North America | Canada | History

From start to finish, Bev Busson blazed the way for women

Bev Busson was a newly minted Dartmouth, NS teacher on May 23, 1974, driving to her summer job working with special needs kids, when she heard on the radio that the RCMP was going to accept applications from women. She happened to be driving by the local detachment and picked up an application. “It was like destiny pulling me in another direction,” she says. In less than four months, the then 23-year-old Bev MacDonald was a sworn police officer in Regina for training with 31 other women who together formed Troop 17, the first RCMP female officers. Little did she know three decades l

North America | Canada | Military

Canadian Military’s Sexualized Culture Hostile To Women, Inquiry Says

Source: Huffington Post

Being called an ice princess. A slut. That they only joined the army to find a man. Those are just some modest examples of the misogynistic, highly sexualized culture that pervades the Canadian military and confronts its female members every day, a long-awaited sexual misconduct review said Thursday. Eradicating that culture will take time and a concerted effort from military leadership, former Supreme Court justice Marie Deschamps said in her report — a conclusion agreed to by top Forces brass. They part ways, however, on the question of whether the problem can be resolved within t