CA — Vancouver, British Columbia. On February 26, 2020, Vancouver City Council voted not to renew its $34,000 in funding for Vancouver Rape Relief and Women’s Shelter’s (VRRWS) Public Education and Community Outreach program – a program that is free, open and accessible to all. The City contends that, because VRRWS’s counseling program (a core service which is separate from its public education work) is only offered to women, VRRWS has a “lack of inclusivity”.
We cannot fight for #womensliberation and the end of #maleviolenceagainstwomen alone. We are extremely grateful for all the support we've received today and in the past few days – having you all join us, speaking in support, and writing into the #VancouverCityCouncil. #UntilWeWin
— VancouverRapeRelief (@VanRapeRelief) February 27, 2020
According to council member Sarah Kirby Young, the City’s decision to deny funding “affirm(s) that the city has an inclusive welcoming policy and that when we are providing city funds and taxpayer funds to organizations we want them to be ones that are inclusive of all people.”
VRRWS is Canada’s longest standing rape crisis centre, and has responded to close to 46,000 women seeking support in their escape from male violence since its inception in 1973. The shelter has housed over 3,000 women and over 2,600 children since opening its transition house in 1981.
Last year, Morgane Oger, an individual born male but who now identifies as a woman, spearheaded a campaign to have the shelter stripped of its city funding. Oger has levelled a series of accusations against VRR, including that it engages in “transphobia” and that it “chooses to ignore Canada’s civil rights laws” because it excludes males from its core services.
Vancouver Rape Relief doesn’t exclude any women. It excludes all males, regardless of their personal beliefs about identity.
Without VRR’s female only service, some women would be excluded from accessing any rape crisis support. But you don’t care about them, do you? https://t.co/lj0iWx7p5S
— Helen (@MsHelenWatts) February 28, 2020
On March 14, 2019, Vancouver City Council voted to terminate its yearly grant to VRRWS. Subsequently, transgender activists have targeted the shelter with violent graffiti and dead animals.
At the February 2020 council meeting to discuss VRRWS’ re-application for the grant, Gwendoline Allison, a lawyer who specializes in employment and human rights law, highlighted VRRWS’ legal right to offer women-only services:
“The BC Provincial Court and the Court of Appeal both held that Vancouver Rape Relief and Women’s Shelter is an equality seeking organization and, as such, is entitled to the benefits of section 41 of the Human Rights Code. If a charitable organization that is not operated for profit has as a primary purpose of the promotion of the interests and welfare of an identifiable group or class of persons of a common sex that organization or corporation must not be considered to be contravening this Code because it is granting a preference to members of the identifiable group or class of persons.”
Lawyer Adrienne Smith (who uses “they” pronouns) spoke against VRRWS city funding. Previously, Smith has expressed support for Yaniv, who filed numerous human rights complaints against female estheticians for refusing to wax Yaniv’s genitalia. Smith felt that a BC Human Rights Decision affirming that women should not be compelled to wax male genitalia was a “step backward for trans people”.
Adrienne Smith, a NB lawyer spoke against VRR funding to COV council yesterday.
Who should get funding? JY!
Smith thinks JY should have received legal aid funding & that the BCHRT ruling was a step back for trans human rights.
Can't make this up….https://t.co/RGab1rUxwB
— 🕸goinglikeelsie (@goinglikeelsie) February 27, 2020
Vancouver City Council’s Uneven Funding Policy
Two days after denying funding to VRRWS for not being “inclusive of all people”, council member Christine Boyle tweeted her support for a $3.8M building purchased by the city to offer trans-specific housing. It is unclear why city funds were used for the purchase (at a cost over 100 times higher than the VRRWS grant), given the city’s new policy of ensuring funding is geared to initiatives that “are inclusive of all people”.
So much for your policy on "inclusivity".
— One Small Voice (@OneSmallVoice9) March 1, 2020
There are no reports of women petitioning the city to stop its financial support for trans-specific housing.
No woman will protest this. No woman will nail a dead rat on the door. No woman will vandalize the premises with vile threats. No one will try to strip the facility of its funding. Odd that you care so little for the safety and dignity of women and children in crisis.
