Victory for Ontario LGBT youth
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Prodded by years of lesbian/gay rights agitation, Ontario New Demo crats compelled the provincial Lib eral Party to stand up and defy theoc racy. The parties passed the Accepting Schools Act in June, mandating that all Ontario schools allow Gay-Straight Al liance clubs to be formed in publicly funded Catholic Separate schools.
In Mississauga (west of Toronto), Catholic high school student Leanne Is kander sparked the controversy when she attempted to form a GSA club in her school, but was met with disapproval from her school administration.
In 2011 the Ontario Liberal minority government introduced an anti-bully ing bill aimed at making schools safer. There was only one problem: making LGBT students safer in schools meant allowing them to form their own sup port groups, which Catholic students weren’t being allowed to do.
Liberal Premier Dalton McGuinty’s position on the clubs was vague at first. He appeared to be playing it safe. NDP leader Andrea Horwath, however, wouldn’t allow him to sidestep the is sue. She stood up in the legislature at Queen’s Park and demanded an an swer: “Nearly two thirds of LGBTQ stu dents and their parents say that they feel unsafe in their schools. There have been at least three young people who have taken their own lives in the prov ince of Ontario. It is heartbreaking, but it is also completely unacceptable. Can we finally put the politics aside and an swer a simple question: Will students who want a GSA club in their schools be allowed to put one together and have one in their schools?”
After that, there was no hiding, and no ambiguity. McGuinty ac ceded to inclusivity. The stakes were high. Religious groups, even non-Catholics, launched a campaign of press confer ences, rallies, and videos all aimed at maintaining their “re ligious freedom” to discrimi nate against LGBT youth on the taxpayers’ dime.
The Progressive Conserva tives, taking a page from the social conservative ex-Reform Party core of the Conservative Party of Canada, made com mon cause with the theocrats.
But no matter how much the archaic religious hierarchy and their Conservative backers kicked and screamed, it was to no avail. The Accepting Schools Act passed the Ontario legis lature with Liberal and New Democratic support on June 5, and will be school policy in time for September.
Another recent major queer rights victory is the passage of Toby’s Law, which amend ed the Ontario Human Rights Code to include the categories of gender identity and gender expression, the first such vic tory for transgendered rights in North America. Although all parties voted for it, the initiative of course came from the NDP—again the result of a long strug gle by campaigners for transgendered rights and their supporters.
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