activism, homophobia, resources, social justice, teacher education
Tara: No that’s great. I want to go back to the campaign that uh, your eldest daughter started.
Karleen: Yeah.
Tara: Tell us a little bit about that campaign, and the way that uh, that you and your partner were able to support her.
Karleen: At the schools?
Tara: Yeah at the schools, yeah.
Karleen: Well, at one point, she actually, she published a piece on it, um where she was in Grade 4, and they were reading like um, you know, a Reader’s Digest version of Shakespeare [Tara laughs], and, and uh, it was like when uh, when Twelfth Night, when two of the characters that were in theory women, anyway, you know, Shakespeare messes it all up. Anyway, so they were all about to kiss and then this other kid went, “Eeeew, you know, eeew they’re lesbos,” you know, and Katie said “Shut up!”, you know she just shouted at the girl “Shut up!”
Tara: Yeah.
Karleen: You know, and then, the um, the teacher asked her to leave the room to calm down. And she didn't say she was in trouble, but you know, being asked to leave the room feels like you are in trouble.
Tara: Right.
Karleen: So, then she told us about it. And first of all, part of the campaign was just documenting it...
Tara: Right.
Karleen: And getting her to tell it in her own words, which I um, I wrote down, I scribed for her. And then I went back and worked with the teacher, and said “look I have all these resources,” but she, she went ahead and she did um, work like social justice education on that topic. Um, so that happened.
Tara: Uh, your daughter or the teacher?
Karleen: The teacher.
Tara: Okay.
Karleen: But um...
Tara: So your interaction with the teacher around that moment was satisfactory?
Karleen: Yes, she was very good.