The dispute over the ownership of the Haldimand Land Grant, near Caledonia, Ontario, stretches back to 1841 when the Chiefs of the Six Nations allegedly agreed to surrender the land to the Canadian government, to be sold on their behalf.

In February 2006, plans for the immediate commercial development of a portion of the disputed territory – what later became known as the Douglas Creek Estates – sparked a confrontation which has yet to be resolved. The problems raised by the land claim are certainly complex, requiring, as Dalton McGuinty frequently stated, efforts to achieve a “long-term solution.” The situation was further complicated by the conflicting pressures for the provincial government to, on one hand, take an active role in resolving the conflict, and on the other, avoid pursuing aggressive policies like those which have been blamed for the death of Dudley George during the 1995 Ipperwash Crisis.

However, the government failed to recognize that short-term developments such as changing attitudes of the Native protesters and the non-Native inhabitants of Caledonia could have a significant effect on the “long-term solution” that it sought.

The provincial government’s failure to change its approach to resolving the conflicting claims contributed to a build-up of tension and ill-will that led to the events of May 22, 2006 in which Six Nations protesters occupied the construction site and severely impeded the resolution of the issue.

Some historical background is necessary in order to understand the conflict. In 1784, the Six Nations were allowed to “take possession of and settle” the Haldimand Grant, which consisted of approximately 385,000 hectares along the Grand River in return for their support of the British during the American Revolution. This amount was reduced to 111, 000 hectares in 1792, and in 1845, land which had allegedly been ceded, or passed over to the government, was sold to third parties.

The source of the debate which would arise over a century later, and which would erupt into open conflict in 2006, was the exact nature of the Six Nations’ concessions to the Crown. In 1841, the Six Nations council authorized the government to dispose of all lands not set aside for a reserve and to invest the money for them. In 1844, forty seven Six Nations Chiefs signed a document that purportedly transferred these lands to the Crown. One group of Six Nations members objected to the transaction at the time, arguing that the council had been “deceived and intimidated,” and called for the land to be leased rather than sold.

On the basis of these documents the Canadian government would later claim full legal rights to the land while the Six Nations would maintain that the documents were not legitimate and that their land rights to a 10 km-wide area of land along the Grand River had therefore never been surrendered. The matter resurfaced in a 1995 “accounting suit,” which maintained that the government had failed to deliver the proceeds from these sales to the Six Nations. Obviously, the matter of the Haldimand Grant had been on the radar for several years. However, it was not until early in 2006 that the question of the legitimacy of the 1841 and 1844 agreements would assume critical importance.

In 1992, Henco Industries purchased a company that owned 40 hectares of land that had once been part of the Haldimand Grant. In 2005, it registered plans to develop a subdivision on what it named the Douglas Creek Estates. Six Nations members vehemently protested the development, arguing (based on a repudiation of the 1844 document) that the title of the land had never left the possession of the Six Nations.

On February 28, 2006, four months after elected chief David General had warned Henco Industries and the Liberal government of the potential negative effects of constructing the subdivision, six protesters from the Grand River Territory Reservation “erected tents, a tepee, and a wooden building” on the construction site. They were joined by approximately forty others, and all remained on the construction site, in defiance of a Superior Court order requiring them to vacate the land by March 22.

At either 4:30 or 5:20 on the morning of April 20, spurred by demands by the non-Native residents of Caledonia that the protesters vacate the site, the OPP conducted a raid, arresting sixteen protesters. Within five hours, hundreds of protesters from the Grand River Territory Reserve had re-established themselves on the construction site, while inhabitants of reservations across Ontario and Quebec demonstrated in support of the Six Nations’ land claim.

The OPP raid, and the resulting escalation of tensions, prompted the first changes in the stance of the provincial government since the beginning of the affair. Prior to this development, the provincial government had maintained its policy of focussing on, as Dalton McGuinty phrased it, “the long-term issues.”

On April 20, David Ramsay, the minister responsible for aboriginal affairs, responded to Conservative John Tory’s accusation that the government had done nothing to prevent the escalation of tensions by stating that the government had initiated a “process of exploration,” which entailed all of the involved parties “negotiating and discussing the land claim issue and the accounting claim that came from that” in 2004.

However, despite the fact that the government had information pickets on the Douglas Creek Estates since the autumn of 2005, and despite the fact that Chief David General had alerted the government to the potential consequences of the construction, an independent inter-ministerial committee was not established until the Six Nations protesters occupied the construction site. Furthermore, negotiations involving senior government officials did not begin until April 14. Following the OPP raid, the provincial government, the federal government, and the Six Nations council began negotiations.

By April 22, each party had agreed to appoint a representative, within two weeks, who would be authorized to negotiate the land claims issue. On April 30, David Peterson, the former premier of Ontario, was appointed to address the immediate problems in Caledonia; on May 3, Jane Stewart, the former Minister of Indian Affairs, was named the official representative of the provincial government. Finally, on May 17, the Ontario government imposed an indefinite moratorium on construction at the Douglas Creek Estates.

I don’t drink beer, I don’t like hockey, and I’m really not the biggest fan of maple syrup. “Traitor!” I’m sure you must be thinking. What could I, a non-toque-wearing, non-chesterfield-owning, non-flannel-donning turncoat have in common with the rest of you Canadians?

Read more…

There are certain moments that will never escape the controversial and mysterious air surrounding their place in history. From Cleopatra’s alleged asp-assisted suicide to the grassy knoll behind JFK’s assassination, there are historical turning points that will forever be shrouded in mystery. As the mother of one of the greatest rulers of the last millennia, alleged incestuous witch and seductress, innocent prey of a lascivious king or infamous coquette, and supposed cause of the English reformation, history has many faces for Anne Boleyn.

Born in either 1501 or 1507 (the latter is more largely accepted due to the birth date of her daughter, Queen Elizabeth, and because a 1501 birth date would have made her relatively old by fifteenth century standards to be birthing a first child) and executed in 1536 for adultery, incest, and treason against her husband King Henry VIII, her name has resonated through history, ripples of controversy surrounding her marriage, miscarriage, and death have crossed five hundred years, and now play out in the pages of historical journals and online academia. Henry VIII’s departure from the Catholic Church to marry Anne and divorce his Catholic Spanish wife, Catherine of Aragon, sparked gossip and controversy so enduring that it continued to haunt Anne even after rumour, court intrigue, and suspicion fueled the fire that lost her her head. And although Henry VIII is notorious for his six wives, none rival Anne in her infamy, timeless allure, or contemporary popularity.

Although never far from the realms of pop culture, the Tudor dynasty, but especially Anne, has made a recent resurgence into the collective consciousness in recent years thanks to the popularity of various historical non-fiction and fiction books, but espeicially the series The Other Boelyn Girl and its subsequent movie, as well as Showtime’s popular historical drama, The Tudors. So when, exactly, does fact blur into fiction? How does history become just a story?

