School transgender policy angers Vancouver’s Chinese Christians

Vancouver's Chinese Christian community is at the forefront of a campaign against a policy on transgender students in public schools in the city, long regarded as a bastion of progressive values.

The proposed policy being debated by the Vancouver School Board advises teachers to protect transgender students' rights to decide who gets to know about their status, to use whichever bathroom they choose and to dress as they feel appropriate. Schools are also advised to reduce sex-segregated activities, such as some sports.

But Cheryl Chang, an advocate against the proposals, said they represented an attempt to usurp parental rights, and there had been inadequate efforts to explain the plan.

"We did not send our children to public schools to be indoctrinated with the teachers' ideology … Parents are primary caregivers and they need to be involved in decisions about what their children are being told and how they are acting out," said Chang. "For a school to say, 'no, we are going to take these kids and tell them what's right and wrong and if [the students] want to do something we'll go along with it and not tell your parents', then that is completely inappropriate."

Chang, a lawyer married to a prominent Chinese-Canadian doctor, spoke at a May 14 board meeting where some parents waved placards denouncing the policy. Cantonese-speaking opponents of the plan urged Chang to speak on their behalf.

"I think this goes to Chinese family values," said Chang on Monday. "Many [opponents of the plan] are Christian, but many are not, and so this is about family values, and the ability of parents to parent their children and not have that disturbed by the school system. The only reason more Caucasian parents haven't been involved is because they haven't even heard about it. The word has gotten out in the Chinese community faster because those were people at the forefront."