Gay marriage was legalized in Canada on July 20, 2005. Yet exactly 15 years later, an Ontario couple in the process of planning their own wedding got a reminder that discrimination can still sour the event.
Kelly Roberts, 26, and Mallory Arthur, 26, who live in Woodstock, Ont., got engaged in January, just a few months before the COVID-19 pandemic response got underway in the province.
Their plan was always to get married next year, but with the pandemic postponing so many nuptials, they have been planning full force since rebookings have made 2021 a busier wedding year.
Roberts came across a videography company based in Brantford, Ont. called Caramount Pictures run by Ian Hamstra and Cara Hamstra and sent an inquiry over this past weekend. On Monday, Roberts got this reply from Cara:
“I say this with much care, because I know that your union is incredibly important to you, but we do not film homosexual weddings,” the email read.
Caramount Pictures did not respond to the Star’s requests for comment.
“The fact that she didn’t even try to mask her homophobia … in writing — I think that was the shocking part,” Roberts said in an interview with the Star.
“The fact that she didn’t even try to mask it just shows that it’s such a normal thought for her to have,” Arthur continued.
The Ontario Human Rights Code states that “every person has a right to equal treatment with respect to services, goods and facilities, without discrimination because of” several identities, including sexual orientation.
Roberts, who is on the Pride committee for Oxford county, shared a screenshot of the email response on her Facebook page and Instagram stories and received several messages of support.
Since then, the company’s Facebook and Google profile have also been flooded with hundreds of negative reviews related to the email, dropping its rating to 1.0 stars on Facebook.
This wasn’t Arthur and Roberts’ first experience with discrimination while wedding planning. They said they reached out to an officiant based in London, Ont. that they found via the app Wedding Wire.
“Once Mallory sat down beside me for the meeting, he realized that we’re a gay couple,” Roberts said. She says he then told them he wouldn’t be able to support their wedding due to his religious beliefs.
There is an exception in the OHRC that allows a religious official to refuse to perform a marriage ceremony if it would be against the person’s religious beliefs or principles.
“Since we had that experience, especially, when I reach out to someone I try to make it clear that it’s two brides marrying each other just because it was such a bad taste in my mouth before,” Roberts said. “The fact that I need to out myself in a way to every single vendor that I reach out to, just because I don’t want to face this problem, it’s sad.”
The two are still focused on planning a day for each other and having fun anticipating their wedding day set for October 2021.
“If I could do it tomorrow I would,” Arthur said.
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So there's the article NSG, what say ye? Do you think this is a case of homophobia? Do you think this is acceptable for the company to do; legally or morally? Do you think the company did the right thing?
Personally, I certainly think this is a plain case of homophobia. If you're providing a service - in this case wedding videography - and you refuse to provide the service solely on the basis of the couple-to-be being homosexual, that's homophobia. The act of videoing a wedding is the same regardless of sexuality.
As for whether I think this is acceptable legally or morally, I am not versed on Canadian or Ontarian law, so I don't know about the legal aspect. However, morally, I think this is not acceptable behavior. That being said, I've always been torn on the "are businesses allowed to deny service to gays" debate - because I don't know the legal aspect but I like to believe that good companies would treat people and couples equally on the basis of sexuality, among other immutable aspects of their being. That being said, I hope this couple receive a lot of offers to video their wedding from actual good companies and I hope that they have a wonderful wedding day. I believe the company did the wrong thing by denying the couple on the basis of their sexuality, but I do find a silver lining in the fact that their homophobia was up front rather than them accepting the job and botching it. You can find another wedding videographer ahead of time, you can't refilm your wedding after the fact.