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OK, kiddo! Here are all the fantastically amazing posts tagged with NHL

Screening Breakfast With Scot

Sep 07 2007

Road Slap

Hey kids! I’m on the other side of the country for a little while to defend my master’s thesis, so I’m posting my very first Road Slap today! (For the astute, a Road Slap is just like any other post on this site, but thanks to soul-sucking jetlag, lacks illustrations or humour of any kind.)

While leafing through my usual news stories, I caught a handful promoting Breakfast With Scot. The Canadian-produced comedy film is a sweet tale about a closeted gay couple, each with “manly” sports professions, that unexpectedly becomes the guardians to a sissy and flamboyant 11-year old boy. Actor Tom Cavanagh shared what I thought were some nice insights into what the story is about:

I like the central conceit of the story. These two fellas who draw no attention to their private lives and sexual orientation are put in a position where they have to look after this young boy who doesn’t really understand what it means to be gay or straight, who is just being himself.

The story has been praised by reviewers, described as a film that that “celebrate[s] the uniqueness of children, and how they can teach adults.”

The anti-gay lobby, on the other hand, has burst capillaries over the movie’s production. Their reaction has been as funny as it is illogical: Both the Canadian Family Action Coalition and the American-based Americans For Truth Against Homosexuality started a public boycott of the NHL (whose Toronto Maple Leaf’s logo was licensed for the film), and bombared Richard Peddie—president of the Leaf’s—with emails he called “raw,” “live,” and “disappointing.” Brian Rushfeldt, head of CFAC, even went on record with this batty rant:

[The NHL’s endorsement of the film] is the epitome of almost evil intent. Perhaps the most disturbing aspect of the entire situation is that an 11-year-old boy is being promoted as a poster child for gay sex.

I’ve already made light of the phenomenal leaps of logic required to reach this conclusion, but considering that the lobbyists’ NHL boycott has failed so completely, I think it’s demonstrative of what the anti-gay industry has become: a cantankerous, disconnected minority.

So, for those available to see Sunday’s screening (6:30 pm Scotiabank 1 in Toronto), go and enjoy film; for those that aren’t, enjoy the NHL season. Others have tried to use their muscle, however atrophied, to ensure you would do neither.

NHL Harassed, Boycotted By Anti-Gay Lobby

Feb 16 2007

Pro-Family Lobby Objections Flowchart

Hey, remember Brian Rushfeldt of the Canadian Family Action Coalition? In December, Brian called on Canadians to boycott hockey because of what he called the NHL’s promotion “of an 11-year-old boy as the poster child for gay sex.”

Now, what Brian was actually refering to is an independent film entitled Breakfast With Scot, which licensed the Toronto Maple Leafs’ logo from the NHL. The film, which just finished shooting, is about a macho hockey player whose life is transformed when he and his gay partner become the guardian of an 11-year-old boy. Paul Brown, the producer, described the comedy as a “crowd pleaser in the spirit of Billy Elliot or About a Boy—movies that celebrate the uniqueness of children, and how they can teach adults.”

Although this is enough to give Rushfeldt a hernia, the hockey boycott isn’t going quite as well as planned. As a result, the anti-gay lobby appears to have switched to Plan B, teaming together with other lobbyists to start an email campaign harassing the Leafs’ president, Richard Peddie. Americans for Truth, a US-based anti-gay organisation, even posted Peddie’s email address online, flooding his mailbox with what he called “raw,” “live,” and “dissapointing” emails.

Former team captain, Rick Vaive, said that both the Canadian Family Action Coalition and Americans for Truth need to “get over it:”

It is time people realized that [homosexuality] is part of real life. It doesn’t matter what the colour of your skin is, or what your sexual preference is, or what your religious beliefs are—we all have to get along. So get over it.

Well put! Though, personally, I’d have liked to see the hockey boycott continue. Given the right resources, I’m sure that lobbyists could have convinced Canadians to embrace an exciting new national pastime: Jesus Ball.