CALGARY — While video footage from the recent federal NDP leadership convention has gone viral online — mainly for reasons unrelated to Avi Lewis’ leadership victory — the spotlight has also turned to the person who chaired the event.During the convention, Adrienne Smith — a Vancouver-based lawyer with a history of left-wing, progressive activism — was misgendered by an NDP delegate wearing a keffiyeh..“I’ll again thank delegates not to call me madame chair. I’m a non-binary person, my pronouns are they/them, and ‘chair’ is sufficient,” she said to applause from the audience.Smith identifies as non-binary and operates a law practice that describes itself as a “progressive boutique law firm for underdogs and the organizations that fight for them,” with the slogan “Keeping the Social Just.”In 2021, Smith made headlines for successfully representing a restaurant employee — who was terminated after insisting on being addressed using they/them pronouns — before the BC Human Rights Tribunal, securing a $30,000 award.“It should be a signal that employers need to be respectful. Correct pronouns for individuals are not optional. Employers are not free to address people by the pronouns employers choose to,” Smith told the Vancouver Sun at the time, adding that “the employee didn’t get $30,000 because they were called by the wrong pronouns. They got the $30,000 because they were fired for being transgender.”The lawyer also offers training sessions and workshops for organizations on her website focused on social justice issues, some of which are titled, “Know Your Rights for Drag Performers and Library Workers” and “Social Justice Intervention Training (Dismantling white supremacy)”, which claims to train participants on how “to do basic social justice interventions in the workplace to combat discrimination, bullying, and harassment, outside the grievance process.”“It helps participants think about our role in dismantling colonial white supremacy, confronting racism, and building a more inclusive world,” the description on the website reads before going on to ask “what does white culture look like and why is it dominant in the academy and the workplace? And, “How are white people complicit in systems that oppress black, indigenous, mixed race, and other people of colour?”.Smith has also dabbled in slam poetry, as seen in a video posted to YouTube in 2021, where she expresses frustration at her inability to sustain long-term relationships, which she blames partially on bigotry.“I’ll assume you freaked out because I’m trans and I made you feel gay,” she said.“It’s okay, really, my fault, and expecting a normal person to get into bed with a monster like me for more than a few weeks is like asking queer people to get breeding, move to the suburbs and stop being fabulous. But that’s alright, you lay on the buddy honorific, I know what it means. It means f*ggot.”Online reaction from most commentators has been one of mockery..“The NDP convention chair who became famous this weekend after complaining about being misgendered is lucky to be alive,” Canadian activist Chris Elston, widely known as Billboard Chris, said.“She says ‘transphobia is a pattern of negative conduct towards trans people that begins with misgendering and can end with violence and murder.’”.Quillette contributor Nick Osmond-Jones related his experience of previously working with Smith on X, saying that when he worked for the BC Ombudsperson, she had “essentially accused me of wanting to genocide trans people because I tried to ask how we could have civil conversations about gender. Total stable and normal person.”
