This article was originally published on April 8, 2013.

Over the weekend a young man came forward to the police to file a report of a sexual assault that occurred early on March 31. The 19 year old told police that he had been out and upon leaving a club in Toronto’s Entertainment District he was offered a ride from four women. Instead of dropping him off, the four women took him to a parking lot and each sexually assaulted him. The police are looking for four white women between 30 and 36 around 5’4″ and between 190 and 200lbs who were out in a Honda SUV on the night of March 30.

The story has made the rounds of all the major news outlets.

The response from some cretins on social media has been jaw-droppingly ignorant and abusive towards the victim.

One might think that, with the Steubenville rape case barely gone from the cultural rearview mirror, in 2013 people may have learned how to better approach rape cases in a helpful and supportive way. Instead the young victim is being told:

1.       It is funny that he was raped.

2.       He should consider himself lucky.

3.       He wasn’t raped because men can’t get raped.

4.       It is his own fault and he is to blame.

These attitudes are not only disgustingly ignorant and wrong, but they perpetuate these same dusty old antiquated ideas for future generations and prevent victims from getting help and keep them suffering in silence.

It is hard to think of a famous case where a man was sexually assaulted because people — society, the media — openly laugh at male victims of sex crimes and these cases don’t make it to light. We don’t need to look any further than Adam Sandler’s recent attemptThat’s My Boy to see an example of a male victim of sexual assault being treated as lucky and the situation as a funny non-issue. It is no wonder that it took this young man until April 5 to go to police: there are almost no resources for male victims of sex crimes and everything out there on the matter completely delegitimises his experience.

Even Nicole Pietsch of the Ontario Coalition of Rape Crisis Centres took the opportunity while being interviewed by the Toronto Sun about this case to say that “statistically and anecdotally [rape] is a crime experienced mostly by women, and the offenders tend to be male.” Her statement has no bearing on the case of the young man who was raped other than to reaffirm notions that this case is an oddity and men aren’t victims, notions that keep victims (like this young man and others) from coming forward and seeking justice for their rape.

This young man is so amazingly brave to go to police with his story.

The reaction on social media has been downright disturbing, with a limitless number of heartfelt LOLs and LMAOs from people like this, who seem to think it is totally okay to laugh at a real human person being gang raped:

To ignorant misunderstanding of the basic idea that men can be victims of rape from people like AHL defenseman Mike Banwell from the Springfield Falcons:

The chatter is easy to breakdown into the four basic categories of dismissal listed above, along with a category specific to this case where we are told that the rape victim wouldn’t have been “raped” when the four attacked abducted him and sexually assaulted him in a secluded parking lot if they weren’t as fat.

Here are some of the most retch-worthy tweets, responses, and Reddit comments.

It’s funny that he was raped

He’s lucky!

Men can’t get raped

Old fashioned victim blaming

This guy, who manages to be offensive to gays, women, and the victim, really takes the cake:

It wouldn’t have been rape if they weren’t chubby

If you’ve made it this far down just be warned that after reading all that garbage it may take some time for your faith in humanity to return.

Join our conversation on Twitter and Facebook about why these attitudes are bad and rape is not okay, regardless of the sex of the victim.

Peter Lloyd is upset with his gym over the hours scheme that he feels is an example of sexism towards men.

The Kentish Town Sports Centre in North London currently bans men and boys from working out for 442 hours every year. According to Lloyd, who wrote an editorial in the Daily Mail on the subject recently, these hours are not only sexist for being exclusionary, but they also create an unjust system where men are paying the same full price for a membership that is inactive for 442 hours a year.

Lloyd suggests that the gym should offer men only hours to balance out the exclusion, to abolish the women only hours, or to charge men less for their membership to make up for the hours they cannot use.

“But, finances aside, the Kentish Town Sports Centre has a social responsibility to encourage equality as well as physical health. Forcing men – whether 70 year-old pensioners or 13 year-old boys who attend with their mothers – to leave a room because of their gender, rather than their behaviour, is degrading. It’s also eerily reminiscent of when African Americans were separated from their caucasian peers in 1940s America.”

What do you think. While it is obviously unfair for men to be paying the same price as women for less time, is canceling women’s hour the best way to correct this? Should men also be afforded their own time, free of women?

Debate recently broke out in Ottawa over a motion pet forward by Mark Warawa, Member of Parliament for Langley (BC), that would have the Government of Canada take an official position on gender selection termination of pregnancy. This piece is not an attempt to endorse his motion. Frankly, I’m not sure how much this is an issue in a country like Canada, nor do I ever think it is advisable for a government to open doors to legislating on question of morality such as abortion. That said, Warawa has never made a secret of his perspective. He has long identified as ‘pro-life’. Where I will attempt to defend him is under the notion of free speech.

Warawa has been driven underground by a government that has embraced partisan interests over that of Canadians’ and that of democracy. First, his motion was denied at the subcommittee level, thus denying him the right to bring his motion before Parliament despite parliamentary experts testifying that there was no reason to prevent the action.

When Warawa attempted to protest in Parliament or petition the Speaker, he has been prevented and denounced as “rogue” by officials within his own party. The situation surrounding Warawa is not new. Parties of all stripes have long held the divisive opinions of back benchers down in the name of party unity. Earlier this year Bruce Hyer, Member of Parliament for Thunder Bay-Superior North (ON), was ejected by the New Democratic Party after choosing to vote in favour of ending the long-gun registry. However, in both the cases of Warawa and Hyer, their constituents were fully aware they held these positions. They were expected to take this message to Ottawa. The heavy-handed leadership of Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Leader of the Official Opposition Thomas Mulcair was not what the electorate voted for their individual ridings.

For the Liberal Party this has not been a great problem during the course of this sitting. That has more to do with the ability of Bob Rae than it does a lack of internal division. This previous weekend Bob Rae’s tenure as interim leader came to an end. Taking over is Justin Trudeau, who has signaled a similar position to that of the Harper and Mulcair. However, during the leadership contest, fellow candidate Martha Hall Findlay took a decidedly different approach. While she declared her opposition to Warawa’s motion, she said she would allow it to come before the house, because that is the job of an MP. As an individual who has always believed that the first job of a politician is to represent those that elect them directly, I welcomed Hall Findlay’s far more ‘liberal’ approach to back bench opinions. Closing up government further will only serve to alienate more and more Canadians. I sincerely hope that Trudeau heeds Hall Findlay’s advice. It could go a long way in helping re-unite a party coming off a contested leadership race.