While The Tudors does have innumerable historical oversights (For starters, Henry was a very distinctive redhead and definitely not as viral as he appears in the show), I found the portrayal of Anne strikingly intriguing, and I set out to determine whether she was the mastermind, cause, catalyst, or victim in the power hungry scramble that saw her quick rise to, and even faster descent from, power that left us with one of the greatest leaders the Western World has ever known. While meandering through various journal articles and books alike, a perturbing trend soon became clear — even close to 500 hundred years after her death, scholars still cannot agree whether she was a saint, a sinner, or some equally confusing combination of the two.

Starting in the late 1980s until much more recently, several contrary, and even directly confrontational, articles and books about the life and untimely demise of Anne Boleyn appear in several prominent historical journals, each with its own unique perspectives of her rise, fall, and everything in between. From the staunchly revisionist to the overtly feminist, countless perspectives restructure the narrative to fit their framework, creating a plethora of histories similar to an array of unlabelled canned soup: you’re never really sure what you’re getting, but it all seems to go down the same.

There are several major plot points of Anne’s life that are generally accepted, although the more specific details are as hotly contested as the events that led to her decapitation. As stated before, Anne was likely born in 1507 to the ambitious Thomas Boleyn and his wife Elizabeth. Her older sister Mary, born sometime around 1500, and her younger brother George formed a tight-knit group, who may have proved mere pawns in their father’s dangerous power-hungry game; however, although most historians agree that Mary was rather placid and easily manipulated, there is much debate as to whether Anne and George were active or passive players in their father’s schemes. All three were well educated, and Anne spent much of her younger years abroad…

…First, she spent most of her adolescence in the household of Emperor Maximilan’s daughter, Archduchess Margaret, who had been married and widowed three times before settling in the Netherlands, where Anne was one of her ladies-in-waiting. It was here that Anne was first educated, but her impeccable French was mastered later in the court of Francis I. Anne’s proponents and detractors alike agree that it was here that she morphed into, as historian David Starkey puts it in his book, Six Wives: The Queens of Henry VIII, “the perfect, quintessentially French, coquette.”

Once Anne returned to English court in either late 1521 or early 1522, the real controversy began. There is little doubt that, at some point, Anne had a romantic affair with the poet Thomas Wyatt, but whether that went beyond the regular strictures of courtly love is easily contested. It is also certain that, at some point between her return to England and the commencement of her romance with Henry VII in 1525 or 1526, she was engaged to Henry Percy, who as a member of court needed the King’s permission to marry. This was swiftly denied — which many historians see as proof of the King’s already growing affections.

Again, both her fans and foes admit Anne was coy with the monarch in the beginning, resisting his advances and refusing the position of “head mistress” which had been filled by two official predecessors. Perhaps because she had seen her sister become “the whore of England” after an affair with Henry, or perhaps for her own, or her family’s, ploys for the crown, she managed to keep Henry on tenterhooks until he agreed to wait until he could either annul his marriage or divorce Catherine. But, as R.O. Bucholz and Newton Key write in their book, Early Modern England, “Regardless of his feelings for Anne or her ambitions, these were, by 1527 at least, already moving the king toward his drastic solution. What he needed was not a mistress but a new queen, a legal consort, young enough and strong enough to bear him a legitimate male heir. Thus, irrespective of Henry’s or Anne’s amorous inclinations, to achieve his goal he needed a divorce.” Indicating that, while Anne may have played her cards right in becoming the prospective new Queen, in reality Henry was already well-aware of the destruction that Catherine’s supposed infertility could inflict on his dynasty and legacy.

It is romantic to think that Anne single-handedly brought about the English Reformation with her coquettishness and French manicured charms, but in reality too many other political factors were in play for this popular assumption to be the case. Like contemporary politics, the Tudor court and Modern Europe were too complex to be simplified to such an extreme. That being said, Anne may have had some hand in the Reformation in so far as she undoubtedly sympathized with the cause, but the idea of Protestantism, were still too new for her to even have privately considered herself one. During her daughter’s reign, a lot of propaganda was written — including an account by John Foxe that some historians follow — regarding Anne as a staunch reformer, even a martyr for the Protestant cause. The majority of this proves false, but it does provide insight into how easily her myth has been skewed, and her influence inflated, throughout history.

Following the prolonged, convoluted, and complicated divorce between Henry and Catherine that eventually resulted in the execution of several of Henry’s top advisors, including Cardinal Wolsey and Sir Thomas More, the schism from Rome, and a new chapter in English history. The details of the divorce are too complex to elaborate on here, but throughout the process Anne goaded, guided, and beguiled where necessary. At one point, she infamously accused Henry of wasting her time, honour, and youth by essentially chasing rainbows.

Approximately seven years after their affair began, an already pregnant Anne Boleyn and Henry VIII were married in the spring of 1533. She was soon coronated, and birthed the future Queen Elizabeth that September. Although the sex of the child, which had been consistently and predictably foretold to be a boy, was a disappointment for both parents — one hoping to affirm her status, the other his legacy — the child was still taken as a good sign of Anne’s fertility.

Between that time and Anne’s execution on May 17, 1536, almost no two historians agree on any one sequence of events. The nature of her personality and role in her ascent to the crown are debated enough, but the cause of her execution , her innocence or guilt in the debasing charges brought before her, and the cause of her falling so out of favour with the King are nearly impossible to pin down. It is known with certainty that between giving birth to Elizabeth and the beginning of the accusations against her, Anne miscarried twice. There are conflicting accounts, but it is widely accepted that the latter of the two miscarriages was of a deformed male fetus, which some historians attribute with Anne’s fall.

In Early Modern England, a deformed fetus was considered a sign of the devil, and the King, as not only Head of State but also the newly appointed Head of the Church of England, could not be associated with such an atrocity. For many, this is what is believed to have caused the investigation and condemnation of Anne. However, others claim that the reports of the fetus are exaggerated, and that Anne may have been more complicit in the charges of adultery, incest with her brother, and treason against the King than many would like to believe.

Some historians even argue that the charges were part of an elaborate political intrigue. Be it a Catholic plot to regain control of the throne or Henry’s close advisor Thomas Cranmer’s elaborate power play, the conspiracy theories that swirl around Anne’s condemnation are almost as elaborate as those surrounding Area 51. Regardless of the origin or validity of the accusations brought against her, she and five men — including her younger brother George — were executed for adultery and treason. But even before the sword cut the air behind her neck, the first whispers about the validity of her execution began.

Greg Walker sums it up best in his article, “Rethinking the fall of Anne Boleyn,” when he writes, “[I]n fact none of the grand and emotive themes evoked to explain her fall, the debates over the dissolution of the monasteries, the machinations of factions, the manoeuverings of foreign policy, or the miscarriage of February, can be shown to be responsible for the queen’s death. At most they predisposed the king to be more responsive to the accusations of adultery when they came. Anne’s fall, as what follows will suggest, was the result of a witch-hunt of a metaphorical rather than a literal kind, and as such it was horrifying enough, without the need to embroider it with superfluous supernatural elements.”

