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“F— rape culture (consensually),” proclaimed one. “F— unsafe space,” said another.

But the event’s key message was probably summed up by a poster that Elaine Tamblyn-Watts, a journalism student at Carleton, made for the event: “Justice shouldn’t come with a dress code.”

Photo by David Kawai / Ottawa Citizen

Tamblyn-Watts, participating in her third SlutWalk, said the event began in 2011 as a “single-issue deal,” after a Toronto police officer sparked outrage by saying women could help protect themselves from rape if they avoided dressing like “sluts.”

Since then, she said, the event has expanded. “It’s become kind of a feminist catch-all for people who subscribe to the same kind of ideas that we do.”

Though most participants dressed for the low-double-digit temperatures, a substantial minority showed up in the revealing attire that has become the event’s trademark.

That prompted one of the speakers, Julie Lalonde of Hollaback Ottawa, an organization dedicated to ending street harassment, to declare: “It’s really cold, so big props to people not wearing pants today.”

Photo by David Kawai / Ottawa Citizen

One of the youngest participants was a Almonte District High School student wearing a pushup Union Jack bustier who had the words “I’m 14” emblazoned on her chest.

The young teen, who said she’d already encountered rape culture “a lot” in her high school, said the SlutWalk was “a good way to spread awareness and try to end the blaming and shaming.”

SlutWalk organizer Fateema Ghani told the crowd that consent was not an afterthought or an act of chivalry. “It is fundamental and non-negotiable. If I were actually asking for it, I would have literally asked for it,” she said.

Lalonde urged women to vote strategically in the Oct. 27 municipal election.

Photo by David Kawai / Ottawa Citizen

Photo by David Kawai / Ottawa Citizen

“It’s important that gender-based violence is a priority for people who get elected,” she said in a fiery speech that drew frequent cheers.

“I don’t want to see anybody get elected if they don’t have a concrete plan on how they’re going to address victim-blaming and sexual violence in our city.”

dbutler@ottawacitizen.com

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