Sluts Take Over Toronto

The sluts of Toronto took over the streets in a march to protest how women are treated in rape and assault cases by the police.

This all started in January when Police Const. Michael Sanguinetti told a group at York University “women should avoid dressing like sluts in order not to be victimized” when speaking for a class at the law school.

He has since apologized and the police force has said that there was a “training issue” they needed to address around victimization.

But it was too late by then. Sonya Barnett organized the walk to claim back the word “slut” and make a statement that regardless of how women dress or behave in their sex life they are never asking for it and should not be blamed for other peoples’ bad behaviour. Especially by the police.

• As the city’s major protective service, the Toronto Police have perpetuated the myth and stereotype of “the slut”, and in doing so have failed us. With sexual assault already a significantly under-reported crime, survivors have now been given even less of a reason to go to the Police, for fear that they could be blamed. Being assaulted isn’t about what you wear; it’s not even about sex; but using a pejorative term to rationalize inexcusable behaviour creates an environment in which it’s okay to blame the victim.

The group walked the streets of Toronto and ended up outside the police headquarters. Hopefully this has made an impact on the police and they have changed their tune and started training officers around sexual victimization.

As Barnett said,  ”It was evident that if you’re going to have a representative of the police force come out [and say that] then that kind of idea must be still running rampant within the force itself and that retraining really needs to happen to change that mentality.”

Good on ya, sluts of Toronto!

Contact the author here: mack@morningquickie.com