LSN Lies About PEI Sexual Development Guide

Apparently PEI has published a guidebook for parents as to what is normal sexual development for children, and the folks over at LifeSite News don't like it very much.   

Link to the actual guidebook: http://www.gov.pe.ca/photos/original/CSA_Healthy.pdf

According to LifeSite:

A new guide from the government of P.E.I. is telling parents that it is “natural and healthy” for young children to “touch the ‘private parts’ of familiar adults” and to look at “nude pictures on the Internet, videos, magazines”. Parents are also being told that they should not discourage their children from masturbating. 

Of course, what LifeSite quietly chooses not to tell the readers is that the guide does give parents some fairly sensible guidelines as to appropriate responses to those behaviours where they would be inappropriate.

For example, the bit about young children touching the private parts of familiar adults occurs in a table with three columns:

Under Normal and Healthy:

Touches the “private parts” of familiar adults and children with hand or body .

Under Of Concern:

Touches/rubs the “private parts” of familiar children or adults after they have been told consistently not to do so . 

Seek Professional Help:

Sneakily touches/rubs the “private parts” of adults or children and, if questioned, deny it . 

Notice anything?  The PEI guide does point out that curiosity driven behaviours are perfectly normal, and only become a matter of concern if the child doesn't respond to appropriate guidance from the parents.

Of course, LifeSite is so concerned about regulating other people's morality that they won't let a few obvious facts get in the way of a good tirade.

The experts state that a child should not be discouraged from masturbating and “should not be told that it is 'bad,' 'dirty,' or 'nasty’”. “It is important to keep in mind that there are no absolutes,” the guidelines state. “Normal, healthy behaviour covers a wide range and may not be expressed the same, or to the same extent, in every child.”“I don’t know what ‘children’ they are referring to, but no normal children do these things at those age groups,” said Landolt who is a lawyer, mother of five children, and grandmother of nine. 

I somehow imagine that Ms. Landolt's household had so many implicit taboos around sexuality that she never saw her children do any of these things.  They were no doubt smart enough to keep it well out of her sight after seeing one of their older siblings disciplined.

Children are naturally curious about all things, and anybody who believes that they won't be curious about their bodies (and the bodies of others) is blind to reality.

Landolt called the guidelines “permissive” and said that parents operating by them will only encourage their children to become “sexually involved at a prepubescent age.”  

“It sets them on a dangerous journey when they are not ready for it,” she said. 

Frankly, after reading the PEI book, there is nothing in it that strikes me as either particularly licentious or unreasonable.  It lists a series of fairly normal developmental moments and when they are likely to occur.  It then gives parents a general guideline as to when problems may be developing.

The pamphlet's advice bears echoes of the views of the 1940-50s researcher Alfred Kinsey, a controversial and highly influential figure considered by many as the “father of the sexual revolution,” who claimed that his research found that infants were sexual. While Kinsey is still widely cited and used in many circles, researcher Judith Reisman famously exposed his abhorrent research methods, which included sexually molesting babies as young as five months old to collect data on children’s “orgasms.”  

Pointing to the guideline about adults allowing children to “touch” their “private parts”, Landolt called it a “diabolic attempt” to make children “vulnerable to sexual activity” and “acquiesce to sexual acts of adults.”  

Landolt said that P.E.I parents should be outraged that their tax dollars were used to fund a guide that promotes a “misleading destructive journey” for children. 

Trust LSN to use every opportunity to slag Kinsey's work.  Of course, the booklet doesn't cite Kinsey.  Apparently, in the LSN bubble, whatever Kinsey did was bad because they don't like his research methods.

The good news for the rest of the world is that Kinsey opened the door to an open discussion of human sexuality at all levels, and that's a genie that's proving very difficult for them to put back into the bottle.

Apparently Ms. Landolt Doesn't Read Her Own Words

Over at LifeSite News, we find REAL Women Canada's Gwen Landolt trying to backtrack on what she said so publicly last week.

The pro-family, pro-life conservative organization REAL Women of Canada is calling a CBC report “absolutely not” accurate that quoted president Gwen Landolt as if she tacitly approved Uganda’s contemplation of the death penalty for practicing homosexuals. 

“I don’t know if the CBC did this deliberately or whether it was accidental and they misunderstood [my position],” said Landolt to LifeSiteNews.com. “My whole life I have been utterly opposed to capital punishment and I would never make homosexual execution the exception.”

Yes, well, when your own press release states rather unequivocally the following:

Minister of Foreign Affairs, John Baird, has abused his position as a cabinet minister to impose his own special interests in the foreign countries of Uganda, Kenya and Russia. 

