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there's a new startling report out today
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it's about femicide
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in canada and it reveals this in our
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country
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last year a woman or girl was killed on
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average
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every two and a half days that's 148
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women and girls killed
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there were 133 incidents 140
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people were accused in those death and
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here's another number
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more than 90 percent of the accused were
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men
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the report's goal is to acknowledge that
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the circumstances
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and motivations surrounding women's
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violent deaths are different from those
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of men and that way
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measures can be put in place to prevent
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them from
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happening to dive deeper into this to
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look at how we can
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turn the tide i'm joined by two women
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who know this subject very well
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in our nation's capital we've got
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women's right rights advocate
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julie lalonde hello to you julie can you
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hear me yes
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great and in guelph we have uh the
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studies lead author
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mirna dawson myrna hello to you and
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thank you for joining us today
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good afternoon thank you for inviting me
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i want to ask you
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i wasn't surprised when i read this i
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supposed about the big theory that you
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know there were so many women killed
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perhaps by the you know one every two
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and a half days
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but let me ask you this myrna were you
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what surprised you
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when you finally collated all the
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evidence you put together
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well this has probably been one of the
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most common questions that i've actually
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been asked today and i i'm
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unfortunately happy to say that nothing
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actually surprised me
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um i think we we've been doing this work
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for a couple of decades as have many
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women who have been working with
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um people who are experiencing violence
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in their lives and so we know the extent
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of it i think
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what was profoundly impacting however as
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a researcher is to was to actually
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look at these cases as they were
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happening in real time often what we do
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in research is we
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are far removed from from these cases
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and here
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in 2018 every second day or every second
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or third day we get up and there was
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another woman or
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girl child killed and so that was very
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impactful the surprise at the at the
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actual numbers was not a surprise
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unfortunately julie your initial
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reaction when you read some of the
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numbers in this report
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as an advocate i've spent the last 15
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years repeating the stat that we had for
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so long which was
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a woman was killed every five to six
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days and so it's quite startling to say
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actually it's closer to every two and a
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half and even just myself as an advocate
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hearing myself say that
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and and seeing the impact the way it
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lands in a room i mean that is
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horrific and i think as myrna said to
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really be able to
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track that and to map it and to see it
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laid out like that in black and white i
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think makes it
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hard to ignore what was hard for me to
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ignore and one of the things that really
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stood out for me
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were those stats on indigenous women and
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we've got them
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to show our viewers indigenous women are
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only five percent of the population
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yet they represent 36 percent
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of women and girls who are killed
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myrna that not only surprises me but it
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makes my heart
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stop you know it makes me think
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does anyone wish to be an indigenous
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woman in canada when there are so many
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issues
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what's behind that statistics myrna
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well okay so a couple of things i want
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to sort of go back to the number
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on one um one woman every 2.5 days so
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i want to clarify that this report
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captures all women and girls killed
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regardless of the gender of the accused
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and so that's the one every 2.5 days
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to my knowledge the one every six days
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is referring to women who are killed by
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a current or former male partner
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so it's not that we've seen this huge
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significant
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increase it's that there's different
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comparisons going on here but as you
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said as we started
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over 90 percent of those women were
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killed by male accused and so i think
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that's that's important to remember
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with respect to the situation um with
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indigenous women and girls i think that
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who anyone who wants to suggest that
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there's no systemic racism or
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discrimination
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in our society should then say i want to
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be an indigenous women
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i don't think anybody can say that and i
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think one of the things that was very
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impactful even though i understand and
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am aware of the issue with missing and
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murdered indigenous women as most of us
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should be by now
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and that we have the inquiry ongoing is
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it is really
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i really feel that that women and girls
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indigenous women girls are under siege
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and i think it has to do with systemic
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discrimination ongoing impacts of
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colonization that are just not being
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recognized by our canadian society
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julie people listening at home and and
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women might be thinking
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okay i go to bed tonight i go to bed
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tomorrow night i'm going to wake up and
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there's another girl or a woman killed
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in canada
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so what do we do about it i suppose you
