There was universal condemnation of the legislation from LGBTQ+ advocates as well as from an impressive array of allies, including the Saskatchewan labour movement and from human and civil rights organizations across the province and around the country. Saskatchewan’s child and youth advocate Lisa Broda warned that the legislation “likely violates children’s constitutional rights,” while Saskatchewan human rights commissioner Heather Kuttia resigned in opposition to the legislation, calling it “an attack on the rights of Trans, nonbinary, and gender diverse children.” Students at multiple high schools in Regina and Saskatoon led walkouts in protest and members of the government were banned from participating in official LGBTQ+ Pride activities for as long as the legislation sits on the books.
Despite this concerted opposition and the overwhelming evidence that this legislation would cause significant harm and risk to LGBTQ+ students, Scott Moe’s government showed no hesitancy in using its full weight to pass the Bill. The government would recall the legislature on October 10th for an emergency session solely to invoke the notwithstanding clause to override a Saskatchewan court decision that the law violated the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
But while court challenges still persist, much of the public fervour against Bill 137 has died down. Part of this is outright fear. As Saskatchewan Teacher Federation president Samantah Becotte observes, the law puts teachers in a terrible bind: “do they obey the law, thereby potentially placing a child in an extremely dangerous position, or ignore it and leave themselves open to legal jeopardy?”
Another reason is that, to “solve” the problem,” the implications of the law are sometimes dismissed. Given how few LGBTQ+ students there are in Saskatchewan schools, so the argument goes, such legislation will have little if any impact and therefore does not need to be actively resisted.
But perhaps the most important element of why open resistance seems to have subsided is the almost liminal way the law exists in practice—which to some extent satisfies certain supporters and opponents of the bill alike. While putatively on the books, there has been no official sanction or punishment against a school staff member for violating it. Moreover, we don’t even know what such penalties would entail because the government has not made it known. And whether the act is ever enforced seems arbitrary—dependent on the discretion of school administrators which means the bill’s impact can vary widely subject to an administration’s approval, fear or misunderstanding of the legislation. This leaves students to try and navigate whom (if anyone) within the school they can trust. For some opponents, the fact that the law does not appear to be openly punishing anyone allows for them to tolerate its existence.
It is this kind of stasis that has allowed the law to be grudgingly tolerated that moved teachers Alex Schmidt and Nick Day to found the Saskatchewan Coalition to Repeal Bill 137, a grassroots organization of teachers and community members working to repeal Bill 137 and urging unions and school administrations to take a stand against the law.
Both have heard a litany of excuses as to why the law should not be openly challenged. Day provides a short-list:
I’ve heard from trustees it only affects a small number because there aren’t many Trans people and most have supportive parents. I’ve heard the legislation is not being followed on the ground so it’s not really having harm… I’ve heard, of course, that there’s no harm because there’s a clause allowing the school counsellor to keep the child’s privacy if the counsellor believes the student might face harm. What people don’t realize is that a) the harm is the heteronormative climate created by the bill and 2) the counsellor has to “work with the student to make a plan to inform parents” or some variant of that. The message that ‘Trans is wrong’ is still coming through loud and clear.
Day believes that people are willing to believe such arguments because the alternative might force people to make difficult decisions:
Instead, people are willing to believe—or pretend they believe—an endless cavalcade of razor thin arguments in order to avoid inconveniencing themselves, coming into conflict at work, and being accountable to the universal human rights not being enjoyed by Trans youth.
Part of the Coalition’s mission is to demonstrate that regardless of the law’s enforcement or lack thereof, its mere existence as provincial policy is profoundly damaging to Trans and non-binary students. While others might be able to turn their heads, Day and Schmidt see what Bill 137 has actually wrought within the schools they work at; a toxic mixture of confusion, fear and capitulation.
Day explains how once Bill 137 was made law, Queer students expressed profound confusion over what was and wasn’t allowed in school. Day summarizes what students were saying to him:
Since the pronoun policy, I don’t know what’s allowed anymore… What I’m really feeling here is, I don’t know what the fuck’s allowed. I’m not allowed, none of it’s allowed. Queer shit isn’t allowed. So I’m just kind of going to go dark.
While open, direct confrontation between students and the law has not been commonplace, the phenomenon of LGBTQ+ students’ “going dark” is. Day describes this as students “going back in the closet,” not attending school, or teachers’ forgoing introducing Queer content for fear of backlash.
For example, Bill 137’s provision that parents must be informed and consent prior to any lessons with sexual health content may prevent teachers from adopting lesson plans that could potentially court controversy. Schmidt observes that teaching sex education was already challenging in Saskatchewan, but Bill 137 makes it even more undesirable for teachers; “Teachers don’t want to teach it because [the environment] is just too combative.”
This chilling effect on both students and school staff is the real impact of Bill 137, regardless of its enforcement, and this chilling effect extends far beyond just what is specifically targeted in the Bill.
Despite not being targeted in the legislation, both Day and Schmidt note that since implementation, Gay-Straight Alliances (GSA) have come under greater scrutiny by certain school administrations. Since 137 became law, Schmidt explains how GSAs have to navigate a new set of “hoops and rules” that other school clubs do not seem subject to. Schmidt recounts how GSAs are now required to validate their existence by demonstrating connections to the curriculum though formal lesson plans that are not expected of other extracurricular clubs. “If this club has to demonstrate its legitimacy and all other clubs don’t,” Schmidt argues, “what you’re clearly saying is it’s not legitimate, right?” For Schmidt, GSAs, like other extracurricular clubs, are for building a community for students “to have a place to be.” While connections to the curriculum might be a valuable adjunct, it should not be the primary focus of extracurricular clubs, and it certainly shouldn’t be a reason for disallowing these vitally important spaces for LGBTQ+ students. Schmidt fears that the extra scrutiny and work required to run GSA’s under the current conditions may ultimately dissuade teachers and students from participating.
That this legislation would have a chilling effect on students and staff shouldn’t be any surprise. We know from the experience of the United States that anti-Trans laws and policies irrespective of what they target have had the overall effect of erasing the reality of Trans people’s experience and fostering a dangerously hostile climate. The logic of erasure is to render Trans students, parents and educators effectively invisible by removing them from lessons, books, language and spaces. “Over time, writes Ezra Kidowski, “those absences become evidence. They’re used to justify neglect, to minimize harm, and to explain away patterns of violence as isolated or rare.”
Unfortunately it is difficult to document the more insidious impacts this legislation is having behind-the-scenes. Schmidt and Day find this the more frustrating aspect of their activism—constantly having to convince figures in positions of power and authority that, because it is not being enforced, the legislation is benign. “It should have been obvious from day one that a toxic policy environment will create these effects, right?” Day laments, “So, if we have to convince you of that, that’s really challenging.” Both feel that the authority figures they confront are more concerned with documenting individual incidents of harm rather than understanding the pervasive effects this legislation is having throughout the province. “There’s a lot of kids, there’s a lot of teachers that are at risk, and we’re not hearing about it all,” explains Schmidt. “We have not scratched the surface of the way that this has impacted people because the risk in talking about the impacts is too great. It is not safe for students, it is not safe for teachers because of this bill.”
But while both remain frustrated by the myopic way the Bill is viewed by so many in the province, they also understand the stakes of continuing to tolerate its existence. For Day this is a simple question, “Do we acknowledge in our public institutions that Transgender people exist irrevocably and therefore bear rights that are inviolable? And do we exist in a culture where universal access to public education is a guarantee?”
