‘Traction’ gained against new sex education curriculum

By David Dyck

Under the slogan “Our kids, our choice, one size does not fit all,” more than 100 parents rallied against the new Ontario sexual education curriculum on Tuesday, April 8.

Standing outside the Eye on Video store on North Talbot Road in Essex, parents held signs while they listened to guest speakers protest what they said was an “invasion of the private home, parental responsibilities and the innocence of children.”

John Azzopardi, who organized the rally as well as a previous rally held in Windsor on April 4, said he started the protest series after a friend sent him more than 200 pages detailing the new curriculum. Azzopardi said he had a hard time going to sleep that night after reading some of the “graphic imagery” that was in it.

“I think they’re going to open the minds of young children to areas most parents feel that they should not be exposed to at this point,” said Azzopardi.

Another speaker, Gregory Moore, a father of four boys, said he found it ironic that he could not bring himself to describe some of the particular “graphic images” in front of a crowd that had children in it, whereas in a few months teachers will have to talk to them about it.

In Moore’s speech, he addressed what he said was the need to let “parents be parents.” This curriculum, according to Azzopardi , is an undermining of parents’ ability to fulfill their roles.

“By implementing this curriculum, in essence, I feel they’re telling us that you as parents are not capable of teaching our children about sex education,” said Azzopardi.

Moore said he does not want a stranger teaching his children about “sex, or homosexuality, or anal sex, or oral sex.” This is something he said parents are best qualified for.

“I believe they have intimate knowledge of their children,” said Moore. “There’s a disadvantage the teachers have, trying to teach sex education to someone they don’t have any intimate knowledge of, they don’t know the maturity level of.”

Moore also said he “did not buy the false narrative” that parents were neglecting to teach their children about sex. He said there may be some Grand Theft Auto parents out there who let the T.V. raise their children, but most parents do care. He referred to the turnout and said “parents are not the problem, they are the solution.”

In Nov. 2014, around 4,000 Ontario parents were asked by the Ministry of Education to participate in a survey reviewing the curriculum and offer their input about who they believe are “trusted sources for health information”. However, Azzopardi said he felt parents were hardly consulted for the instituting of the curriculum. He said he had only one parent at the last rally who said they were consulted about the creation of the curriculum and the questionnaire that was given was “vague.”

Ron Nelson, a parent who was also one of the speakers agreed with the parental under-representation.

“They did not even consider the parental input. To have any kind of opposing view was not really considered broad enough,” said Nelson. “There were those who were polled supposedly, who knows who they were. I just think there should have been more of a provincial wide opinion poll.”

Along with silencing opinions, Diana Cornell, the fourth speaker said the government may be trying also to unify all of Ontario under one belief system.

“It’s getting closer to a ‘one size fits all’ and then they don’t have to deal with all the different cultures, religions and issues the government has to deal with currently,” said Cornell. “And that will never go away. We won’t allow it to go away. They cannot take that away from us.”

With their fighting against the curriculum, Azzopardi said he feels they have gained some traction already.

“I really believe this has started a ground-swell. We got some feedback as far as Toronto on how they were happy Essex County has finally stepped up publicly,” said Azzopardi.

Azzopardi plans to hold another rally at Charles Clark Square on April 14.