In October 2023, the Saskatchewan Legislature passed the “Parents’ Bill of Rights,” dubbed the “pronoun law” in media. The content of the bill is relatively simple: should a student (under the age of 16) want their teacher(s) to address them by a name or set of pronouns not on their official documentation, they need parental consent.
The exact wording from the bill reads as follows:
“Given the sensitivity of gender identity disclosure, when a student requests that their preferred name, gender identity, and/or gender expression be used, parental/guardian consent will be required for students under the age of 16.”
The great controversy of the bill lies in that this bill substantively targets queer students, as heterosexual-cisgender students would almost never request teachers call them by another name.
Various Saskatchewan Party representatives have denied the obvious fact that the bill targets the minority trans population in Saskatchewan. Premier Scott Moe was quoted as saying, “This is not in any way targeting anyone, this is targeting how we can best support our children in our community and step one of that support is to provide the parents with that opportunity to support their children.”
Regardless of his view, the bill transfers personal rights and protections away from trans students and to parents, who might very likely be transphobic, and therefore less than likely to giving their consent. This leaves trans students with just two real options: outing themselves to their parents (which can be dangerous for trans and queer youth in unsupportive households), or being deadnamed at school. This transfer of rights from trans students to parents will result in increased levels of uncomfortability, suffering, depression, and perhaps suicide among Saskatchewan’s trans youth.
The Saskatchewan Party made a feeble legal attempt to make this rights infringement seem less blunt. Section 197.4(2) of The Education Act the states that, “If it is reasonable expected that obtaining parental consent…is likely to result in physical, mental or emotional harm to the pupil, the principal shall direct the pupil to the appropriate professionals, who are employed by the school, to support and assist the pupil in developing a plan to address the pupil’s request with the pupil’s parent or guardian.” The fact that Saskatchewan schools have on staff professionals to help the Sask Party force queer students out of the closet does not absolve Moe or his compatriots of the guilt of this law.
Saskatchewan bill not the first of its kind
A.J. Withers has eloquently pointed out that the bill enjoys backing from the far-right in Saskatchewan, but it is also true that even moderately-conservative Saskatchewan residents strongly support the bill as well. Despite the moral clarity that any sober-minded person ought to be able to use in an analysis of the “Parents’ Bill of Rights,” the bill actually enjoys majoritarian support in Saskatchewan. According to Angus Reid, 55% of surveyed Saskatchewan residents said they supported or strongly supported the bill. Only 39% said they opposed or strongly opposed it, and 5% said they were unsure. An earlier estimate had essentially claimed the opposite: that 55% of Saskatchewan residents believed that the issue of preferred names and pronouns should be “left to the discretion of the teachers.” Debates about the bill seem to have brought increasing numbers of citizens onto the side of the government, supporting a mandate on the issue.
It is worth noting that the Saskatchewan bill was based on a virtually identical law from New Brunswick. Policy 713 encompasses more than just the controversial gender identity issue; the pronoun question came up only when the Progressive-Conservative government decided to review and amend the bill. Like the Saskatchewan bill, Policy 713 now forbids teachers from using under-16 students’ preferred names and pronouns without parental consent. The Education Minister of New Brunswick denied that the bill discriminates against “gender-diverse youth.” Moreover, Premier Higgs reportedly sees the policy as an “election winner,” demonstrating that the reasoning behind this bill is not about protecting a vulnerable minority (trans youth), but appealing to a majority that does not need protection. The main difference between the Saskatchewan and New Brunswick cases is that, in the latter, the support is not so deafening. In June 2023, several Progressive-Conservative MLAs voted against the Premier on an issue pertaining to the policy.
Support for the bill…but from whom?
Perhaps the most interesting part about the new polls that reveal majoritarian support for the Saskatchewan bill is that the respondents are not those who will be affected by the bill. While many respondents were parents, and therefore the ones who would be required to give consent if their children wanted to use a preferred name/pronouns, the bill is not dealing with their (the parents’) rights, despite what the title of the bill suggests. What is at stake here is not the rights of the parents, but those of the trans youth, an extremely small minority in Saskatchewan and Canada. Statistics Canada places the number of trans people in the country (aged 15 or older) at 0.3%. What could the Government of Saskatchewan and the province’s population stand to gain from this widespread support for the removal of minority rights?
In reality, the trend of majoritarian support against minority rights is not new in Canada (nor around the world). Beyond the new pronoun laws of New Brunswick and Saskatchewan, one could also look to the history of abortion access in Prince Edward Island, where women could not access free abortions on the Island without a doctor’s approval until 2015.
The Parents’ Bill of Rights is now situated within the recent anti-trans protests that erupted across the country last year. Homophobic protestors against “gender identity” called for legislation similar to that adopted in NB and SK. The tagline, “leave our kids alone,” suggests that the trend of majority domination of minority rights continues. Children’s and trans rights are being increasingly marginalized in conservative strongholds across the country.
“Rights” at the expense of trans youth
The anti-trans movement in Canada is not (nor could it ever be) about protecting the rights of children, trans or cisgender. It is about empowering the majority, even at the expense of the most vulnerable in our society. This is demonstrated by the Government of Saskatchewan using the notwithstanding clause to protect the bill from any legal challenge. In passing these anti-trans laws, parents stand to gain control, transphobes stand to gain hegemony, and governments stand to gain legitimacy.
Saskatchewan’s pronoun law does not have any moral ground to stand on. Any reasonableness that one could hope to find in the act of protecting the autonomy of parents is thrown to the wayside by the unabashed attack on trans youth. Only by trespassing on trans minority rights can “Parents’ Rights” cultists achieve their goal: the complete pacification and subordination of queer identity in Canada. Canadians on the left should be committed to fighting the Saskatchewan Party’s efforts to reverse 2SLGBTQ+ rights in the province.
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