Ontario Catholic School Boards putting hatred ahead of student safety - It’s time to shut them down for good

I’ve long been on record opposing Ontario’s two-tiered public education system.  

In Ontario, we all inherited the status quo which consists of publicly funded schools for the general public and a separate system of publicly funded schools just for Roman Catholics.  There are no publicly funded school systems for any other religions.  In Ontario, Roman Catholics enjoy constitutionally protected special rights not enjoyed by any other religion.  It is fundamentally wrong and it is discrimination based on religion.  In an era where the right and the left are demanding full equality under the law, this is a relic of a bygone era that has no place in a modern society. 

Furthermore, despite the fact the vast majority of people favour equality and inclusion in our society, including the vast majority of Roman Catholics, many of these Catholic school boards are still putting their quite frankly hateful religious doctrine ahead of sending messages of inclusion and safety to their students.  

The latest examples being the Dufferin-Peel and York Region Catholic school boards who refuse even the modestly symbolic gesture of flying Pride flags during Pride.

The message to their students is clear: being LGBTQ is not okay.  This message reinforces discrimination and violence against LGBTQ students in their schools. An institution that supports discrimination against one group supports discrimination against all groups.  

Enough is enough!  I wish some Ontario political leader would finally have the guts to take on this unacceptable status quo.  

Former Newfoundland & Labrador premier Brian Tobin had the guts in the 1990s when he called a binding referendum in that province to give citizens the ability to vote to disband religiously segregated school systems and unite them into one publicly funded school system for all.  It won with over 70% of the vote.  The province and the federal government then passed the required constitutional amendments to remove the special exemptions that allowed their religiously discriminatory school systems.

We ought to do the same in Ontario as soon as possible.  I have a strong sense that Ontario voters would also vote by huge numbers in favour of one education system for all.  

If our political leaders won’t do it, citizens should force the issue.  I’d be in favour of citizen driven referendums (with thresholds of at least 5% of all voters to get the referendum triggered) that would allow us to organize and put this issue before all voters, since most Ontario political parties (except for the Ontario Greens) seem too scared to take on this sacred cow.