Canadian Queer History
Our Heroes - It's important to recognize those individuals who have made a significant impact in the lives of queer citizens.
barbara findlay - describes herself as an old white cisgender queer lawyer with disabilities who was raised working class and christian on the prairies.
barbara findlay is a lesbian feminist lawyer known for her ground-breaking equality rights cases argued at the highest court levels in Canada.
In 2001 she became the first openly LGBT2Q+ lawyer in Canada to be recognized with a Queen's Counsel designation.
findlay has represented the queer community in a number of landmark cases, including same-sex marriage in BC and establishing the right of two lesbian mothers to both be registered on their child's birth certificate. She has represented a transgender woman's right to be considered a woman
in Nixon v Rape Relief; a lesbian couple's complaint against the Knights of Columbus for refusing to rent them a wedding hall; and an incarcerated transgender woman's right to have sex reassignment surgery and to be housed in a facility for women. (www.queerevents.ca/queer/individual/barbara-findlay)
barbara findlay is a lesbian feminist lawyer known for her ground-breaking equality rights cases argued at the highest court levels in Canada.
In 2001 she became the first openly LGBT2Q+ lawyer in Canada to be recognized with a Queen's Counsel designation.
findlay has represented the queer community in a number of landmark cases, including same-sex marriage in BC and establishing the right of two lesbian mothers to both be registered on their child's birth certificate. She has represented a transgender woman's right to be considered a woman
in Nixon v Rape Relief; a lesbian couple's complaint against the Knights of Columbus for refusing to rent them a wedding hall; and an incarcerated transgender woman's right to have sex reassignment surgery and to be housed in a facility for women. (www.queerevents.ca/queer/individual/barbara-findlay)
The following video gives a snapshot of eloquence, knowledge and passion in righting the wrongs of the law:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_RO-Z7U5zjw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_RO-Z7U5zjw
In 2000 the town council of Terrace, B.C. refused to proclaim Lesbian and Gay Pride Day. The Terrace Rainbow Committee formerly complained to the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal and were astounded when barbara findlay volunteered to represent the complainants (Terrace Rainbow Committee).
The Tribunal Hearing to place in Terrace to ensure that the process would have maximum impact.
Here is the link to the full account of the trial plus the Tribunal Chair's ruling https://www.canlii.org/en/bc/bchrt/doc/2002/2002bchrt26/2002bchrt26.html
Below is barbara's summation.
The Tribunal Hearing to place in Terrace to ensure that the process would have maximum impact.
Here is the link to the full account of the trial plus the Tribunal Chair's ruling https://www.canlii.org/en/bc/bchrt/doc/2002/2002bchrt26/2002bchrt26.html
Below is barbara's summation.
Terrace 2002 B.C Human Rights Tribunal Closing Remarks
IN THE MATTER OF THE BC HUMAN RIGHTS CODE
AND IN THE MATTER OF A HEARING
BETWEEN
TERRACE RAINBOW COMMITTEE - COMPLAINANTS
AND
CITY OF TERRACE - RESPONDENT
Argument of the Complainants
Madam Chair, we have been here for a day and a half, because of the contempt in which gay and lesbian citizens are held by the city council in Terrace.
The Terrace Rainbow Committee requested a proclamation of Lesbian and Gay Pride Day. They made the request after they learned that a similar request, made by the provincial Rainbow Coalition, had been turned down on the basis that applicant lacked a local presence, that the date requested coincided with local Riverboat Days, and that applicant had said that in the absence of a proclamation it would seek a human rights remedy.
The applicants were very accommodating. They said that they did not want to overlap Riverboat Days. They requested a day in August. They agree that it was important for a local group to make the request. The Terrace Rainbow Committee was such a group. Ironically, the Terrace Rainbow Committee had formerly been called the Terrace Tolerance Committee.
When the request was made, it was already the law in British Columbia that to refuse a request from a gay and lesbian group, when a similar request from other groups was acceded to, was discriminatory and contrary to the Human Rights Code.
Council refused the request. Actually, they did not even do that. They marked the request ‘received’ and made no decision at all.
When Council took its action, in 2000, it knew that it was breaking the Human Rights Code. It knew because there was already a decision squarely on point: The Okanagan Rainbow Coalition v City of Kelowna.
You are going to hear from my learned friend that the reason that Council refused the request because (according to his reading of the minutes of that meeting) the applicants were “rude”.
