Cops Force Strippers Into Creepy Photo Shoot; NFL Cool With Woman Beating

Image via Creative Commons.
Sometimes, I’m truly #blessed to have a couple of heavenly weeks in a row during which I escape blatant harassment from men. So usually, I begin this column with an outward-looking lamentation of events so misogynistic they sound made up. I’m in a bubble. Then, the bubble unceremoniously bursts, and I’m always yelling about patriarchy.

So I was home in New Brunswick this week visiting family. My Dad said he sometimes doesn’t read my writing because it’s “angry.” He’s said this before, but this time he went on at length about how he doesn’t understand what I’m so angry about.

I told him to read the column to find out what I’m angry about. (In summation: women’s risk of facing rape and physical violence, lack of recognition of trans* folk as human beings, state-imposed regulation of women’s reproductive rights, women of colour being at more of an economic disadvantage than white women due to double-edged sword of systemic racism/sexism, glass ceilings, concerted ignorance of violence against and murder of Indigenous women, etc.).

I shook off the argument, and later that day, I went down to the river with my brother to swim. Afterward, as I was walking to my car, alone, a group of boys who couldn’t have been older than 18 started hollering at me to “take it all off.”

First of all, I wasn’t in the process of taking anything off. They were yelling at the wrong overalls-clad, drowned rat looking bitch.

I marched over like an angry mama, stuck my head in the car and started regaling them with rape statistics, letting them in on the fact that many women are scared of/hate being cat-called because they are, really, afraid of being raped and killed by the harasser. Three of the kids couldn’t look me in the eyes, but the fourth, sitting in the back seat with his insolent blue eyes and half-smoked cig hanging out of his slack mouth, stared me down and argued.

“What, are you afraid I’ll jump out of the car and grab you?” He said. I told him that happens far more often than he’d think, and when it does, media convinces women it’s their fault. I then went on my way so as to avoid doing something that would get me arrested or molested by these young creatures, because that’s what you have to do as a smart young lady. Avoid getting molested by being on your best behaviour. In short, be scintillating, but not so much so that someone feels compelled to abduct and molest you!

Dudes: please don’t verbally sexualize women against their will as they walk by you. It doesn’t feel good; it feels scary. You either want to pick up, intimidate, or make a game of women when you do this, and none of that is kosher. If you find a woman beautiful or interesting, by all means approach her politely and see if she wants to talk. Say hi. There’s nothing wrong with that. I’m not saying never speak to women you don’t know. I’m just saying don’t do it like a coward from the safety of your car, and don’t leer at her as though you may eat her. And I mean eat her, eat her, not…you know. Eat her. She is more than capable of accepting or rejecting your advances. Let her do it instead of hooting pathetically at her from the confines of your individual transportation pod.

Anyway, here’s some other horrible shit that happened this week:
 

NFL Player Knocks Out Fiancée, Gets Two-Game Suspension

Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice punched his fiancee so hard she passed out, then dragged her, unconscious, from an elevator earlier this year. The abuse was caught on camera at an Atlantic City casino in February, and he was charged with aggravated assault.

His punishment? Rice was suspended from the first two games of the year, without pay. But the guy makes a million dollars a year, so this punishment is really just the equivalent of a restrained little smack on the wrist of a toddler who, I don’t know, punches his baby sister in the face because he thinks it’s funny.

The NFL released a preposterous statement playing on the supposed complete lack of intelligence of the public at large.

Why are we so devoted to applying endless excuses for athletes when they behave this way, but when other celebrities, like actors or comedians, commit these crimes we jump down their throats with unparalleled and unforgiving tenacity?

When an athlete actually commits violence against a woman, his employer excuses him. Rice was let off easy despite the charges, joining a diversion program which could lead to the charges being expunged, if he successfully completes it.

The only thing funny about this (and it’s rather dark humour, I assure) is that another player was charged with a 16-game suspension for smoking weed, Jezebel reports. Off season. That means beating a woman is 1/8th the crime of smoking a joint, which is recognized as medicine in some states.

Yet again, this “incident” proves that if you have enough money, it is perfectly fine to beat women. No one from the NFL has truly indicated otherwise.

 

Image via WikiMedia Commons.
San Diego Cops Take Nude Photos of Strippers, Strippers Sue

Whilst ostensibly conducting licensing inspections in a San Diego strip club, a bunch of cops felt it prudent to take “nearly nude” photographs of the dancers who were working. This happened at two different clubs, on two different occasions.

While the cops photographed, they allegedly made “arrogant and demeaning remarks,” and intimidated the dancers to keep them from leaving, according to Reuters. Apparently, the officers thought it was necessary to document every single one of the dancers’ tattoos. My face just looks like that emoji who doesn’t have a mouth. What?

And the dancers aren’t having it. They’re suing. No fewer than 30 of them have filed a lawsuit because their rights were violated during the too-vigorous inspections, which happened in March at Club Expose and in June, 2013 at Cheetahs Gentlemen’s Club.

The police are supposedly allowed to make “regular inspections” at any given time, but why said inspections should include detaining women against their will and forcing them into multiple poses, then photographing them—also against their will—is far beyond me.

How about, instead, police include in regular inspections a plainclothes officer who sits in the clubs and pays attention to all of the attempted sexual assaults that go on in the club that night? That would be a useful way to regulate a workplace, I would say, since what the dancers are doing is 100 percent legal and licensed.

The damages, the dancers say, centre around “emotional distress and pain” and should be enough to “punish and make an example” of not only the city, but police chief Shelley Zimmerman. That’s according to attorney Dan Gilleon, whose firm filed the suit.

They need to be made an example of because, also according to Reuters, no fewer than four San Diego cops have been charged with sexual assault since 2012. Two of them are charged with committing sexual assault against more than five victims each, aka, it’s pathological. Two are fighting the criminal charges, one was convicted, and another pleaded no contest.

What it all boils down to is that these cops, presumably, are insecure about their dicks, and they signed up for a job where they can get guns to compensate. They make their spooky and abusive rounds, threatening fabulous tattooed naked dancers to feel better about themselves. It’s about intimidation on the part of a group of sick, sad individuals.

Sadly, then, I can’t imagine the lawsuit going anywhere. “Get thee a chastity belt” the judge will likely say. I’m praying to the goddess for the dancers, though.


@sarratch