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Lighting A Spark, Playing With Fire: Feminism, Emotions, And The Legal Imagination Of Campus Sexual Violence, Daniel Del Gobbo May 2022

Lighting A Spark, Playing With Fire: Feminism, Emotions, And The Legal Imagination Of Campus Sexual Violence, Daniel Del Gobbo

Dalhousie Law Journal

Feminist law and policymakers have been inspired by collectively generated experiences of emotion that help to shape what counts as justice and injustice in campus sexual violence cases. Focusing on events surrounding the Dalhousie University Faculty of Dentistry in 2014–2015, this article explains how emotional incitements in the case contributed to an infrastructure that supported formal and specifically carceral responses to campus sexual violence. Correspondingly, this article explains why alternative modes of legal and political formation that challenged the premises of the formal law, including restorative justice, were misread by some commentators as a form of “weak justice” and therefore …


Intimate Images And Authors’ Rights: Non- Consensual Disclosure And The Copyright Disconnect, Meghan Sali Jan 2022

Intimate Images And Authors’ Rights: Non- Consensual Disclosure And The Copyright Disconnect, Meghan Sali

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

This article responds to a brand of legal realpolitik that says using property law to respond to the non-consensual distribution of intimate images (NCDII) is appropriate and even necessary, because its remedial frameworks are well developed and provide the relief that is often most sought after by targets of an assault: the immediate removal of photos from online platforms. While some targets are not considered the ‘‘authors’’ of their intimate images, most of the images that are the subject of NCDII are selfies, taken by the target themselves. In these cases, that person rightfully owns the copyright in those images …


Reframing Technology-Facilitated Gender-Based Violence At The Intersections Of Law & Society, Jane Bailey, Carys Craig, Suzie Dunn, Sonia Lawrence Jan 2022

Reframing Technology-Facilitated Gender-Based Violence At The Intersections Of Law & Society, Jane Bailey, Carys Craig, Suzie Dunn, Sonia Lawrence

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

This introductory article proceeds in three parts. First, it discusses the origins of this special issue as part of a multi-event, SSHRC-funded conference that focused on pushing beyond a narrow conception of TFGBV; rather than approaching TFGBV as solely an issue of interpersonal behaviours, the animating objective of the conference was to examine the structural, systemic, and design factors that contribute to TFGBV. Second, it explores the importance and promise of reframing TFGBV in this way through intersectional and structural lenses. Third, it briefly highlights some of the key insights from each of the contributions in this special issue. It …


“I Bet You Don’T Get What We Get”: An Intersectional Analysis Of Technology-Facilitated Violence Experienced By Racialized Women Anti- Violence Online Activists In Canada, Nasreen Rajani Jan 2022

“I Bet You Don’T Get What We Get”: An Intersectional Analysis Of Technology-Facilitated Violence Experienced By Racialized Women Anti- Violence Online Activists In Canada, Nasreen Rajani

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

Despite growing attention to violence that women face in online settings, a relatively small proportion of academic work centres on the experiences and perspectives of racialized women in Canada. Informed by an intersectional framework, I draw on semi-structured interviews with nine women across Canada, all of whom are involved in anti-violence online activism, about their experiences of technology-facilitated violence (TFV). Their experiences revealed less prominent narratives, including instances of TFV beyond instances of intimate partner violence (IPV) and beyond sources of anonymous trolling by supposed white men, such as violence perpetrated by peers, white women, and racialized men. In this …


‘‘Don’T Take On The Responsibilty Of Somebody Else’S Fu**Ed Up Behavior”: Responding To Online Abuse In The Context Of Barriers To Support, Chandell Gosse Jan 2022

‘‘Don’T Take On The Responsibilty Of Somebody Else’S Fu**Ed Up Behavior”: Responding To Online Abuse In The Context Of Barriers To Support, Chandell Gosse

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

Responsibilization, in a true circular fashion, is not only born of but also benefits institutional (e.g., social media companies and law enforcement) and cultural power structures (e.g., misogyny and patriarchy). When targets of online abuse take responsibility for the abuse launched against them, that assumption of responsibility requires energy, and that energy is taken away from efforts to hold institutions and perpetrators accountable. Responsibilization tries to tranquilize change in the service of power. The tricky thing about interrupting this process is that it requires more than just offering better support. It also requires exposing, challenging, and dismantling harmful ideologies, belief …