The story of Anne Boleyn has become swaddled in myth and mystery, but even as time progresses she cannot escape the historical bonds that make her Madonna or whore, martyr or adulterer. However, when examining her life, it must be kept in mind, as one of her more radical biographer’s Retha Warnicke writes, “The sex and gender bias of early modern society was, of course, pervasive and ubiquitous. Prescriptive works instructed women to confine their activities to domestic and family matters. […T]heir male contemporaries judged women’s worth by their chastity, silence, piety, obedience, and household efficiency and accused them of being garrulous, materialistic, and driven by lustful intentions.

“While neglecting to allow for gender bias in the archives, many scholars have also credited the biased observations of early modern authors who wrote their accounts long after the women were dead.”
Warnicke implies that any history of Anne based in primary sources or similar accounts is immediately flawed due to the overtly patriarchical nature of the era — a rather bold statement, but one that perhaps provides the best explanation of the muddy and uncertain accounts of her life. She lived before even the pre-cursors to the pre-cursors of suffrage, and the accounts of her world are appropriately skewed — just as any document is influenced by the era in which it was written. So, the story of Anne must be taken with a grain of salt and an awareness that the biases of her contemporaries due to her gender alone make it nearly impossible to take their versions literally.

Inarguably intelligent, flirtatious, and occasionally brazen, Anne’s infamous doe eyes and pale skin may have brought her attention, but she held it with her wit. Had she been born a few centuries later, she may have become a world leader; but in her era, a woman who even attempted to assert herself and control her fate was playing with fire all too readily. She often feared fulfilling an ancient prophesy of an English queen being burned at the stake — a fate she just barely avoided when Henry granted her the relative luxury of decapitation.

For Anne, it seems her downfall may have been less a result of her fateful miscarriage, and more due to the era in which she was born. Whatever her true character, be it coquette, victim, witch, or pawn, even the best accounts we have of her life are too steeped in the beliefs of her time to ever paint an accurate portrait of Anne Boelyn.

I recently spent an evening taking care of my fourteen-year-old and seven-year-old cousins. The cable was out, so lacking any inventive child-entertainment strategies, I marched them down to the local video rental store and let them pick out anything with a reasonable rating. They picked out a tween-comedy vehicle for Disney starlet Ashley Tisdale entitled Picture This. In the movie, Tisdale’s character, a high school senior, gets asked out by the hottest boy at school, overcomes all sorts of challenges to make the date, including his scheming, jealous girlfriend, a grounding from her father, and studying for upcoming school exams, and then debates whether or not to go to “the clock tower” with him — where school legend proclaims that he will “deflower” an unsuspecting girl. Part of the character’s dilemma was about leaving with him at all, and what her classmates would think of her after assuming she had had sex with him.

I’ll leave out the film’s conclusion to avoid spoiling it for you, but the plot described so far is very interesting because of the stereotypical gender norms it presents: women valuing a man’s attention over other goals, female sexual naivety, the male as a sexual aggressor and initiator, the understanding of the perception that a man and woman leaving a party alone together is a common element in the widely socially acceptable sequence of events that leads to sexual intercourse, and the existence of potentially negative social consequences of female sexual behaviours.

With multiple decades of feminist scholars, artists, and protestors arguing for gender equality and a renegotiation of societal gender roles, it seems that many traditional expectations for gender-specific behaviours, particularly in sexualised situations, remain intact. A study by David J. Bergen and John E. Williams, published in the research journal Sex Roles in 1991 examined male and female stereotypes in 1972 and again in 1988. They concluded that over the sixteen years between trials, that stereotypes regarding typically male and typically female psychological traits (such as perceived levels of ability to self restrain, act rationally, and act in social interactions) remained distinct and changed relatively little. With results like these, it could be argued that I shouldn’t have been surprised at the conventional gender roles portrayed in Picture This, as it seems that stereotypical views of men and women have been with us for a long time and are slow to change.

Although the content of gender norms may vary between cultures, for example, between the predominant North American, East Indian, and South-East Asian cultures, almost all human societies prescribe sets of different stereotypical traits and behaviours to different genders. Although widely varying opinions exist regarding the approval of the existence and content of these norms, there seems to be a general agreement that these norms act as cognitive and social “short cuts.” Norms, whether they are helpful or harmful, allow us to form expectations of what people are like and how they will act. For example, North American culture widely supports norms of female irrationality and male aggression. With these expectations, it is common to attribute a woman’s emotional distress to her gender, such as in cases of blaming tears on hormonal fluctuations around menstruation.

Conversely, it is far less acceptable for men to cry in most situations. It is also common to expect men to be aggressive protectors of stereotypically weak submissive females, as illustrated in many movies wherein male protagonists “defend the honour” of their female partners by fighting off any number of goons. By providing us with expectations of men and women’s behaviours, norms help us to develop route series of behaviours or “scripts” for common social situations. Consider, for example, the common male experience of “watching the game;” grabbing a chilly beverage, grunting at each other, hooting at goals and booing at referees. Although this caricaturized portrayal of male bonding may not apply to all men, it is a fairly well accepted social script, and is presented in many t.v. commercials, shows, and movies, including 90s sitcom Home Improvement, more recent series such as Everybody Loves Raymond and King of Queens, and scores of contemporary beer advertisements. If they have come to accept and utilize this script, some men may find themselves awkwardly confused as to how to proceed in situations that deviate from it. The familiar is cozy, and, in some cases, deviations from accepted norms may be discouraged to keep everyone comfortable in their expectations of events. Consider, for example, poor Al in Home Improvement, who was often belittled by the hyper-masculine Tim for exhibiting stereotypically female traits and behaviours such as emotional sensitivity and a desire to talk about his feelings.

Such behavioural scripts operate largely unconsciously in multiple social situations, and sexual encounters between women and men are no exception. An example of this is the script that prescribes a general order to the escalation of heterosexual mating behaviours: kissing precedes fondling, which precedes oral sex, which precedes penetrative intercourse. Traditional sexual scripts in North America, and in many other cultures, also include prevailing gender norms that support the idea of men as sexual initiators and aggressors in both dating and sex. Although things appear to be changing, a woman asking a man out is still seen by many as the exception in heterosexual dating, rather than the rule. North American traditional sexual scripts are somewhat adversarial in nature, also including “…the woman as the gatekeeper of sexual activity (i.e., she decides how far sexual activity should advance), and the man as having a higher sexual drive,” explain Heather L. Littleton and Danny Axsom, in a 2003 Sex Roles article on the implications of sexual scripts in university students.