I disagree profoundly with the characterization that Terrace makes of the conduct of the applicants. They were not rude. They were polite. They took into account expressed concerns of the city. They simply asserted their right, as citizens of this beautiful city, to have a proclamation of Pride Day.
But even if you find them to been rude: does that justify a refusal of a proclamation? Let us compare rudeness. Let us evaluate disrespect.
Terrace came to this hearing and began by offering to admit the evidence of Dr. Becki Ross, evidence which has demonstrated that lesbians and gay men have suffered, and continue to suffer, egregious discrimination in Canadian society. Terrace not only knew that to refuse a proclamation was against the law, they were willing to agree that these citizens of their community have been discriminated against, harassed, hated, assaulted, and killed across the country. They knew they were breaking the law; and they knew that the citizens whose request they were refusing suffered assault and discrimination and death. They refused (they say) because the complainants were “rude”.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect. Neither the mayor, nor any of his council, have showed up at this hearing. The respondent has called no witnesses, offered no evidence in this hearing. Terrace has come before you and thumbed its civic nose at the process, at the rights claim that the complainants make. Their position before this tribunal is, in effect, that they knew of the situation of lesbians and gay men, that they knew that some of the citizens of this town are being harassed and beaten and spat at on a daily basis. They did not care.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect. Council for the City made an application to have morning freed up so that he could attend to a matter in court. An order was made in his favour over the objections of the complainants, who pointed out that their counsel had to come at great expense to Terrace and would have to stay an extra night to accommodate his request. Then he did not even trouble to advise the tribunal or counsel for the complainants when his schedule changed. On the other hand, the complainants – who are entitled to demand significant damages to compensate them for egregious contempt of Council’s action in turning down their request, because they knew that money would come from the pockets of the taxpayers of Terrace, and they believe that the citizens of Terrace should not be made to suffer for the sins of their elected representatives.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect. Counsel for the city deliberately sat behind counsel for the complainant and spent the time in this hearing working on another case. His conduct throughout this hearing is a demonstration of the contempt in which the gay and lesbian citizens of Terrace are held by their elected officials.
Terrace should be ashamed. Each of the members of council should hang their heads. They are not upholding the laws of the province. They are deliberately sending a message to their gay and lesbian citizens that Terrace is not a place for them.
You have heard from the complainant’s witness what it is like to live as a lesbian or a gay man in Terrace. Maureen Bostock has been involved in organizing lesbians and gay men in Terrace for twenty years. But the people who came to the meetings – meetings of between three and ten people, mostly - were so afraid of what might happen if people in the town knew that they were gay that the norm was no one could ‘out’ anyone else without their explicit consent in advance.
Maureen is a farmer. She does “men’s work”. She says now she realizes that, far from breaking the stereotype of “women’s work” by doing non-traditional work, she reinforced it, because she is seen as a lesbian who (everyone knows) just want to be a man. The men she encounters never make the connection to their own wives or daughter, never conclude that they too are capable of this kind of work.
Maureen herself has been out in the community for decades. Asked how the question of her sexual orientation came up in conversation, she said that it often came up when someone asked her to speak to her husband. She says she has not had a bad time in Terrace as a lesbian … because the men just treat her as “one of the guys”. Bostock notes that one of the reasons it is easier for lesbians than for gay men in Terrace is that the sexuality of women generally is ignored. Because men don’t see women as sexually autonomous beings to with start with, they do not “see” lesbians in the same way that they see and are threatened and disgusted by, gay men.
You heard from Maureen about the context of queer issues in Terrace. About the visit to town of Kari Simpson, a woman who was in town to organize against the request to the Surrey School Board that the curriculum include books reflecting the lives of children with same sex parents. Simpson came to town and called a town meeting in the arena where she told lies about lesbians and gay men: that gay men are pedophiles, for example, and not to be trusted as teachers. In response the local gay and lesbian community organized a march in which they put origami doves on the door of the arena where the meeting was being held.
You heard from Maureen that a recall campaign was organized against Mr. Giesbrecht, the NDP MLA for this region, because he refused to attend that meeting.
You heard from Maureen about the letters to the editors, describing gay and lesbians as sinners, who are going to hell.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect.
