I have grown accustomed to the typical banal bleatings of Phil Schurrer in his columns — musing such as the government is too large. The uterus is not regulated enough. Queer folk are becoming too accepted
And typically, I skim those same banal columns and move along. After all, as Schurrer is so fond of opining, we must make room for those who have differing opinions, however vile those opinions might be.
But opinions are not free of consequences or real world effects.
And the victim-blaming and rape apologism of his latest column absolutely have consequences.
You see, in his use of a survivor of sexual violence in order to make one of his usual points about big government, he perpetuates the same abhorrent attitudes that have been used to silence and shame survivors of sexual violence the world over.
Survivors like me, who have been told that what happened to us didn’t really count as rape, that we asked for it, that we shouldn’t ruin our attacker’s lives, that we are lying in order to get attention.
Never mind that 60 percent of sexual assaults go unreported, never mind that an astounding 97 percent of rapists will never spend even a day in jail, never mind that 38 percent of rapes are committed by a friend or acquaintance [statistics from Rape, Abuse, Incest National Network] — Schurrer has decided that it’s more important to use the narrative of sexual violence as part of his scare tactic argument.
But let me make this clear — survivors are not props to be set up as the villains in his anti-big-government drama.
We are, in fact, not props at all and the fact that he would use as such is utterly unacceptable and abhorrent. He owes himself an education and all of us an apology.
Kat Virostko
