Julie Lalonde sees backlash after complaint about Royal Military College cadets

A sex-assault prevention educator says she's receiving abacklash of nasty and abusive emails andtweetsafter publicly complainingthat she was verbally abusedby Royal Military Collegeofficer cadets she had been invited to speak to last fall.

"If me talking about having been harassed compels you to write me an email telling me that Iam human garbage and deserve to die, Ithink you're proving my point," Julie Lalonde told CBC News.

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Lalonde said shehadbeen asked to speak to approximately 1,000 undergraduate students in groups of about 250. All of the studentshad been ordered to give up a weekend day off to attend the session.

The cadetswere the most hostile audienceshe had facedin a career of speaking about sexual assault prevention, Lalonde said.

She complained about being whistled at, catcalled, laughed at and openly disrespected by the officer cadets. Shewas able after five months to secure an apology from the school's commandant, Brig.-Gen. Al Meinzinger.

Lalonde went public with her experience, which resulted ina flurry of criticism.Following aninterview with Radio-Canada, Lalonde said shegot "a detailed threat telling me to kill myself."

She said another person wrote:"If you are to comment about sexual harassment, you need to be able to handle it when it comes your way."

Lalonde'scomplaints come in the wake of the release of a report by formerSupreme Court justice Marie Deschamps. Deschampsfoundthe military possessed a sexualized culture in which harassment and assault were underreported and often overlooked.

'Culture of silence'

Deschamps, along with Maj.-Gen. ChristineWhitecross,who was appointed to lead the military's response team to the report, appeared before a Housestanding committeeon national defenceMonday.NDP defence critic Jack Harris mentionedLalonde's incident andraised concerns about whether Canadians' sons and daughters who join the military will be protectedfromcriminal actsand harassment.

"I think my experience of not only having been harassed, but having been harassed for speakingout about it, Ithink proves the Deschamps report about how there's a culture of silence," Lalonde said.

"And there's a culture of misogyny and sexism. So much of the response I've gotten is very gendered. It isn't just 'Idisagree with you' or 'Idon't think you should be speaking out.' It's very clearly gendered. It's very clearly sexist. It's very clearly 'asa woman you're disgusting. Ican't believe you would even think you would have the right to speak out on these issues.'"

The attacks have been verypersonal, she said, not from people seeking statistics or questioning her approach.

A common response has been "Imight'velistened to you if you weren't a woman," she said.

Meanwhile,anumber of cadets who took part in the lecturehave accusedLalonde of beingprovocative andbaiting and suggestingthatRMC men had a "rapist" culture across the board. Lalonde has denied this, and stated emphatically on Twitter that she "did notin any way, shape or form imply that all men are rapists."