Presentation against ‘LGBTQ agenda’ ruled out of order

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This article was published 25/10/2023 (708 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A speaker at Monday’s Brandon School Division board of trustees meeting had her presentation terminated while still in progress after the chairperson judged it to be “on the verge of hate speech.”

The meeting also saw heated defences of the division’s relationship with St. Augustine’s Catholic School as well as an accusation that board members had previously engaged in anti-Catholic bigotry.

Lorraine Hackenschmidt, who previously initiated an attempt to form a committee to review and potentially ban content from school libraries dealing with sexual or gender issues, returned to the board to deliver a rebuttal to another resident’s request to teach 2SLGBTQIA+ history in local schools.

Shortly after Hackenschmidt started her presentation by saying that she doesn’t hate any people but she opposes the “LGBTQ agenda,” vice-chair Jim Murray interrupted with a point of order to argue that the presentation was out of line.

Quoting provincial education and human rights policies, Murray said the board has a duty to support 2SLGBTQIA+ students.

“Lorraine’s presentation starts off by saying she opposes the 2SLGBTQIA agenda in our schools,” Murray said. “That is clearly discriminatory speech, it has no place at our board table.”

Breeanna Sieklicki, the lone trustee in support of forming a book-banning committee, challenged Murray, asking why he didn’t speak up when resident Heather Gillander made a presentation questioning the BSD’s relationship with St. Augustine’s Catholic School.

Those remarks, Sieklicki said, were discriminatory toward religion.

Chairperson Linda Ross rebutted by saying that Gillander’s presentation was fact-based and it was unclear whether Hackenschmidt’s remarks would be along the same lines. She ruled Hackenschmidt’s presentation would be out of order unless she were to provide factual information.

These comments drew the ire of Hackenschmidt’s supporters, though she was allowed to continue her presentation.

Continuing, Hackenschmidt said some pioneering sexologists were sexually abusive to others.

“You are talking about sexual deviants, you are not talking about LGBTQ history, unless you are conflating the two,” Ross said.

Trustee Kim Fallis spoke up on a point of order, saying that queer people are not deviants and criticizing Hackenschmidt’s past comments linking gay people to pedophilia and grooming.

This sparked an argument between Fallis and Hackenschmidt, who was given a final chance to continue after the chair and vice-chair called for order.

“This is not hate speech,” Hackenschmidt said.

“I’ve given you the chance to prove that it’s not,” Ross replied.

Hackenschmidt, who served as a BSD trustee in the 1990s, threatened that if she was not listened to, she would advocate to local religious groups to come before the board and demand that their histories also be taught.

After raising a point about a Muslim man interviewed by the CBC at the One Million March for Children last month denigrating gender transitions, Ross officially ruled Hackenschmidt out of order and demanded she stop her presentation.

A previous presentation in the meeting from Mike Theriault criticized previous delegations to the board criticizing St. Augustine’s School as anti-Catholic bigotry and called for “fundamental faith-based education” about religions to be instituted at local schools.

Manitoba’s Public Schools Act states that if a school with three or more classrooms receives a petition signed by the parents of at least 25 children who attend it requesting religious instruction to be instituted at that school, a school board is obligated to pass a bylaw authorizing it.

Such authorization expires on June 30 every year.

If that happens, a school cannot provide students with more than two and a half hours of religious instruction per week and the instruction must be provided by a priest, rabbi, spiritual leader or a parental representative recognized by the school board. Parents can ask for their children to be excluded from such instruction.

Theriault alleged that the chairperson and Murray had been organizing a hate campaign against local religious groups and demanded that the board issue a public apology for its actions as well as undergo sensitivity training on religious issues.

His remarks also contained a defence of patriarchal power structures, attacks against abortion, and a comparison of recent events at board meetings to historic examples of anti-Catholic discrimination in Manitoba.

He also said that teaching children about the Anishinaabe seven sacred teachings was an example of the success of faith-based education in schools.

Trustee Duncan Ross asked Theriault about his use of the term “fatal consequences” in his presentation. Theriault said that anti-religious sentiment in Canada has led to the vandalism of churches and other violent acts in recent years.

Former superintendent Donna Michaels also sat at the presenter’s spot to provide a background of the division’s relationship with St. Augustine’s School and a defence of its operations as a representative of the parish.

She said that the school strives to provide education under the terms listed in the legal agreement between the parish and the division.

“The St. Augustine of Canterbury parish values and cherishes this agreement, committing to act in good faith and honour in all related practices and undertakings,” Michaels said.

“Recently, there has been much public discussion about the legitimacy of this agreement and the condemnation of Catholicism. It has been stated that the values of the Catholic Church are in opposition to current societal values. This is a specious argument.”

While there may be theological or spiritual differences among people in society, Michaels said those differences are to be respected and it is the responsibility of the individual to accept them.

“The specific teachings of the Catholic Church do not undermine the human values of respect, decency, honesty, truth, moral capacities of the person, human freedom, personal free will, justice for all persons, compassion, integrity, stewardship, dignity, humility and care of the poor and vulnerable,” she said.

According to Michaels, in a given six-day cycle, students in kindergarten through Grade 3 receive two half-hour periods of religious instruction and three periods for students in Grade 4 through 8.

Currently, Michaels said, there is a waiting list for some parents to get their children into the school due to limited class sizes at St. Augustine’s imposed because of resource constraints and best practices for students.

In order to increase class sizes to meet current and projected increases in demand, she said the school has determined it would need to build a new school, buy portable classrooms, adjust the current facilities, rent space in an offsite facility and use church space like multi-purpose rooms.

Not under consideration by the parish is the establishment of a private school.

After the meeting, Linda Ross said she didn’t think Theriault’s allegations of bigotry had any basis in fact.

“I think they’re grasping at straws,” Ross said.

With an increase in the number of delegations at board meetings and several presentations being made with very similar comments, Ross said she thinks trustees need to take a closer look at the bylaws governing those presentations.

Some discussions have happened with the Manitoba School Boards Association, she said, about how those policies can be modified and how other boards have reacted to the same problems.

She expressed concern that with this conversation still dominating discussion at board meetings after five months, some members of the community are losing sight of the fact that the division’s role is to support local children.

As for ruling Hackenschmidt out of order, Ross said it’s the first time in her multi-decade career as a trustee that she has had to do that.

“I don’t remember the words she used, but it was clear that she was not going to talk about any factual information, that it was going to be more hateful rhetoric against the LGBTQ community. At some point, this just has to stop,” Ross said.

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