BC Human Rights Tribunal orders ex-school trustee to pay $750,000 over hate speech for saying there are two genders

A former British Columbia school trustee has been ordered to pay $750,000 in damages to LGBT teachers following a complaint that accused him of discrimination and hate speech after he had publicly campaigned against the idea that gender is a “social construct.”

Barry Neufeld, the former Chilliwack school trustee, must pay damages to “LGBTQ2S+” teachers after the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal determined that dozens of his statements amounted to so-called hate speech.

The case stemmed from a 2017 complaint filed by the Chilliwack Teachers’ Association and the BC Teachers’ Federation over a number of Neufeld’s statements that took issue with gender ideology found in the SOGI123 curriculum.

Neufeld has maintained that his statements were not derogatory and that he was criticizing government policy, specifically the SOGI 123 curriculum. He argued that his remarks reflected legitimate concerns and were not motivated by hatred.

On Wednesday, the tribunal released its decision concluding a human rights case that spanned nearly a decade. The panel found that Neufeld’s comments regarding sexual orientation and gender identity education created a “poisoned” work environment for LGBT-identifying teachers. It further alleged he breached three sections of the Human Rights Code: employment discrimination, discriminatory publications, and hate speech. As a result, he was ordered to compensate dozens of impacted teachers.

The $750,000 was granted to the Chilliwack Teachers’ Association to be equally distributed among LGBTQ2S+ class members, with an estimated 45 to 163 teachers. Neufeld also has to pay additional costs for improper conduct during the proceedings, according to CTV News.

The tribunal said that Neufeld “publicly denigrated LGBTQ people and teachers” over the course of five years and “inundated public discourse in Chilliwack with speech that degraded and denied trans people.” The panel said his statements “sought to eliminate public policies for their inclusion” and stoked “an imaginary threat posed by their social acceptance.” It concluded that he created a discriminatory work environment for LGBTQ2S+ teachers, and that several of his public posts violated the law and constituted “Hate Speech Publications.”

“This provision prohibits the publication of speech that ‘is likely to expose a person or a group or class of persons to hatred or contempt’ because of their protected characteristics. This is colloquially referred to as ‘hate speech’,” the decision stated.