Kiwi BloggerBringing a Same Sex Date is Not Allowed in This School
A St. Patrick’s College male student is hoping to bring along a boy as his date for a school ball this weekend but he was told that he won’t be allowed to push through with his plan.
The St. Patrick student, Malcolm Pimentel was told by the school rector, Father Paul Martin that he won’t be able to bring Keith Fredrick Labad, formerly a St. Patrick’s Town student as his date for the school affair this coming weekend. Keith has announced that he wanted to attend the event as Malcolm’s friend. Keith and Malcolm have set up an event page at the social networking site Facebook, and so far have 2100 attendees. Keith said that the Facebook event was set up to gather support for the fight against discrimination and to share ideas.
Keith shared on the Facebook page that, ”I am a Catholic. I just also happen to be queer. We are not taking shots at religion, but rather, we’re trying to claim what we deserve as humans and that is our right. This is not an attack on our school or religion”. Zubin D’Sousa, St. Patrick’s prefect said that he supports Keith and Malcolm’s fight. He said, ”While this may be against a supposed teaching of the school and the Catholic institution, as intelligent beings we need to consider and question rather than accept blindly”.
Father Martin called on the school’s policy to defend his decision. The policy states that "old boys" and boys from other schools are not allowed to attend school functions. He said,’ It’s a management issue. When you have boys from other schools or former students, you can have tensions between the students. Balls are complicated enough without adding another dimension”.
Gilbert Wong, a Human Rights Commission spokesman said they have not received any complaints yet regarding the issue. Basing on the details, this could raise questions about unlawful discrimination under the Human Rights Act. It is the court’s call to decide whether it is unlawful or not but the commission will work towards mediating between the school and the students who are affected.
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