Onlife Harms: Uber And Sexual Violence, Amanda Turnbull Jan 2022

Onlife Harms: Uber And Sexual Violence, Amanda Turnbull

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

Uber markets itself as a technology company that is managed primarily by ML algorithms with the support of human engineers. Yet, in its 2019 Report, the role that its technology played in relation to sexual violence is, for all intents and purposes, absent. Likewise, solutions dealing specifically with the role of technology in facilitating gender-based violence are also missing from the series of initiatives in which Uber has invested that are aimed at preventing sexual violence. Uber was not sufficiently rigorous in defining the problem it was trying to solve. It was a missed opportunity that has resulted in continued …


Does “No, Not Without A Condom” Mean “Yes, Even Without A Condom”?: The Fallout From R V Hutchinson, Lise Gotell, Isabel Grant Dec 2020

Does “No, Not Without A Condom” Mean “Yes, Even Without A Condom”?: The Fallout From R V Hutchinson, Lise Gotell, Isabel Grant

Dalhousie Law Journal

In R v Kirkpatrick, the Court of Appeal for British Columbia held that consent to sexual activity cannot be established where a man proceeds with unprotected vaginal intercourse when his sexual partner has insisted on a condom. While this finding should be uncontroversial, it is in fact contrary to the Supreme Court of Canada ruling in R v Hutchinson. In this comment we argue that the approach taken in Kirkpatrick is correct and consistent with the landmark decision in R v Ewanchuk. We urge the Supreme Court of Canada to reconsider its majority judgment in Hutchinson in order to fully …


A Leap Of Faith: Twail Meets Caribbean Queer Rights Jurisprudence—Intersections With International Human Rights Law, H. Patrick Wells Jan 2020

A Leap Of Faith: Twail Meets Caribbean Queer Rights Jurisprudence—Intersections With International Human Rights Law, H. Patrick Wells

Dalhousie Law Journal

This article examines the legal status of queer rights in Caribbean jurisprudence. It conducts an analysis of Caribbean queer rights case law, in order to arrive at an understanding of the extent and dynamics of constitutional protection for these rights. It then uses the revelations from this analysis to determine how Caribbean queer rights jurisprudence has intersected with international human rights norms, values and rules. Finally, the article applies the TWAIL methodological approach to international law to argue that the Caribbean queer rights jurisprudence has not so far reflected the counter-hegemonic, resistance, anti-imperialist discourse that TWAIL champions, in spite of …


A "Reasonable" Expectation Of Sexual Privacy Inthe Digital Age, Moira Aikenhead Oct 2018

A "Reasonable" Expectation Of Sexual Privacy Inthe Digital Age, Moira Aikenhead

Dalhousie Law Journal

Two Criminal Code offences, voyeurism, and the publication of intimate images without consent, were enacted toprotect Canadians' right to sexual privacy in light of invasive digital technologies. Women and girls are overwhelmingly targeted as victims for both of these offences, given the higher value placed on their non-consensual, sexualised images in an unequal society.Both offences require an analysis ofwhether the complainant was in circumstances giving rise to a reasonable expectation of privacy, and the use of this standard is potentially problematic both from a feminist standpoint and in light of the rapidly evolving technological realities of the digital age. This …


On Being A Second: Grace Wambolt, Legal Professionalism And 'Inter-Wave' Feminism In Nova Scotia, Elizabeth Legge Apr 2017

On Being A Second: Grace Wambolt, Legal Professionalism And 'Inter-Wave' Feminism In Nova Scotia, Elizabeth Legge

Dalhousie Law Journal

Grace Wambolt was the fifth female graduate of Dalhousie Law School and the second woman to practise law in Nova Scotia. She was one of the relatively few female lawyers in Canada (up to the influx of the nineteen-seventies) who practiced law following the push by the first female lawyers for the elimination of formal barriers to practice. This paper examines the similarities and differences between the "firsts" and those who followed them, primarily by looking at the life of Wambolt and her letters and speeches preserved in the Wambolt fonds located in the Nova Scotia Archives and donated by …


Beyond Airspace Safety: A Feminist Perspective On Drone Privacy Regulation, Kristen Mj Thomasen Jan 2016

Beyond Airspace Safety: A Feminist Perspective On Drone Privacy Regulation, Kristen Mj Thomasen

