Manitoba RCMP tweet blamed victims of revenge porn: advocate

VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) — A Vancouver anti-violence advocate has some advice for the Manitoba RCMP after they faced backlash and had to delete a tweet about sharing photos online that was widely condemned as victim-blaming.

Mounties released a Valentine’s Day-themed tweet on Sunday, saying love doesn’t necessarily last forever but pictures do. The post also read, “this Valentine’s keep your privates private” and included a pixelated photo labelled “censored.”

The police apologized Monday, and a spokesman says the intent was to raise awareness, and prevent exploitation.

“We chose the wrong words, unfortunately,” said Sgt. Paul Manaigre, a media relations officer with the Manitoba division.

“On Twitter you only have 280 characters to get your message across. We obviously didn’t word it properly. So we felt in order to prevent the continuation of those that want to put a negative spin on it we just figured it’s easier to take it down.”

‘The problem isn’t that someone shared an image’

Angela MacDougall with Battered Women’s Support Services says sending a message targeting people who share images showed was absolutely the wrong move.

“The problem isn’t that somebody shared an image, it is because a person decided to use the image against their consent, and as a way to do harm. I would hope that they would spend their time focusing on how they could ensure that revenge porn — which is a horrible reality for many victims — if they could figure out how they can do their work to ensure that those who are doing revenge porn are held accountable, that they would exercise and understand their role in enforcing legislation,” she says.

“Any of us that are dating in the 21st century are well aware of images, and their potential misuse, and how people can decide to violate consent agreements with respect to images. Everyone’s aware of that. What we don’t have is any sense of sanctioning those people that, quite frankly, make a choice to go against consent, and to misuse and abuse someone’s images.”

MacDougall also worries about the message being sent to victims of revenge porn who may be considering reporting to the police.

“When we blame victims for when images are used inappropriately, that is the last thing that police should be doing in the 21st century,” she says.

“What we have is a serious problem about how revenge porn victims are forced to deal with complete and utter incompetence of the police.”

Her advice to the RCMP is simple, and blunt.

“They should just stay out of this kind of conversation entirely. They are way over their head, and way out of touch.”

– With files from the Canadian Press