School Board Bans Anti-Homophobia Poster
The Mission Public School District in B.C. has banned an anti-homophobia poster from all of its staff rooms for the second time in two years. The poster, which was to be displayed in locations only visible to staff members, featured a gloved hand holding a medical syringe accompanied by the tag line “homosexuality is not an illness.”
Randy Huth, the Director of Instruction for the school district, said the poster was “graphic,” adding that it visually depicted substance abuse and homosexuality. Huth said that even though students were unable to view it, it was “inappropriate—even for staff too.”
Lauren Gosselin, a spokesperson for the Fondation Émergence who designed the poster, was surprised by Randy’s interpretation:
[Substance abuse] is not what we were aiming for when we were designing the poster. The message that we want to send out is basically a very simple one: homosexuality is not a disease, period.
I’m inclined to believe the poster designers. Substance abuse isn’t mentioned anywhere in the poster text and I’m not really sure that injection drug users use sterile gloves more than, say, nurses.
Incidentally, this is not the first time the Mission Public School District has banned an anti-homophobia poster. Last year, it pulled posters featuring a newborn wearing a hospital bracelet with the word “homosexual,” accompanied by the text “Sexual orientation is not a choice.”
- Mission bans gay posters in schools [Xtra West]
