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Premier Scott Moe was asked by a reporter about the evidence on which the decision to require—by law—that teachers must inform parents of any student’s expressed wish to be addressed with gender free pronouns. The new directives also legislate that any parent will have the right to withdraw their child from a sex education program if they deem it inappropriate, plus a few other provisions claimed to be "parents' rights" supportive.
His response[i]
to the reporter cited a survey of some 3000+ people, the majority of whom
agreed that any student’s request to have a name change or to be addressed with
gender-neutral pronouns in school should be reported to the child’s parents.
It’s easy to word a question that will elicit a positive
response in favour of parental rights regarding children. Of course, the people
who manage the household in which a child spends most of his time are justified
in claiming greater authority over that child than does a neighbour. Not the
government nor his teacher can set a bedtime for my boy.
There are a number of factors that make of the premier’s
defense of the policy a naïve and hopelessly incomplete. Some that
come to mind include:
First: in in loco-parentis law (local
parent), the adult in legitimate supervision of that child has the
responsibility of a parent, and by the same token, the biological or adoptive
parent cannot maintain parental supervision while his/her/their child is in a
classroom or on the school playground. Are we clear about what that means in
this case? As it stands, a teacher's relationship to a student's parent is not like that parent's relationship to, say, a babysitter.
Second: “Parent,” as used in the survey for instance,
conjures good, responsible, thoughtful, informed mother and father who live
together and plan and cooperate in the teaching and mentoring of their children.
Parents out of Dick and Jane readers, sort of. Meanwhile, every teacher knows
that some minority in their class are coming to them from dysfunctional homes. It
requires four years of pedagogical training including internships and regular
evaluations in order to become qualified for the in loco parentis role. Heated
copulation in the back of a Nash Rambler is all that’s required to make of
yourself a “parent.”
Third: Is “parental rights” the appropriate term for
what we’re talking about? In general, human rights are our way of defending
the basic well-being of individuals, not of classes of people. If
a child is badly injured and doctors determine he/she/they require a blood
transfusion to survive, would an ability of the parent to overrule the doctors—in obedience
to a religious tenet, say—be a legitimate right? Or is it the child’s human
right to life that is in question? Likewise,
if a teacher senses a danger to a child if the child is outed to the
parent(s), would that be like the doctors following the parents’ wishes in the blood
transfusion case if the teacher is forced to inform? Do human rights of the
individual extend to, say, a ten-year-old child who has already decided
that coming out to parents will bring him/her/them harm?
Fourth: Saskatchewan once had a premier whose grasp
of issues went well beyond political or religious calculations. Tommy Douglas
would say things like,[ii]
“We are all in this world together, and the only test of our character that
matters is how we look after the least fortunate among us. How we look after
each other, not how we look after ourselves. That’s all that really matters, I
think.” There’s no arguing that people with same-sex orientation or gender
dysphoria’s manifestations form a minority in Canadian culture. Do their
unchosen natures fit them into Douglas’ “least fortunate among us” category? If
so, is Moe’s new legislation an attempt to “look after” their well-being? Or is
it another too-hasty reaction of turning the dilemma of being born different
into a simple question-simple answer, solution?
Five: Is there any part of pitting teachers and
parents against each other that can be logically justified? If a teacher is
attacked verbally, pejoratively and a school is ordered by a parent to
otherwise engage their child when a provincially authorized sex education
curriculum is being taught, what outcome should we expect for the well-being of
the child, either in school or at home? Isn’t the sex education curriculum
already carefully tailored to match the students’ developmental ages? Is parent
education on these curricula lacking? Are there better ways of doing Home and School?
Six: The legislation curtails schools’ utilization of outside
resources in sex education instruction. Are we remembering that this all
started in Saskatchewan with a Planned Parenthood presentation to a school
class in Lumsden whose participation there wasn’t criticized, except for having left behind a brochure that a parent found offensive
because of its explicit illustrations? “Is the decree proportional to the problem?”
I ask myself. And myself answers, “No, it’s not. It’s too much like banning all
people under the age of twenty-five from owning Pitbulls because one twenty-two-year-old
in Melville had such a dog that bit his neighbour twice.”
Finally, opinion surveys are not research; for one, responses
are far too subject to the phrasing of the question. Also, we know full well
that, “the majority think so” doesn’t necessarily make an assertion wise, true,
or even practical, although it can help a political party plan its election
strategy. Lastly, a society that heeds Tommy Douglas’ statement on what
matters, and is therefor proactive in defending the rights of minorities, by
this same impulse can’t help but be a defender of every child:
yours, mine, the neighbours’. Sexual behaviour affects everyone; education to help all of us get it right is key; surely the timing and content can be arrived at in better ways than through arbitrary and hasty legislation.
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