He awarded $200,000 of Canadian taxpayers’ money by way of the Department of Foreign Affairs to special interest groups in Uganda and Kenya to further his own perspective on homosexuality.  He also insulted the speaker of the Ugandan Parliament, Rebecca Kadaga, at a meeting of the International Parliamentary Union in Quebec City when he criticized Uganda for its position on homosexuality and same-sex marriage.  In response, Ms. Kadaga stated that Uganda was a sovereign nation and not a colony of Canada, and no one could tell Ugandans what to do. 

In case Ms. Landolt hasn't been paying attention, Uganda is proposing a bill which would result in the imprisonment or execution of LGBT people in Uganda.  Let's not mince words here - LGBT people in that country face the most severe punishments possible under law for simply being alive.

So, Canada isn't supposed to protest what is clearly a violation of fundamental human rights in Uganda?  Apparently not, Ms. Landolt says the following:

Landolt stated that REAL Women would “never support the death penalty in any circumstance.”
“I would never ever in a hundred years say the execution of people is suitable and appropriate. Never,” she said.

Funny.  Out of one side of her mouth, she says that she doesn't support the death penalty, and yet Baird, acting on behalf of Canada at a diplomatic summit, shouldn't raise these issues?  Her logic is circular to say the least.

Saying nothing is tacit approval - especially of laws which have been so widely publicized on the world stage during their formulation.

CBC interviewed Landolt at the time, reporting: “When asked about reports that Uganda has considered the death penalty as punishment for having homosexual relations, Landolt said, ‘It may be unwise by Western standards, but who are we to interfere in a sovereign country?’” 

Landolt told LSN that her original comment to CBC was about the newly enacted Russian law to eliminate homosexual indoctrination of minors, which allows for jail terms for offenders of up to three years. 

Landolt said that she told CBC that while she didn’t think Russia’s move was “necessarily a human rights violation” she did think however that it was “unwise by Western standards” adding as an aside, “but who are we to interfere in a sovereign country?” 

Having read through Landolt's original press release, it is my opinion that she is lying through her teeth trying to undo some of the damage she did to her own organization.

Frankly, whether Landolt's comments to CBC were "specific to Russia" or not is irrelevant.  The laws recently passed in Russia are every bit as flawed and damaging as those proposed in Uganda.  About the only difference is the severity of the punishments.  The laws in Russia have rightly been criticized for being so loosely worded that just about anyone could be convicted of "homosexual propaganda".

Further, the presupposition of such a law is that there is such a thing as "homosexual propaganda" in the first place.  Let me be emphatically clear here - it is only in the minds of those who are irrationally opposed to homosexuality that there is any notion that homosexuals "recruit" people.  If you think a "pride parade" or a rainbow flag is somehow "propaganda", then chances are you haven't exactly got a clear understanding of the purpose, place and history of such things. 

Barbara Kay on REAL Women Canada's Outburst

In one sense, I was very happy to read Barbara Kay's column excoriating Gwen Landolt and REAL Women Canada for their attack on Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird this week.  I was pleased to see that at least someone on the far right could see the ridiculousness of Landolt's position.

That said, there are a couple of aspects of Kay's column that I find somewhat troubling.  Superficially, it gives off the impression that she is truly outraged by Landolt's statements.  But, there is an undercurrent of a parent scolding a wayward child for doing something phenomenally stupid ... like throwing a rock through the window of the neighbour that nobody on the block likes.

On one hand, the child went too far, acting in part based on what they've heard their parents say over dinner.  In effect, the child has given expression to what the parents have said in private but would never act on in public.

The child has to be disciplined for what they did, even though the parents may well think that it's perfectly apropos.

I've read enough of Ms. Kay's columns over the years to be fairly confident that she is generally sympathetic to most of the positions that REAL Women Canada has expressed.  In broad terms, she lives on the political right of Canada's spectrum, and would qualify as a social conservative no matter which way you examine her statements.

Ms. Landolt is out of line here. What Mr. Baird does or does not believe about homosexuality is irrelevant to his job, which is to represent official Canadian positions. Our government, and most Canadians, perceive homosexuals as fully equal citizens under the law, including the right to marriage and parenting. Whether or not many Canadians are uncomfortable with those positions (as indeed many are) is not pertinent to this situation. Mr. Baird is not demanding other countries enact gay-marriage laws. He is reacting to punitive measures for the “crime” of being homosexual. 

It gets worse. 

