Interview with Al Saplys

I invited parent Al Saplys over to talk about issues emerging from the transgender teacher making international news in an Oakville, Ontario high school. Two Dads talking about gender politics in the workplace. What could possibly go wrong?

Watch: https://youtu.be/zRWg0REhKak

Unedited Transcript.

Jim Allan: Two dads talking about gender politics in the workplace, what could possibly go wrong? Hello, Al Saplys.

Al Saplys: Hey, how you doing?

Jim Allan: It's been a while. Okay, let's say if you were in a company, and what would you do if one of your male employees decided to transition to female and showed up dressed with huge fake breasts? That's what happened at a high school in Oakville, Ontario, one of the biggest stories in the world, right under our noses. And I thought it would be interesting to unpack some of the related issues with a parent, somebody I know, who still has a child in the school. You're in the middle of this, sort of.

Al Saplys: Yep.

Jim Allan: How did you get involved?

Al Saplys: Well, like everyone else, I mean, I saw the initial media coverage and my eyebrows were raised at first thinking that this is some kind of a hoax. And I had to give my head a shake and drill down on exactly what was happening here. You know, there are times where you just kind of, very frequently where we, as citizens, we just kind of say, okay, whatever, let those people fight it out, et cetera. And then there are some cases where you're directly involved and you're like, if I don't get personally involved, then first of all, I'm not gonna be true to myself. And secondly, this thing's not gonna get resolved in a manner, in a time or manner that I think is appropriate. I wasn't really clear on what the specifics were, but once it became clear to me that this was a teacher that was transitioning, that had made the decision to wear these giant fake prosthetic breasts, there was a lot of head scratching going on thinking this doesn't seem right from a professionalism and HR policy perspective. And honestly, I thought it would just go away in a week or a couple of days.

Jim Allan: And maybe it should have, maybe it should have, right? And so let's just hit the rewind button a little bit. So it's the beginning of September.

Al Saplys: Right.

Jim Allan: Just after Labor Day and I mean, I thought maybe we would look at this case like we're discussing a case study in a business school, which you've been to or teachers college, or I don't know, principals. Is there a principal school? I don't think so. But, and I kind of empathize with the principal, right? Because as far as I know, I mean, it's a new job. You're all excited about your new job and you walk down the hall and into your office. You know, I finally made it to the top and I'm the boss of this school. By mid morning, perhaps there's a little scuttle button in the teacher's lounge. And by lunch, you probably know there's a problem. So Al, you're the principal. You're the principal. Play along with me. What would you have done on that very first day? What, if you were in charge, if you were management, what would you have done on that very first day?

Al Saplys: Well, I think as a manager, I think that it would have made sense to have a sit down with that particular teacher and understand their rationale for the attire that they had chosen in our professional environment, in our school, as a role model, to have a discussion about appropriateness. That's what I would have done. However, are we in a different climate now?

Jim Allan: Well, there's not a lot of transparency. Like if a teacher or anyone leaves for health reasons, we're not allowed to know just for privacy reasons. So I get all that. But in this situation, there hasn't been a lot of transparency either. We don't know what discussions took place. Is that fair to say?

Al Saplys: We do not know.

Jim Allan: So even on that first day, right?

Al Saplys: We do not know if any of those discussions took place, nor do we know if this had already been an issue when the individual, the teacher was being hired. And that potentially this had already been, for lack of a better term, condoned.

Jim Allan: Now, a more experienced manager, I mean, maybe a more experienced principal. I mean, as far as I understand, it's her first day as a principal on the job. Is that your understanding?

Al Saplys: First day as a principal on the job, but not the first day at OT at Oakville Trafalgar High School. My understanding was that this principal was previously a vice principal at the high school a few years ago.

