Michael Sanguinetti
Michael Sanguinetti was a City of Toronto Police Constable who triggered world-wide attention when he offered controversial advice to York University law students on how to dress in order to avoid being raped.[1][2][3] Sanguinetti's comments were the trigger to world-wide slutwalk movement, that argues that women are not responsible for rape by how they dress, or where they go. Rather they argue it is very simple -- men who try to rape are responsible for their own actions.[4][5][6]
Sanguinetti was accompanying a more senior officer, who was leading the presentation.[7] Sanguinetti chose to interrupt the more senior officer, saying:
- "You know, I think we’re beating around the bush here. I’ve been told I’m not supposed to say this – however, women should avoid dressing like sluts in order not to be victimised."[7]
Sanguinetti was directed to send a written apology for his comment to the University community.[8] Sanguinetti was disciplined, and directed to undergo retraining. Scholarly articles continue to comment on the underlying meaning of his comments.
Writing in Gender and Education, Jessica Ringrose and Emma Renold described Sanguinetti's comment as symbolic of a meme that men's sexuality was not under conscious control, making it the responsibility of women to prevent rape.[7]
- "To begin, we think that what is needed is to unpack the logic that underpins Sanguinetti’s comments. Victim blaming is steeped in the cultural belief that women are the bearers of morality, and essentialised understandings that this morality is held within the female body (McClintock 1995). Drawing on an evolutionary fantasy about hard-wired male sexuality, is the idea that somehow an electromagnetic, biological (or affective) force will stir up crazed, uncontrollable hormonal sexual desire when in the company of women (Gavey 2005)."[7]
Brent E. Turvey, in an article entitled "Forensic victimology in cases of sexual assault", quoted stunned attendees at the presentation who concluded that Sanguinetti didn't seem to intend to be deliberately insulting -- that he seemed to think his comment was genuinely helpful.[8] Turvey concluded:
- "Whatever the training the Toronto Police provides its officers with respect to preventing rape, it was clearly insufficient to deter this particular officer from making a bold and ignorant assertion. It speaks to the officer's real beliefs on the subject, despite his training, and reflects on the Toronto Police in as much as this was the officer that they sent to speak with students."[8]
References
{{Reflist| refs= [1] [2] [4] [5] [7]
[8]- ↑ 1.0 1.1 "Slut Walk". University of Pittsburg. 2012-08-02. Archived from the original on 2014-07-28. https://web.archive.org/web/20140728224245/http://www.wstudies.pitt.edu/blogs/tsc6/slut-walk. "The entire idea that the clothing choice of the victimized woman would be taken into account in litigation is ridiculous, and really drives home the divide that we've talked about in some discussions. You're a man who raped a woman? Well, OBVIOUSLY it's the woman's fault for forcing you into it with her clothing selection. She wanted it, it's her fault."
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Joetta L. Carr. "The SlutWalk Movement: A Study in Transnational Feminist Activism". Journal of Feminist Scholarship. Archived from the original on 2014-07-28. https://web.archive.org/web/20140528025629/http://www.jfsonline.org/issue4/articles/carr/. "Sanguinetti's remark struck a raw nerve, and several young women responded by organizing the first SlutWalk in Toronto on April 3, 2011. They expected a hundred or so participants, but the event attracted several thousand people. Protests organized around the theme "Because We've Had Enough" opposed slut-shaming, sex-shaming and victim-blaming in society. Several thousand people in Toronto protested against rape cultures that perpetuate the myth that what women wear is a key component in getting raped."
- ↑ Cite error: Invalid
<ref>tag; no text was provided for refs namedTorStar2014-12-05 - ↑ 4.0 4.1 Anita Raychawdhuri (2013-10-18). "Slut shaming should be no more: A woman's sexuality is her business, and her business alone". Pipe dream. Archived from the original on 2014-07-28. https://web.archive.org/web/20140728220114/http://www.bupipedream.com/opinion/24461/slut-shaming-should-be-no-more/. "The famous case in Toronto, where Constable Michael Sanguinetti said that if women don’t want to get raped they should “avoid dressing like sluts,” is an example of how even a legal system could hold that women shouldn’t be sexually provocative."
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 Kathryn Carlson (2014-04-29). "Ending Rape Culture One Slutwalk at a Time". GC Magazine. Archived from the original on 2014-07-28. https://web.archive.org/web/20140728221007/http://gcmag.org/ending-rape-culture-one-slutwalk-at-a-time/. "When discussing the history of Slutwalk, Bredbeck explained how Sanguinetti's charged statement about 'dressing like a slut' was what spurred a movement. "He inadvertently stumbled into something that rocked the world," she said."
- ↑ Cite error: Invalid
<ref>tag; no text was provided for refs namedSlutInSlutwalk - ↑ 7.0 7.1 7.2 7.3 7.4 Jessica Ringrose, Emma Renold (2012). Slut-shaming, girl power and 'sexualisation': thinking through the politics of the international SlutWalks with teen girls. Gender and Education. Archived from the original on 2014-07-28. https://web.archive.org/web/20140728223152/http://eprints.ioe.ac.uk/11877/1/Ringrose_and_renold_Slutwalk_2012.pdf. "What ended up being productive about Sanguinetti’s slut-blaming comments was the incredible international response that has emerged from this small, typically insignificant everyday moment. Indeed, the SlutWalk movement illustrates how a small group of determined women can generate awareness that has grown into a fully fledged international reaction and form of political resistance to a culture that considers it acceptable to blame the victims of sexual violence.".
- ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 8.3 Brent E. Turvey (2011). Rape Investigation Handbook. Academic Press. pp. 214-215. ISBN 9780123860309. http://books.google.ca/books?hl=en&lr=&id=mGaOIzxRByoC&oi=fnd&pg=PA209&dq=%22Michael+Sanguinetti%22+slut&ots=rCgUdpxS27&sig=5-pqDUZnYy7oxC5lo6qA-XdFJcQ&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=%22Michael%20Sanguinetti%22%20slut&f=false. Retrieved 2014-07-28. "Clearly speaking in the absence of any actual education or training on the subject, Constable Sanguinetti advised female students that they could avoid becoming the victim of a rape if they stopped dressing like sluts."