Unfortunately, some scholars believe that the widespread acceptance and application of these traditional scripts may, in some cases, contribute to horrendous consequences. Littleton and Axsom continue, “Several aspects of sexual scripts may contribute to sexual assault. For example, the idea that men should initiate sexual activity and will often have to use multiple strategies to overcome women’s reluctance or refusals may lead men to feel justified in using verbal coercion or physical force to obtain sex.” These writers do not indicate that they feel that traditional sexual scripts are an excuse for rape or other forms of sexual assault, nor do they advocate the argument that all men subscribe to traditional scripts or these lines of thought, but only suggest that these gender norms may allow for the ideas of “seduction” and “rape” to be confused, and thusly contribute to the cognitive processes that allow for the perpetrator’s self-justification of sexual assault.

If this argument seems far fetched, consider the prevalence of the phrase “no means no” in cautioning adolescents to make sure that all sexual behaviours are consensual. Why would as simple a term as “no” require additional explanation — unless our culture contains norms which some people interpret to mean that, in some situations, “no” may be just a bump on the normal roadmap to “yes”?
Littleton and Axom’s argument is a somewhat extreme example of the negative implications of unconsciously adhering to a behavioural script, particularly in sexual encounters; however, if you consider comparably less frightening sexualised situations, it is easy to think of examples of how traditional sexual scripts can negatively affect anyone. For an example, consider the average consensual stint between the sheets…

As the 2006 edition of the psychology textbook Understanding Human Sexuality explains, there is a prevalent North American stereotype that prescribes that “…males are expected to be ‘sexperts’ and to take responsibility for both their own and their female partner’s sexual pleasure and orgasm.” With expectations like these, it wouldn’t be unreasonable for men to experience some performance anxiety and, subsequently, a related reduction in pleasure during sex.

Additionally, consider the implications of the North American norm that “females are expected to be sexually naïve”. The same textbook goes on to say, “Thus, they may be afraid to share their sexual preferences with their partner out of fear that he will take this as evidence they have had many sexual partners (something that is evaluated negatively in women).” Keeping this in mind, it isn’t hard to see how gender norms can prevent not only men, but also women, from having sex that satisfies their own unique needs. Going on about how gender norms may prevent women from communicating their specific desires to their male partners, the authors of Understanding Human Sexuality postulate, “They also may fear that their partner will think they are criticizing him for not being the sexpert he is supposed to be.”

The expectation that women have few sexual partners is not paralleled in the predominant North American culture by a similar restriction for men. While women who have had many lovers are seen as “sluts” and shamed, men with the same sexual patterns are seen as sexually victorious “studs”.
This double standard can have detrimental effects beyond the obvious stigma against women with numerous partners. For example, consider situations where women are reluctant to give full sexual histories to nurses and doctors, limiting the professionals’ ability to make well informed medical decisions, and also, situations wherein perceived female promiscuity is responded to with aggressively punitive measures. For example, some cultures have norms which allow females who have pre-marital sex to be viewed as punishable “whores”; on their website, Jane’s Due Process, a legal resource and advocacy organization for pregnant teens in Texas, publishes first-hand narratives of young women who have been beaten and otherwise abused by parents and other people in their lives for becoming pregnant.

Whether you conceptualize them as efficient mental short cuts, subconscious stereotypes with potentially harmful consequences, or some blending of the two, all of the North American gender norms discussed thus far have one thing in common — they draw a distinct line between what is acceptably “male” and acceptably “female”. This black and white thinking places gender into only two, very separate, categories. Although this separation –as visible through the proliferation of segregated washrooms, clothing departments, magazines, television networks, sports teams and social groups, etc – may be the most prevalent view in North America today, it is not the only way of understanding gender — other cultures and subcultures have different norms.

Many North American Native cultures include persons called “two spirits”. These individuals can be either anatomically male or anatomically female (that is, having the biological traits of either sex), while expressing a gender (the social role often associated, especially in the colonizing European cultures, with anatomical sex) that is neither male nor female, but rather, a third (or more) gender(s) that mix traditional “male” and “female” traits. In fact, Terry Tafoya and Douglas A. Wirth, authors of the chapter “Native American Two-Spirit Men” in John F. Longres book, Men of Color, report that, “Of the over two hundred Native North American languages spoken today, at least two-thirds have terms, like nadleeh, that describe other genders beyond male or female.” Two spirited persons include biological men who fulfill traditionally female roles, and vice versa. McGill University’s “Project Interaction”, a social service initiative that “..is committed to the health and well-being of gay, lesbian, bisexual and two-spirited (glbt-s) people, their families, communities and allies”, reports that, historically, in many Native American cultures, being two-spirited “…meant that this individual had the ability to see the world from two perspectives at the same time. This greater vision was a gift to be shared with all, and as such, Two-spirited beings were revered as leaders, mediators, teachers, artists, seers, and spiritual guides. They were treated with the greatest respect, and held important spiritual and ceremonial responsibilities.” (Please note the distinction between gay, lesbian, bisexual, and two-spirited — an anatomical woman who is two-spirited is not considered to be homosexual if she chooses to partner with a cisgendered woman, who is both anatomically and gendered female).

Although two-spirited individuals were widely accepted within their own cultures, European colonizers, whose cultures supported dichotomous “male” and “female” gender roles, were not tolerant of Native American gender multiplicity. Tafoya and Wirth go on in Men of Color to report that, “… in 1513, the Spanish ‘explorer’ Balboa referred to these different Native biological men as ‘sodomites’ and let loose his dogs to rip them apart and kill them…This was the period of the Spanish Inquisition where it was normal to kill or maim individuals whose beliefs or practices were different from established Catholic orthodoxy.”

This persecution is not unlike that which confronts many trans men and trans women, who, like Aboriginal two-spirits, also blur the traditional line between male and female with gender roles that are viewed by the dominant North American culture as inconsistent with their anatomical sex. For example, consider the July 2008 killing of twenty-year-old Angie Zapata, a trans woman, in Colorado. The Associated Press reported that the accused, Allen Ray Andrade, “…told investigators that Zapata performed oral sex on him, but would not let him touch her…Andrade later grabbed Zapata’s crotch area, felt male genitalia and became angry…He told investigators that he took a fire extinguisher off a shelf, struck Zapata twice in the head and thought he ‘killed it.’”

Unfortunately, both the historical violence toward Native two spirits and the brutal murder of Angie Zapata illustrate the negative consequences of strictly dichotomous gender roles that do not allow for any blending of male and female roles. Although Human Rights organizations have made some headway in changing societal views of trans gendered people, individuals who deviate from these traditional views are still often met with widespread oppression and violence from a society that that does not allow for their gender identities.

Where, then, do these strict North American gender norms come from? Some have argued that they flow from naturally occurring biological differences. For instance, take the argument that posits that the high sex drive and sexual initiative that characterizes the prototypical man is due to high levels of testosterone in males, a hormone that has been linked to aggressive behaviours. These theories, simplified, suggest that gender norms are just the expression of pre-existing biological differences: our bodies are different, therefore we behave differently, and our roles are different.

Others oppose this view by suggesting that gender norms are learned primarily through socialization.