Jim Allan: Well, that makes sense though. You're a teacher. Maybe you get your master of education. You work somewhere as a vice principal and then you work your way up in your principal. And it's like, this to me is the nightmare scenario for the principal, first day on the job. So I'm watching from kind of afar. I had two kids that used to go to that school and mercifully  don't anymore. So I don't need to worry about it too much. But I have to admit, and I'm just being honest here, when I first heard about it, I kind of laughed. I figured this was either a gigantic kind of FU to the system or to somebody, right? Which was rumored. Again, there's a lot of rumors, a lot of gossip, but there's not a lot of transparency because you can't really confirm anything. Or maybe this, I mean, again, I'm just being honest. Maybe the person's suffering from mental illness or some sort of mental illness.

Al Saplys: Absolutely, that's what we thought.

Jim Allan: Because however you characterize it, it was a provocative act. If you've ever seen, we're not gonna show the pictures, but if you can Google the pictures, you can Google the pictures. This was over the top, provocative act.

Al Saplys: To be fair, again, we don't know the actual conversations or sequence of events that took place, but to be fair, the principal, the principal may have sought guidance from the board.

Jim Allan: Right.

Al Saplys: Not the trustees, but the board, the directors, the HR director, and they may have told the principal, you can do nothing.

Jim Allan: Yes.

Al Saplys: To be fair. However, the principal perhaps should have thought or considered that the events that took place afterwards, such as the international media sensation that had become could take place and this could have an impact on the principal, on the school, on the board, et cetera. But clearly that wasn't thought through.

Jim Allan: Yeah, I mean, she lost control of the situation, to put it mildly. So we don't know what happened, but basically maybe she talked to her own vice principals, maybe she talked to her superior who would have been at the board. And from my point of view, it looks like no one wants to get sued, right? No one, she doesn't wanna get sued, and then she goes to the board and they don't want to get sued. So they push it to the province and the teacher's union, and eventually they push it back to the schools, to the board saying, you've got, there are rules in place here, you deal with it yourself. Is that, am I correct in that?

Al Saplys: Pretty much, that's a fair assessment. But unfortunately, if there wasn't pressure put on the school board and province, I don't know that we would be anywhere close to a resolution of this. And we're not 100% there. The province directed the board to institute a dress code policy, which by the way, the parents that have been active have basically just said, please, can we have a dress code that is the same as the student's dress code? Doesn't that make sense? Otherwise it's hypocritical. But.

Jim Allan: But they have a collective bargaining agreement that the teachers do and the kids don't. Correct, correct. So you can tell kids to do whatever, don't do as I say do, do as I say not as I do, right? You just, you're not allowed to wear halter tops or tank tops. No, no, of course you're not.

Al Saplys: But regardless, the province and the Ontario College of Teachers and other bodies came to the conclusion that the board had the tools to deal with this, but chose not to deal with it because they felt that they would be infringing on the Ontario Human Rights Code. And that's kind of what they stood behind.

Jim Allan: So, I mean, you're a parent in this situation where people are getting more and more angry because what I understand too is you weren't told a lot. And it's like two or three months passed before parents are even allowed, given a forum to speak to the board. Is that correct?

In late November, so September, October, November.

Al Saplys: That's right. The parents effectively were shut down to discuss this matter. And that aggravated a lot of people. And we felt that this is pretty arrogant on behalf of the board not consulting the parents, which they said that they did not have a legal obligation to do in this particular case because it was an HR matter. But at the end of the day.

Jim Allan: Well, it's your kids.

Al Saplys: It's your kids. And they're, unfortunately, because of the international media sensation and attention, unfortunately, because of this is such a polarizing issue, there were bomb threats leveled against the school. There was intimidation against teachers at the school and all kinds of nasty stuff that occurred because of this polarizing issue of this trans teacher that was inappropriately dressed. And it's not even a trans, it's not even a transgender issue. This is a, in our view, it was a professionalism issue, a dress code issue.

Jim Allan: Right. And the board originally, their original position or existing position is to support just people that are transitioning in general. So they were supporting this teacher in general terms. It's their right to do whatever they wanna do in the professional.

