Tucson is hopping on the Slutwalk bandwagon, a raucous-sounding trend that is sweeping parts of the Western world in response to an idiotic remark made by a Toronto police service officer.
He said women should not dress like sluts if they want to avoid being raped.
Nice. And men shouldn’t dress like police officers if they’re going to make such inane statements.
The cop, Constable Michael Sanguinetti, made the remark back in January at a university campus-safety event. The area’s Excalibur newspaper that reported he even prefaced his statement with something like, “I’ve been told I shouldn’t say this.” Sanguinetti has since apologized, according to CBS, but he was merely disciplined, and not fired from the force.
Meanwhile, people lose their jobs in a heartbeat for Tweeting they’re bored at work.
Although his apology was much delayed, and the dude is still serving a community that he evidently neither respects nor understands, the Slutwalks are serving him a fine slap in the face.
They’ve already popped up all over Canada, England, at Arizona State University, California and Maine, and one is scheduled in Tucson at 5 p.m. Friday, May 13 (today!).
The location is in front of the main Tucson Police Department station, 270 S. Stone Ave. While the location is prime for rallying against law enforcement, it does seem a bit unfair to Tucson cops. First off, it was a Toronto officer who uttered the phrase, not our Tucson men and women and blue.
Perhaps a more fitting location might be in front of a Canada Dry factory, although we do not have one. But there’s always the Consulate General of Canada offices, just up the block at 33 N. Stone.
The protest is also unfair to Tucson police because budget cuts have already cut down on manpower and patrols. With a Slutwalk scheduled for 5 p.m. on a Friday, either overtime will have to be scheduled to patrol the Slutwalk, or officers will be pulled from their beat on the streets. This means fewer police out catching rapists, Peeping Toms other sexual assault perpetrators and perverts who flash their privates at small children in supermarket parking lots.
Bet Constable Sanguinetti would say the kids were asking for it by dressing like sluts.
Those two minor TPD twists aside, Slutwalks are a brilliant way to bring attention to the backward thinking that obviously still prevails that victims of sexual assaults are somehow at fault.
We would expect such a mentality, perhaps, from 1950s small-town America, but not from police officer in a Canadian metropolis in the year 2011.
Sanguinetti needs to get with it. It’s incredibly sad and surprising he’s not more knowledgeable about his own career field. If he were, he would realize that a rapist will rape, a Peeping Tom will peep, and predators will continue to sexually assault, harass and batter victims based on opportunity, impulse, obsession and mental instability more than anything else.
This includes their mode of dress. Even if they are, as Sanguinetti so delicately puts it, dressed like sluts.
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Ryn Gargulinski, aka Rynski, is a writer, artist, performer and poet. Her radio show airs every Wednesday and her column appears every Friday. See more writing and art from RYNdustries at ryngargulinski.com and rynski.etsy.com.
This article appears in May 12-18, 2011.
Members of TPD have made similarly insensitive and inaccurate assertions. When asked “why he thought rape happened” by a student during a recent meeting with local youth, head of the Adult Sex Crimes Unit Sergeant Tim Milbourn said that it was because “the victims were engaging in certain lifestyle choices,” and made references to drugs and promiscuity.
We have had many attendees at our Tucson planning meetings relay similar sentiments from TPD – including one in which a detective said he thought the marjority of reported rapes were false reports.
There is a pervasive cultural notion that women need to prevent rape my changing something about themselves. Rapists report that the way a woman was dressed didn’t encourage the rape – the most common reason for victim selection was opportunity – not age, appearance, behavior or attire.
Agree with jvp. The attitude of victim blaming is not localized in Toronto. TPD, the Pima County Sheriff’s Department, and UPD have a long way to go.
hiya jvp and AzCrow –
wow, thanks for input on the false/backwards thinking being closer to home than i thought. thankfully, i have never personally heard such utterances by TPD – and it sickens me. guess SO MANY law enforcement personnel need a wake-up lesson here.
in that case, the location is incredibly a propos. how sad, very sad, that people honestly think this way. and the reports of rape being false reports? geesh.
long live the slutwalk.
thanks for comments,
ryn.
Appreciated Rynski. Focusing on what a Toronto cop did would be rather wtf. The point is that it does happen here, as it does in Boston, Milwaukee, and other cities that are participating, as well as those that aren’t. “Buyer’s Remorse” gets used a lot, as though a woman wakes up with a jerk and says to herself, “You know what I should do? I should go to the ER, talk to an officer, then a detective (both of whom will ask me if I was drinking, doing drugs, how long I knew the guy, why did I go wherever I went, etc.), sit for hours and get a forensic exam (head to toe), then take a ton of meds to prevent STDs and pregnancy that will make me feel like garbage for a few days. That’ll show him!”
There’s also this: http://azstarnet.com/news/local/crime/arti…
i hear ya, AzCrow – and that story link you shared – what?!!!!
i really, really wish that was a bad joke:
“After the victim described being held face-down and violently assaulted, Marquez asked her, “What were you doing while he’s doing all of this?”….”
My nails, officers, i was painting my nails….
sounds like a total crock of poo.
thanks for the add’l info and response.
slutwalks seem more necessary by the moment….