Toronto police fail to understand why both queers and women need safe public space<\/p>\n\n \n\n
On Nov 19, 2016, I was one of the protesters<\/a> in Marie Curtis Park condemning Project Marie at the Walk the Beat<\/a> event. The event, put on by Toronto Police Service, was an attempt to \u201ctake back the park.\u201d\r\n\r\nI\u2019m livid about Project Marie, especially considering this recent sting exists in a long lineage of Toronto police actions<\/a> that target queer sexuality when it takes up public space \u2014 which is by default, always heterosexual space. We can\u2019t afford to pretend Project Marie isn\u2019t deeply insulting to queers and to women. Let\u2019s look at how much Toronto police defend and serve straight male comfort and ignore the realities and needs of others.\r\n\r\n \r\n<\/p>\n Toronto police fail to understand why both queers and women need safe public space<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":256,"featured_media":72640,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"editorial_slug":"25","_editorial_slug":"","exclude_from_latest_block":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,14,11],"contributors":[643],"topic":[66,74,162,86,122,131,140],"clients":[],"series":[37],"timeliness":[],"editorial_format":[25],"type-of-work":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72638"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/256"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=72638"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72638\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/72640"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72638"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72638"},{"taxonomy":"contributors","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributors?post=72638"},{"taxonomy":"topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topic?post=72638"},{"taxonomy":"clients","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/clients?post=72638"},{"taxonomy":"series","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/series?post=72638"},{"taxonomy":"timeliness","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/timeliness?post=72638"},{"taxonomy":"editorial_format","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/editorial_format?post=72638"},{"taxonomy":"type-of-work","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xtramagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/type-of-work?post=72638"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Access to queer spaces, safety and the shooting at Pulse nightclub<\/h3>\r\nA lot of people I\u2019ve spoken to across the sexual orientation spectrum don\u2019t understand why queer cruising needs to happen in an open, multi-function, multiple-community-serving space like Marie Curtis Park. Have sex in your home<\/i>, they say. Use an app to meet people. Come downtown to Church Street and dance in a club.<\/i>\r\n\r\nThis line of thought ignores cultural and class barriers that many people in our community face. Though many of us have phones and data and can use HER and Grindr fearlessly, there are an equal number of us queers who don\u2019t have that safety or privilege. Public queer cruising spaces fulfill a vital social function because they serve queers who might otherwise be completely excluded from being able to explore and express their sexuality.\r\n\r\nThis includes queers who are closeted; queers who can\u2019t make their way downtown to more socially-acceptable queer hubs; queers who don\u2019t fit into what can be a very narrow view of what is considered attractive in queer culture; queers who are not fluent in English; queers who cannot identify as queer because of cultural background and\/or internalized homophobia; queers who can\u2019t afford phones or computers to meet people online; queers who can\u2019t afford a private space in which they can explore their sexuality; and queers who feel safer exploring their sexuality in an open or public space.\r\n\r\nThis last point applies to me. I\u2019m a five-foot-tall, hundred-pound person. If I enter a private space with another person \u2014 my home, their home \u2014 I have to be deeply confident that they aren\u2019t going to try rape, beat or murder me, because if I\u2019m wrong, physically there\u2019s not much I\u2019m going to be able to do to stop them.\r\n\r\nFor that reason, I have a lot of sexual encounters, especially early on in building a relationship, in spaces that are not private residences. I\u2019m a regular at the sex parties Sapphic Aquatica and Bed, Bathhouse and Beyond at Oasis Aqualounge (Sapphic Aquatica is exactly the kind of event that led to the Pussy Palace raid in Club Toronto back in 2000. Oasis Aqualounge is now in the space where the former club was located). I\u2019ve had sex in the bathrooms of LGBT bars and on club dancefloors. These have been ways and circumstances in which I felt I could explore my sexuality without putting my safety or my property at risk.\r\n\r\nAnd then this summer\u2019s shooting at Pulse nightclub happened, and while that shook all of us in different ways, it made me question the definition of and safety of queer space.\r\n\r\nWhen I first came out, going to an LGBT dance club felt like there was finally a place I could be myself safely. I work at Glad Day Bookshop on Church Street. I\u2019ve performed at Buddies in Bad Times Theatre quite a bit. The shooting at Pulse nightclub made me think about the fact that by inhabiting known, recognizable and enclosed queer establishments, from a certain perspective, I was making it very easy for a bigot with a gun to know where to find me.\r\n\r\nSo if queer establishments aren\u2019t necessarily safe, and neither are private spaces, then places like the paths and bushes of a large and secluded park in Etobicoke are exactly where we queers need to be. Rather than punish us for expressing our sexuality the way we do, I wish those whose batons our tax dollars pay for would engage with us about what support the queer community needs.\r\n\r\nThis lack of engagement, however, about the unmet needs of the queer community surrounding space and safety, actually points to what Toronto police think of the men they spent weeks targeting through undercover police work. Toronto police see the cruisers of Marie Curtis Park as perverts. I see us as people living in frightening and isolating times.\r\n\r\n \r\n
