Of Pride & prejudice

A student beaten at a grad party for being gay. Rainbow Pride flags stolen at two schools and burned. Students in Pride T-shirts at another school harassed and mocked by fellow students clad in black.

Those disturbing incidents have all happened in just the last week — during the Pride-designated month of June — in Atlantic Canada.

The first two occurred in Newfoundland and Labrador, the third in P.E.I.

An unnamed student from Holy Spirit High School in Conception Bay South, NL was apparently attacked at a grad party over the weekend.

Paradise Elementary and Mount Pearl Senior High in Newfoundland had rainbow flags flying at the buildings stolen over the weekend and later found burned nearby. Both have been replaced.

Last week, at East Wiltshire Intermediate School in Cornwall, P.E.I., students wearing black disrupted Pride events at the school, destroying Pride-themed posters and hurling slurs at students wearing Pride colours.

Sadly, however, these types of incidents could have happened anywhere in our region or our country.

Earlier this month, late on the night of June 5, a 24-year-old man was violently assaulted in Toronto in a suspected homophobic attack by a group allegedly including a member of the CFL Ottawa Redblacks. The league says football player Chris Larsen has been suspended.

A few days later, on June 9, a 71-year-old man in Saskatoon was charged with causing a disturbance for physically interfering with — in a scene caught on video — a group painting a rainbow crosswalk.

Such homophobic behaviour repulses most Canadians.

Studies have shown homophobic attitudes are more likely among those who’ve had less contact with members of the LGBTQ2S+ community.

Other factors include growing up where such prejudices, and belief in rigid gender roles, are the norm; having peer groups, especially male, who espouse those negative attitudes; and being less well-educated.

That underlines that education — particularly at public schools — is crucial to challenging prejudices and changing hearts and minds.

Given that, it’s disturbing that recent incidents in the region have all involved schools. It’s especially disquieting that school officials at East Wiltshire Intermediate in P.E.I. were allegedly forewarned that some students planned to disrupt Pride activities but did little to stop what happened. Education officials are investigating.

Whenever homophobia rears its ugly head, it’s on all of us to confront and condemn it loudly for what it is — ignorance and hate.

It’s also up to all of us to insist on consequences for those who choose to perpetrate homophobic attacks, whether physical, verbal or emotional.

Battling homophobia, similar to fighting racism and other forms of prejudice, cannot succeed as a passive endeavour.