Al Saplys: Exactly. I mean, that's what, again, with regards to your previous comments, how would this be dealt with in a workplace, in a professional corporate workplace? I think everybody has-

Jim Allan: It probably would have been handled very quickly and swiftly.

Al Saplys: Probably.

Jim Allan: And for whatever reason, this wasn't.

Al Saplys: Yes, it wasn't.

Jim Allan: And then, and as you say, there's bomb threats and some of them are just called safety threats, but in a document that I received, there were bomb threats on November 16th, November 17th, November 20th, November 21st, December 14th, December 16th, December 19th. That's a lot of bomb threats. So how many bomb threats is too many?

Al Saplys: Well, yeah, I mean-

Jim Allan: So it got real. I mean, I would think shit got real. It's kind of funny from my point of view and it's like an amusing little cocktail party chatter, but then until there's bomb threats and then shit gets real at that point.

Al Saplys: Absolutely, shit gets real. That's like,

Jim Allan: what are you doing to protect my kids?

Al Saplys: 100%.

Jim Allan: So what was the messaging you were getting during, because some of these bomb threats were happening and you didn't necessarily even know about them. Is that correct?

Al Saplys: Yes, some of them were disclosed, but some were not because they were not deemed to be credible. But again, who's to determine which is a credible threat and not? Obviously you'd prefer to have no bomb threats or no threats whatsoever, but as this situation continued to spin out of control, not being managed, we felt that the communication was becoming more and more convoluted. So that's why parents decided ultimately to get active.

Jim Allan:And that's when the lawyers get involved, which is always unfortunate, of course. So the lawyers are involved, so everything's fine now, right? Well, I wouldn't say fine.

I'm joking, of course.

Al Saplys: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jim Allan: I know there's lots of lawyers in Oakville, some steps from the school, right? So if you need a lawyer, just throw a rock, right? For sure, for sure. And I sued someone in small claims court once and it's like once in, somebody's told me at the time, as soon as you do that, the horse is out of the barn. So you can't get the horses back in the barn. So the idea from the beginning was probably to avoid legal liability, and I'm certainly not a lawyer. But of course, that all backfires because now the lawyers are involved. And even a document that you sent me, I can tell lawyers are kind of involved because there's now a chronology in all the dates and everything's laid out in what happened and when, right? So because I'm not paying attention and things are not being, I'm not giving 100% attention and there's not a lot of transparency. So I'm like reading the Oakville Beaver or the Toronto Star or the Sun or the papers in England are carrying this and the New York Post is carrying this, Fox News is carrying this.

Al Saplys: Absolutely, Tucker Carlson's all over it. Tucker Carlson's over it. All over it.

Jim Allan: You know, that's a good sign. So I mean, they were attempting to politicize it. So we're tempers flaring at some of these events

Al Saplys: Well, the events were few and far between. I mean, the tempers were flaring online and via letters and via appeals to the trustees and the board.

Jim Allan: But there were in-person protests and things like that.

Al Saplys: There were in-person protests. Unfortunately, so at the protest, some of the protests attracted people that were not part of the school.

Jim Allan: Right.

Al Saplys: That were, whatever.

Jim Allan: Protesting whatever.

Al Saplys: Protesting whatever, right? People's party, convoy protesters, et cetera. That's not what this is about. The end of the day- And rebel news was there. Right, rebel news. The end of the day, for those that had a vested direct interest, it was about ensuring the safety of the school and trying to get an answer from the board in terms of how are you gonna deal with this? And back to your original question, why wasn't this thought through at the beginning? What did you think was gonna happen here? Did you think that we're on a different universe now where anything goes with regards to decorum and dress in the workplace, et cetera? It's like, so I think that's where the biggest mistake was made. Not extrapolating where this was going and being so risk averse, right? With regards to legal liability that maybe they were frozen. There are others who believe that the board has a particular agenda with regards to diversity, inclusion, equity, et cetera, but we have no proof of that. And that's irrelevant in this case because I think it's just all about professionalism and dress code.