Straight male complaints, sexual harassment and dismissing women\u2019s everyday public safety realities<\/h3>\r\nWhen I was protesting Project Marie, I had a lot of enlightening conversations about what was at play in the weeks of undercover police work that went into writing mostly bylaw-infraction tickets. I chatted with one of the local residents, a straight white man who was there celebrating the police action. This man told me that he is the father of toddler twin girls.\r\n\r\nThis straight father claimed that while walking through the park, a man he didn\u2019t know touched his arm. He mentioned being verbally propositioned by a man. I told this father that while I understood his alarm at unwanted sexual contact, that being touched, being verbally propositioned \u2014 as a person with breasts and a vagina, that is my daily reality. I asked this straight father if he thought that the police were using a disproportionate amount of force to protect local straight men from the kind of harassment women are subjected to regularly.\r\n\r\nHe responded yes, it is disproportionate, but unfortunately the sexual harassment and assault of women happens everywhere, so there\u2019s nothing that can be done about it.\r\n\r\nHe continued by telling me that men keep getting hit on by men in this park \u2014 unlike the way women are treated, this was a specific and small enough issue to tackle, and it was happening near his home, so he was glad the police did something about it.\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nOverblown reactions and misuse of police discretion<\/b>\r\n\r\nConstable Kevin Ward, who has been the public face for this police sting, told a story to a group of us protesters about the kind of lewd sexual conduct that was allegedly directed at him while undercover in Marie Curtis Park. He claimed that a man in the park had walked up to him, touched the inside of his arm, and asked him, \u201cWhat are you looking for?\u201d\r\n\r\nI thought adults talking to other adults about sex before hooking up was supposed to happen.\r\n\r\nWard then says he pulled down the zipper of his coat to show the man hitting on him his badge (as if asking what a person is looking for is a crime), and the man reached into Ward\u2019s coat and touched Ward\u2019s chest. This was shockingly sexual behaviour and against park bylaws, according to Ward.\r\n\r\nI pressed this subject and asked Ward if I would be charged if I asked to kiss him, or if I asked to touch his hand. He said no.\r\n\r\nI asked him if I would be charged if I asked to touch his penis. He said I may be ticketed, because according to him that would be me engaging in sexual behaviour in a park.\r\n\r\nThere\u2019s a lot we still don\u2019t know about Project Marie, and we still have no verified answer on the specific charges laid. What I know for sure is that Ward told me I could be charged for asking another adult if they\u2019d like to have a sexual interaction with me.\r\n\r\nAt police discretion, an officer like Ward can decide that an adult asking another adult if they\u2019d like to hook up is lewd conduct. He can decide to charge a man for asking what are you looking for<\/i>, but not charge a woman asking to kiss him. If Ward decides that your behaviour is unacceptable and offensive, he\u2019ll find a way to charge you for it.\r\n\r\nI asked Ward when was the last time Toronto police did weeks of undercover police work investigating complaints from women about sexual harassment in public spaces. He said he didn\u2019t know. I asked Ward if he would ticket someone for calling me a slut, in this park. He said no, because me being called a slut was not sexual harassment.\r\n\r\nNot only does Project Marie demonstrate how little awareness Toronto police care to have about the way queer people are marginalized, but it insults those of us regularly on the receiving end of sexual harassment and violence. Police have the resources to defend communities \u2014 but those resources seem to be powerfully evoked when there\u2019s a perceived threat to straight masculinity.\r\n\r\nIt was difficult to stand in Marie Curtis Park, watching the police hand out hot chocolate and encourage children to play in the police cruiser they\u2019d driven up on the grass. I\u2019d like to be one of the toddler twin girls I saw, having an out-of-the-ordinary day of fun in the park with big police officers I can admire. It would be less exhausting for me to believe that Project Marie was fair. But I know too well that what the toddler twin girls need of Toronto police is the same thing people of colour need, that women need and the same thing us queers need: a police force that tackles the intimidation, harassment and crime in our city that is so entrenched that straight men think it\u2019s normal.\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"