Maureen was careful to note that the impact of homophobia was different for different people. That privilege mitigated the effect of homophobia, for example for people who owned property and did not have to worry about whether a landlord would rent to them if they knew they were queer, or white people who did not have to worry that if they came out, they could lose the safety of their haven against racism.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect.
You heard heartbreaking testimony from Gavin Wallace, the courageous young man who gave evidence of the disrespect he experienced in school, from the time in grade school. He was taunted by other students. His locker was vandalized repeatedly, and glued shut. He had food thrown at him, and rocks. Twice he was injured by rocks.
You heard him say that he was called ‘faggot’ and ‘fudge packer’ and ‘cocksucker’ and every other anti-gay epithet, every single day. Not once a day – he counted one average day and recorded 47 times. Though he complained to his principal, his principal did nothing. The principal told him that he was going to try to do his job though his religion taught him that Gavin’s behavior was wrong. His counsellor told him he should be in a private school because he was a ‘faggot’.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect.
Gavin got trained to be a soccer coach. But when one of the parents learned that he was gay, they demanded a meeting with them and someone from their church, someone who told Gavin he was going to hell.
The young ones kill themselves, from that kind of vicious disrespect. Because the message is that his life, his pain, his rights do not matter at all.
Perhaps the most poignant line in Mr. Wallace’s testimony was, “But I didn’t have it so bad. I was one of the lucky ones.”
We can compare Mr. Wallace’s life to the life of Jamie Lazarre in Prince George, the gay teenager who killed himself.
Mr. Wallace is bitter. He is going to leave Terrace as quickly as he can. Leave, and never come back.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect.
Candace Weller, mother of five children, the oldest of whom is a gay man, testified about her son’s coming out to her. She explained that she had always known he was special, that he was not like other little boys. So she was not surprised when her son told her he was gay. But he too left Terrace as soon as he could, to go to university. Now he is teaching in Taiwan.
Ms. Weller described the experience of her son when went back to his old high school. She described watching – she could not hear because of a hearing impairment – as the interactions in the school became more and more threatening.
And when they left, they found that several young men from the high school had spit on their care.
A girl who had seen it happen sent flowers and an apology for their behaviour the next day.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect.
You have heard from Ms. X that when she broke up with her partner, and needed time off to deal with the breakup, she went to her employer and explained the situation. The employer gave her the time off – but also began a five-month investigation, talking to every single person Ms. X had anything to do with in her work at a residential care facility – solely, only, because she had told them she was a lesbian.
You heard Ms. Weller say that she was testifying in this hearing in part because of the effect of hearing about the murder of a young man in Stanley Park. She thought about his mother, his grandmother, his family. And she was testifying for them.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect.
Terrace apparently believes that because it doesn’t like the tone of voice of a request by the ‘Terrace Rainbow Committee”, it is ok to ignore the law, even though they know that to do so will contribute to the vicious discrimination that some of their citizens experience in this town. … Rudeness as a defense: a transformation of the Canadian legal system.
You heard Dr. Becki Ross, a pre-eminent authority in the area of discrimination against lesbians and gay men, describe the history of discrimination in Canada, its depth and breadth. You have heard her testify that there is nothing different between the sexual practices of lesbians and gay men, and the sexual practices of heterosexuals. You have heard her describe the ameliorative effects of gay pride events for the self-esteem and the public respect for queers.
But Terrace did not only refuse a proclamation to queers. They hated queers so much that they were willing to – and they did – cancel all proclamations, for every group of citizens in this town.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect.
Lesbian and gay Pride day, an internationally celebrated event, is called “pride day” for a reason: it asserts against the shaming tactics of communities of Terrace the basic human right to be proud.
A right that Terrace cannot, will not – without an order of this tribunal – respect.
We can speculate on the motives of the Terrace City Council. That they are so thin-skinned as to have been offended by my clients’ proclamation request is ludicrous. That they don’t want to have been seen to support lesbians and gay men when next they go to the polls – that is the point. That is the reason that they have not settled this complaint. They want to be able to say to the electorate “The human rights tribunal made us do it”.
They have insisted that this hearing be held – a hearing conducted of at the taxpayers’ expense – to get themselves off a political hook. They cannot afford to be seen to respect their lesbian and gay citizens.
They should be ashamed.
