The headline of this story comes from the “name” when you get an e-mail from the Garneau Sisterhood. It certainly speaks to the idea the Sisterhood supports: that the people of Edmonton will be the ones to take things back from those who would do wrong.
The timing of this story couldn’t be better/worse with news of a new sexual assault in the university-U south area. Police aren’t saying the new assault IS connected but they also note that they can’t rule things out just yet. Either way, it’s troubling for that section of the city and, really, for everyone. Police are on the hunt for clues and tips.
One of the Garneau Sisterhood posters near the U of A.
After the school year began I noticed new posters going up around the U of A area. They were from the Garneau Sisterhood, which sprang up last year, when the Garneau rapist was part of police and community vernacular. As they identify themselves, they are “feisty concerned citizens in the Garneau area and the larger Edmonton community who are organizing and mobilizing to catch the most recent serial rapist in the neighbourhood, challenge the culture of violence and reclaim safe spaces for women in their communities.”
I e-mailed the Sisterhood to find out more about their visible re-emergence. I thought the new posters had something to do with the beginning of a new school year, and the influx of students who wouldn’t have heard (or be hearing, due to our news cycles of breaking news) about the Garneau rapes.
The Sisterhood wrote: “In terms of the new posters, they were mostly in response to discussions we had around the results of what happened in Millwoods (another series of sexual assaults). In that sense, they were not to do with the beginning of a new school year, but the decision to put them up in the university area was with the idea that it might introduce a large group of people to the GS.”
The crimes in Mill Woods had kept the Sisterhood busy trying to continue wide, public, dialogue about sex crimes, police and media responses to such, and what people could do.
“In terms of what sparked the poster campaign, the process was basically this: we heard about the Millwoods rapes when the police released the info. We were reminded of what happened to Jane Doe in Toronto – repeat sexual assaults that followed a pattern, the police having some information about the offender and the pattern, the police not sharing that information with the public, and finally, someone else getting raped,” the Sisterhood said.
“When we talked about it as a group we had a lot of different and complicated ideas about what we would have liked to see the police do differently, but couldn’t come to a consensus on one final solution. Part of it was that we didn’t have enough information in order to say something concrete about what we would want the police to do. We felt like there really needs to be room for discussion and criticism about police and media responses to stuff like this. Finally, we felt like a big gap exists between what the police know and what the community knows, and we were hoping that some questions/discussions could bridge that a bit. That is why we decided to ask the public (the real experts) about their opinions, experiences, and needs.”
The new posters have included questions, and the collective is getting responses. That troubles them.
“…unsettling in terms of how many people have experiences with sexual assault. We’re running the campaign a bit longer to see what people have to say and then want to create something (a zine, for instance) out of people’s answers to make them available to the community and police.”
Now, if you read the Edmonton Journal story on the sexual assault that just happened in Belgravia, you’d have noticed a professor criticizing the police warning to not answer your door if there’s a stranger. That’s the kind of criticism the Sisterhood has talked about: the fact that telling people to hide in their homes and be wary is “blaming the victim.”
That’s not all the Garneau group wants to see change.
“Media representations and reports of rape concern us for a number of reasons. First, the media tends to portray sexual assault as a rare and shocking occurrence when, in reality, it is frighteningly common. Second, the media portrays sexual assault as ‘bad sex’ rather than an act of violence. For example, in the Roman Polanski case, we see articles saying that he ‘had sex with’ a 13-year-old. He didn’t ‘have sex’ with her – he sexually assaulted her.”
The Sisterhood expands on that point. “Instead of ‘kissing,’ when it’s sexual assault, it’s someone forcing his/her tongue down someone else’s throat; instead of oral sex, it’s forced oral-genital contact, etc… Finally, we feel that the media usually reinforces the idea that the police are the main experts in dealing with sexual assault. We saw this as a problem especially in the case of the Garneau assaults when they advised women to ‘lock their doors and windows, not go out late at night, etc…’ putting the responsibility on women themselves to not get raped.”
“In our opinion, there are numerous expert positions, such as front line workers at sexual assault centres, counselors, professors, people who have experienced sexual assault, who recognize the danger in these kinds of ‘tips’ and it is important to hear their voices as well. It would also be helpful if the media reported information on sexual assault such as: the majority of sexual assaults are perpetrated by people you know; 1 in 3 women and 1 in 6 men have experienced sexual assault (or will). Both the media and police are so influential in public perception, and in order to combat common rape myths and misconceptions it would be great if they could consistently provide educational and supportive messages rather than reinforcing rape culture. We believe that changing rape culture is possible, and we all have a responsibility in making it happen!”
The Garneau Sisterhood is an ever-changing group of people looking to “challenge the culture of sexual violence.” In that way they don’t see the Sisterhood as a stand-alone group.
“It can be anyone who does this,” they say.
“Sure, there is a group of people who meet to respond to e-mails and get certain group actions done, but the GS is more of an outlet for different voices that are not often heard in the public spaces around sexual violence issues. To make it easier for people to get involved with this conversation, we are working on making our original posters available on our website so that people can poster in their own areas. After all, the Garneau Sisterhood is all of us!”
This is a very good message to spread in the community. Women have just as much right as anyone else to be in their community and to feel safe there.
Great work and keep it up!!
The Sisterhood is an interesting group, a community that’s sprung up to push that message and get others talking and questioning the status quo.