Brody's Notes... Editors Of Canadian Newspaper Apologise For Offensive Advert

By Brody Levesque | ONTARIO, CANADA -- The staff of the National Post, a major daily newspaper published in Ontario have publicly apologised for an ad that gave many of its readers great offence.

The ad was purchased by the anti-gay Institute for Canadian Values, a conservative chrisitan organisation whose founder, Charles McVety, had his television programme, Word TV pulled from Canada's airwaves in December of 2010.

McVety was found in violation of the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council broadcast codes for two errors of fact expressed by in a discussion of LGBTQ persons, one pertaining to erroneous statements that the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario and the Alberta Human Rights Commission had a 100% "conviction rate" and the other pertaining to the criminalisation of commentary by a measure introduced in Parliament, Bill C-250, which was to amend the Canadian Criminal Code with reference to hate propaganda. After its passage McVety stated erroneously that “it is now a crime to speak against homosexuality.”

In the latest controversy, a transphobic advertisement appeared in Canada’s National Post calling on the local leaders of the three national political parties to “stop teachers from confusing” children on issues of gender identity and expression.

Today the paper ran the following editorial response in apology:

Earlier this week the National Post ran an advertisement that has caused some controversy. The ad, bought by the Institute for Canadian Values, argued against aspects of the Ontario school curriculum that include instruction about certain aspects of human sexuality. Specifically, it objected to teaching young children — those between junior kindergarten and Grade 3 — about transsexual/transgender/intersexed/two spirited issues.

The National Post has procedures in place for vetting the content of advertising, especially advocacy advertising. The procedures are intended to ensure that such ads meet a standard of tone and respect that is consistent with furthering constructive dialogue about important public policy issues.

In this case, those procedures were not followed. An ad that should not have run in its proposed form was allowed to run.

This ad will not run in the National Post again.

The National Post believes strongly in the principles of free speech and open, unhindered debate. We believe unpopular points of view should not be censored simply because some readers may find them disturbing, or even offensive. Free speech does not apply only to views that will not offend anyone.

The ad in question was attempting to make the case that the Ontario curriculum was teaching very young children about issues that, at that age, should be the domain of parents. In addition, it made the case that even when parents or teachers may object to the material being taught, they did not have the right, in the case of parents, to remove their children from the class, or in the case of teachers, to decline to teach the material on the grounds that they objected to it.

In an open society, these positions are worthy of being part of a debate on this issue. They are also legitimate arguments to make in a paid advertisement in a media outlet.

Where the ads exceeded the bounds of civil discourse was in their tone and manipulative use of a picture of a young girl; in the suggestion that such teaching “corrupts” children, with everything that such a charge implies; and in their singling out of groups of people with whose sexuality the group disagrees.

The fact that we will not be publishing this ad again represents a recognition on our part that publishing it in the first place was a mistake. The National Post would like to apologize unreservedly to anyone who was offended by it. We will be taking steps to ensure that in future our procedures for vetting the content of advertising will be strictly adhered to.

The Post will also be donating the proceeds from the advertisement to an organization that promotes the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered people.