We hereby request that you order Terrace to proclaim lesbian and gay pride day, on a date to be chosen by the complainants, and that the City of Terrace publish that proclamation in the newspaper and once a day for a week on the local television and radio stations. The week shall be chosen by the complainants.
Madam Chair, my clients have specifically declined to ask for a monetary award from the City, respecting that the money comes from taxpayers who have no role in this decision of council.
So we make no request for damages. But we do make this request. We ask you to include in your decision the award of damages you would have made had such a request been made.
We ask you to tell this council, and any other city council in B.C. which might consider turning down a request for pride days, what the price is – the price of disrespect.
Thank you,
Those are my submissions.
Submissions is Reply
In reply to the submissions of the Respondent, we noted
That the allegation that the complainants had been ‘rude’ or ‘threatening’ as described by the respondent was an allegation made by them in relation to comments the Rainbow Committee of Terrace made not in relation to their own application, but in relation to a discussion of council’s refusal of the application by Rainbow B.C., a provincial organization, at the previous council meeting.
That the allegation that the complainants had been ‘rude’ and ‘threatening’ was in any event a mischaracterization of the minutes of the meeting of the council
That it is trite human rights law that the intention of a respondent to a complaint of discrimination is entirely irrelevant to the question of whether or not discrimination occurred.
That it is trite human rights law that if there is both a discriminatory and a non-discriminatory purpose to an action, the action is discriminatory.
barbara findlay, Q.C.
June 25, 2002
IN THE MATTER OF THE BC HUMAN RIGHTS CODE
AND IN THE MATTER OF A HEARING
BETWEEN
TERRACE RAINBOW COMMITTEE - COMPLAINANTS
AND
CITY OF TERRACE - RESPONDENT
Argument of the Complainants
Madam Chair, we have been here for a day and a half, because of the contempt in which gay and lesbian citizens are held by the city council in Terrace.
The Terrace Rainbow Committee requested a proclamation of Lesbian and Gay Pride Day. They made the request after they learned that a similar request, made by the provincial Rainbow Coalition, had been turned down on the basis that applicant lacked a local presence, that the date requested coincided with local Riverboat Days, and that applicant had said that in the absence of a proclamation it would seek a human rights remedy.
The applicants were very accommodating. They said that they did not want to overlap Riverboat Days. They requested a day in August. They agree that it was important for a local group to make the request. The Terrace Rainbow Committee was such a group. Ironically, the Terrace Rainbow Committee had formerly been called the Terrace Tolerance Committee.
When the request was made, it was already the law in British Columbia that to refuse a request from a gay and lesbian group, when a similar request from other groups was acceded to, was discriminatory and contrary to the Human Rights Code.
Council refused the request. Actually, they did not even do that. They marked the request ‘received’ and made no decision at all.
When Council took its action, in 2000, it knew that it was breaking the Human Rights Code. It knew because there was already a decision squarely on point: The Okanagan Rainbow Coalition v City of Kelowna.
You are going to hear from my learned friend that the reason that Council refused the request because (according to his reading of the minutes of that meeting) the applicants were “rude”.
I disagree profoundly with the characterization that Terrace makes of the conduct of the applicants. They were not rude. They were polite. They took into account expressed concerns of the city. They simply asserted their right, as citizens of this beautiful city, to have a proclamation of Pride Day.
But even if you find them to been rude: does that justify a refusal of a proclamation? Let us compare rudeness. Let us evaluate disrespect.
Terrace came to this hearing and began by offering to admit the evidence of Dr. Becki Ross, evidence which has demonstrated that lesbians and gay men have suffered, and continue to suffer, egregious discrimination in Canadian society. Terrace not only knew that to refuse a proclamation was against the law, they were willing to agree that these citizens of their community have been discriminated against, harassed, hated, assaulted, and killed across the country. They knew they were breaking the law; and they knew that the citizens whose request they were refusing suffered assault and discrimination and death. They refused (they say) because the complainants were “rude”.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect. Neither the mayor, nor any of his council, have showed up at this hearing. The respondent has called no witnesses, offered no evidence in this hearing. Terrace has come before you and thumbed its civic nose at the process, at the rights claim that the complainants make. Their position before this tribunal is, in effect, that they knew of the situation of lesbians and gay men, that they knew that some of the citizens of this town are being harassed and beaten and spat at on a daily basis. They did not care.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect. Council for the City made an application to have morning freed up so that he could attend to a matter in court. An order was made in his favour over the objections of the complainants, who pointed out that their counsel had to come at great expense to Terrace and would have to stay an extra night to accommodate his request. Then he did not even trouble to advise the tribunal or counsel for the complainants when his schedule changed. On the other hand, the complainants – who are entitled to demand significant damages to compensate them for egregious contempt of Council’s action in turning down their request, because they knew that money would come from the pockets of the taxpayers of Terrace, and they believe that the citizens of Terrace should not be made to suffer for the sins of their elected representatives.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect. Counsel for the city deliberately sat behind counsel for the complainant and spent the time in this hearing working on another case. His conduct throughout this hearing is a demonstration of the contempt in which the gay and lesbian citizens of Terrace are held by their elected officials.
