This article took me some time to
write, and in the course of the time that I began writing until it
was publishable half a dozen more accidents involving pedestrians and
cyclists hit by cars surfaced in the news. For a while I tried to
keep on top of the latest ones and update the first paragraph
accordingly, but there are simply too many, which goes some way
towards proving my point in the first place.
 | |||
| Hey, I wonder how fast that car's going. |
On Monday morning of last week, 6
people were struck by cars in Toronto in the span of an hour, all
while legally crossing or waiting to cross the road. That seems like
a lot – and it is, it is a lot, a rash –
so surely there was some connective factor this morning? Something to
learn from so many violent interactions in a single morning? Indeed,
says traffic services Const. Clint Stibbe, the common factor was
“dark clothing worn by pedestrians”. If those pedestrians had
been wearing lighter clothing, then, they may not have been struck by
the cars that struck them. What if they had been younger, if they had
not been pushing a stroller? Did
they make sure all the cars were going to stop at the crosswalk
before they started walking? Did they? And if, as Christopher Hume
asks in the Toronto Star, Monday's pedestrians were all crossing
legally, “why should the colour of their clothing make a
difference?” Indeed.
So, to
summarize the coverage: a
person is the victim of a violent act, a
crime,
and in the aftermath of that crime we ask each other what the victim
did or did not do to invite the violence on themselves.
This
is victim-blaming, pure and simple.
