Trends in Canadian Newspaper Coverage of Gay–Straight Alliances, 2000–2009

Abstract

Gay–straight alliances (GSAs) in Canadian public schools have gained considerable attention from print media since reports first surfaced in the year 2000. This study tracked and analyzed Canadian newspaper reporting about GSA creation. It summarized the shift in public opinion toward lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) youth activism by analyzing how Canadian newspapers reported on emerging GSAs. The emergence of Canadian GSAs was grounded in what is known about the social, political, geographical, and legal contexts of the first decade of the 21st century. This study framed the textual evidence of emerging Canadian GSAs that was reported in the newspapers as one measure of public opinion toward LGBTQ youth activism.

KEYWORDS:

• Canada
• gay–straight alliances
• journalism
• LGBTQ youth
• newspapers
• public opinion

Notes

1. For historical reasons, full public funding for Catholic schools is enshrined in the Canadian constitution for three of Canada's ten provinces: Alberta, Ontario, and Saskatchewan.

2. In the first decade of 21st century, Canada also saw legal cases that addressed gay rights outside of the public school system. Section 15(1) of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms (1982), in particular, proved instrumental in mounting legal challenges to state-sanctioned homophobia and heterosexism. Originally not included in the scope of section 15(1), sexual orientation was found to be an analogous ground to be protected from discrimination in the Supreme Court case Egan vs. Canada (1995). Although all nine judges ruled that section 15 prohibited discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation in Egan, they did so from two distinct premises. The majority, led by Justices Peter Cory and Frank Iacobucci focused on the social, political, economic, and legal status of LGBTQ persons as a recognizable group (Wintemute, 2004). The minority focused on the unchangeable causes of homosexuality as an important factor in the decision (Wintemute, 2004). Within the time frame explored in this study, all ten provinces had either already adopted or else introduced legislation that enshrined sexual orientation as an analogous, protected ground in their provincial human rights charters. The last province to do so was Alberta, which amended its human rights legislation to include sexual orientation in June 2009 (Hansard, 2009). This delay is notable for two reasons: first, because it took place 11 years after being ordered to do so by the federal Supreme Court in the case Vriend v. Alberta (1998), and second, because it was seven years after the next-to-last territory—in this case, the Northwest Territory—amended its human rights charter to include sexual orientation.Alberta also proved to be the provincial laggard in supporting same-sex marriage, which was legalized nationwide by the federal Civil Marriage Act in summer 2005. Sensing the impending legalization of same-sex marriage in Canada, Alberta passed the Marriage Act (2000), which defined marriage as between a woman and a man. As the Canadian public weighed in on national discussions of same-sex marriage, Alberta premier Ralph Klein publicly stated that should the federal parliament pass a law legalizing same-sex marriage, he would invoke the notwithstanding clause (section 33) to prevent legally recognized same-sex marriages in Alberta (Hiebert, 2003). Premier Klein has also referred to Alberta as the province of the “severely normal,” which meant that good, natural, and valued citizens are “rugged individuals who are right-wing Christians; they are white, heterosexual, adult, in a stringent gender hierarchy, which produces all women as less worthy” (Filax, 2004). Despite Alberta's position, the patchwork legalization of same-sex marriage in Canada began in the provinces of Ontario and British Columbia in 2003, followed by six more provinces in 2004, and Alberta and Prince Edward Island being forced to do so as a result of the federal Civil Marriage Act in the summer of 2005. Despite its earlier threats, Alberta did not invoke the notwithstanding clause to prevent the federal legalization of same-sex marriage from applying to the province of Alberta.

3. Consistent with Rayside (2008) and Wells (2006a), there were no data available before the year 2000, which is likely because either there were no GSAs in Canada before 2000 or that the GSAs which did exist before the year 2000 did not draw attention from print media.

4. New Brunswick holds the distinction of being Canada's only officially bilingual province; the other eight provinces are officially unilingual English. New Brunswick is 69% English and 29% French (Statistics Canada, 2006), which is why the majority of its daily newspapers are printed in the English language.

5. Shortly after this paper was accepted for publication, several Canadian newspapers reported on a publicly funded Catholic school board refusing to allow GSAs to form within its district. In defense of the decision, the school board director was quoted as comparing GSAs to neo-Nazi groups. This marked the first occurrence of opposition to GSAs on the grounds that they are dangerous to be reported in a Canadian newspaper since the year 2000.