Jim Allan: And again, and the safety of the kids too, right? So it's just that extra little thing when you bring in bomb threats, it gets a little more-

Al Saplys: Yeah, I mean, remove the problem, the bomb threats go away. It's very simple, right?

Jim Allan: Well, and then I had heard, again, just through the media, that the teacher actually suffered an injury and wasn't even at work, which I didn't know for two months.

Al Saplys: Right.

Jim Allan: And then the principal is off, which I don't doubt at all, for whatever reason, medical leave probably.

Al Saplys: We don't know.

Jim Allan: We have no idea. No one knows, but it's not a coincidence to me, right? It's not shocking that they're both out of the situation, which probably should have happened earlier. I feel sorry for the principal. I really do. I have a lot of empathy for the principal, because you're not trained to do this stuff. So you almost need an office down the hall with legal counsel now.

Al Saplys: Absolutely, and as a parent, I was asked by the Toronto Star, as a parent, because I'm not officially part of Students First, that's another group. That is a group that is a fantastic group that got together and-

Jim Allan: What's it called again?

Al Saplys: Students First Ontario. So that's the parents that got together. It's basically a group of OT parents that wanted to take, and are continuing to take, a very high road approach to tackling this professionally and appealing to those who might influence the situation in a positive direction. But long story short, I was also asked by the Toronto Star, as a parent, to give a quote, and we had a discussion, and the star kind of felt that the principal was being thrown under the bus here in a irreconcilable position, in terms of damned if they do, damned if they don't.

Jim Allan: It's kind of above her pay grade, so I get that.

Al Saplys: It could have started right from when this individual was hired, if they had been presenting themselves with that dress, with the costume, because it is a costume, it's, you know. Again, what are the limits of gender expression? I don't know. Are we in a different realm right now? Do you know what I mean?

Jim Allan: Well, I guess this is how we figure it out. We just have to plow through situations like this.

Al Saplys: Right, right. And so, like you're saying, it's a case study. It's a test case.

Jim Allan: I mean, I'm a pretty liberal guy.

Al Saplys: Same here.

Jim Allan: I'm slightly, perhaps a little left of centre compared to most people in this neighbourhood, but at the same time, this got to be, this is almost ridiculous. This is a ridiculous situation.

Al Saplys: I saw a great quote that I continue to use. It makes a mockery of equity, right? So if you, I believe very much in equity.

Jim Allan: Well, and the next, I've seen that too. The next trans person that comes along is gonna think twice or whatever. It just makes it harder for the next trans person that comes along.

Al Saplys: Right, and it shouldn't. It shouldn't. It shouldn't. And, you know, if this had been dealt with swiftly, then I don't think the trans community would have potentially been, not that they are suffering, but the trans community wouldn't have been vilified as much by those who seek harm to them. And it's just-

Jim Allan: Because people are, certain people are threatened by just the transition.

Al Saplys: Yes, yeah.

Jim Allan: And, you know, for a lot of people, I mean, it's a very conservative area in general.

Al Saplys: Right.

Jim Allan: SouthEast Oakville. That said, I know a lot of parents that do have trans children and are, have kind of faced it in a mature way and been very supportive of their children as they've transitioned. And it's not uncommon in this neighborhood. It's almost like how gay rights were, I don't know, 30 years ago, 40 years ago, because it's all new. It's all kind of, in my opinion, uncharted territory.

Al Saplys: There were a number of labor lawyers who were consulted from Toronto and elsewhere, leading labor lawyers who just said, you know what, I don't really want to touch this because this is new ground now and very sensitive ground. I'm not saying it's a good thing or a bad thing. I'm just saying it is, right? This is a bit of a sensitive area. You know, you don't want to be the law firm and the lawyer that's labeled the, unfortunately, anti-trans, anti-LGBTQ, right, et cetera. So, and it just, you know, it may not be worth it.

Jim Allan: I mean, so you went to this, you went to a meeting the other day. Any news out of that meeting for Students First Ontario?

