A Christian mother is threatening to sue a primary school after it hosted an equality event she claims promoted LGBT lifestyles.
Izoduwa Adhedo says her son was forced to attend the ‘Proud to be Me’ day at Heavers Farm School in South Norwood, London, which she described as ‘against our religious beliefs’.
The school rejected her claim they organised a ‘gay pride parade’ and said support for the anti-homophobia event vastly outweighed any criticism.
Izoduwa Adhedo says her son was forced to attend the ‘Proud to be Me’ day at Heavers Farm School in South Norwood, London. Pictured: An undated photo of the school
Mrs Adhedo told The Guardian: ‘I wasn’t even trying to stop the Pride event. I just wanted my child to receive an education, rather than indoctrination.’
She is due to meet the school’s governors today with backing from Christian Concern, which regularly takes up legal cases from people claiming religious discrimination.
The organisation alleges Mrs Adhedo withdrew her son from the school last month after he was put in detention for three hours. The school denied this and said the maximum detention time is one hour.
Its headteacher, Susan Papas said: ‘At the end of the year we decided to do something on anti-homophobia as part of Pride month, taking the idea that people and families can be different but everyone can be proud. There were some objections but they were outweighed by support.’
She did not comment directly on Mr Adhedo’s complaint over the June event, during which pupils walked with banners about what made them proud to be themselves.
Another parent, Izzy Montague, also raised concerns about the event, and is quoted on the Christian Concern website.
The organisation says Mrs Montague went to the school to discuss the issue with Ms Papas.
It claims she was met by the headteacher’s daughter wearing a t-shirt bearing the slogan, ‘Why be racist, sexist, homophobic or transphobic, when you could just be quiet?’
The pressure group’s chief executive, Andrea Williams, said this was an example of ‘totitolerance’ – a mash-up of tolerance and totalitarianism.
Christian Concern is linked to the Christian Legal Centre, which provided representation to the parents of terminally-ill toddler Alfie Evans when doctors ordered him to be taken off life support.