To hear the chant of the rally, click below for an audio report by Jane Gerster.
Sirens and chants filled the air as about 30 students marched through the tunnels around 9 p.m. Nov. 28, raising awareness about rape culture and demanding a student-run sexual assault support centre.
“One, two, three four, we won’t take it anymore,” shouted participants. “Five, six, seven, eight, no more violence, no more rape.”
The Coalition for a Carleton Sexual Assault Centre and the Carleton Disability Awareness Centre (CDAC) helped organize the rally, which came on the heels of two recent incidents of sexual assault and narrowly preceded allegations of a third, on-campus sexual assault.
Take Back the Tunnels was a follow-up to a Nov. 14 rally, where coalition co-founder Julie Lalonde called the administration’s denial of a sexual assault support centre “shameful” and “outrageous.”
The group left posters around campus in their wake to draw attention to the issue.
The push for a support centre that started in September 2007 has gained momentum in recent weeks, following the reported sexual assaults.
Take Back the Tunnels was based on a class project by master’s student Polly Leonard.
Leonard, who works at the Sexual Assault Support Centre of Ottawa, said she’s been able to see the benefit of peer-run services, through her work.
“It’s become clear that one of the best practices for social services in general is peer-run groups,” she said. “At the collective I work at in Ottawa, it’s for women by women and lots of people say you need experts to tell you, but it’s actually the women’s lived experiences that help support women way better.”
The idea of students helping students with no expert support is something Carleton president Roseann Runte has maintained the administration can’t condone.
“The university needs to have students work with professionals,” Runte said earlier in the month. “We can’t just have students talk to other students.”
However, Edward Ndopu, an administrative co-ordinator at CDAC and one of the organizers of Take Back the Tunnels, said this idea is misinformed.
“I think that it lacks legitimacy and credibility,” Ndopu said. “There are various schools across North America and elsewhere where you have student-run sexual assault support centres.”
Part of the timing for the event was to “capitalize on recent media attention” on the issue, Ndopu added.
Members of the Coalition were also present at Robertson Hall a day later after learning that the issue of a student-run centre was raised at the Nov. 29 Board of Governors meeting.
But security asked the students to leave, since the meeting was closed to the public due to concerns that a Students Against Israeli Apartheid (SAIA) demonstration would take place.
“There was a public statement by SAIA that they would demonstrate at this meeting,” Runte claimed during the meeting.
Coalition member Sarah McCue tried to deliver letters supporting the centre at the meeting, but was turned away by safety director Allan Burns. She did, however, manage to deliver the letters to Smita Bharadia, Equity Services’ department advisor, a little later on.
The letter, addressed to Runte, asks for administration to take preventative action.
“It is both astonishing and appalling that after four years of lobbying, student, staff, and faculty support, and national news coverage, Carleton University’s administration still has not found the space or funds to give Carleton students a dedicated sexual assault support centre,” the letter reads.
McCue said the meeting left her with mixed emotions.
“On one hand, I’m very discouraged that the coalition was not informed this was going to be brought up at the meeting,” she said.
On the other hand, McCue said she’s “curious to see what’s going to come of this and excited that finally after four years of fighting, this has finally been taken seriously and brought to the Board of Governors.”
The issue has sparked discussion across the country, with Free The Children co-founders Marc and Craig Kielburger even writing about the issue in the Vancouver Sun.
For now, the push for a student-run centre at Carleton continues.
— with files from Marina von Stackelberg
