Worried Sick About the State of Rights in the World?
A dispatch from the CBABC Sexual and Gender Diversity Alliance
Canadians are on edge. For years, creeping racism, colonialism, antisemitism, misogyny, homophobia, transphobia, division and polarization have spread on both sides of the Canadian-US border. Now, the rule of law faces a critical challenge that threatens the fabric of North American society.
How should the legal profession respond?
The 2SLGBTQIA+ community has helpful perspectives to share. We lived through arbitrariness and the surreal. Baffled and distressed, we experienced bans, raids, misinformation, disinformation, chaos and an epidemic that killed our nearest and dearest. Queer, trans and gender-fluid people fought for the right to gather, the right to intimacy without breaking the law, and against stigmatization in healthcare during the AIDS crisis.
We’ve been lied about, lied to and lied at. We were erased, silenced and ignored by the law. We lost family, friends and lives. But, we lived, appeared, yelled and marched. We fought for equal rights in relationships and families, and we won battles.
It even felt like we won the war for a while. Our jobs were secure. We compared photos of our children. We reveled in the luxury that was, for so long, out of reach — the prospect of blandly mundane lives as we grow old with our significant others.
Lately, though, it’s looking like some of us may have become complacent about our victories. Did we so integrate our entitlement to equality that we ignored the possibility it could be taken away? Did we really think the road to equality was one that can only travel in one direction — forwards?
And so it is with all the progress we have seen in Canadian society — the Charter notwithstanding. For example, in the 2010s, “gender identity” and “gender expression” were added to human rights and education statutes across Canada. Schools then took on a greater role in supporting transgender students.
Then in 2023, the landscape shifted as three provinces introduced policies requiring parental consent for minors to change their names and pronouns at school. While the Supreme Court of Canada has recently ruled that the Charter applies to school boards in Ontario, politicians across the country are signalling a growing willingness to use the notwithstanding clause to legitimize discrimination against marginalized people. Between an erosion of section 15 Charter equality rights and the stream of edicts from the American White House, we ask ourselves — what else is to come?
Someone outside the 2SLGBTQIA+ community might be forgiven for thinking that threats to organizers of drag performances had nothing to do with them. Or for thinking that a reasonable approach to gender identity and participation in sports was to “slow down and think it through.” But our community has seen this before.
Stigmatization and discrimination start small and then, slowly but surely, any of us can feel the heat like the proverbial frog in the kettle. We watch with eyes widened as, to the south, what once felt like secure legal foundations favouring bodily autonomy and modernized definitions of family are chipped away until they crumble away. People are losing their livelihoods for working to make the world a more equal and better place. Science and scientists are viewed with suspicion.
In a September 2024 interview with the CBC, queer and trans advocate barbara findlay, KC emphasized how anti-trans activists deliberately adopted a strategy of targeting schools under the guise of “parental rights” and “protecting children.” But this narrative masks harmful transphobic intentions and misleads uninformed parents into supporting movements that ultimately erode human rights.
The interview concluded with a critical message from findlay — opposing attacks on trans rights is essential not just for the protection of trans kids, but for safeguarding the rights of all marginalized groups. The fight against transphobia in schools is a fight for equality, respect and human rights in the education system.1
In an opinion piece published March 8, 2025 in the Globe and Mail, human rights lawyer and scholar-activist Ayo Sogurno put a fine point on it stating, “the future of democracy could depend on our ability to see through the smokescreen of ‘traditional values’ and identify these measures for what they truly are: calculated steps toward democratic erosion. In defending LGBTQ rights, we preserve the democratic principles that protect us all.”2
So where does that leave us? The legal profession is not just a dignified profession of law administrators. We animate the principles that drive the law forward — dignity, respect, individuality, communality, safety, the rule of law, the pursuit of a fulfilling life and fulfilling relationships within that life.
If we see the legal system permit corruption or legitimize discrimination — our disapprobation must be heard. If we see our kindred being erased from their place in society, we must stand with them and be seen together. If we see our compatriots pushed away from their place at the Table of Society, we must speak boldly and fearlessly and demand that they be restored and venerated for their uniqueness.
And we must not be content to do this as individuals. The law should be there to protect all members of society. Our profession must appear and stand tall. Our profession must speak up and be seen. The 2SLGBTQIA+ community knows what Canadians are feeling, because we’ve felt it before, and we feel it now. We’ve seen what it does to people. Or what it can do to anyone.
The legal profession must refuse to let it happen again.
