Joint Book Launch

Pride and Politics: Queer Rights in Canada and
Government’s Role Then and Now

Gary Kinsman & Patrizia Gentile’s
The Canadian War on Queers: National Security as Sexual Regulation

and

Tom Warner’s
Losing Control: Canada’s Social Conservatives in the Age of Rights.

Where: The Croissant Tree, 625 Church Street, Toronto.
When: Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Time: 7:00 – 10:00 PM
*This event is wheelchair accessible.

Gary Kinsman and Patrizia Gentile provide a disturbing view of the history of queer surveillance and regulation in Canada, while Tom Warner documents the progress and status of more recent struggles for queer rights, and sheds a light on the forces of social conservatism that seek to reverse this progress.
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Toronto: Queer Ontario strongly supports the inclusion of the terms “gender identity” and “gender expression” in human rights legislation as tabled in private members bills brought forth by NDP MP Bill Siksay at the federal level and NDP MPP Cheri DiNovo at the provincial level in Ontario. The extension of human rights protections to Canadians who do not base their gender identity or expression solely on their innate biological gender is long overdue, given they are one of the most disenfranchised and oppressed populations in the country.

Queer Ontario urges that all MPs support Siksay’s Bill-389 that would include “gender identity” and “gender expression” in both the Canadian Human Rights Act and Hate Crimes Provisions. Similarly, Queer Ontario calls upon all MPPs in the Ontario provincial legislature to support DeNovo’s private member’s bill known as Toby’s Act that would include “gender identity” as an enumerated ground in the Ontario Human Rights Code. Queer Ontario also urges organizations and residents across Ontario and Canada to support these legislative amendments to prectect trans people from harassment and discrimination.
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Toronto: Queer Ontario feels the Elementary Health and Physical Education Curriculum proposed by the McGuinty government back in January of 2010 was a step in the right direction that would have provided Ontario children and youth with up-to-date scientific information on human development, physical health, sex, sexuality, sexual behaviour, and gender identity. So it came as a tremendous disappointment to hear that McGuinty succumbed to the pressures that were created by sex-negative religious fundamentalists, moral conservatives, and misinformed parents, ultimately rescinding the curriculum just 54 hours after he had come out in strong support of it.

Given that the first round of consultations had already taken into consideration the concerns of parent groups and religious organizations like the Institute for Catholic Education – alongside public health organizations, sex educators, school boards, academics, and LGBTQ groups including Queer Ontario’s predecessor, the Coalition for Lesbian and Gay Rights in Ontario (CLGRO), – the new curriculum was in no way under consulted and actually served to bring Ontario’s Health and Physical Education Curriculum in line with those of other, more progressive provinces like British Columbia. The new proposed curriculum is long overdue, especially in its recognition of ‘invisible differences’ like sexual orientation, gender identity, and cultural values and beliefs: a much-needed concept that would begin to acknowledge the full diversity of Ontario’s population within Ontario’s elementary school systems.
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