Social learning theory hypothesizes that we learn how to be “male” or “female” by copying the behaviour of men and women around us; when we act in socially acceptable ways, our gender-normative behaviour is supported by praise and acceptance, and we continue doing it. For example, when parents react well to their sons play fighting, the young boys learn to repeat that aggressive behaviour, internalizing it’s value. This theory suggests that “boys will be boys” after all, as long as somebody cheers them on. When, on the other hand, we act in socially unacceptable ways, discouragement from those around us may teach us to extinguish behaviours that contradict prevailing gender norms. Take, for example, situations wherein young girls explore their own genitals and/or engage in masturbation as children. In such cases, the gender norm that demands female sexual naiveté may lead parents to tell their daughters to stop, that “down there” is “dirty”, and that “nice girls don’t do that.” This type of discouragement may deter girls from this type of behaviour, ingraining the related gender norm, and perhaps producing some shame in the woman’s mind in connection to sexual expression and enjoyment.

Some sociologists posit that in addition to the behaviour of individuals around us, macro structures such as language, other social symbology, and the media also support our learning of gender norms. In support of these ideas, consider the example of the word “pussy,” which is used to describe someone cowardly, weak, and submissive, as well as to describe the vagina, possibly reinforcing gender norms of the less aggressive female. Also, consider the symbolism of “boy” and “girl” colours: although green or yellow may be increasingly used to colour gender neutral baby blankets and other accesories, pink blankets and toys are still used to welcome baby girls, while blue is often still reserved for little boys. This colour segregation draws a clear line between “boy” and “girl”, emphasizing the two genders as distinct. Toys continue to teach and reinforce gender norms throughout childhood, as certain toys, say soldiers and tanks, are often assigned as aggressive “boy” toys, while others, say dolls, are seen as nurturing “girl” toys.

The media, in addition to marketing toys in these gender-normative ways, also contributes to the development of gender norms in other ways. As we have seen in the examples of beer commercials and shows like Home Improvement, the media also reinforces gender norms by making fun of characters that deviate from them, (like our poor, sensitive friend Al), and by positively reinforcing prototypically “female” and “male” roles, such as in the afore-mentioned movie, Picture This. In all these ways, socialization, both on the micro and macro levels, contributes to the development of gender norms in children.

In between biology and socialization in this nature versus nurture debate are socio-biological theories that argue that gender norms are the product of both biology and socialization. These theories contend that there are undeniable physical differences between men and women, but that it is not these differences alone — but rather, how they are perceived and interpreted — that create gender norms. Take for examples, stereotypes of male emotional strength and female emotional weakness. A sociobiological theorist might suggest that because male bodies are, on the average, larger than female bodies, and therefore generally stronger, we cognitively link “male” with “strong” and carry that association – whether accurately or not — into situations that have nothing to do with physical strength. This could explain the gender norm that, in emotionally charged situations, men are expected to be strong and stoic while females are expected to be weak and temperamental.

Sociobiological theorists argue that many gender norms are constructed this way. Consider, for example, the stereotype of male aggression and initiation in dating and sex. It is not hard to connect the dots between physical strength and aggression, and within a sociobiological framework, between males’ greater average physical strength and the social perception of them as sexual aggressors. As we have discussed, these, and other gender norms, can play out rather significantly in the bedroom.

Regardless of where your opinions fall in the biological versus socialization debate, and whether you think of gender norms as helpful cognitive and social shortcuts, dangerous stereotypes, or a bit of both, it is easy to agree on one thing: they are generalizations. Very few of us are society’s prototypical male or prototypical female — Rambos and Barbies are rarely encountered in real life.
Unfortunately, when we are confronted with new people and social situations, we often unconsciously apply these sweeping generalizations to individuals — all of whom are unique and different. Not every woman is submissive, and not every man is aggressive, in fact many of us may be aggressive sometimes and submissive others, regardless of whether we’re an Angelo or an Angela.

Likewise, each sexual encounter is different; although the traditional sexual script may say otherwise, penile penetration is not the end goal of all hetereosexual sexual encounters.

When it’s all said and done, old gender norm jokes can be inverted — after sex, some men may want to chat and cuddle while some women just want a sandwich, switching up traditional expectations of women valuing emotions in connection to sex more than men do.

As the example of Aboriginal two spirits show us, the line between male and female, and what is appropriate for both, may be much blurrier than predominant gender norms would lead us to believe.
Since life doesn’t fit nicely into what society declares as “normal”, it is important to re-examine the gender norms that we ourselves prescribe to, and to be aware of when we may be applying them inappropriately in our own encounters. As discussed, doing so can lead not only to plain-old bad sex, but also to dangerously misunderstood medical histories, oppression, and, in some cases, violence and death.

In conclusion, if while reading this article, you presumptively assumed that you are too intelligent, too educated, too aware, or too “progressive” to make the mistake of blindly applying gender norms, answer this question:

What gender did you assume my cousins were?

The war has been started. Propaganda is the sole weapon of either side. Battles rage on the internet and have spilled over in to real world protests. Trenches have been dug, and forces assembled on both sides. On one side, the Church of Scientology — the controversial new religious movement largely based on L. Ron Hubbard’s 1950 book Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health. On the other side, Anonymous — a group of internet users birthed from humour sites like 4chan.org and eBaumsworld.com. Anonymous is clear about their goal: they will destroy the Church of Scientology. Their means? Information.

Anonymous is calling the world’s attention to already-available information on the actions and beliefs of the Church of Scientology (CoS), which the group openly calls propaganda. Anonymous has released a suite of L. Ron Hubbard’s lecture CDs and spread documents pertaining to high-level church teachings. The stated goal of Anonymous is to “Save people from Scientology by reversing the brainwashing and helping Scientologists realize that the Church of Scientology in its current state is a vast money-making scheme under the guise of ‘religion’. Everyone has the right to freedom of religion, but religion should be free.”

The war began when the CoS offended the internet users who would become Anonymous with its intellectual property actions; by making YouTube pull down what they have called an internal training video featuring Tom Cruise talking about Scientology. The video is about nine minutes’ worth of Cruise talking, backgrounded by the theme music from Mission Impossible. Gawker.com introduced the video on their site saying, “Let me put it this way: if Tom Cruise jumping on Oprah’s couch was an 8 on the scale of scary, this is a 10.” Professor Doug Cowan, University of Waterloo sociology professor, expert on New Religious Movements, and author of Religion Online, cautions against accepting Cruise as the face of Scientology. “I don’t want to make [Tom Cruise] the measure of Scientology because I don’t think that’s fair. He is a person who lives in a fantasy world — not because of being a Scientologist, but because of being the world’s most recognizable movie star. How can that not be a fantasy world?”

The Cruise video is a part of the CoS’ esoteric information — that is, information to be kept within the barriers of the church and released at its discretion. Cowan said this practice is perfectly acceptable and quite common, but lamented that the CoS doesn’t open itself up to academic study. “The last full-on sociological study of Scientology is 30 years old. It was done in 1976,” said Cowan.