Ms. Landolt told a CBC interviewer that gay rights is not a human rights issue per se. She said, “according to the culture and the religion of, you know, Uganda, it’s not a human rights issue. You can’t imply that every country has to take our human rights issues and plunk it down in another country.” When pressed to comment on the fact that Uganda has contemplated the death penalty for practicing homosexuality, Ms. Landolt responded: “It may be unwise by Western standards, but who are we to interfere in a sovereign country?” [ http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2013/08/08/barbara-kay-canadas-socially-conservative-womens-organization-just-went-too-far/ ]

For a long time, I have felt that Canada's social conservatives have an unwritten rule about what they say publicly:  "Don't let the ugliest stuff out of the closet - believe it, advocate for it behind the scenes, but never say it where Canadians will hear it".

It's almost as if the Conservatives have an unacknowledged monologue that gets brutally suppressed when it surfaces.  (Not unlike the "in the closet" experiences of many LGBT people, I might add)

Ms. Landolt's outburst was that voice coming to the surface when the body politic of the right wing wasn't willing to face itself.  Ms. Kay is acting very much in the role of the parent scolding the child.

I'd feel better if I saw a general renunciation of these positions coming from Ms. Kay rather than what appears to be a scolding of an errant child.

Gwen Landolt Resurfaces ...

I have been somewhat surprised that we haven't heard more from Gwen Landolt during the debate on C-279.  Then she popped up with a bunch of comments on Lifesite...which really refers to a press release from Landolt's REAL Women Canada organization.

Frankly there isn't much new being said here.  The press release is fundamentally the usual set of deliberate misrepresentations that we've heard during the debate of C-389 and during the debate over C-279 as well. 

However, it does warrant taking a closer look just to see how Landolt and her bunch are twisting things:

“It’s all in how the word ‘gender identity’ is defined,” said Gwen Landolt, National Vice-President of REAL Women of Canada, to LifeSiteNews.com.

The bill, put forward by NDP LGBTT Critic Randall Garrison (Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC), defines “gender identity” as an “individual’s deeply felt internal and individual experience of gender, which may or may not correspond with the sex that the individual was assigned at birth.”

Landolt explained that “gender identity” is a catch-all phrase that could be interpreted by activist courts to legitimize “any kind of sexual deviancy”.

“This could include pedophilia, if that’s their deeply felt experience of gender and if that’s their sexual preference.”

Landolt is, as one would expect, confusing sexual orientation with gender identity.  Whether she knows the difference or not is immaterial - she's lying.

Gender Identity is not Sexual Orientation.  Period.  End Of Statement.  The two intersect with each other in some interesting ways, but make no mistake - they are distinct.   The language of the bill is actually derived from the Yogyakarta Principles document which reads:

1. 1)  sexual orientation is understood to refer to each person’s capacity for profound emotional, affectional and sexual attraction to, and intimate and sexual relations with, individuals of a different gender or the same gender or more than one gender.
   
2. 2)  gender identity is understood to refer to each person’s deeply felt internal and individual experience of gender, which may or may not correspond with the sex assigned at birth, including the personal sense of the body (which may involve, if freely chosen, modification of bodily appearance or function by medical, surgical or other means) and other expressions of gender, including dress, speech and mannerisms. 
   

 It doesn't take a genius to understand the distinction that is drawn between these two points.

So, turning back to Landolt's idiotic twisting of things, and we find her concluding that C-279 could be used to "legitimize" pedophilia.  Absolute nonsense.  This is nothing more than a transparent attempt at fear mongering on the part of REAL Women.

The press release goes on to discuss the Australian law's definition:

The phrase sex and or gender identity is used … as a broad term to refer to diverse sex and or gender identities and expressions.  It includes being transgender, trans, transsexual and intersex.  It also includes being androgynous, agender, a cross dresser, a drag queen, gender fluid, genderqueer, intergender, neutrois, pansexual, pan-gendered, a third gender, and a third sex…

The list that the Australians have used are predominantly gender identities.  The only one I question is the Pansexual, which according to wikipedia is more of an extremely broad sexual orientation.  That said, I can see how someone who is pansexual could well have a very fluid notion of gender and its expression.

REAL Women's press release then goes on to say:

It would seem, therefore, that this bill may have been brought before Parliament for purposes other than promoting sound public policy. Rather it will be used to extend legal protection to other questionable sexual activities without having these matters exposed to Parliamentary debate.  That is, this is an attempt to deliberately by-pass Parliament, where these changes may not be acceptable.