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know these reports and these stats and
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the numbers
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lead us to talk but do they lead us to a
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solution
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what are your thoughts yeah raising
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awareness is not the same thing as
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creating social change
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and as an educator i'm deeply concerned
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about these statistics but i'm also
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really motivated to do true prevention
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and the first thing we have to realize
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is that
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the vast majority of violence against
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women can be prevented but i think
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the reaction that for example the
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gillette add around masculinity
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the number of people who are outraged by
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us even daring to talk about the role of
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masculinity
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tells you that we have a lot of work to
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do if we can't even talk about
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uh the role of men when in this case
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what do we have work to do with
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do we have work to do with women or do
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we have work to do with men because
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i have posed this question to men in my
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circle of friends
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to find out what their reaction was and
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it was mixed and i was actually
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surprised that it was
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on that particular toxic masculinity ad
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so
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are we if we talk to women are we
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preaching to the converted
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i think we can do work with women around
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self-esteem around women supporting
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other women
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and challenging what we call lateral
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violence which is women blaming other
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women when they experience violence
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absolutely i do that work and it's very
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fulfilling
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but we absolutely have to have
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conversations with young men and boys
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and talk about healthy relationships
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entitlement um because that's the root
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cause of this problem
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what we're talking about and if we can't
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even have a conversation at a really
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quite frankly i mean this is a
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capitalistic 101 level the gillette ad
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and people just
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went ballistic i think that tells you
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that we have a lot of work to do
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murder let me bring you in on this
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conversation what does that tell you
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in terms of the work we have to do i
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think in response to your question about
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who do we have to work with my response
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is everybody
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men women boys and girls and i think you
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know the work that julie does as an
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educator is so important because one of
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the things that
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has been recognized is that it's the
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ongoing damaging
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attitudes beliefs and stereotypes around
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violence against women that actually
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perpetuates and maintains the rates of
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killing and the rates of non-lethal
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violence against women and girls that we
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see
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those attitudes that minimize it or
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blame the victim because she didn't
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leave or suggest that these are normal
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normal elements of an intimate
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relationship when someone when a man
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texts a girl
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10 times 15 times 20 times 100 times a
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day to find out where she is these are
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not
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normal behaviors and so i think we need
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to work with everyone
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including the people who are working
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within the sector and in particular in
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the criminal justice system that are
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responding to these i think we all have
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um some work that we need to do in
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analyzing some of these damaging
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attitudes
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i get your point about we don't have to
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talk to just one particular segment of
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society not just women not just girls
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not just men not just boys but everybody
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sometimes that feels like a lot to chew
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on though
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and then you kind of stop doing it
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because it's like how do i affect
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everybody
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so julie can you even though myrna i do
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appreciate your point and i'm not taking
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umbrage with it but we ran out of time
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unfortunately julie
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what advice would you give to that
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particular sector we talked about
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you know speaking in particular to to
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men and
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young men what would be the message that
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you would share as a young woman
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yourself on this particular topic that
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women don't owe you anything
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women don't owe you a second date women
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don't owe you to send you their nude
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photos women don't owe you
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to come back to you even though you
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think that you've changed and you become
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good people
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i mean we have to talk about male
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entitlement and that you know so many of
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these cases are about men
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feeling like their ego was bruised
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because a woman left them or a woman was
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fighting for custody of their children
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we have to talk about male entitlement
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and it's an election year
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and i really want to put it out there to
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people to say if we want this to be a
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federal election issue then we
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have to make it an election issue i'm
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going to take that to heart because we
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are doing a lot of election coverage
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here on cbc news network as a public
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broadcaster leading into
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october of this year and i think that's
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a really interesting
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panel discussion that we could have
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about not only women
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and their voices but women and their
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voices in politics i want to thank you
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both for your time
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you're fascinating julie lalonde is a
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women's right
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rights advocate she is in ottawa and
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myrna dawson is the study's lead author
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in guelph
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goodbye to you both thank you very much