Anonymous is accusing the Church of Scientology of being a “dangerous cult.” Indeed many of those concerned about the conflict have brought up the question of whether Scientology is a cult or a religion. According to Cowan, Scientology is both. But for many, the word “cult” conjures up images of purple Kool-Aid and armed raids.

“Sociologically speaking,” says Cowan, “it fulfills the criteria of a cult, but that’s entirely value-neutral. That’s the problem with using the word cult. [Scientology also] fulfills all of the criteria that social scientists use for identifying a religion.” Cowan said he usually calls Scientology a religion because there are too many negative associations with the word “cult.”

Many draw their conclusions about Scientology from popular media accounts, including the Emmy-nominated South Park episode which detailed the story of Xenu, a creation story divulged to Scientologists when Scientologists reach the level of Operating Thetan III (OTIII). OTIII is a step in the hierarchical spiritual progression that members are expected to move through, termed “The Bridge to Total Freedom” by the CoS. Members of the CoS begin at a level called “pre-clear” and must work their way up to “clear,” then proceed through the levels of Operating Thetan (OT). A “thetan” in Scientology is similar to a “soul” in other religions.

Although the Xenu story is often trumpeted around as a ridiculous belief and used to lampoon Scientology, Cowan cautions against immediate reactions to the cosmic creation story Scientology tells. He compares the story of Xenu to the biblical creation story believed by millions worldwide. “The only difference is that one is part of a dominant religious tradition and the other one is part of a non-dominant religious tradition,” said Cowan.

Although the story of Xenu is closely guarded by the CoS, it was leaked on to the internet and later made public in a related court case.

Xenu was the head of the Galactic Confederation who resolved to solve the overpopulation problem in the universe by bringing billions of aliens to Earth, then called “Teegeeack”. The aliens were dropped into volcanoes and then blown up with hydrogen bombs. Their souls escaped and Xenu captured them. He showed the souls a series of pictures detailing everything from organized religion to modern technology. The souls, or “body thetans,” then stuck to humans and are responsible for our problems and history. This is referred to as the “R6 implant.” Levels beyond OTIII are dedicated to ridding oneself of these body thetans.
Some find it difficult to reconcile their own religious views with the Xenu story. Scientology, however, like Buddhism, claims it is compatible with other religions. According to their official website, Scientology.org,

“In Scientology no one is asked to accept anything as belief or on faith. That which is true for you is what you have observed to be true. An individual discovers for himself that Scientology works by personally applying its principles and observing or experiencing results.”

The CoS has a great deal of esoteric information, but many of L. Ron Hubbard’s teachings are available for purchase by the public. Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health is recommended as the starting text for those interested in Scientology — $35 for the hardcover edition directly from the CoS. Or, if you want to dive in to Scientology, the complete suite of basic texts including 18 hardcover books and 14 lectures by L. Ron Hubbard runs for $3,500. Some introductory texts can be found at the library.

The study of Scientology centres on a process known as auditing. Auditing is a form of talk-therapy consisting of reliving past moments in order to clear out negative experiences. Through auditing, practitioners are cleared of “unwanted spiritual conditions” by talking to an auditor while holding the leads to an E-meter. An E-meter is defined by the CoS as a pastoral counselling device. Technically speaking, it is a galvanometer — a well known tool for measuring electric current.

For the most part, Scientology looks like many other religions. It is heavily devoted to the study of sacred texts, much like Judaism, Islam, and Christianity. In Scientology, the sacred texts are the writings of L. Ron Hubbard, whose most important writings are called “tech” in Scientology jargon. “Tech” refers to Scientology teachings which can be applied in one’s life. For example, L. Ron Hubbard has written what is called “Study Tech” to aid Scientologists in studying. One key feature of “Study Tech” is a process called “Word Clearing” wherein the Scientologist must ensure that they understand precisely the meaning of every single word. Some other Scientology principles have been the subject of Anonymous’ scrutiny, particularly their beliefs about Suppressive Persons.

A Suppressive Person (SP), according to church teachings, is one who acts negatively towards anybody for any reason. For example, an SP could be Rick at the office who constantly dismisses the success of others. The teachings of Scientology direct them to “handle” the SP or “disconnect.” Literally, tell Rick to stop, or fire him. From L. Ron Hubbard’s Introduction to Scientology Ethics: “An ethics officer can encounter a situation where someone is factually connected to a Suppressive Person, in present time. This is a person whose normal operating basis is one of making others smaller, less able, less powerful. [...] The answer is to sever the connection.”2

Some severed connections can be as simple as firing the misbehaving employee. Others call for complete disconnection from loved ones. Some members of the CoS have gone so far as to disconnect from friends and family members. The official CoS website describes this as necessary for ensuring the spiritual progress of the Scientologist. Anonymous has plans to embrace people who have lost friends and family to CoS’ disconnection policy. Disconnection has created many enemies for the Church of Scientology.

Disconnection is just one issue for Mark Bunker. He operates XenuTV, a streaming video website critical of Scientology. Bunker’s history with the Church of Scientology runs deep. He was the media co-ordinator for the Lisa McPherson trust, an organization founded by millionaire Bob Minton designed to fight Scientology and help victims of Scientology’s practices. They aimed to provide support for people looking to leave Scientology. Furthermore, the Lisa McPherson Trust acted as a watchdog organization and produced videos and documents about the CoS’s actions. The Lisa McPherson trust, founded in 2000, was disbanded in two year’s time after funding ran dry due to pressure from the CoS.

The trust was so named because of Lisa McPherson’s death while in the care of the CoS. McPherson was a Scientologist from the age of 18 until her death at the age of 36. McPherson was involved in a car accident in 1995. She appeared to be unharmed, but then got out of the car and took off all her clothes. Doctors at the hospital said she was physically fine but had concerns for her mental health. The CoS is fundamentally opposed to psychiatry, going so far as to declare war on it through internal letters and videos depicting explosions and grenades. Church members prevented McPherson from receiving psychiatric aid at the hospital, instead giving her an “Introspection Rundown” — Scientology tech designed to help mentally unstable people. In McPherson’s case, she died from “bed rest and severe dehydration.” The McPherson case is often cited by Anonymous during its actions against the CoS.

Early efforts of Anonymous were unorganized and unexperienced — attacking both the faith and the CoS in their words, and by using unorthodox methods to take down the official CoS website. Anonymous has since refined their protest efforts and group methodology to target the CoS organization, not the underlying faith.

The early actions of Anonymous came under heavy criticism from other CoS critics. Initially Anonymous embarked on a campaign of denial of service attacks on the CoS’s official homepage. Denial of service (DoS) attacks flood a webserver with so many requests it simply shuts down. Anonymous quickly abandoned this strategy when Bunker (called “Wise Bearded Man” by Anonymous) and others reprimanded the group for their hacker tactics.

