudes toward lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer people.”

The manual also teaches its readers about “Offensive Terminology to Avoid.” Instead of saying ‘”homosexual,” students are taught to say “lesbian” or “gay man” because the word “homosexual” has allegedly “been adopted by anti-gay extremists to suggest that lesbians and gay men are psychologically or emotionally disordered.”

A list of “Privileges Non-Trans Individuals May Take for Granted” in the Safe Zone training manual includes “Strangers do not ask me what my ‘real name’ (birth name) is and then assume they have a right to call me by that name” and “I am not required to undergo extensive psychological evaluation in order to receive basic medical care.”

The extensive document also contains a section on oppression and privilege, which teaches participants that “[s]ocial group differences have been constructed in a way over time so that social meanings justify inequality and oppression.”

[RELATED: UCI offers ‘Advanced’ LGBT ‘Safe Zone’ trainings]

Adelphi’s Safe Zone manual concludes with a section titled “An Ally’s Promise,” which consists of a series of affirmations one must make in order to truly be considered an “ally.”

Affirmations include “I believe nobody is wrong they are only different,” “I believe our minds are like parachutes ... [t]hey only work if they are open,” ”I believe we only live life once, but if we live it right, one time is all we’ll need,” ”I will transcend political correctness and strive for human righteousness,” and ”I promise to interrupt the world when its thinking becomes ignorant.”

In 2022, Campus Reform reported that the University of South Florida also holds Safe Zone training sessions that educate “the USF community on LGBTQ+ identities, policies, and ways to be supportive allies and advocates across campus.”

Adelphi University, Adelphi’s office of multicultural affairs, and LGBTQIA+ Adelphi have not responded to comments requested by Campus Reform.