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

No technology emerges in a social or legal vacuum. The laws and norms guiding acceptable uses of new technologies help to shape the ways in which these technologies benefit or disadvantage different individuals and communities. Recently, the impact of drones on women’s privacy has garnered sensational attention in media and popular discussion. Media headlines splash stories from drones spying on sunbathing or naked women and girls, to drones being used to stalk women through public spaces, to drones delivering abortion pills to women who might otherwise lack access. Yet despite this popular attention, and the immense literature that has emerged …


An Analysis Of Gender In Admission To The Canadian Common Law Schools From 1985-86 To 1994-95, Brian M. Mazer Apr 1997

An Analysis Of Gender In Admission To The Canadian Common Law Schools From 1985-86 To 1994-95, Brian M. Mazer

Dalhousie Law Journal

Using statistical data covering a ten year period, this study examines the issue of gender representation in admissions to first year law study at common law schools in Canada. After addressing three identifiable steps in the admission process-applications, offers and registration-the author concludes that while there has been progress and the gap has narrowed, the problem of gender inequality persists.


Teacher Power In The Law School Classroom, Julie Macfarlane Apr 1996

Teacher Power In The Law School Classroom, Julie Macfarlane

Dalhousie Law Journal

Law teachers make choices over syllabus material, teaching methods and assessment formats, and thus inevitably exercise some control over what and how students learn. The actualpowerof each individual law professor will depend on the context of her particular classroom and her perceived credibility, generally defined by the university as the demonstration of a particular (rationalist) model of subject expertise. The intrinsic hierarchies and highly competitive culture of law school sustain this traditional model of knowledge along with its congruent image of the professor as autonomous, powerful and the focus of the classroom. Feminist law teachers and others who wish to …


We Can't Go On Together With Suspicious Minds: Judicial Bias And Racialized Perspective In R. V. R.D.S., Richard F. Devlin Oct 1995

We Can't Go On Together With Suspicious Minds: Judicial Bias And Racialized Perspective In R. V. R.D.S., Richard F. Devlin

Dalhousie Law Journal

In recent years it has been recognized that the Canadian judiciary has been drawn from only a relatively small cross section of the community, specifically privileged white males. As a result there have been calls for, and some action in pursuit of, appointment processes that are designed to diversify the bench in order to render it more inclusive. Gender and race are the two primary categories that are invoked as the benchmarks of diversity. While it would appear that numerically there seems to be some very modest progress towards the goal of achieving a more inclusive judiciary, significant qualitative, institutional …


Siberian Tigers And Exotic Birds: Ronald Dworkin's Map Of The Sacred, Hester Lessard Apr 1994

Siberian Tigers And Exotic Birds: Ronald Dworkin's Map Of The Sacred, Hester Lessard

Dalhousie Law Journal

At its most abstract, Life's Dominion: An Argument about Abortion, Euthanasia, and Individual Freedom is a meditation on the nature of individual freedom. However, as author Ronald Dworkin explains at the end of Chapter One, he believes in doing philosophy in much the same way common law jurists believe in doing law-from the inside out-that is, by starting with a concrete problem and then proceeding to the more general questions raised by that problem. According to Dworkin, this generates a theory that is appropriately tailored to the issue, "Savile Row" so to speak, rather than "Seventh Avenue," and thus a …


A Comment On The Canadian Bar Association's Gender Equality Task Force Report, Dianne Pothier Oct 1993

A Comment On The Canadian Bar Association's Gender Equality Task Force Report, Dianne Pothier

Dalhousie Law Journal

The Canadian Bar Association's Gender Equality Task Force Report sets out to challenge the traditions of a male model of the legal profession. The title of the Report, Touchstones for Change: Equality, Diversity, and Accountability, announces the challenge. Although in a formal sense the legal profession has been open to women since well before the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council acknowledged women's eligibility to be Senators, the sad truth is that, in many respects, the legal profession is still not a welcoming environment to women. While women are entering the profession in greater numbers than ever before, they are …


Psychiatric Evidence Of Sexual Assault Victims: The Need For Fundamental Change In The Determination Of Relevance, Sadie Bond Oct 1993

Psychiatric Evidence Of Sexual Assault Victims: The Need For Fundamental Change In The Determination Of Relevance, Sadie Bond

