Making the Case
Making the Case
2SLGBTQ+ Rights and Religion in Schools
Despite growing acceptance of 2SLGBTQ+ rights, Canadian schools regularly become battlegrounds in clashes between students wishing to express their sexuality or gender and those who perceive this as a threat to their values.
Making the Case clearly shows how Canadian law responds to what are known as “competing human rights claims,” when conflict arises between people asserting sexual minority rights and those asserting religious rights, for example, when a principal forbids same-sex prom dates or when parents oppose gay-straight alliance clubs. With a focus on the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the authors call on related court cases to explain the position of Canadian law. They demonstrate that Canadians have rights to religion and rights to gender expression or sexual orientation; and that supporting sexual minority rights does not undermine other people’s rights to religious freedom.
This accessible book is an important tool for anyone working to create an inclusive school environment or respond to rights-based conflicts within the school system. It establishes conclusively that school cultures must be transformed so that 2SLGBTQ+ students can feel as safe and welcome as their heterosexual and cisgender counterparts.
This important book will help teachers, parents, and school administrators to function as 2SLGBTQ+ allies. Education students, legal scholars, politicians, civil servants, and people of faith who are interested in the issue of 2SLGBTQ+ rights will also find it invaluable.
The authors do an excellent job of defining terminology and making the legal content accessible for lay readers. This book could serve as a practical guide for Canadian schools.
Donn Short is a professor in the Robson Hall Faculty of Law at the University of Manitoba. In 2017, he received the inaugural Aaron Berg Award for his significant contributions to the advancement of human rights. He is the author of Don’t Be So Gay! Queers, Bullying, and Making Schools Safe and Am I Safe Here? LGBTQ Teens and Bullying in Schools. Bruce MacDougall is a professor at the Allard School of Law in the University of British Columbia, and has been Associate Dean of Academic Affairs and Associate Dean of Graduate Studies at Allard. Among his numerous publications is Queer Judgments: Homosexuality, Expression, and the Courts in Canada. Paul Clarke is a professor in the Faculty of Education at the University of Regina, and has served as president of the Canadian Association for the Practical Study of Law in Education. He is the author of Understanding Curricular Control: Rights Conflicts, Public Education, and the Charter.
Introduction: Point of Departure
1 Legal Possibilities and the New Schools
2 The (New) Safe School
3 Whose Voices?
4 The Challenge of the “New”
5 Making Spaces, Making Community
Conclusion: Getting There
Notes; Bibliography; Index
Religion and Sexuality
Diversity and the Limits of Tolerance
Edited by Pamela Dickey Young, Heather Shipley, and Tracy J. Trothen
Disrupting Queer Inclusion
Canadian Homonationalisms and the Politics of Belonging
Foreword by Rinaldo Walcott; Edited by OmiSoore H. Dryden and Suzanne Lenon