Al Saplys: Well, basically the meeting concluded that we are anticipating a positive announcement in and around March 1st with regards to the board implementing a teacher's dress code, which they have been told by the province that they should be doing and that they have the tools to do so, same as with the Ontario College of Teachers, which is the body that anybody can complain to about a particular teacher in Ontario.

Jim Allan: January 3rd, the board passed a motion to develop a professionalism policy for staff to include standards of dress and decorum, and that was going to be delivered. So are they going to deliver that report or there's solution by March 1st?

Al Saplys: There's an interim report that apparently should be available in mid-February, and then a final report or policy March 1st. We're hoping that that's the case and then that this issue becomes resolved and that this becomes a test case for other boards in Ontario, because apparently everybody's looking to what Halton District School Board's going to be doing and the rest of Ontario and Canada, because this could be coming.

Jim Allan: They got all the PhDs on the case here.

Al Saplys: Right, exactly. So let's figure this out.

Jim Allan: So I was going to say, so is the problem over, we figure it's almost there, we're close.

Al Saplys: We're close, but at the meeting, there was a lot of apprehension about, you know what, we're not done yet. Let's, you know, is there a way that, you know, someone somehow, you know, again, cynically, some people believe that there's hidden agendas here and that they're going to, there might be a challenge to the province.

Jim Allan: Even the most radicalized bureaucrat would have to concede that this is, like, this was way over the line, I would think, if you're just being reasonable. I don't know.

Al Saplys: I agree. It's, you know, anything goes is not a solution. It's not a way to present. I mean, again, you know, you've seen the analogies, right? What if a woman was transitioning to a man and decided to walk around the school with a massive, protruding dildo? Like, and it's absurd, right? So we're in the theater of the, honestly, I mean, if you want to be, you know, comical about this, it's like the theater of the absurd.

Jim Allan: So what do the kids think of all of this? I mean, we kind of, I don't lose sight of the kids, but the kids, I mean, I've heard, again, it's all, everything is gossip because there's not a lot of transparency. But so I hear that a lot of the kids, I mean, maybe the kids are just a little more liberal than their conservative parents, which is normal. So the kids are somewhat supportive of this, but I've certainly seen interviews with kids that are just tired of the attention and want to move on with their lives.

Al Saplys: I think the majority of the kids, you know, are kind of like, whatever, move on. It doesn't bother us that much, especially if we're not in that class, until the bomb threats and the disruption to classroom activities occurred and learning and trying to, you know, get into universities and whatnot. It's a massive disruption, right? And that's kind of-

Jim Allan: Well, kids were sent home just once or twice, though, with these bombs, and then they started just not sending them home.

Al Saplys: Right, but it affected the school culture to some degree.

Jim Allan: Right, so it's not fun going to school anymore.

Al Saplys: Right, for some kids, it was not fun going to school for, I mean, there was- We

Jim Allan: traumatizing for some people.

Al Saplys: Yeah, there was a spectrum of upsetedness, if that's a word, or trauma. Right. And, you know, who needs that, right? And in school, you want to be a safe place. You want to focus on learning and sports and-

Jim Allan: Did the kids get help, like counseling, or did they get extra counseling?

Al Saplys: Yeah, you know, the school communication with regards to this situation was pretty good. But it was so frequent that, you know, there was a lot of eye rolling going on, and-

Jim Allan: There was too much, then.

Al Saplys: Yeah, almost, you know, too much.

Jim Allan: So they were overcompensating.

Al Saplys: They were, and not addressing the situation directly at all.

Jim Allan: Right.

Al Saplys: You know, vaguely saying, we know that our school has been subject to a lot of media attention, but not talking about the situation at all. Right. End of the day, the kids, I think, felt that there should be a dress code for teachers that's the same as students.

Jim Allan: Okay, let's pretend I'm an extreme right wing-

Al Saplys: Sure.

