Kenney unlikely to take up lang’s Pride offer
CALGARY — Alberta crooner k.d. lang has invited politician Jason Kenney to Calgary’s Pride festivities, but it appears he won’t be attending.
The country singer took to Twitter on Tuesday to offer Kenney, a leadership candidate for the province’s new United Conservative Party, free tickets to a concert if he would sit down and discuss LGBTQ rights with her.
Lang’s offer followed a tweet from blogger Mike Morrison, who also invited Kenney on Twitter to attend Pride.
It came after Kenney’s spokeswoman, Annie Dormuth, said in a statement on Monday that he would skip the annual parade because he wasn’t invited.
In response to lang’s invitation, another spokesman, Blaise Boehmer, tweeted that Kenney was “100 per cent focused” on the leadership campaign and had a “packed week meeting with members.”
Calgary Pride begins on Friday and ends on Sept. 4. The marquee parade will be held on Sept 3.
While lang and Morrison urged Kenney to attend, parade organizers made it clear last weekend that the United Conservative Party was not welcome because the party doesn’t have a clear stance on sexual diversity issues.
Leadership candidate Brian Jean said he hoped they would reconsider, noting he had asked to march in the parade and has always championed diversity and tolerance. Jean’s campaign organizers said he might try to attend as a spectator.
Others affiliated with the party expect to attend as spectators, too, including interim leader Nathan Cooper, and leadership candidates Doug Schweitzer and Jeff Callaway.
The United Conservative Party was created last month after members of the Progressive Conservative and Wildrose parties voted overwhelmingly to join forces. A new leader will be picked in October.
Both the PCs and Wildrose have had strained relationships with the LGBTQ community.
The Wildrose party lost the 2012 general election in part due to its refusal to sanction a candidate who once warned gay people to repent or face eternity in hell’s “lake of fire.”
The PCs faced a backlash in government over their handling of gay-straight alliances before passing legislation acceptable to all sides in 2015.
Kenney has had an especially fractious relationship with the LGBTQ community, drawing criticism for urging that parents, in some circumstances, be told if their children attend a gay-straight alliance group. Critics say that could out kids before they are ready and put them at risk of family estrangement or worse.