Alberta activist convicted of promoting hatred at Toronto's Pride Parade

An Albertan who, along with six of his followers, donned skin-tight, lime-green spandex body suits with matching green hooded masks and handed out anti-gay pamphlets disguised as condoms at Toronto’s Pride Parade a decade back has been convicted of wilfully promoting hatred.

William Whatcott, who accessorized his parade outfit with a tutu and a rainbow-striped cape, was originally acquitted of the charge, but the Crown appealed because the trial judge refused to hear from an expert on the history of anti-gay discrimination. Ontario’s top court saw that as an error and ordered a new trial. The Supreme Court of Canada declined to hear Whatcott’s appeal.

His new trial in Ontario’s Superior Court of Justice heard that, on July 3, 2016, Whatcott marched with his followers in the parade after obtaining a permit by “falsely representing” the group as the “Gay Zombies Cannabis Consumers Association” using a fake name.

In his parade application, Whatcott “falsely told the organizers that his contingent consisted of ‘zombies who are gay and who smoke pot’ and that their message was ‘to have fun’ but to do so ‘responsibly and safely,’” said the recent decision. “He said they would provide ‘zombie safesex packets’ to ‘encourage zombies to be safe when having sex or when playing with blood sports.’”

Although Whatcott was “required to get advance approval for any handouts,” he didn’t provide a sample to parade organizers.

“Based on the evidence in the trial before me, I am satisfied beyond a reasonable doubt that the flyer distributed by Mr. Whatcott and his fellow Zombies promoted hatred of gay men, as defined in the case law, and also that Mr. Whatcott willfully distributed the flyer knowing this to be the case,” Justice Anne Molloy wrote in her Sept. 16 verdict.

Each of the people in Whatcott’s group “carried a large shoulder bag containing packages of what appeared to be condoms, but which instead contained a folded-up flyer printed on both sides with what is alleged in this case to be anti-gay messaging,” said the judge.

“As they continued along the parade route, the Gay Zombies handed out 3,000 of these packages.”

One recipient complained to the Toronto Police Service. Whatcott, whose name and contact information were on the flyer, was charged with inciting hatred against gay men.

“The content of the flyers is partly about the health risks associated with gay men, partly about their sinful ways and criminal conduct, and partly about government figures said to have been associated with the gay agenda in a negative way,” Molloy said.

“Gay men are portrayed as immoral and a danger to children. It is thinly disguised scare-mongering and loaded with toxic imagery. However, it also includes calls for sinners to repent and messages that God loves them.”

An expert on the history of anti-gay discrimination — Nick Mulé, a practising psychotherapist and an associate professor at York University — testified that Whatcott’s pamphlets include demeaning tropes that identify “gay men as carriers of disease,” and “references to the gay lifestyle as being sordid; the use of pejorative terms like sodomy and homosexual; references to pedophilia, recruiting children to become gay, and feeding false information to children who then change their genders; and repeated strong religiosity and references to sinful conduct.”