On May 22 CCLA spoke with and wrote to Minister Blackett, outlining the association’s concerns regarding Bill 44’s proposed amendments to the Alberta Human Rights, Citizenship and Multiculturalism Act. In CCLA’s view, there is no legitimate public interest in allowing children to be withdrawn from all material that touches on religion, sexuality, or sexual orientation. To the contrary, such a regime could undermine legitimate educational goals such as fostering knowledge, debate, multiculturalism, and tolerance.
Bill 44 was put before the Alberta Legislature to amend Alberta’s Human Rights, Citizenship and Multiculturalism Act to explicitly include sexual orientation as a prohibited ground of discrimination. The original Bill, however, also inserted into the Act a provision which would require a school board to notify a parent when courses of study, instructional materials, instruction, or exercises included subject-matter that dealt explicitly with religion, sexuality or sexual orientation. Parents would then have been able to obtain an exemption for their child.
CCLA pointed out that there should be a distinction between imparting knowledge about sensitive or controversial subjects, and promoting a belief in the correctness of a given viewpoint. Following this distinction, while indoctrinating students into a particular faith should not be acceptable, this cannot be extended to teachings that impart information on various religious practices in the community, the history of religions, or religious references in art and literature. Similarly, classroom discussions of important social issues such as the right of certain religious adherents to deny their children blood transfusions, to wear veils in court, or kirpans in schools should be encouraged, not stifled.
As regards the Bill’s provisions for exemption from materials that mention “sexual orientation”, a tolerant society must have citizens who accept and respect the dignity and equality of people with different sexual orientations. Landmark Canadian cases on sexual orientation and equality rights should be discussed. Once more, no valid public interest is gained from exemption in this regard, and much stands to be lost.