Dalhousie Law Journal

What follows is a discussion of the use of evidence of the complainant's psychiatric history in sexual assault trials. I will argue that the introduction of this evidence is sought mainly for the purpose of discrediting the complainant's testimony, as part of an "attack the victim" strategy. The admissibility of this evidence as relevant is the product of unfounded myths and sex-biased, if not misogynist, views about women. This evidence is rarely, if ever, relevant and its minimal probative value is, in most cases, far outweighed by its potential for exacerbating or perpetuating sex bias in the sexual assault trial. …


The Role Of The Judiciary In The Work Of Madame Justice Wilson, Christine Boyle Jul 1992

The Role Of The Judiciary In The Work Of Madame Justice Wilson, Christine Boyle

Dalhousie Law Journal

My topic is the role of the judiciary in the work of Madame Justice Wilson, but I am going to use a particular focus. I started with the famous lecture "Do Women Judges Really Make a Difference" delivered at Osgoode Hall Law School7 and it helped me think of a question. What is it that women judges might make a difference to? One answer is the law, another is judging itself. These themes were very clear in Madame Justice Wilson's lecture. Another answer, however, is the concept of woman. When women judges make a difference to law, part of what …


The Hidden Gender Of Law, Christine Boyle May 1992

The Hidden Gender Of Law, Christine Boyle

Dalhousie Law Journal

Two legal academics who set out to produce a book of materials with such a title could weave many components into it. They could explore feminist methodology, and show how much feminist legal scholarship has in common with feminist scholarship generally. They could illustrate the influence of feminist academic work on actual legal decisions and legislation. They could discuss feminist scholarship and legal education, including the dramatic developments over the last twenty years. Questions about fundamental values - equality, liberty, security, fairness - could be addressed. Materials could be included from the field of law often called Women and the …


Canadian Tort Law: A Review For The Nineties, B T. Hill Oct 1991

Canadian Tort Law: A Review For The Nineties, B T. Hill

Dalhousie Law Journal

My purpose in writing this review follows from a tradition initiated by feminist scholars. My analysis of Canadian Tort Law. Cases, Notes and Materials begins with a survey of the casebook with commentary concerning its historical development as a casebook, focussing on instances where gender issues are raised. I then offer a critique concerning the lack of consideration and misappropriation of gender issues in the recently released 1990 edition of the casebook, using illustrative examples from the casebook and a selection of two feminists' critique of tort law. Some modest suggestions for improvement are made throughout the review, and the …


Abortion Law In Canada: A Matter Of National Concern, Moira Mcconnell, Lorenne Clark May 1991

Abortion Law In Canada: A Matter Of National Concern, Moira Mcconnell, Lorenne Clark

Dalhousie Law Journal

Canada's newest abortion legislation, embodied in Bill C-43, was defeated in the Senate on January 31st, 1991. The Bill sought to remedy the state of "lawlessness" which has existed respecting abortion ever since the decision reached by the Supreme Court of Canada in R. v. Morgentaler in January, 1988. However, this determination is incorrect. The law is quite clear: there is no criminal prohibition against abortion in Canada. This follows directly from the Court's holding in the Morgentaler decision that the old law, s. 287 (formerly s.251) of the Criminal Code, infringed a woman's right to security and liberty of …


Nomos And Thanatos (Part B). Feminism As Jurisgenerative Transformation, Or Resistance Through Partial Incorporation?, Richard F. Devlin May 1990

Nomos And Thanatos (Part B). Feminism As Jurisgenerative Transformation, Or Resistance Through Partial Incorporation?, Richard F. Devlin

Dalhousie Law Journal

In Part A of this essay, "The Killing Fields", I developed a critique of the disciplinary impulses that underlie modern law and legal theory. Invoking a number of perspectives and a plurality of analyses, I proposed that male-stream legal theory and contemporary law both assume as inevitable, and legitimize as appropriate, the funnelling of violence through law. The problem with a funnel, however, is that it does not curtail or reduce that which is channelled through it. On the contrary, to funnel is to condense and to intensify. Viewed from this perspective, interpreted from the bottom up, law and legal …


Judging And Equality: For Whom Does The Chartertoll?, A Wayne Mackay Sep 1986

Judging And Equality: For Whom Does The Chartertoll?, A Wayne Mackay

Dalhousie Law Journal

While it may be in questionable taste to begin an article on equality with a poem that uses "man" in the global sense, John Donne's words do evoke a sense of community that feminists would applaud.' The tension between an individualistic and communitarian approach to the world is crucial to how equality will be defined in Canada. Violations of equality diminish the rights and dignity of all Canadians and not just the particular individuals or the specific groups who are the immediate victims of inequality. This recognition is only the beginning of the complex task of defining equality as guaranteed …


Prostitution And Pornography: Beyond Formalequality, Christine Boyle, Sheila Noonan Sep 1986

Prostitution And Pornography: Beyond Formalequality, Christine Boyle, Sheila Noonan

Dalhousie Law Journal

Both issues that are the subject of this paper raise questions relating to the meaning and application of section 15 of the Canadian Charter ofRights and Freedoms.' They provide case studies of the difficulties in putting an abstract concept, such as equality, into practical legal effect.


