Open letter to Kitchener Council. I hear you’ve been getting a lot of mail… #flagflop

Dear Councillors, and Mayor Zehr,

It was said at council that there was very little response to our request to change the protocol when it was presented on a Monday afternoon when even our group of delegates had to take the afternoon off of school or work to be there. It was stated in a cheeky and condescending manner, and I must admit that for one of the few times in my forty years on the planet, I had a very hard time sitting quietly.

My argument to council was that the appearance of impropriety is impropriety itself. I will post some of the text of my speech that I gave that day in a bit.

After this meeting, I returned home disappointed, and rather angry about the comments from some councillors. It would be good to see transcripts because even though my memory is quite good, I can imagine that it has been tainted by the emotionality of that day.

You see, I didn’t walk into council emotional. I walked in expecting to give a rational argument to people who I would have assumed came to listen with fresh ears and open minds. I cannot begin to express my utter disappointment when it occurred to me that most of your minds were made up long before you entered that room… your own speeches pre-composed… your minds resolved.

So here we are. You are receiving tonnes of emails. I have heard that some of them have been hurtful and for that I feel badly. No one in that room intended for you to be insulted, or hurt. But we didn’t wish to be either.

I got home, and posted an exasperated comment on Facebook about being ridiculed for “not exactly” filling council chambers. And almost immediately a friend posted all of your email addresses (one who wasn’t at council because she was working), and we started emailing. By today, there are likely 200 posts on Facebook that have spiralled off of these original conversations — they get hard to follow, so I am ballparking a guess. A good 50 of them were there before we actively campaigned for people to email you.

A few things you should know when communicating with the public:

1. Being LGBTQ is not a “lifestyle”, a “life choice”, or a “life decision.” Those words, even if they are in your head, in the 2000s, should never be spoken or written in public by a public official. They are enormously inappropriate and considered offensive. Here is a media relations guide by GLAAD describing the most important terms to avoid. If you want to be perceived as educated (not ignorant or intolerant) get with the right rhetoric. Being called ignorant is hard, but the term mostly means misinformed. So get informed.
2. Knowing someone who is gay doesn’t mean you have any right to say what is appropriate for someone who is LGBTQ. Even as a person who fits in the spectrum, I cannot speak for others either — I have no idea what it’s like to be a gay man, and cannot pretend my words fit a gay man’s life… even if I know many. And even then, LGBTQ opinions are as diverse as anyone else’s. Not everyone in this community will see eye to eye on the Rainbow Flag issue. Making assumptions about anything based on your acquaintance with a gay person is such a crappy way to approach folk who have a different experience, and one you are clearly not understanding just by your behaviour and rhetoric. So the gay family member, friend, neighbour argument just doesn’t cut it. Stop using it. Here’s a link to a wiki on the Friend Argument.
3. Flags do not represent every interest in a country, even for people who stand behind the flag of that country. Universities have flags that represent them. So do sports teams (GO Rangers!!!) Nations have flags. Festivals have flags. The Rainbow flag is something different. And it represents an identity in Canada and in the rest of the world that sees much persecution, and has to fight for its rights like few others, right up to this day. In this, the LGBTQ community are not like other communities in Canada. So yes… we have a flag. Some people will agree with you, but the logic is very flawed, and falls apart quickly when you start to think about the purpose of flags.
4. The Rainbow Flag is not the tri-Pride flag. Every delegate at the meeting said they were speaking as themselves. Not as tri-Pride. Stop confusing the two.

I will address your arguments in another message, because it is important to do so. But at least for now, please take this bit I wrote up top in the best and most generous light, as I do with your communication. I can imagine it’s been a hard few days for you, and I can’t promise it will slow down. A movement takes a breath, and then it lives on its own. It is my hope that people treat you with dignity, but I cannot take any credit for how this situation you’ve created is being perceived. As I said, the perception of impropriety is impropriety itself.

Terre