Nothing is more frustrating than having to view the world through the lens of my gender.
I’d like to pretend, like the legions of ladies who recently took to the Internet to claim their aversion to feminism, that I live in a world of complete equality. Women are paid the same, treated to the same opportunities and never more likely to fall victim to violence. We are not expected to trot around like pretty ponies on special occasions while life marches on business-as-usual for our male counterparts. Nor should we smile vacantly when controversy arises, lest we be known as a shrew.
Life truly is beautiful—rose-coloured, even.
Of course, that’s a load of garbage. One need only go to a wedding or read the most recent statistics on violence against women in this community alone to know most of those assertions are baseless.
Perhaps it’s the fact that I’m continually bra deep in stories of this kind that made me particularly annoyed by this week’s tale of the superhero buttocks slapper.
Every news organization in the city and a few in Vancouver, picked up and added flourishes to the police press release for its apparent absurdity—this one included.
The bare bones of the story went like so: Man in superhero costume jumps from bushes, slaps a couple butts—one belonging to a 15-year-old— then runs to the safety of his car.
The goofiness begged to be explored for some easy laughs. Where the fun ended, however, is where pixels met real people.
In the online wake of one news organization’s rendering of the police press release, there were a series of comments about how the story was insubstantial.
People, or as I like to call them “victims”, need to learn how to put things in perspective, readers said. And there were questions about why the police even reported it.
No thought was given to how the 15-year-old or her adult friend at the receiving end of the slap may have felt.
Nobody commented that it must have been upsetting and scary to be randomly hit by a weirdo super-perv who was such a coward that he had to run away after his attack.
Nope. It was all about how the two women should learn how to take a joke.
Thing is, I don’t think it’s a joke.
If it makes that teenager think for one minute that it’s OK for men to touch her in a sexual way, scare or demean her, for the sake of their own entertainment as she makes her way in this world, it’s not funny.
And, while I’m on this soapbox, I’d like to point out that there’s usually more to a police press release than meets the eye.
For reasons I may never understand the Mounties often underplay the crimes they’re dealing with when they issue notices. And when that’s the case, the old adage “no news is good news” doesn’t apply.
Top of mind are the two attacks convicted murderer Matthew Foerster pleaded guilty to late last year.
When he was arrested for Taylor Van Diest’s murder in 2012, police revealed that Foerster was wanted for an earlier thwarted attack on a woman he lived near as well as an assault on a sex trade worker.
Neither story, at first glance, seemed as serious as it was eventually revealed to be.
In particular, the thwarted home invasion made me think that the victim got off easy.
Police reported that Foerster entered the woman’s house, threatened to sexually assault her, then was scared away.
What was revealed by the victim at Foerster’s sentencing hearing, was that he attacked her so violently in an attempt to make her submit to his sexual impulses, that she couldn’t see straight.
And while he didn’t rape her, he did manage to leave her without any sense of safety, forever looking over her shoulder for a potential attacker.
Basically, she was forever a prisoner to his violence.
The press release fell quite short when it came to revealing those details.
If you want a femme-free cause for caution, look at the story of a fairly infamous June 2011 fight in Rutland.
Police wrote that up like a battle between two backwater families, and local reporters took the bait. Headlines about our own versions of the “Hatfield and McCoys” naturally rose from the keystrokes of editors looking to breathe life into the stiff prose of police.
Of course, a day later when we all learned a Rutland man was beaten to death by a bunch of local thugs, including a couple Hells Angels, the nature of the headlines changed.
It’s these stories that remind me to view these dribs and drabs offered by police a little less like potential punchlines, and a little more like a news story.
For those who need some help, you’re welcome to borrow my frustrated woman lenses. They’re giving me a headache.