Professor Avner Levin at the Ryerson University Privacy and Cyber Crime Institute said the early actions of Anonymous were inappropriate and should be viewed as such. “We don’t really judge the actions of people online in the same way that we judge them in real life. We tend to be a little bit more lenient,” said Levin. Anonymous has moved most of their efforts in to the physical world, using the internet for organization and information dissemination.

The CoS has been muted in response to Anonymous, shying away from talking to the press save for a few brief quotes in news stories and one official response. They have not returned repeated calls from The Boar. In their official response to Anonymous, the CoS accuses the group of “perpetrating religious hate crimes against churches of Scientology and individual Scientologists for no reason other than religious bigotry.” The response goes on to say that Anonymous “publicly proclaimed its guiding materials to be the Communist Manifesto and Mein Kampf.”

Anonymous was the subject of a scathing spot on FOX News calling them “cyber-terrorists.” The group has been responsible for, among other things, hacking MySpace accounts, invading the online game “Habbo Hotel” and attacking online personalities they take issue with. The nature of Anonymous is open and decentralized, with no hierarchical organization or declared leadership. Thusly, anybody could become a member of Anonymous for one cause (like fighting the CoS) but not for others (like hacking MySpace accounts). The group often states that they speak as one, though some members have gone on the record with the media.

In the past, Anonymous has primarily targeted users of websites and games they deem to be unacceptable. The group goes on “raids” — attack campaigns of different types. For example, Anonymous refers to its protests against the CoS as IRL (In Real Life) raids. These raids, according to the various sites, are decided on by the group of Anonymous. To get raided, according to Encyclopedia Dramatica, one of Anonymous’ sites, “The best way to catch the rAIDS is to get ebaum’s attention. There are many ways to do this but if you’re already an arrogant attention whore, a racist blowhard or a self-righteous hypocrite you are most likely already halfway to asking for it.”

The movement of Anonymous to attack the CoS has attracted other previously unorganized parties to the mix. Anonymous has gained the attention and support of several mainstream CoS critics like former CoS member Arnie Lerma. Indeed, the ranks of Anonymous have grown considerably beyond those usually involved in 4chan-inspired raids. You can see this especially in their behaviour on forums and the official wiki, where members discuss issues coherently and conscientiously.

Anonymous’ attack is on the CoS and its actions, but not necessarily on the faith behind it — though that may be collateral damage as many members of Anonymous still attack the Scientology creation story and L. Ron Hubbard as a person. Cowan says that attacks on L. Ron Hubbard won’t do a thing. “It’s kind of like the ‘What if Jesus never existed?’ question,” said Cowan. “If we found out Jesus never existed, do you think two billion Christians would fold up their tents and go looking for the nearest Buddhist centre? Never going to happen.” The founder, says Cowan, is separate from the social existence of the religion.

Evidence of Anonymous’ good will towards practicing Scientologists can be seen on their discussion forum, Enturbulation.org. There is a two-page thread where Anonymous members are interviewing a member of the Freezone — an organization devoted to practicing L. Ron Hubbard’s teachings outside of the supervision and rules of the CoS organization. When asked if he ever felt victimized or attacked by the actions of Anonymous, Freezone member Terril Park said, “Absolutely not. I’m engaged in efforts to give them more info on [Freezone] and Scientology. All I met in the London protest were very interested in asking me about the [Freezone] and were very polite and friendly.”

Several members of the Freezone have pledged their support to Anonymous’ mission. The Freezone is, like Anonymous, a decentralized organization, so there is no official declaration to speak of. Park is an active member of online ex-Scientologist community exscn.net.

Anonymous’ interactions with the Freezoners demonstrate their cited goal — to take down the CoS specifically, not to prevent people from practicing Scientology. It is the structure, not the faith that is the subject of Anonymous’ attacks.

The Freezone is unable to publicly use a number of trademarked CoS properties including the Scientology cross and other materials. The Freezone notably won the right to use the word “scientology” after it was found that a German author had written a book called “Scientologie” prior to L. Ron Hubbard’s use of the word.

The protests of February 10, 2008 were Anonymous’ first major actions against the CoS following their controversial DoS campaign and release of documents. According to reports, about 7,000 members of Anonymous protested at CoS locations worldwide. Protesters wore masks and costumes to remain anonymous.

About 15 of these protesters gathered at the Kitchener CoS location despite unusually frigid weather that day. They filmed the local raid and posted the video on YouTube, much like other raids around the world. Pictures and media are very widely available. Though Anonymous’ recent protests went off without a hitch, past protests against the CoS haven’t gone so well.

The founders and members of the Lisa McPherson Trust have been protesting against CoS for years. Bob Minton and Stacy Brooks are featured in several videos produced by Bunker’s XenuTV protesting outside of Church locations. In these videos, a man present at the demonstration can be seen engaging in bull-baiting — provoking protesters as a psychological tactic. He accuses Brooks of having multiple partners (including Minton and another gentleman protesting), and attempts to make Minton think Brooks is out to steal all his money.

February 10 was merely a battle in Anonymous’ war against the CoS. Anonymous has planned raids March 15 to commemorate the birthday of L. Ron Hubbard on March 13 — a date viewed as a sort-of holiday by members of the CoS. The protest will be geared towards opposing the CoS’s tax exempt status in countries where it has that privilege. The CoS is not tax-exempt in Canada, but still operates in locations across the country.

Anonymous has constructed a long-term plan on their wiki to guide the group on their campaign against the CoS. Both Cowan and Levin aren’t sure how long the movement will last, though.

“What’ll be really interesting is to see what’s going on in a year. The one thing about the internet is that as short as people’s attention spans were, it’s shortened them even further. People will get bored of the electronically synthesized voice,” says Cowan.

The battle between Anonymous and the CoS has kicked up the dust, attracting national media and Anonymous members from all walks of life. According to people claiming to be insiders from the CoS posting on Enturbulation.org, Anonymous’ actions have caused ripples in the CoS. Thus far, legal action has not been taken against members of Anonymous for their actions. The CoS has a long history of using courts as a battleground.

One thing is certain — Anonymous has given a collective voice to those fighting the CoS online. Their actions in the real world have been building momentum as well. The events over the next year will tell if Anonymous’ actions change the public perception of Scientology and the CoS. The war between Anonymous and the CoS is just beginning. The real battles still remain to be fought.

With the yearly occurrence of International Women’s Day (March 8th 2008), it is easy to focus on a variety of issues pertaining to the equalization of women’s rights in North America, including, among others, working conditions and issues of income. While discussing these issues, it is easy to focus on the glass ceiling – on the female C.E.O. and whether or not she makes as much as her male counterpart. Often left out of discussions on equitable pay and acceptable working agreements are workers in a less politically-correct field: the sex industry. More specifically, prostitutes are rarely numbered among the female workforce in such analyses. Although prostitution is not limited to females, a proportionately lower number of them are male, meaning that issues pertaining to the business of sex have a particular significance for women.