Jim Allan: Power guy. Why couldn't they have just fired this teacher immediately? Like, they didn't want to?

Al Saplys: Under the Human Rights Code, the way that I understand it now is I've been currently educated. I would have known this previously. But the way that the Ontario Human Rights Code is written, there is a huge gray area with regards to gender expression and somebody transitioning.

Jim Allan: Right.

Al Saplys: And there is no mention of dress. So I think the board, the board basically said we have been advised by leading human rights and labor lawyers and have been advised that we can do nothing. Okay, I'd like to know who those lawyers are and what their base. I think it's all risk mitigation.

Jim Allan: But if they- Right. This teacher's motivation, maybe she was just trying to get fired so like pay me the last 20 years of my contract.

Al Saplys: Absolutely.

Jim Allan: I'll take that. But I guess there could be damages beyond that. And I guess there's a precedent as well. Absolutely. So everyone starts showing up in-

Al Saplys: When this started, I thought this was gonna go away in a few days, not a week. This is Corporal Klinger from MASH trying to get a massive payout or get booted out of the army, right? And then it went on and on and on.

Jim Allan: And then what impressed me, she was committed to the bit. I mean, if it was a bit, like if you're a comedian, you're committed, like this is not, this is lasting more than a day, a week, a month. She is committed to the bit, which was impressive to me, actually.

Al Saplys: Absolutely, absolutely. And so, and then that's kind of when everything started ratcheting up with regards to measures and countermeasures and parents organizing. I mean, you have to understand, there's no way for parents to naturally organize. People have to do it, you know, very personally, right? I have to talk to my friends who then have to talk to their friends, who have to talk to their neighbors, but then somebody has to set up a website.

Jim Allan: So it's like, let's do something about this.

Al Saplys: Right, let's do something about this. Because no one else is doing something, so we gotta do something. Right, and so I honestly believe without the pressure that the parents created, in addition to unfortunately having to create more media awareness, and I say unfortunately, because sadly, more media awareness means that some nut job somewhere is gonna call in a bomb threat, right?

Jim Allan: Well, I saw American comedians, it was part of their act and stuff. It made it around the world.

Al Saplys: Absolutely, and so because it's, this person is breaking boundaries, and that's why this was such a head scratcher. Yeah. And it shouldn't have been, because again, right, if I had walked into place of business X, Y, Z, I worked at Microsoft. If I walked into Microsoft dressed like this as transitioning, you know, it just, that wouldn't have held water, right?

Jim Allan: But most corporate environments, they're here for the bottom line.

Al Saplys: Yeah, and at the end of the day.

Jim Allan: You're interrupting our flow of profit.

Al Saplys: Absolutely, at the end of the day, it's kind of fine, you're transitioning transition, but why the getup? Why the Halloween costume? Again, there are boundaries regardless of I think what community you're in with regards to professionalism and teaching kids.

Jim Allan: Well, where do we go from here? We're just waiting for this final, what we hope is a final report.

Al Saplys: What we hope is a final report and a new policy, address code policy for teachers in the Halton District School Board.

Jim Allan: Which sounds complicated, because that would probably have to be bargained in their collective bargaining.

Al Saplys: Apparently not. Apparently it's not, it doesn't have to be bargained. That isn't necessarily 100% correct. But.

Jim Allan: That's why you have a lot of lawyers.

Al Saplys: That's why there's lawyers involved and whatnot. But I can't see the union necessarily standing, condoning this, right?

Jim Allan: Right.

Al Saplys: Yeah. So, you know, we'll see how it goes. I mean, it's just, is a school environment that much different that there have to be separate dress codes. Right, for the teachers. For teachers and students, I don't think so. Yeah. Am I missing, are we missing something here? I don't think so.

Jim Allan: That's ultimately what it comes down to.

Al Saplys: That's ultimately what it comes down to, right?

Jim Allan: Well, thanks for coming, Al. Appreciate the chat. So, thanks for coming.

Al Saplys: Great, thanks. Appreciate it.