After reading about how the Halton Catholic School Board has decided to deal with it's controversial ban on the Gay Straight Alliance.
On paper its ban on gay-straight alliances is lifted, but a new draft inclusion policy by the Halton Catholic District School Board doesn’t allow them either.
By disappearing the word "GAY." And treating gay kids like they were diseased.
While the document calls on educators to enforce anti-discrimination policies, it also reiterates the church’s official prohibition against sexual activity between two people of the same sex and exhorts teachers to lead “the homosexual student” toward “better sexual morality.” It further suggests that “romantic attachments and behaviour” are fully expected of heterosexual couples, but discouraged among gay students.
Or less than human.
All I can say is when are we going to stop funding religious schools?
The Catholic Church shouldn't be allowed anywhere near children
As the Halton Catholic District School Board prepares to debate its decision to ban the Gay-Straight Alliance from its schools. And this reporter states the obvious.
Catholic schools should not be allowed to override our Charter of Rights and Freedoms in the name of religion.
As Grade 11 student trustee Clarisse Schneider said of the current policy, it is “saying that supporting our gay peers and accepting them is wrong, that being yourself is wrong. A gay-straight alliance is nothing to do with homosexual activity, it is about acceptance and belonging.” From the mouths of babes.
And the ignorance and bigotry of those who are supposed to be making sure their schools are safe for ALL children is brutishly revealed:
The anti-gay gaffes keep coming. At the policy meeting on Jan 11 in Burlington, trustee Ed Viana told the story of Sodom and Gomorrah; afterward, trustee Jane Michael told Xtra, "I don't think sex clubs should be in school."
And other gay kids aren't even allowed to use the word gay.
A parent of a gay teenager sends an anguished message from a hospital emergency room.
I am writing to you from the emergency ward at Oakville-Trafalgar Memorial Hospital, where my son is recovering from an attempted suicide.
Every day he curses that he is gay because of the bullying and abuse he experiences. I am not naïve enough to believe that all of his fellow teenagers are accepting of his orientation. If he could conform to what many believe is “normal”, he surely would.
There are many days that I have had to wipe eggs off of our windows and our home while some of the public shows its disapproval for my son. This is truly the ugly (side) of our society. My son is a loving boy and it is extremely sad that he is so often judged by his sexual orientation rather than the wonderful qualities of his character.
And strangely enough all I can think of is, I hope that parent, that wounded teenager, and all those other gay kids saw Chris Colfer, the gay actor from Glee, pick up a Golden Globe Award the other night.
And send them a message...
Because I did and I thought it was awesome.
Yup. Screw that, kids. That's all that needs to be said.
If some members of that Catholic School Board can't do their jobs.
For the sake of that kid in the hospital, for the sake of human decency.