Equality, Efficiency And Judicial Restraint: Towards Adynamic Constitution, Peter Rogers Sep 1986

Equality, Efficiency And Judicial Restraint: Towards Adynamic Constitution, Peter Rogers

Dalhousie Law Journal

Whatever else may be meant by "equality" in specific contexts, its ordinary usage requires a comparison of the political, social, and economic conditions of different members of society. Equality theories are normative theories that explain which differences in condition are justifiable, and which are unacceptable. In short, equality is about the distribution of social benefits and burdens; equality rights are rights to distributive justice.


Women, Pensions And Equality, Susannah Worth Rowley Sep 1986

Women, Pensions And Equality, Susannah Worth Rowley

Dalhousie Law Journal

A society's values are reflected in its treatment of the elderly. The relationship of the aged to the rest of the population and the social and economic hierarchy within the aged as a group provide tangible and graphic evidence of a society's most fundamental values and attitudes. Who is rewarded and for what? What qualities and contributions are valued, and to what extent?


Equality, Ideology And Oppression: Women And Thecanadian Charter Of Rights And Freedoms, N Colleen Sheppard Sep 1986

Equality, Ideology And Oppression: Women And Thecanadian Charter Of Rights And Freedoms, N Colleen Sheppard

Dalhousie Law Journal

The major objective of this article is to contribute to an understanding of the potential impact of the equality provisions of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms2 on the lives of women. This requires an awareness of the realities of women's inequality in our society, an understanding of the legal conceptualization of equality, and a consideration of the role of "law" in remedying societal injustice. My focus in this article is on the second concern-that is, on legal theories of equality as they relate to women. I begin with a brief outline of the conflicting ideological approaches that infuse …


Judging And Equality: Quis Custodiet Ipsos Custodes?, Edward J. Mcbride Sep 1986

Judging And Equality: Quis Custodiet Ipsos Custodes?, Edward J. Mcbride

Dalhousie Law Journal

"Equality," like law, politics, and life itself, displays myriad aspects. Reflections on equality, therefore, must take many differentforms, as this volume will subsequently demonstrate. Now that Canada has entrenched equality as a constitutional value, facets of the issue seem to proliferate, almost without end. Questions abound: Will the equality guarantees be confined to public action only? What constitutes public action? Will the enumerated categories protected against discrimination be supplemented by incorporation of unenumerated categories? Will a conventional liberal point of view inform the development of equality under the Charter? What part will a crystallizing feminist perspective play in the process? …


The Idea Of The "Private": A Discussion Of Stateaction Doctrine And Separate Sphere Ideology, Hester Lessard Sep 1986

The Idea Of The "Private": A Discussion Of Stateaction Doctrine And Separate Sphere Ideology, Hester Lessard

Dalhousie Law Journal

This essay is a discussion of the formalization in law of a dichotomy between a natural, private order on the one hand, and a public sphere of state action and citizenship on the other. The discussion takes place in the context of equality rights and of the philosophical tensions that underlie the delineation of rights in general. Two legal phenomena are examined: state action doctrine as it has developed in American equal protection jurisprudence under the Fourteenth Amendment and separate sphere ideology as a rationalization for sexual discrimination. Under each doctrine, judicial denial of relief is predicated on a pre-ordained …


Sexual Divisions In Law, Christine Boyle Jun 1956

Sexual Divisions In Law, Christine Boyle

Dalhousie Law Journal

I remember Katherine O'Donovan vividly. She was a young law lecturer at Queen's University Belfast when I was a first-year student there seventeen years ago. Law, on the whole, does not provide a large number of women to stimulate one's aspirations, but Katherine O'Donovan would have been outstanding in any context. She was clever and as beautiful as her name. She has written an outstanding book.