Since when was sexuality something that should be subject to "parliamentary debate"?  In writing this one paragraph, they have told us a great deal about their objectives.  Groups like REAL Women are all about regulating sexuality and everything that they perceive as related to it.

Canada's TheoCon$: No Condoms - You Should Just Obey Us

Apparently, Gwen Landolt isn't satisfied with lecturing Canadians on the immorality of anything other than missionary sex for making fetuses, and is now whining about the fact that our prisons make condoms available to help reduce the spread of HIV/AIDS in the prison population.

Landolt said that distributing condoms avoids the central problem leading to AIDS.

“AIDS is a tremendously serious health issue,” she emphasized. “They should be dealing with the problem, not trying to deal with the consequences. They should be monitoring the inmates to prevent them from carrying on this activity which is causing the AIDS.”

Landolt said that condoms “only encourage the inmates to be involved with this dangerous activity.”

Apparently Ms. Landolt thinks that telling prisoners not to engage in sexual activity means that they won't. I don't think it's news to anyone grounded in reality that sexual activity happens in prisons - regardless of what the regulations say. This has been the case for as long as prisons have been bigger than a few cells in a castle's cellar.

The reason for distributing condoms is simple - they work.

Ms. Landolt seems to be of the opinion that anything even remotely related to sexuality is automatically giving "permission" for sexual acts. It isn't, but just telling people not to engage in sexual acts isn't going to stop that either. I may not like the idea of sex happening in prison, but that doesn't mean it's going to stop either.

Ms. Landolt might want to consider the consequences of allowing our prisons to become a primary source of HIV infection. Does a prisoner infected with HIV have anything to lose when they get out of prison?

Lies and Distortion - Gwen Landolt Parrots The Ezra

It's amazing how the right wingnuts manage to parrot each other. Over at the magazine Catholic Insight, we find "Real Woman" Gwen Landolt whining and snivelling about how the Charter of Rights and Human Rights commission infringes upon her right to be a religious bigot where GLBT people are concerned...and of course, the HRC's are "out of control".

The crux of Landolt's complaint appears to be that because the courts have been persuaded that it is in fact valid to recognize discrimination against GLBT people, they have thereby constricted her rights as a religious person.

The guarantees for religious freedom have, in fact, most often been used to restrict or narrow religious freedom rather than expand it, especially when it has come in conflict with the “equality” rights of homosexuals. The latter’s rights were written into the Charter by the courts and, in contrast to religious rights, have increased and been strengthened step by step by the courts, so much so that, for the most part, homosexual rights now trump religious rights.

Her conclusion that treating discrimination against GLBT people as being just as wrong as discriminating against someone because of their gender, religion or ethnicity somehow impinges upon her religious freedoms is distinctly misguided. Nobody has told Ms. Landolt that she has to renounce her belief that being GLBT is somehow sinful. She is perfectly free to believe that, and few in the world would really care. Of course, for Landolt, and others, it's not good enough for them to believe that GLBT people are sinful, they want to punish by social and legal sanction as well.

It is significant that actual proof of discrimination against homosexuals has never been introduced at any time in evidence in any court in Canada.

Ummm...incorrect, Gwen. Remember the case of Vriend v. Alberta? There is a clear case of government discrimination in a matter, based on an intentional omission in law.

Of course, Landolt completely misinterprets the Vriend decision, and twists it around to being a matter of "judicial activism", as the Alberta legislature had clearly not voted to provide protection to homosexuals in the province of Alberta:

On the basis of this broad definition of equality, the Supreme Court of Canada in Vriend ordered the Alberta government to include sexual orientation in that province’s human rights legislation, even though that legislature had previously voted against such an inclusion. It is noteworthy that the purpose of the Charter was supposed to be to protect individuals from government legislation and policies that discriminated against them; it was not to provide new rights to individuals to be written into legislation. The Vriend decision, therefore, was a twist in judicial activism which strengthened judicial power.

Of course, what Landolt has completely failed to admit and accept is that the legislation in Alberta was at odds with the Constitution. It was not a matter of "judicial activism" at all, rather a recognition that the jurisprudence around S15 of the Charter had already established that S15 was not an "exclusive" list; further other jurisdictions in Canada had already extended legal protections against discrimination to GLBT people.

Further, the Vriend case is quite clearly a matter of government legislation that discriminated against homosexuals. The entire Vriend case centers around the fact that the Alberta Human Rights and Citizenship Commission refused to hear the Vriend complaint on the basis that it revolved around the fact that Delwin Vriend was fired for being gay.

