August 17- Vancouver
Betty Baxter, 40, former Canadian volleyball team member and spokeswoman for Vancouver’s “gay games” in 1980, will run for the NDP in the coming federal election as Canada’s first openly lesbian candidate. She became a lesbian in her twenties.
Baxter will run in Vancouver Centre, now held by current Justice Minister Kim Campbell, former NDP member- turned Social Creditor-turned Conservative. Campbell, herself a feminist, wants to place sexual orientation under the protection of Canada’s Human Rights Act this fall.
August 18- Ottawa
The RU-486 abortion pill continues to be promoted after Ontario Health Minister Frances Lankin put out a call for its introduction into Canada. (See “Month in Review,” July 20 and 22, September Interim).
NDP and RU-486 supporters Dave Black (MP-New Westminster/Burnaby), Toronto lawyer Clayton Ruby, columnist Michelle Landsberg, and others, are given wide coverage across Canada.
The Globe and Mail allows Dr. Paul Ranalli to offer a counter-word (August 28) and the Ottawa Citizen permits another view from Women for Women’s Health. See front page.
August 22- Houston Texas
Canadian reporters, columnists and editorialists express their deepest concern about the Republican Convention in Houston.
The general theme of their comments is that the Republican party has been hijacked by “an intolerant right wing,” led by “evangelists and pro-life crusaders.” They quote American commentator Gary Wills’ remark: “The crazies are in charge.”
When galls them most is that the Republicans allowed pro-abortionists to speak. Then after listening to them, they adopted a pro-life platform.
The same media never reported that pro-lifers had been denied the right to speak at the Democratic convention in New York, when that party adopted a pro-abortion platform
Ottawa Citizen columnist Joe Sornberger declared it “all very, very scary.” U.S. voters, Canadian media predict, will sweep Bush away.
August 22- Halifax, N.S
The Canadian Bar Association tables a 190-page report authored by Richard Peck, who demands “a major overhaul” of a “badly outdated” Criminal Code. Peck picks up the idea of the recently-abolished federal Law Reform Commission that public morality evolves and progresses to higher stages.
The last major reform of the Code was the 105-item Omnibus Bill of 1968-69 which legalized the killing of the unborn and private homosexual acts between adults 18 and over. Today Canada is long beyond that.
Says Mr. Peck, “A new Criminal ode is essential to respond to these changes. Advances in medical science, psychiatry and penology, to name a few, need to be recognized in the Criminal Code as do changes wrought by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.”
One of the new norms for discerning criminal intent, the Report says, should not be the objective standard of the “reasonable person” but the accused’s subjective state of mind.
August 23- Fredericton, N.B
The United Church’s 34th General Council concludes week-long deliberations covering a host of social/political issues.
According to Toronto Star religion reporter Michael McAteer, the delegates “defused” the controversy of blessing same-sex unions by allowing every congregation to do its own thing, and they took steps to heal “the wounds of the homosexuality debate by acknowledging the existence of deep theological differences.”
All this is like a medical doctor saying he has healed a patient by acknowledging he doesn’t know what to do.( see Update Religion, page 00)
August 25-Toronto
Male nurse Scott Mataya, 27, is given a suspended sentence for administering sentence for administering potassium chloride to Joseph Sauder, 78, in Wellesley Hospital. Sauder died immediately afterwards.
Sauder was in a coma but taken off life support by his doctor at the request of his family on November 21, 191. Subsequently, when the patient vomited mucus, Mataya administered the death-causing chemical.
The family did not want Mataya in jail. “They know it was not right,” Crown Counsel Chris Punter said, “but it was understandable why he did it.” Judge Ted Wren of Ontario Court, general division, agreed.
Marilynne Seguin of the pro-euthanasia group Dying with Dignity thought the ruling fair. Campaign Life Coalition spokesman Kurt Gayle thought the ruling a serious error.
August 28 – Charlottetown
Ten provincial premiers, one Prime Minister and a host of others conclude a new “constitutional deal.” Though requested, there is no mention of protecting innocent human life from conception to natural death.(see editorial and pages 10 and 11)
August 30-Ontario
Catholic parishioners throughout the province signed letters of protest against a threatened provincial take-over of religious hospitals. They did so on the request of their bishops.(See front page.)
September 1-Toronto
A three-member tribunal of the Ontario Human Rights Code orders the Ontario Government to grant homosexual and lesbian partners of provincial civil servants the status of “spouses.”
The government must pay long-term homosexual “partners” survivor pensions on the death of one partner, and health insurance, dental coverage, bereavement leave and other family benefits during their partnership, starting immediately.
Tribunal members were pro-homosexual York University law professor Peter Cumming, lawyer Brettel Dawson, and pro-abortion Rabbi Gunther Plaut.(see Robert Eady on page 7)
September 2-Montreal
Public display-signs of naked strippers outside strip bars and sex shops can stay, says Judge Ginette Piche, in a 128-page judgment. A Montreal by-law prohibiting “erotic businesses” from displaying nude bodies or body parts on outdoor signs is “unconstitutional and inoperative” because it violates the “freedom of expression” guaranteed in the Charter of Rights.
The Charter did not permit her to act otherwise, the judge said. While she was personally opposed to the displays it was not her task, but that of legislatures, to correct laws, said the Quebec Superior Court judge.
University of Ottawa professor Cecile Coderre, blamed the obscenity clauses in the Criminal Code for the ruling. They are, she stated, “very old and very moralistic and not at all relevant to what is happening out there today.”
In those days, of course, modesty was still a virtue and communal rights were still respected- ideas which no radical feminist would dare defend today.
Amjad Alvi, a 29-year-old family physician, announces the opening of a sex-selection clinic later this month. The method known as sex pre-selection does not guarantee the couple will have the child they want but does claim a “success” rate of 75 to 80 percent.
Sex selection is a growing practice in North America. Its purpose, here as in India, is mainly to eliminate girl babies.
Editorials across the country denounced the announcement without acknowledging that it is the logical conclusion of allowing women to choose abortion. Pro-lifers have always said that they, and not the feminists, are the true defenders of women.
September 4- Toronto
Local pro-life activist Jane Doe is arrested for counseling women who were entering the Scott abortuary. Her behaviour was described as orderly and unobstructive, but because Scoot is located only 20 meters from Henry Morgentaler’s new abortuary, he falls within the 150 meter injunction limit.
This is this first time Toronto police have enforced the injunction since the explosion forced Morgentaler to switch his place of operation.
Jane is not answering questions and therefore has to appear in court every three days. She was released on September 18 but has been re-arrested since. Her trial date is set for October 13.
September 8-New York
Warner Books of New York announces a new Madonna sex book, described by Vanity Fair as the “dirtiest coffee-table book ever published.”
The volume contains pictures of a nude Madonna in various poses, including scenes of lesbianism, bondage and group sex.
The publisher justify publication of this pornographic,128-page book, selling for %50.U.S., as a contribution to ART. Warner Books is part of the Time-Life corporate empire.