A preliminary study conducted by Freakonomics author and University of Chicago professor, Steven D. Levitt and his colleage, Professor Sudhir Venkatesh of Columbia University’s sociology department, used rate information from their 160 prostitute participants to calculate the expected annual income of a full time prostitute in Chicago at $20 000. This is notably low in comparison to the 2001 Census Report data released by Statistics Canda, indicating the average incomes for Canadians at $29 679 USD. Criticism of this study can be derived from its observations being based in two small and specific areas in Chicago and because of its limited sample size.

With so little income to be had, it is easy to question why anyone would choose to enter the sex business. Although it is possible that some prostitutes may well enjoy their profession for various reasons, the impact of poverty cannot be ruled out as a motive for engaging in the sale of sex for money. The link between poverty and prostitution is widely acknowledged by researchers, including in a 2002 article authored by Lena Edlund and Evelyn Korn and published in the Journal of Political Economy. With a strong correlation documented by the World Bank connecting high poverty with low levels of education, it is easy to see how poor women could be forced out of our continent’s increasingly competitive “normal” workplace.

Some self identified sex workers, such as Scarlet Lake, a high class escort featured in director Carolyn Allain’s Canadian documentary, A Safer Sex Trade, reported income above that of the average prostitute, and appeared to conduct her business in a way more comparable to an accountant than a street walker. Lake even went so far as to state, “The sex trade is a valid career option.” Although cases such as Lake’s are documented, they appear to be largely out numbered by reports of prostitutes in more dire situations, affected deeply and negatively by issues surrounding poverty.

Such an example exists within the same documentary that Lake herself participated in. Her less fortunate counterpart, a former homeless prostitute named Jennifer who now works with Vancouver advocacy agencies to to aid prostitutes working on the streets . When interviewed for A Safer Sex Trade, Jennifer described many dangers of the sex trade, placing an emphasis on sex workers’ vulnerability to crime. When taking into consideration the poverty and consequentially low educational achievement of a large number of prostitutes, it is not surprising to learn that they are often socially marginalized. This precarious status on the fringe of society appears to be both supported by, and supportive of, the ambiguous legal status that many North American prostitutes endure.

The direct sale of sex for money is not illegal in Canada, with prostitution-related laws focusing on surrounding activities such as the preceding act of soliciting a prostitute for sex, or owning or operating what the legal jargon refers to as a “bawdy house” — a place for prostitution to take place. In America, state laws differ, allowing prostitution to be legal in some locations, perhaps most notoriously Nevada, while applying varying degrees of legality in others. It is interesting to note that the Levitt and Venkatesh study stated that prostitutes were arrested more often than their customers.

With prostitutes facing a clear economic disadvantage, resulting educational barriers, and, in most cases, the shadow of criminality and social ostracism, it is unsurprising that prostitutes appear to be at a greater risk for work-related harm than other, more formally accepted professions. In addition to concerns surrounding safe sex practices, the Levitt and Venkatesh study reported that, on average, prostitutes reported being beaten once a month. Media reports, such as the recent reports on the Robert Willie Pickton trial, highlight the fact that prostitutes are at a high risk of assault. Pickton was charged with the murder of twenty-six women and was eventually convicted of second degree murder in the deaths of six Vancouver sex workers. This elevated risk of violence may further the traditional societal stigmas and stereotypes that affect sex workers, and it may also be caused or at least heightened by these views. Take, for example, a February 19, 2008 comment posted on a yahoo.ca online publication of a Canadian Press story covering the Pickton trials: “Drug-addicted prostitutes are killed by pimps all the time.” This non-chalant response to the death of Pickton’s victims highlights the complacence that many members of society feel toward the violence enacted upon the prostitutes.

These apathetic and more than occasionally disdainful views of sex workers undoubtedly influence the political impetus to address the disadvantages they face. Another comment on the above mentioned yahoo.ca web page contradicts the first, reading, “The laws need to be changed so that [prostitution is] legal and can be regulated.”

Although an essay by Gert Hemka suggests that the stigma surrounding the sex trade remained a part of prevailing Dutch culture even after it was legalized in the Netherlands, proponents of the legalization of the sex trade feel that the process will lead to improvements in the safety and perception of prostitutes. In 2005, then-Vancouver Island Liberal MP Keith Martin was quoted as saying “It should be legalized and regulated for the sake of people who are working in the industry…” in reference to the possibility of getting rid of solicitation laws. Proposals for the legalization of the sex trade have been offered from various sources. In 2006, the Pivot Legal Society in Vancouver stated that the sex trade should be legalized by 2010.

In an article by Ian Mulgrew of the Vancouver Sun, the legal committee reported that by 2010, they want to see Canadian sex workers that are able to collect unemployment cheques, take maternity leave, and even go on strike.” Activists for the legalization of the sex trade have not been waiting for their dreams of unions to come true to hit the strike lines. The Alliance for the Safety of Prostitutes, based in Vancouver, held a large demonstration at the City Hall in April of 1983, and repeated the process in July of the following year by occupying a church to protest what they viewed as tough legislation against the sex trade. Similar protests have taken place in France.

A number of legalization supporters frame their argument in terms of labour organization and business ethics, requesting recognition of the sex trade as a legitimate business endeavour. In the Levitt and Venkatesh study, prostitution appeared to parallel more readily recognized types of business, with reports of repeat-customer discounts and predictable patterns of “busy days”. Mondays were the slowest, Fridays were the busiest, and business boomed on holidays like Independence Day. Through this lens, prostitution can appear more like a home business than a crime, a view that challenges the complacency seen in some public responses to the risks that many sex workers bear in their day to day work. This is the sort of framework that has been adopted by the International Union of Sex Workers, who offer workers help on issues, and a collective community of support while campaigning for “sex workers’ rights at a local, national, and international level to decrease stigma and violence against sex workers, improve working conditions and create a clear and fair sex industry.” The logic in these types of approaches is clear: If prostitutes are engaging in a legitimate business, they should be afforded the same of rights that are afforded to workers in other industries, including safe working conditions, health and safety compensation, and unemployment insurance. Imagining a future implementation of these ideas can lead one to envision prostitutes with a regulated price scale, contributing income taxes, and organizing into local unions. Many argue that these ideas make sense, both from human and civil rights and economic perspectives. Additionally, some supporters of legalization feel, in contrast to the Hekma study, that this sort of formalization will change the social perceptions of prostitutes and afford them greater acceptance within the greater community.

With Canadian society’s emphasis on the pursuit of human rights and an inclusive social fabric, it is important to consider the fit between the consequences of Canada’s current laws and these guiding principles. Additionally, given the particular gender demographics of the sex trade, it will be interesting to see if this year’s International Women’s Day observations will address the issue. The International Union of Sex Worker’s website lists plans for members to form a contingent and march in the International Women’s Day March in London, England.

– with files from Veronica Zaretski