Let's be absolutely clear here - the Vriend decision was in fact very much about a provable case of discrimination of precisely the kind that Gwen Landolt is claiming the Charter was intended to protect people from.

Of course, Gwen's happy little fantasy world holds that we all have to bow down on Sundays and worship:

The chipping away of religious freedom began almost immediately after S.15 of the Charter came into effect in 1985 in the R v Big M Drug Mart Ltd. [1985][vii]. In that case, the Supreme Court of Canada decided that the Lord’s Day Act, which required the closing of businesses on Sunday, infringed on religious freedom because religious freedom meant not only freedom of worship, practice, and teaching, but also included freedom from coercion, e.g., that the government could not coerce individuals to affirm specific religious belief, such as, in this case, coercing non-believers to observe the Christian Sabbath. That is, the Court held that non-religious individuals have a right to be free from religious observance.

She is correct in one point here - freedom of religion also implies freedom from religion. Of course, what shreds of rationality are gradually torn away as she progresses down her fantasy path about just how evil it is that legislation that implies a particular religious tradition becomes problematic when you grant freedom of religion to those who aren't followers of Christian tradition:

This interpretation departed considerably from the long established interpretation of freedom of religion, which, heretofore, had meant that one was free to practice one’s religion without interference from the state. In short, the court emphasized the individual conscience and the rights of non-Christians at the expense of the religious rights of communities of believers. It is obvious that Sunday shop closing legislation simply respected the Sabbath observed by the majority of people in society, and protected both shop owners and retail workers from being compelled to work on their day of rest.

The problem with Landolt's argument is that her reasoning is deeply flawed. What Landolt has missed is that the Charter of Rights and Freedoms applies equally to all Canadians, regardless of their faith; and further fundamental individual freedoms such as freedom of religion mean that a law whose fundamental premise is based on a particular religious tradition (and the "Lord's Day Act" was clearly such a law) is on very weak ground. Further, the Charter and the Constitution quite clearly do not recognize any single faith tradition as being primary in Canada.

We then find Landolt repeating the usual whines about cases like Brockie and others which I have already addressed in some detail. Amusingly, I'd like to know what's so offensive about printing letterhead for a gay organization that it caused Mr. Brockie to find his "religious sensibilities" offended. Of course, I wonder what would happen if the tables were turned, and a printer refused to print something with overtly christian symbols plastered all over it?

Oh yes, she tries valiantly to rescue the Boissoin case from the toilet:

Stephen Boissoin, a Baptist Minister in Alberta, published a letter opposing homosexuality in a local newspaper, The Red Deer Advocate. This letter was an expression of Mr. Boissoin’s deeply held beliefs on the issue, and ran under the subheading “Homosexual Agenda Wicked”.

Boissoin's letter was no "religious" letter. Give me a break. That letter was filled with enough distortions, outright lies and falsehoods to make any self respecting Christian blush with embarrassment with the myriad ways it breaches fundamental tenets of the ethics of that faith.

As if Boissoin's letter would have provoked any kind of rational discussion, Landolt points to this tidbit on the matter from a Gay publication:

Significantly, according to the homosexual newspaper, Xtra West (December 6, 2007), the complaint against Pastor Boissoin was opposed by the homosexual lobby group, EGALE, which issued a press release on the case stating “that debate was the best method for dealing with homophobia (sic)” and that “sunshine is the best disinfectant.”

Debate is fine. Boissoin was not opening the door to any kind of debate. Period. His language alone made it clear that he wasn't seeking debate, but was making a call to arms against GLBT people. Landolt conveniently ignores the fact that while the furor was boiling around Red Deer in the weeks after Boissoin's letter was published, a gay youth was severely beaten. While the connection is difficult to prove, the temporal coincidence cannot be ignored.

What Landolt and others need to recognize is that matters of faith are just fine - nobody has a problem with the fact that some faiths consider GLBT people "sinful". That doesn't give anybody the right to marginalize, discriminate against, or abuse someone else simply because "their faith tells them that the Other is an evil sinner". Period. It's amusing how "religious freedom" seems to imply for these people that includes discriminating against GLBT people in both law and life.

Like Ezra's tirades against Human Rights tribunals, Landolt's claims are rooted in a sense of entitlement. Her rights supercede the rights of others. Landolt is perfectly free to believe what she wishes. She is not, however, free to simply impose her religious beliefs on every body else. When she, and others like Charles McVety get it through their heads that individual freedoms are just that - individual - then they might just start to realize that they are free to their beliefs, but that freedom does not extend to imposing their beliefs and values upon others.