Vengeance Has No Fury Like DEI/Transgenderism Spurned

"While individuals are entitled to their religious beliefs, opinions and views, what they are not entitled to do is act in a manner that disrespects, discriminates, insults, denigrates, harasses, bullies of otherwise creates an unsafe environment for anyone in the school."

Renfrew County Catholic School Board

Protester Josh Alexander at a downtown Ottawa protest in this file photo. Alexander lost a court challenge to be reinstated to his high school after being expelled. Photo by Tony Caldwell /Postmedia

18-year-old Josh Alexander was suspended late in 2022 (at age 16) from St. Joseph's Catholic High School. His sin was to insist in his belief that humans are created as immutably male or female; their gender or sex cannot be altered at whim or will. Moreover he expressed his belief in the immorality of biological males entering washrooms meant for females. He argued that he was a victim of 'faithism'; in that his Catholic faith led him to the belief that there are two sexes; male and female.

The high school student had been given a 20-day suspension by the principal of the high school he attended, based on his understanding that the Grade 11 student had expressed 'inappropriate' comments to transgender students in class and online. He had referred to a trans student by a 'deadname' (birth name) and suggested that trans students' presence in the girls' washroom posed a risk. 

 

To be redeemed and permitted to return to school, he had to fulfill stated obligations.

When his suspension period was over, the principal offered to allow the young man's return to class as long as he behaved respectfully, abstained from attending two of his classes where transgendered students were registered to attend, and forbore from using their 'deadnames'. When Alexander refused compliance with the conditions, the principal issued an order excluding him from school attendance.

A fresh suspension order and exclusion resulted from his ignoring the original ones and attending school on two occasions, regardless. He then appealed the decision that shut him out of his school, by the exclusion and suspension. His argument was that he had not caused actual harm to anyone, though he may have offended transgender students. He appealed to the Ontario Divisional Court for judicial review of the decisions.

His argument was that the school board did not accommodate his right to express minority religious beliefs on gender and sexuality; that he was essentially discriminated against. His arguments were rejected by a three-member Divisional Court appeal panel which felt the school board's decision to respect his exclusion and suspension by the school's principal was a reasonable one.

Citing the school's obligation to maintain a safe and inclusive environment, a majority of judges felt the board had correctly balanced the student's right to religious freedom, stressing that it was the student's behaviour toward other students, and not his religious convictions at the heart of the case. According to the Divisional Court panel, no flaws could be found in the reasoning of the committee, describing it as "intelligible, clear and  rounded in the evidence".

There are limits, the court stated, to all freedoms, including the freedom of religion, particularly when the rights of others are affected. 

There are, evidently, no limits on the type and amount of punishment meted out to the skeptical, those who maintain a reasonable belief in the supremacy of science and biology. And the fact that the rights of females to feel safe and secure in their own spaces, and not to have them invaded by males claiming themselves to be females in essence, if not through nature's designation. 

 

It is impressive that a pathology of anti-science, anti-biological verities have been trashed through a social construct of gender fluidity. One that presumably sane minds, lodged in well-educated heads that would deny that the Sun circles our Earth, and that our Planet is flat, but have no problems believing that gender can be expressed in any conceivable manner that people can convince themselves suits their mindset.