Police are investigating the homicide as a “hate-motivated” act. It is not yet known what police believe the motive to be. Since the victim was a woman, it has prompted many to ask: Why is violence against women not treated as a hate crime? This question is long overdue and has now been taken up by the Office of the British Columbia Human Rights Commissioner’s inquiry into pandemic hate. This is the first such survey in Canada, and one of the few worldwide, to include a focus on gender-based violence as a form of hate. In Canada, the definition of hate crime has evolved from the relevant sections of the Criminal Code, identifying “sex” as an identifiable group. The Canadian Human Rights Act also includes “sex” among a list of identifiable groups protected from discrimination. For decades, then, it has been possible to respond to violence against women and girls as a form of hatred based on “sex.” How often does this actually happen?
Data Gap in Sexually Motivated Hate Crimes
Police-reported statistics from 2006-20 show that sex never made up more than 3% of reported hate crimes. A 2014 focused study compared police data with self-reported data to show that sexually motivated hate crimes were significantly under-reported: under 3% compared to 22%. It is likely that many cases were fueled by the intersections of gender and characteristics such as race and religion, but the data are limited in their ability to capture these combinations—an important gap that is increasingly recognized.
Power and control do not negate hate
A common argument for the invisibility of sex-motivated hatred is that violence against women and girls is more often seen as motivated by men’s desire for power and control, as women and girls are more often (58 percent ) victimized by male partners and family members. But the presence of power and control as a motivation for male violence does not preclude the accompanying motivation of hate. In fact, hatred can be the primary motivation for attempts to exert power and control over a woman. A large proportion of women and girls are also victimized by men with whom they shared more distant or no relationships, or simply said they did not want to be in a relationship. The Toronto woman who was burned alive did not know her killer. A mother and daughter killed last month and a second daughter injured in Ottawa were not related to the accused male shooter. He allegedly had “romantic interests” in the surviving daughter. Days before the attack, he had been released after being accused of stalking and sexually assaulting unrelated women.
Sexually motivated hate crimes are common
One could argue that these examples are anomalies, perpetrated by men with mental health problems. This is a common reasoning that justifies the perpetrator. This perception must change. While the past month has been filled with tragedy for these women and their loved ones, three separate processes have also been underway to help us move toward a better understanding and develop better responses to hate-motivated killings of women. The Office of the Chief Justice of Ontario conducted a three-week investigation into one of the worst cases of intimate partner femicide in Canadian history. The case involved the murders of three women by one man in 2015. The inquiry made 86 recommendations on femicide and gender-based violence. Jailing the man for life, the judge said: “…he is a violently vengeful, rational abuser of women, who…carried his hatred to its ultimate climax…” The convicted male shooter in the “Toronto Van Attack” was also convicted of killing eight women and two men and injuring 16 others in 2018. He has said he was inspired by the so-called incel online subculture of men who bond over sexual frustration and a hatred of women. Read more: Incels are surprisingly diverse but united by hatred And the Nova Scotia Mass Accident Commission is currently looking into the events leading up to and surrounding the murders of 13 women and nine men in April 2020. Ultimately killed by police, the man’s killing spree began with violence against his partner. according to information, this is not the first case of violence against her. Relationships between gender-based violence and mass murder are examined, including the role of misogyny, roughly defined as hatred of women. However, mass killings are not the only types of incidents involving hatred of women and girls.
Daily experiences of hate
According to the Canadian Femicide Observatory for Justice and Accountability, one woman or girl is killed every other day in Canada, a significant portion of which is likely motivated by hate. We do not have reliable data to understand its true appearance. Research into missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls demonstrates how a significant proportion of femicides are motivated by a combination of sexual and racially motivated hatred. These killings highlight how intersectional identities fuel hatred, often facilitated by institutional and systemic misogyny, including by the police, which also affects black women and other racialized and marginalized groups. And then there are many other forms of everyday sexism that occur, often including violence and hatred, particularly against women in public life. So why is it that hate-motivated violence against women and girls is rarely addressed as such, despite the fact that our legislation provides the mechanisms to do so? The pending report from British Columbia and the recently announced national Hate Crime Task Force may help begin to answer that question. Until then, violence against women and girls remains marginalized in Canada’s hate crime context, just as their experiences of male violence are marginalized, normalized and minimized in society.
