Oh Canada, Our Home On Native Land

And apparently, the land of the free... or something.

Meanwhile, back in reality, we have the opening of the "Truth and Reconciliation" talks in regards to Indian Residential Schools. (Also, a little reality check on that one as well: We have more First Nations children in care today than we ever did in residential schools. So the idea that it's over and done with, let's-just-do-these-talks-and-then-move-on-from-the-issue is bullshit).

Then we have a father and son who have finally pled guilty to murdering Aqsa Parvez, a 16 year old from Mississauga who was rebelling against her family's stronghold. It's been called 'an honour killing'; a term that is contested by both feminists and non-feminists alike.

Just this past week, another young womyn was attacked by her family, this time her mother, for a so-called shaming of the family's honour. Thankfully, the womyn in this case will survive her injuries.

Oh and we're apparently jumping on the bandwagon of hating on people who call out Israel. Apparently calling out violence against Palestine means you're 'anti-semitic'. NDP MP Libby Davies called out the very obvious fact that criticizing Israel is not something that is done by Canada's Parliament and that many people who support Palestine are silenced or threatened. In saying this, what's happened to ole Davies? She's being threatened.

Where the fuck has Canada gone and what the hell is replacing it?

Sexual Assault Awareness Month

May is sexual assault awareness month. It’s April in the US, which seems odd, but whatever… In any case, it’s the time of the year when we’re supposed to be raising awareness about sexual assault.

What the hell does that even mean?

Does it mean dispelling the myths of all the bullshit ‘prevention tips’?

Does it mean targeting boys and men to not only stop raping people but calling out other dudes who do?

As a sexual assault support worker and an anti-violence activist, my views on the matter are clearly more ‘radical’ than others. Although I speak and work in many different forums that require different techniques and approaches, the truth is that all I really want to do is RAGE. Rage, rage, rage against the statistics, the bullshit policies and the apathy that I see around me every day.

It’s not healthy or wise to spend each moment of everyday telling people “Every 17 minutes in Ontario, a womyn is raped BUT that also means that every 17 minutes, a man is raping someone”. It doesn’t exactly make for great chit chat.

But what I really want to do and the message I want people to absorb is that rape is cancer.

Yes, rape is cancer. (Hear me out...)

People give a shit about cancer. Trust. People will wear a ribbon, join a walk/run/job/stroll, sign a petition, donate their pennies or ride their bike across the country. People will go around in public with signs saying that they are a survivor, or love someone who is. They will come up with clever slogans like “Save the Titties” and put pink on everything when dealing with cancers that deal with genitalia. Companies will jump on board, spread the anti-cancer cheer and rage, laugh and dance to cancer.

People will stand together and publicly raise their hands to say that they or someone they love was affected by cancer. And when they do, they will look around to see the vast majority of people with their hand up.

This is why rape is cancer.

If most people have been affected by cancer and are willing to publicly own it, why are they not doing this for rape and sexual assault?

If 1 in 4 womyn in Canada (with higher rates for First Nations, immigrant and refugee and disabled womyn) will experience sexual assault in their lifetime and that’s just the womyn, and when you consider that womyn make up 51% of the Canadian population, where’s my public witnessing?

“But FC”, I hear you saying, “Sexual assault is private”.

Why? Why do survivors of sexual assault live with a giant scarlet “S” on their chest and yet those with cancer are publicly defended and supported?

Rape happens to someone. Cancer happens to someone. Nobody with cancer deserves it just like nobody who is sexually assaulted deserved it.

People who lived with cancer are survivors. People who are sexually assaulted are survivors.

Rape is a societal cancer that we all live with, whether we know it or not, and it’s about damn time we end the shame. That's my hope for this month.

Can I get a witness?

Reproductive Justice FAIL

"No Abortion in Canada's Maternal Health Plan" for the G8 (Cbc.ca)

Because apparently in 2010, we still think we can talk about reproductive and maternal health without discussing contraception, which includes abortion. (Yes, abortion is a form of contraception. Many people, including pro-choicers, shy away from saying this but it's true! Contraception is for preventing baby making and that's what abortion, like Plan B, like condoms, does).

Anyway...

Canada is getting an all around "F" in the reproductive health department lately.

Ontario had an amazing new sex-education curriculum ready to roll out but are now back-pedaling and 'doing reviews'. Apparently teaching about sexual orientation in grade 3 and teaching masturbation in grade 6 is scandalous and 'should be the responsibility of the parents to do'.

The Ontario Liberals are getting lambasted for this (thankfully) so I won't dissect it to death, because it's already been done. Read this amazing G&M editorial instead.

When did Canada get some anti-sex and shitty?

FC Shout-Out

I would like to give a huge shout-out to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for her recent comments at the G8 summit where she called out countries like Canada for not including REAL maternal health in their strategy.

"You cannot have maternal health without reproductive health, and that includes contraception and family planning and access to legal, safe abortions." (Cbc.ca)

I'm glad somebody gets it.

Too Many Jerks, Not Enough Time

1- Ann Coulter was warned to watch her language for her talk at the University of Ottawa. Didn't like it and is now 'filing a Human Rights Complaint'. Except we all know that would require Ann knowing what human rights are. (And don't right-wing nutbags always bitch that the HRC is biased towards Conservatives? Pick a side and stick with it, asshats).

