Crosswalk controversy was a wake-up call

A few months back, The Canadian Press reported that a poll it had conducted showed St. John’s was the most “open” city in the country, a place where the welcome mat was always out for minorities and immigrants, results that placed still another notch in Newfoundland’s public relations belt.

It’s the sort of information that can’t help but add more credence to the polls that reveal Newfoundlanders to be among the most generous people in the country, and enhance further the favourable international image this place has gotten through the incredible success of “Come From Away,” the Broadway play depicting the open-arms reaction of Ganderites to the “plane people” diverted to their town on 9/11.

But, lest we all start measuring ourselves for the latest style in angel-like halos, or start believing, without qualification, every single word of our own press clippings, it’s healthy to recognize that bigotry and intolerance do exist here, often sliding unnoticed beneath the surface of the goodwill inherent in most of this province’s residents, the goodwill that generates its share of justifiably positive publicity.

Thus, it’s probably a good thing that we can bear witness this past week or so to the wrong-headed decision by the municipal leaders in Springdale to turn down a request from a local high school’s Gender Sexuality Alliance (refreshing to see students engaged in social activism) to have a crosswalk painted in rainbow colours in support of the gay community; it’s good, in sort of a warped way, in that it draws attention to the fact that there are pockets of intolerance and discrimination in this smiling land of ours; we’re not perfect along those lines, even though outside pundits (and our Tourism Department) would have you believe otherwise.

Because make no mistake about it, this decision by the Springdale council had nothing to do with costs or politics or setting a precedent; it was rooted in homophobia, as was any support the move generated in the town, and in the province, for that matter. (The decision may have been reversed by the time this Saturday piece of mine is being read, but the damage would have already been done).

I came across a reaction from one woman who, accidentally, in all likelihood, put her opposition to the crosswalk in its most accurate and honest — albeit bigoted — perspective; after indicating that her support of council centred around her concern that the money for the crosswalk (a miniscule amount, one would think) could have been spent elsewhere in Springdale, she blurted out: “Besides, the Bible talks about Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve.”

In other words, she wasn’t opposed to a crosswalk being used to deliver a message; nope, she was opposed to a crosswalk that delivered a specific message about a specific group. A crosswalk with a biblical focus would have been quite OK with her, I’m sure.

I heard a conversation on VOCM’S “Open Line Show” on the same topic the other day, and a caller was doing his utmost to argue that no group should be able to display its agenda in the way he thought the students from the high school in Springdale were attempting to do, but he showed his true colours when he implied that if the gay community could have its message conveyed on a crosswalk, then perhaps the “unborn” should have a similar method of communication.

It was the language of the zealot-like anti-abortionists, those who oppose the legal right of every Canadian woman to obtain an abortion, to have control over their own bodies, the socalled Christians who describe those who obtain abortions as “killers,” and declare that anyone supporting abortion rights will burn in hell. The words are sometimes less provocative in recent years, but the message is still the same.

And most of those self-described Christians display a small-minded prejudice towards gay people, and all members of the LGBTQ community, the Adam and Steve crowd, as they see them.

Abortion rights and gay rights, two issues that seem to be united under the umbrella of the socalled Christian Right, an umbrella of bigotry, intolerance and hatred.

It’s too bad that Springdale has to be placed in the forefront of the realization that we’re not quite as devoid of bigotry as we’d like to think in Newfoundland, a shame because I’m sure many of the people in that community are embarrassed to tears about the decision of their municipal representatives (or at least four of their representatives; the vote was 4-3).

I recall spending a week or so there about 15 years ago, while producing a documentary for “Land and Sea” on Ed Smith, the prolific writer and Telegram columnist; Smith, who passed away last September at the age of 76, was a tremendous human being and a very thoughtful man whose resilience after a car accident that paralysed him from the neck down was absolutely inspiring, as was the unending support of his wife and children. (I’ll bet Ed would be mortified at the crosswalk decision).

My stay there was long enough to appreciate Springdale’s beauty, and to get the sense that it was populated by decent, hardworking Newfoundlanders.

But even Springdale has its bigots.

It’s a lesson for the entire province.