Sensationalist media target Surf Life Saving Australia over draft gender diversity guidelines

A draft gender diversity guidelines document circulating to surf lifesaving clubs by Surf Life Saving Australia (SLSA) has been seized upon by sensationalist media including the Daily Mail Australia and Sydney newspaper The Daily Telegraph.

Seemingly intent on fuelling division over inclusivity, the media outlets have suggested that SLSA has been “highjacked by activists”.

The draft Diverse Gender Factsheet for Surf Life Saving Clubs details how the organistaion should instruct members to “retrain your brain” to avoid calling people by their biological gender.

The guidelines also say that volunteers should advocate for the needs and rights of “gender diverse people” and clubs should modify existing change-rooms, bathrooms and showers to “gender neutral spaces” and build more unisex toilets.

The draft guidelines, which will be given to clubs across Australia once finalised, state that Surf Life Saving Australia members should become “educated on gender diverse identities and experiences”, noting “avoid making assumptions or asking invasive questions about someone’s gender identity, expression, or history.

“Advocate for the rights and needs of gender diverse people in all communities.”

In a section dealing with what to do if the life saver accidently uses the wrong name or pronouns, the documents state members should apologise and move on from the conversation, advising “this can take a lot of practice to retrain your brain especially if you knew someone before transition with a different name or gender, so try to practice when you are alone or in your head.”

Reporting criticism over the draft guidelines, the news sites quote a series of unnamed surf lifesaving volunteers.

In response, to the media reports, Surf Life Saving NSW Chief Executive Steve Pearce explained the document had been developed in consultation with all the states and territories.

Pearce explained that being more inclusive “does present some challenges, particularly in that sporting area, where you have people who aren’t identifying as male or female and they still want to compete and you have to accommodate those people and be as inclusive as possible with as much common sense as possible.

“This can take a lot of practice to retrain your brain especially if you knew someone before transition with a different name or gender, so try to practice when you are alone or in your head.”

Explaining that the document was developed in consultation with all the states and territories, Pearce added “with changing community needs and expectations there’s a requirement for us to ensure we’re inclusive for all persons, identifying as any gender and to cover the non-binary gender allocation.

“Out of our membership of around 76,000 members we only have on our records around 20 members identifying themselves as non-binary.

“In NSW we are actively promoting ourselves as an inclusive organisation.”

Lower image: A section of a new draft Diverse Gender Factsheet for Surf Life Saving Clubs.