Terrace should be ashamed. Each of the members of council should hang their heads. They are not upholding the laws of the province. They are deliberately sending a message to their gay and lesbian citizens that Terrace is not a place for them.
You have heard from the complainant’s witness what it is like to live as a lesbian or a gay man in Terrace. Maureen Bostock has been involved in organizing lesbians and gay men in Terrace for twenty years. But the people who came to the meetings – meetings of between three and ten people, mostly - were so afraid of what might happen if people in the town knew that they were gay that the norm was no one could ‘out’ anyone else without their explicit consent in advance.
Maureen is a farmer. She does “men’s work”. She says now she realizes that, far from breaking the stereotype of “women’s work” by doing non-traditional work, she reinforced it, because she is seen as a lesbian who (everyone knows) just want to be a man. The men she encounters never make the connection to their own wives or daughter, never conclude that they too are capable of this kind of work.
Maureen herself has been out in the community for decades. Asked how the question of her sexual orientation came up in conversation, she said that it often came up when someone asked her to speak to her husband. She says she has not had a bad time in Terrace as a lesbian … because the men just treat her as “one of the guys”. Bostock notes that one of the reasons it is easier for lesbians than for gay men in Terrace is that the sexuality of women generally is ignored. Because men don’t see women as sexually autonomous beings to with start with, they do not “see” lesbians in the same way that they see and are threatened and disgusted by, gay men.
You heard from Maureen about the context of queer issues in Terrace. About the visit to town of Kari Simpson, a woman who was in town to organize against the request to the Surrey School Board that the curriculum include books reflecting the lives of children with same sex parents. Simpson came to town and called a town meeting in the arena where she told lies about lesbians and gay men: that gay men are pedophiles, for example, and not to be trusted as teachers. In response the local gay and lesbian community organized a march in which they put origami doves on the door of the arena where the meeting was being held.
You heard from Maureen that a recall campaign was organized against Mr. Giesbrecht, the NDP MLA for this region, because he refused to attend that meeting.
You heard from Maureen about the letters to the editors, describing gay and lesbians as sinners, who are going to hell.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect.
Maureen was careful to note that the impact of homophobia was different for different people. That privilege mitigated the effect of homophobia, for example for people who owned property and did not have to worry about whether a landlord would rent to them if they knew they were queer, or white people who did not have to worry that if they came out, they could lose the safety of their haven against racism.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect.
You heard heartbreaking testimony from Gavin Wallace, the courageous young man who gave evidence of the disrespect he experienced in school, from the time in grade school. He was taunted by other students. His locker was vandalized repeatedly, and glued shut. He had food thrown at him, and rocks. Twice he was injured by rocks.
You heard him say that he was called ‘faggot’ and ‘fudge packer’ and ‘cocksucker’ and every other anti-gay epithet, every single day. Not once a day – he counted one average day and recorded 47 times. Though he complained to his principal, his principal did nothing. The principal told him that he was going to try to do his job though his religion taught him that Gavin’s behavior was wrong. His counsellor told him he should be in a private school because he was a ‘faggot’.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect.
Gavin got trained to be a soccer coach. But when one of the parents learned that he was gay, they demanded a meeting with them and someone from their church, someone who told Gavin he was going to hell.
The young ones kill themselves, from that kind of vicious disrespect. Because the message is that his life, his pain, his rights do not matter at all.
Perhaps the most poignant line in Mr. Wallace’s testimony was, “But I didn’t have it so bad. I was one of the lucky ones.”
We can compare Mr. Wallace’s life to the life of Jamie Lazarre in Prince George, the gay teenager who killed himself.
