Toronto's Catholic Board Finally Accepts Gender Identity Issues Into The Code Of Conduct
After months of deliberation, the Toronto Catholic District School board came to a conclusion regarding it's code of conduct rules. The board voted in favour of adding gender identity issues as prohibited grounds for discrimination. The Toronto Catholic District School Board code of conduct will now require fair treatment of everyone regardless of gender identity, gender expression, marital status or family status.
These are all already identified terms in the Ontario Human Rights Code, CBC reports. The motion passed in the early hours of Friday morning, at around 2 a.m. on November 8, according to CTV News. It passed in a vote of eight-to-four. This was approved by the Archdiocese of Toronto prior to the meeting. “We finally, finally, after months and months of turmoil and creating this division, we finally came together as a board and did the right thing by our students and our families,” board chair Maria Rizzo told the Toronto Star. Since this was proposed back in March, it has sparked controversy on all sides as to how to proceed. There was even a petition of 2,000 signatures making a case against gender identity being added to the code of conduct.
Yesterday, CLC's David Cooke delivered almost 2,000 signatures to Cardinal Thomas Collins, asking His Excellency to… https://t.co/G4CqwFWQKr— Campaign Life Coalition (@Campaign Life Coalition) 1573060698.0
Ultimately, it failed though, and, according to CP24 after an "occasionally heated" meeting, the green light was given to add "gender identity" and "gender expression" to the code of conduct.
Only a week ago, on November 1, the Toronto Catholic District School Board announced that it would not be including such language.
This has obviously been a topic of much deliberation and debate. People were quick to respond, and many were against not including gender identity language."Cool cancel all the tax money they get then," one Twitter user wrote.
@StarGTANews Cool cancel all the tax money they get then.— Tactical Clinical Therapist (@Tactical Clinical Therapist) 1572572581.0
@StarGTANews Appalling that that any publicly funded board in 2019 can have a subcommittee this offensive. This is… https://t.co/kO4zkMMDhQ— Toni (@Toni) 1572621800.0
Now that the board has finally accepted gender identity issues, it seems others are starting to complain after Faith Goldy tweeted about the new code of conduct.
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