Want to know how the transphobic ad made it into the National Post?
So does the Post. Advertising manager Enzo Loschiavo told OpenFile "I'll be honest, no one saw it."
So does the Post. Advertising manager Enzo Loschiavo told OpenFile "I'll be honest, no one saw it." Meaning, none of the checks the Post runs before printing an ad caught the widely-panned Institute for Canadian Values ad.
You can read the full apology issued by the Post here, but here's the nut of it:
[node:ad]The National Post believes strongly in the principles of free speech and open, unhindered debate. We believe unpopular points of view should not be censored simply because some readers may find them disturbing, or even offensive. Free speech does not apply only to views that will not offend anyone.
The ad in question was attempting to make the case that the Ontario curriculum was teaching very young children about issues that, at that age, should be the domain of parents. In addition, it made the case that even when parents or teachers may object to the material being taught, they did not have the right, in the case of parents, to remove their children from the class, or in the case of teachers, to decline to teach the material on the grounds that they objected to it.
In an open society, these positions are worthy of being part of a debate on this issue. They are also legitimate arguments to make in a paid advertisement in a media outlet.
Where the ads exceeded the bounds of civil discourse was in their tone and manipulative use of a picture of a young girl; in the suggestion that such teaching “corrupts” children, with everything that such a charge implies; and in their singling out of groups of people with whose sexuality the group disagrees.
The fact that we will not be publishing this ad again represents a recognition on our part that publishing it in the first place was a mistake.
Read the OpenFile story here. And, if you haven't seen the ad, here's a link for that, too.
