TDSB on Parents: Screw You. Does the Ontario Liberal Party Agree?

TDSB refuses to hear concerns of parents on anti-discrimination curriculum

As the Ontario election showly plods toward its conclusion, it seems that the Liberal Party has become increasingly frustrated with its inability to take a lead and put this election away.

Now, they're resorting to their typical tactic of last resort: accusing their opponents of bigotry.

The Ontario Progressive Conservative Party has taken up the issue of the Toronto District School Board's anti-discrimination curriculum, placing it at the centre of the election. And rightfully so.

The Liberal Party and various far-left groups have predictably declared a new flier being distributed by the Tories to be "homophobic". It's typical far-left bully language, trying to intimidate their opponents into silence.

It was tried once before. When a controversial sex education program was proposed by the McGuinty government, any who objected to the education of Grade 6 students in matters such as anal sex were declared to be homophobic. Contrary to the intention of activist groups to intimidate religious groups, and ordinary parents, out of the debate, public pressure instead built until McGuinty's government was forced to postpone the changes for further consideration.

The TDSB apparently had no appetite for "further consideration", or even for public consideration at all. As reported by Michael Coren, the Equity Advisory Committee of the TDSB decided that public consultation was unnecessary.

One member of the committee who attempted to raise objections to the curriculum was shouted down and declared a homophobe by other members of the committee. The committee, when contacted by producers of Coren's show, were told that this woman was "only a parent." They also accused her of being "singularly destructive."

Nothing could make the attitude of these people toward parents any more clear: the concerns of parents are not to be heard, are not to be considered, are not even to be taken seriously.

They believe they have all the power, and it's their clear intention to deny any modicum of power to parents; at least to those who don't blindly support their extreme agenda.

It isn't that fighting bullying in schools through education is an extreme agenda. However, subjecting children to demagogic (not pedagogic) far-left reeducation programs over the objections of parents very clearly is.

Not everything within the TDSB anti-discrimination curriculum is extreme and outrageous. For example, teaching kids about different family structures is entirely reasonable; many of these children are already growing up in non-conventional family units, so this is very much a live issue for them.

The question of whether or not they're a boy or a girl, however, and the curriculum's teachings on transgendered persons, is not a live issue for these kids. And the recent case of Thomas Lobel, a California child who has apparently decided, on a whim, that he would rather be a girl than a boy.

His adoptive parents have decided to indulge this whim by putting him on hormone blockers, hoping that he can decide by puberty whether or not he wants to be a boy or a girl.

Anyone who imagines a child, even at age 14, is psychologically qualified to make that kind of life-defining decision, is simply out of their minds.

This case underscores precisely what is so irresponsible and reckless about what the TDSB wants to teach young children; planting the question in their heads about whether they are a boy or a girl long before they can be expected to make such a decision while understanding the gravity of the choice.

Contrary to claims by the Ontario Liberal Party, there is nothing inaccurate about the flier. It accurately reflects how eager the TDSB is to trample parental rights in their well-intentioned desire to stop the bullying of gay, lesbian and transgendered people in society.

It's not their intentions that are misguided; it's their actions.

The Toronto District School Board is apparently more than content to thumb its nose at the rights of parents. In jumping all over this issue, the Liberal Party seems to be sending a message to the parents of Ontario that it's willing to do the same.

They should not be rewarded at the polls for this. Quite the contrary: they should be punished with the loss of their government until such a time that they are willing to approach these issues responsibly.

TDSB Criticisms Have the Kangaroos of the Far Left Hopping

With the far-left desperate to silence any criticial discussion of the Toronto District School Board's anti-discrimination curriculum, it was only a matter of time before things came to a head.

With the Toronto SUN printing the controversial ad by Charles McVety's Institute for Canadian Values, even after the National Post was cowed into printing an apology for it, the activists desperate to conceal the authoritarianism underlying the anti-discrimination curriculum have finally decided to swat a fly with a sledgehammer.

It was inevitable.

At least one blogger is bragging about having complained to the Ontario Human Rights Commission. The clear goal is to harness the power of the state to shut down any discussion of the TDSB's anti-discrimination curriculum, whether it's actually age-appropriate, and whether or not the TDSB has violated the rights of parents.

The open letter, written by one Kim May of Sarnia, ON, actually includes some rather remarkable ramblings that seem entirely disconnected with the content of the ICV ad:

"...you would have them drawn and quartered if you could...since you are ignorant and intolerant of difference."

"Have you learned nothing from WWII. You can't ship different people off to an camp somewhere, simply for being different. This has been tried in the past."

The extent to which the imaginations of such people has utterly run away with them.

The demagogues and would-be demagogues, crusaders and would-be crusaders, of the far-left have become so indifferent to the concerns of others that they are now demanding that such people be silenced by the state.

If the full scope of the authoritarianism of the far-left wasn't on full display in the TDSB's locking out of parents, it's certainly going to be on full display if -- more likely when -- the Ontario Human Rights Commission decides to pursue far-left vengeance against Charles McVety in all its kangaroo court glory.