Mr. Wallace is bitter. He is going to leave Terrace as quickly as he can. Leave, and never come back.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect.
Candace Weller, mother of five children, the oldest of whom is a gay man, testified about her son’s coming out to her. She explained that she had always known he was special, that he was not like other little boys. So she was not surprised when her son told her he was gay. But he too left Terrace as soon as he could, to go to university. Now he is teaching in Taiwan.
Ms. Weller described the experience of her son when went back to his old high school. She described watching – she could not hear because of a hearing impairment – as the interactions in the school became more and more threatening.
And when they left, they found that several young men from the high school had spit on their care.
A girl who had seen it happen sent flowers and an apology for their behaviour the next day.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect.
You have heard from Ms. X that when she broke up with her partner, and needed time off to deal with the breakup, she went to her employer and explained the situation. The employer gave her the time off – but also began a five-month investigation, talking to every single person Ms. X had anything to do with in her work at a residential care facility – solely, only, because she had told them she was a lesbian.
You heard Ms. Weller say that she was testifying in this hearing in part because of the effect of hearing about the murder of a young man in Stanley Park. She thought about his mother, his grandmother, his family. And she was testifying for them.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect.
Terrace apparently believes that because it doesn’t like the tone of voice of a request by the ‘Terrace Rainbow Committee”, it is ok to ignore the law, even though they know that to do so will contribute to the vicious discrimination that some of their citizens experience in this town. … Rudeness as a defense: a transformation of the Canadian legal system.
You heard Dr. Becki Ross, a pre-eminent authority in the area of discrimination against lesbians and gay men, describe the history of discrimination in Canada, its depth and breadth. You have heard her testify that there is nothing different between the sexual practices of lesbians and gay men, and the sexual practices of heterosexuals. You have heard her describe the ameliorative effects of gay pride events for the self-esteem and the public respect for queers.
But Terrace did not only refuse a proclamation to queers. They hated queers so much that they were willing to – and they did – cancel all proclamations, for every group of citizens in this town.
Let us compare rudeness. Let us compare disrespect.
Lesbian and gay Pride day, an internationally celebrated event, is called “pride day” for a reason: it asserts against the shaming tactics of communities of Terrace the basic human right to be proud.
A right that Terrace cannot, will not – without an order of this tribunal – respect.
We can speculate on the motives of the Terrace City Council. That they are so thin-skinned as to have been offended by my clients’ proclamation request is ludicrous. That they don’t want to have been seen to support lesbians and gay men when next they go to the polls – that is the point. That is the reason that they have not settled this complaint. They want to be able to say to the electorate “The human rights tribunal made us do it”.
They have insisted that this hearing be held – a hearing conducted of at the taxpayers’ expense – to get themselves off a political hook. They cannot afford to be seen to respect their lesbian and gay citizens.
They should be ashamed.
We hereby request that you order Terrace to proclaim lesbian and gay pride day, on a date to be chosen by the complainants, and that the City of Terrace publish that proclamation in the newspaper and once a day for a week on the local television and radio stations. The week shall be chosen by the complainants.
Madam Chair, my clients have specifically declined to ask for a monetary award from the City, respecting that the money comes from taxpayers who have no role in this decision of council.
So we make no request for damages. But we do make this request. We ask you to include in your decision the award of damages you would have made had such a request been made.
We ask you to tell this council, and any other city council in B.C. which might consider turning down a request for pride days, what the price is – the price of disrespect.
Thank you,
Those are my submissions.
Submissions is Reply
In reply to the submissions of the Respondent, we noted
That the allegation that the complainants had been ‘rude’ or ‘threatening’ as described by the respondent was an allegation made by them in relation to comments the Rainbow Committee of Terrace made not in relation to their own application, but in relation to a discussion of council’s refusal of the application by Rainbow B.C., a provincial organization, at the previous council meeting.
That the allegation that the complainants had been ‘rude’ and ‘threatening’ was in any event a mischaracterization of the minutes of the meeting of the council
That it is trite human rights law that the intention of a respondent to a complaint of discrimination is entirely irrelevant to the question of whether or not discrimination occurred.
That it is trite human rights law that if there is both a discriminatory and a non-discriminatory purpose to an action, the action is discriminatory.
barbara findlay, Q.C.
June 25, 2002