2- The Conservative Party wants to push "Maternal Health" at the G8 summit but refuse to consider abortion or birth control in their framework. The Liberals pushed for 'birth control' to be added and then when it went to vote, it got defeated... by fucking Liberals. Jesus H. Christ. I can't even form a sentence to comment on that, it's so bad

3- A bad story turned good: A Calgary Based Condo project promoted their project with some of the most vile and sexist advertising I've seen in a long while. It included gems like "A $20,000 down payment is as easy as a 25-year-old scotch, or a 25-year-old blonde on a 25-year-old scotch. Get on it." Yeah, just amazing. What is amazing though is that the ads were mostly posted in men's washrooms and *surprise surprise* some awesome men were incredibly offended.

And so, major props to Will Knoll from Calgary who took photos of the ads and posted them online to publicly shame the company and get people to boycott them. It worked and the ads were pulled.

Now I'm not usually a fan of raising a stink about advertising because it's usually offensive on purpose and all about giving them publicity, but in this case, the company was specifically targeting men and was not a major campaign and so 'being offensive' and 'cutting edge' was not their goal, necessarily. They honestly thought that dudes taking a leak in clubs would see this, think it's witty and clever and buy a condo. So raising a stink in this case not only had the ads pulled and therefore dudes didn't have to stare at their ignorant crap, but it's also a shot to PR and marketing folks who think that all men are ignorant chauvinists who fall for any BS advertising that talks about ladies and booty.

Thanks to that one particular man and all other men who took a stand not only against sexual assault and womyn (which is what 'getting someone drunk to fuck them' is - it's sexual assault) but also for taking a stand against the BS of hypermasculinity.

Reason #31 I Am Not a Lawyer

So a computer tech went to this guy's house to fix his internet connection and noticed that the guy had sketchy icons on his computer which included the words "Lolita Porn" and "Lolita XXX". He also noticed that webcam was set up and pointed towards a little girl who was playing in the room.

Dude came back the next day to finish fixing the computer and noticed that the icons were gone and the webcam was moved.

Tech man clearly knew something was up, so reported it to the authorities.

Well the man with the questionable computer content and behaviour has been let off by the Supreme Court of Canada because apparently the police didn't have enough evidence to issue a search warrant. Furthermore, apparently, having clearly sketchy icons on your computer and a camera pointed towards your young child isn't enough evidence because "The court found that the information used to obtain the warrant failed to mention the child was fully clothed and there were no signs of abuse when the technician visited the home." (CBC.ca)

Let's break this down for a second.

Clearly this guy isn't too smart for having left the icons on his computer but he's obviously not STUPID enough to let his child be filmed in the nude while a technician is there. This should be obvious to anyone and therefore, the fact that the child was clothed at that time shouldn't be enough to dismiss the evidence.

And the signs of abuse thing is also questionable because if the child was fully clothed and playing with toys and you're just a computer technician and not a trained criminologist, then you're obviously not going to know all there is to know. The man went on intuition, for Pete's Sake. Intuition that they are hoping to become law in Alberta, where a politician is pushing for legislation forcing anyone who witnesses child pornography, comes across it or suspects that it is being made/used, report it to authorities.

Cases like this aren't exactly encouraging people to report suspicious activity.

However my issue here is how the law misses the obvious in favour of tripping over the small things. The Supreme Court didn't say that the guy wasn't a perv, or wasn't in the wrong, they were saying that no case could go forward because the search warrant was not okay. This is what I don't understand.

Obviously police work should have made sure to cross their Ts and dot their Is to ensure crap like this doesn't happen but it makes me sick to see people not even arguing that they are innocent but simply arguing that "Hey, I know you found sketchy stuff in my house, but you had no right to come into my house, so you can't mention it".

And in this case, we're not talking about 'sketchy stuff' like a home grow-op, we're talking about child pornography.

Jeez Louise!

How To Detect If Your Neighbour is A Feminist

Being the concerned citizen that I am, I thought it would be wise to put together a short check list for curious city folk, suburbanites and condo dwellers who think there's something rather... interesting about their neighbours but can't quite put their finger on why.

So here it is: If your neighbour fits the following criteria, they're probably a Feminist:

1- Their deck/balcony has a bicycle, bras hanging to air dry and a bajillion little pots of growing herbs and spices

2- "Party Night" consists of gender-queer folks showing up with platters of hummus and board games

3- There's always at least one cat in the window

4- The music emanating from the windows in the summer is loud, raw and contains a female vocalist and at least one banjo

5- Their mode of transportation is a bike, a hybrid or a really, really old car. Either a Volkswagen or a Chevette.

6- Said mode of transportation has at least one bumper sticker that rages about "The Man"

7- Garbage day sees them put out half a bag of garbage and four recycling bins

8- You've heard the words "patriarchy", "chauvinist pig" or "ignorant asshole" shouted at least once

9- Their house/apartment smells strongly of incense, candles, pot and/or a combination of all three.

And finally,

10- They stand at the mailbox and actually read all the junk mail, political pamphlets and spam they receive and then attempt to educate you, said neighbour, on why you should care.