Gender Is A Social Construct

Jeff Green | May 08, 2024

The case surrounding a Granite Ridge student who wore a t-shirt saying “There are only two genders” has drawn attention on social media which has spread out from Sharbot Lake across Canada and into the United States.

The Limestone District School Board took the position that the assertion on the t-shirt represents a threat to students or anyone else on the school grounds who identified as anything but female or male, because they are excluded from that binary.

If someone is told they don't exist, that constitutes an implicit threat to their well-being.

The Limestone District School Board leaned partially on the Canadian Human Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of “race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, age, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, marital status, family status, genetic characteristics, disability and conviction for an offence for which a pardon has been granted or in respect of which a record suspension has been ordered.”

Further, the board and the staff at the school are responsible for making every child attending their schools feel safe while under their supervision.

The boy in this case, and his mother as well, said that the statement on his shirt is an equivalent kind of expression as “Black Lives Matter” or a poster asserting support for the LGBT+ community.

The difference, in the viewpoint of the school board, staff at the school, and the human rights act, is that the Black Lives Matter and LGBT positive posters do not exclude anyone, they do not say “Only Black Lives Matter” or only the LGBT community should be made welcome in the school.

The t-shirt, however, says, “there are only two genders”.

The claim made by the boy and his mother their supporters, seems to be based on the assertion that there are only two sexes assigned at birth.

The Human Rights Act includes sex, sexual orientation, and gender, as three distinct categories that warrant protection.

Sex refers to biology, the male and female parts. Sexual orientation refers to who people are attracting to and have sex with. Gender is different, it refers to the identity that people assume during their lives.

The Oxford dictionary defines gender in this way: “the male sex or the female sex, especially when considered with reference to social and cultural differences rather than biological ones, or one of a range of other identities that do not correspond to established ideas of male and female.”

Social and cultural differences can and do change, and by Canadian law they have changed as regards gender, and protecting the free expression of gender identity makes a differences for the safety, well-being, and employment prospects of one group of Canadian citizens without removing any protections from any other Canadian citizens.

When GREC administration decided to insist that a student remove a “there are only 2 genders” shirt, it may or may not have been the best decision. There may have been another way to address the matter, but they were within their mandate to do what they did, based on the Human Rights Act and their policies regarding keeping the school safe.

The boy could have worn a t-shirt saying “I am Proud to be a Man” which may not have been well received in the school either, but would not have said anything about anyone else. But he did not do that, he said something about the gender of other people, and that's where he went from simply asserting his own beliefs to denying the identity of others.

The boy and his mother said they did not agree with the black lives matter or LGBT+ positive posters in the school, which is their prerogative, and they have also made it clear that the posters make them feel uncomfortable, unheard, which is understandable given their set of beliefs.

However, those posters are not a threat to them, they do not take away their identity, they do not deny their lives, or their ability to pursue their religious beliefs.

“There are only two genders”, however tells gender queer and trans-people that they do not exist.

For people who have been and still are subjected to discrimination and violence, that is indeed a threat.

Perhaps the core concept of Christianity could hold sway here for everyone involved, the “Golden Rule”.