— Rory (@rory10780492) February 29, 2020
Those wishing to send comments to Vancouver City Council can do so here.
Those wishing to donate to VRRWS to help it maintain its various service offerings can do so here.
Read more on this story
Funding ends for Vancouver Rape Relief service
News 1130
Vancouver City Council has voted to not renew its funding grant for Vancouver Rape Relief, citing its non inclusive policy of ‘women only’.
City stops funding rape shelter over refusal to admit men who identify as women
The Christian Post
The Vancouver City Council has voted to deny funding for a women’s rape shelter over its policy of only allowing women into its peer counseling program, arguing that it discriminates against men who identify as women.
Rape shelter loses funding after trans rights activists complain
The Post Millenial
On February 26, the City of Vancouver voted not to renew funding for the Vancouver Rape Relief [VRR] shelter — Canada’s oldest sexual assault crisis shelter.
I find this utterly outrageous. To deny a much needed service to women is a disgrace. Yet, the trans community has many services that exist for the trans community alone. How can these trans”women” deny services to their own community. They should all be adhamed.
Hm.
Women can no longer have places to call their own, but trans people can be given special treatment and get their own trans specific housing for their homeless.
Just wow.
I really wish that the City of Vancouver would have the decency and good sense to renew funding for this rape shelter, which was only denied funding in response to the agitation of Morgane Oger, a transwoman who made it their priority to defund the organization in a petty act of “retaliation” for them not allowing another transwoman to work there VOLUNTARILY. Oger is no longer in Parliament, the decision should definitely be reviewed. I feel that if Canada doesn’t want to be known as a hotbed of misogyny – they would fund the centre again.
it makes me mad when people justify transgender women being women shelters by saying stuff like this:
“So many people use the excuse of some cis women at the shelters having had bad experiences with abusive men and trans women being triggering for them because the cis women consider them men.”
“The thing I get stuck on is this. Would the same consideration be offered for a man that gets triggered by the sight of a black person (or really any other skin colour) because he was traumatized by one? So, he demands that he not be forced to share a room with one. I don’t think the same consideration would be offered to that person. I think people would think him a racist for generalizing that way, despite his PTSD. What makes it different here?”
“First of all, not every woman in a DV shelter was in a heterosexual relationship – lesbians have been okay with people who may have features similar to their abuser in shelters with them, so I don’t see what the issue is. Further, people with ‘masculine features’ are already coming into DV shelters – some therapists, counselors, lawyers and security people at shelters are even cis men, and that hasn’t been a problem.
And as others pointed out, what about really tall women with big hands and feet, or more masculine looking women? Do women need to be acceptably ‘feminine looking’ to go to a shelter? Further, I don’t see how separate shelters for trans women would be feasible or necessary. Trans women are a rather small part of the population, and a given area may not have enough trans women to make a separate shelter feasible or able to be adequately supported.
Cis women and trans women are subject to the same violence of men, sometimes for different reasons but the end result is all the same. Trans women deserve a safe space too. Women in shelters should be protected from abusers – this is what a safe space is, not a “male features” free zone. Trans women are statistically more likely to be raped, abused and killed. They need protection and shelter too”
By the logic of what they are saying, we should just not bother having men and women shelters, and just have all shelters be gender inclusive. I mean they are already getting rid of women-only gyms in many places. https://www.womenarehuman.com/women-only-gyms-violate-state-anti-discrimination-law-rules-supreme-court-of-connecticut/
A woman who has been abused by another women isn’t going to feel the same way towards other women like how a woman who has been abused by a man is going to around other men. Reasons are because men are biologically stronger than women are, and men assault women a lot more than women assault other women.
Most women don’t look masculine, and the ones who have masculine features, you can still tell they are women. So a woman who has been assaulted by a man is still more likely to feel threatened by a man than they are by a woman with masculine features.
