On the surface, the University of Waterloo might look like a “safe space” for the LGBTQ+ community. Take a tour around campus and you’ll find rainbow-painted crosswalks and Pride flags proudly waving. But even my university wasn't safe from hatred when on June 28th at 3:37 p.m., an attacker entered Hagey Hall — the main arts building on campus — reportedly pulled two knives out from his backpack, and proceeded to stab the professor and two students after confirming that it was a gender studies course being taught.
Waterloo Regional Police have charged 24-year-old Geovanny Villalba-Aleman, a recent Waterloo graduate, with multiple counts of aggravated assault, assault with a weapon, possession of a weapon for dangerous purpose, as well as a charge of mischief under $5,000 for a ripped Pride flag. Police also said that the two students attacked, a 19 year-old man and 20 year-old woman, were released from the hospital on the same day after having sustained non life-threatening injuries. I have been told by a fellow reporter at the University of Waterloo's student newspaper that a source said the professor also "is recovered from the hospital and at home."
One of my roommates was in class in Hagey Hall when the attack happened, and another broke the story for our student newspaper in real-time, yet none of this felt real at the start. Even after watching local and international media outlets pick up the story, and covering a local anti-hate rally myself as a student journalist, I couldn't wrap my mind around it. How was it possible that in the same building where I first read texts like Judith Butler’s Gender Trouble, multiple people were violently attacked for doing the same? How did something like this happen here?
But really, I should’ve known better — and this attack should come as a surprise to no one.
During this year’s Pride Month, a rainbow crosswalk in my city was covered with tire marks, a hateful act of vandalism that also occurred in 2018. A survey conducted by Outlook, a group that "explores the wellbeing of LGBTQ2S groups in Waterloo region," shows that of 112 trans individuals surveyed, 75% felt that being trans hurt and embarrassed their family while 96% have heard that being trans is not normal. Hatred doesn’t happen in a vacuum: when left unchecked, it spreads like poison that extends to our friends, neighbors, and classmates. The attacker who committed this violent act was no stranger; he’s a just-graduated student who was until very recently an active member of our campus and community.
Still, I’ve overheard more than one student deny the targeted nature of the attack, insisting that the gender studies classroom in which it took place was likely random. We can rationalize this as a random incident all we want, but doing so would be as dangerous as it is dishonest. Waterloo police said they believe it was “a hate-motivated attack related to gender expression and gender identity,” an assertion that James Chow, a student who witnessed the attack, agrees with. Chow told GlobalNews that he saw Villalba-Aleman’s body language change once he learned that it was a philosophy of gender class. “I think [the attack] was motivated by hatred of transgender and queer people in general,” he said.
A friend and classmate of Villalba-Aleman’s told GlobalNews that while he believes that the attack wasn’t hate-motivated, Villalba-Aleman “held some beliefs against the LGBTQ2 community” and openly disliked university initiatives like drag storytime and the rainbow crosswalks. In order to prevent violent acts like these, we must first combat the day-to-day queerphobia and transphobia that leads up to them. In distancing ourselves from or dismissing bigotry, we only end up enabling it.
It’s easy to assume that since Canada is generally viewed as a leading nation when it comes to LGBTQ+ rights (particularly when compared to the U.S.), our cities and campuses would be safe from targeted attacks like these. However, a Statistics Canada study released this March shows that there was a 64% increase in the number of national police-reported hate crimes targeting a given sexual orientation in 2021.
The recent wave of anti-trans legislation across the U.S. is no distant reality: It directly emboldens Canadian politicians like New Brunswick Premier Blaine Higgs’s government, who issued a policy change preventing children under 16 from changing their pronouns without parental consent. The policy officially went into effect on July 1, and according to the New Brunswick Association of School Psychologists, “increases risk of self-harm, suicidal ideation, and other mental health concerns” among transgender and gender-diverse individuals.
Less than a month ago, a nine year-old girl with a pixie cut in Kelowna, B.C. was harassed by an older man who, her mother said, insisted that she provide documentation proving her daughter’s gender. According to the girl’s mother, she and her ex-wife were called “genital mutilators and groomers.” How many more hateful acts, crimes, and laws are needed for us to see that the lives of LGBTQ+ folks are in danger?
My university campus was supposed to be a safe space away from violence and hatred. But it’s not, and it won’t be until we fight the bigotry happening in our backyards as well as beyond them. The safety of my queer and trans friends depends on it, because if we’re not careful, an attack like this will repeat again – and there’ll be no one to blame but us.
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