Taking it to new heights

"Victims of sexual assault may not have to wear masks in public spaces because a mask might remind them of the trapped feeling they experienced during the assault," said a CBC radio announcer yesterday.  I almost drove off the road!

As someone who has been sexually assaulted and raped -- the former when I was 13 by my orthodontist and the latter when I was 20 by a guy with whom I had gone on a blind date -- I could not believe my ears.  But then again, of course I could.  

(Note:  I was not a fan of blind dates, but this one was with the best friend of my cousin's boyfriend and we were going to his parents' cottage while they were there.  I thought that was pretty safe.  Wrong.  Frankly, instead of teaching women how not to be raped, we should teach men not to rape.  The other thing to remember is that most rapists are not slathering deranged creeps in dark alleys.  They are ordinary in every other sense, they are our co-workers, our neighbours -- even our friends.  They are often our bosses.  In my case, I was sexually harassed and assaulted by a Minister of the Crown in Pierre Trudeau's cabinet in 1977, for whom I worked.  Rapists are ubiquitous.)    

Victimology is rampant and apparently everyone, if they look inside hard enough, can be one.  If I had kept dining out on what had happened to me, I would have had a miserable life.  The one thing I took away from the orthodontist incident was a vigilance to tell my daughter and stepdaughter, when they were young, to tell me immediately if anyone -- be it a doctor, dentist or teacher -- ever touched their private parts.  As to the rape, I got my revenge years later when I bumped into the perpetrator at a school function, when he was a "stalwart" citizen and president of the school parents' council.

"Hi Bill," I said in a group of people.  "Remember me?  Remember when you raped me at your parents' cottage?"  He froze in terror.  I just smiled broadly.  It was a great moment.

"Cancel culture" is another dangerous societal fad that must be resisted at all costs.  And you know how I feel about "Black Lives Matter".  We are being terrorized into silence by radical groups -- be they left or right -- and I'm sick of it.  Happily, this blog allows me to talk about it freely.