Approximately 472,000 women across the country are sexually assaulted every year, according to Statistics Canada. That’s almost 38 times more Canadians than people seriously injured or killed in vehicle accidents in 2011.
And while I grew up with police officers showing pictures of twisted cars to students and posters of anti-drinking-and-driving ads in bathroom stalls, I didn’t grow up learning about consent and sexual assault.
This year the Howe Sound Women’s Centre (HSWC) set out to change this with a poster campaign entitled “Don’t Be That Guy.” But it’s image of a drunken girl being helped into a car by a guy with messaging, ‘Just because you helped her home, doesn’t mean you get to help yourself,’ was too hard-hitting for some bars and patrons. And while the women’s centre did land on a better campaign that calls on bystanders to step into questionable situations, the initial reaction of Sea to Sky pubs speaks to the deeper problem.
Sexual assault is not seen as a widespread issue that affects the country. It’s usually invisible from media, education and government programming. Until this changes, services that proactively address the issue and dealing with the aftermath will remain woefully underfunded.
This year the HSWC is hoping to scrape $8,000 together to continue its two-hour workshop for Grade 10 students about healthy relationships and consent. At the same time the Vancouver Health Authority is considering, pulling together $30,000 in infrastructure costs for forensic examinations to take place in Squamish – sparing victims who are pressing charges against the perpetrator the drive to Vancouver General Hospital.
To put this in perspective, last year for the single month of September ICBC spent $300,000 on ads in its distracted driving campaign. While government officials could continue to leave the blindfold on and side themselves with the low number of women reporting the crimes – in 2009 only 10 per cent of women in the Sea to Sky Corridor who were sexually assaulted went to police, according to Laurie Leith, Vancouver Coastal Health operations director – alternatively they could take a stand.
We could start by funding more than one sexual assault forensic examination facility in the Lower Mainland. Whatever we do, we need to take this issue seriously, 38 times more seriously.