Juast as they have so many times before, they will take Charles McVety and make him a sympathetic figure in the eyes of freedom-loving Canadians. All this while they are so blinkered by their own ideology that they can't even see it.

Authoritarian Post-modernism Oversteps Its Bounds

LGBT activists freaking out over Institute for Canadian Values ad

Across Canada, LGBT activists are up in arms over a full-page ad placed in the National Post by Charles McVety's Institute for Canadian Values.

In the ad, a young girl is pictured above a caption reading "I'm a girl. Don't teach me to question if I'm a boy, transexual, transgenered, intersexed or two-spirted."

A header at the top of the ad reads: "Please! Don't confuse me."

The ad is in opposition to the Toronto District School Board's anti-discrimination curriculum, which has garnered increased public attention since a planning calendar sent home for first grade students came to light. The calendar featured references to prostitution, transgendered people, AIDs, and female genital mutilation.

All of this and more... for six year olds.

The TDSB anti-discrimination curriculum insists that it's age-appropriate. A great many Torontonians -- and Canadians -- are coming to disagree.

LGBT activists quickly voiced their outrage that the ad would be printed, and immediately began to deploy their typical responses, accusing McVety of being a homophobe and a transphobe.

But as it turns out, the ad is entirely accurate. The accusations are merely bully words, intended to intimidate McVety out of the debate, and similarly intimidate anyone who may be inclined to agree with him.

This author is not inclined to agree with McVety very often on these sorts of issues. But your not-so-humble scribe does find one important point of agreement on this particular subject: the authoritarian approach of the TDSB to this curriculum is entirely unacceptable.

In the ad, the curriculum is directly quoted regarding the rights of parents in relation to this curriculum. The TDSB makes itself clear: it believes parents have no right to object to this curriculum.

"'Can a parent have their child accomodated out of human rights education (LGBTQ) based on religious grounds? NO'

'Should schools send notes or permission slips home before starting any classroom work on LGBTQ (Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transexual/two-spirited, queer) issues? NO'

'Can teachers seek accomodation from teaching materials that may contradict their religious beliefs? NO'

'Can schools/teachers choose not to address controversial issues for fear of negative parent response? NO'

'Teachers are obligated to address all equity issues. Any ommisisions that maintain a non-inclusive curriculum and pedagogy are considered to foster a poisoned environment..."

The problem is that the environment is already poisoned, and has been poisoned by the TDSB. Whether one likes or dislikes the religious beliefs of any number of people -- and there is much to dislike about religious beliefs that may lead one into homophobia -- the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees the right to hold such beliefs.

Moreover, parents have the right to raise their children according to these beliefs. They have the right to decide what their children will be taught, for good or ill.

The TDSB does not recognize these rights. They've locked parents out, refusing them their parental rights. It's absolutely shameful.

Meanwhile, some LGBT activists have not only missed the point, but they've lost the plot.

A parody ad, produced by Toronto film maker and LGBT activist Chase Joynt, declares "I'm Chase. Teach me to question everything! Specifically that transgender, transsexual, intersexed and two-spirit are just some of my options."

More is wrong with Joynt's response than can be named in one place at one time.

The first is that Joynt is very clearly an adult. He appears to be in his late 20s, if not his 30s. As such, Joynt is mature enough in life that he can reflect on these issues and make these decisions with a full understanding of whatever consequences they may have.

In other words, while Joynt's own questioning nature -- if it is at all genuine -- is worthy of applause, but he is not a child. Not like the children the TDSB's anti-discrimination curriculum is aimed at.

Anyone who has had any dealings with children, whatsoever, know that children are far more impulsive than the vast majority of adults. Neither Joynt nor the demagogues at the TDSB have stopped for so much as an instant to wonder about a child who may -- thinking that the idea seems neat -- decide that they are transgendered, not having considered what impact that decision may have on their lives.

Which brings up the other area in which Joynt has entirely lost the plot. LGBT activists have long insisted -- and scienctific studies strongly support this -- that LGBT is not a lifestyle choice. They'd likely tell Joynt to go back and listen to his Lady Gaga CDs a little more closely, because gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transsexuals were "Born This Way".

These aren't "options", as Joynt suggests. They aren't "lifestyle choices", as far-right anti-LGBT activists insist.

“What’s crucial about any curriculum in regard to identity politics is that it’s providing a breadth of options and potentially the inclusion of LGBT rights in any curriculum at any level is that it affords another opinion,” Joynt insists. “While I think there is opportunity to speak to things such as when is age appropriate, the ability to learn about those identities is integral to our success as educators.”

If Joynt is really interested in fostering discussion about whether or not this curriculum is age-appropriate (and that would be welcome, indeed), the least he could do is not obscure this issue in his counter-ad.

In the end, this issue is very simple: the postmodern leftist ideology behind this curriculum has overstepped its bounds, adopted the trappings of authoritarianism, and violated the rights of parents.

If it's up to Charles McVety and the Institute for Canadian Values to rally ordinary Canadians to shove the footsoldiers of this grievance-mongering demagoguery back across the line, that is what will simply have to happen.