As for the race part, So, should black folks undergo surgery, chemical peels, etc to dramatically become white so people won’t get PTSD? Is that possible? You are born, black, white, other races, etc. I could also say that a black person might have PTSD at the sight of white people. Should whites then transition? This is not the same. It’s really hard to disguise your race.
This is the problem with transgenders; comparing race, which is the right to be human to transgender right., which is the right to feel a certain way within oneself and in the bedroom. There is no comparison there. And, talking about black people fight against segregation; were you aware about development disparity in white vs black communities? Or even basic things like water fountains in public spaces, toilet, guest houses /hotels, public transport etc. A white transgender knows how to easily become white when racial discrimination is involve; which means the right to be human surpasses any other rights.
Black women are female, and trans women are male. There is no need for white only spaces because black people aren’t systematically attacking whites. However, there is a need for black only spaces, because black people face systematic racism from white people. If a white person “identifies” as black, and tries to enter black spaces, they will usually be met with a lot of criticism from the black community. Women face systematic violence and oppression from men, so we need women only spaces. If anyone who says they’re a woman is allowed in these spaces, it defeats the purpose.
This just shows that the transgender community doesn’t care about biological women. Also, I love how the transgender community tries to use gay people and people of different races (issues they don’t really care about themselves) to try to silence people who show opposition to their insane demands.
Biological sex is in no way analogous to race. It’s thoroughly logically fallacious to attempt to compare trans identity to racism. For example, in the US, West African men, women and children had been bought and transported there as tools to do slave labour including the reproductive labour of the women and girls. For hundreds of years they were all considered to be subhuman, thus deserving of the ways in which they were used and abused by European settlers. Eventually, a war was fought which, while it afforded the ex-slaves their “freedom” resulted in much of the country passing draconian laws preventing their freedom of movement and essentially reinforcing the fact that many white people still thought the African Americans were somehow beneath them. [Jim Crow.]
There is no nation by the name of “Transania”, from which a generation or two of men who prefer to emulate women have been kidnapped, sold and shipped as slave labour for others. They are not a cohesive group such as an ethnicity with cross-dressing as an inherited cultural practice, although the vast majority of autogynephile do happen to be white. They all share a paraphilia – nothing more. They are not forced to go about their entire lives in WoMAN Face and wearing women’s clothes. If they dress in traditional male garb, 99.8% of them are indistinguishable from all other men – because they are MEN. White, heterosexual MEN are simply not marginalised in Western society.
They choose to look and behave in ways which mark themselves as “different”. Contrast that with being a woman or a person with Black skin and African features in a culture which still venerates blonde, blue eyed women. We cannot take our “womanness” off – they can. People with Black skin and African features cannot take these features off – the men in dresses can stop taking wrong sex hormones whenever they choose.
Women are still discriminated against because we are the only type of human who can bear children. White or Black, that ain’t a costume.
Reddit is filled with a lot of misogynistic people who don’t respect biological women. Here’s this one conversation about transgender women being allowed in women shelters: https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/comments/leid9x/cmv_womens_shelters_should_be_allowed_to_turn/
Here’s someone’s response when asked what’s the point of shelters been gender segregated if men with penises are allowed in women shelters if they identify as a woman:
“There should be and are mixed gender shelters, but not all shelters are mixed gender nor should they be.
Because different shelters are for different purposes. Those different purposes have different resources and different connections. A shelter that is overextended cannot help as many people. That is why they focus on particular needs, to better use their resources. Resources for battered women and children regarding getting homes, WIC, women’s halfway houses, etc use different programs than for standard homeless shelters or LGBT youth shelters.”
Do this person realize that transgender women are not the same as biological women and have different experiences from them? Transgender women don’t have periods and don’t get pregnant, and the ones that haven’t taken any hormones and still have their genitals intact are just men saying they are women.
How is having all shelters be gender mixed be different than them letting men into women shelters just because they identify as women?
Most single hospitals are designed to treat for different purposes, and those different purposes have different resources and different connections. Most single hospitals that are overextended that cannot help as many people will still have to help as many people as possible.
The ones who have taken hormones and who no longer have their genitals intact are just men saying they are women, as well.