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There was no sit-down strike in the Alberta legislature after NDP member Deborah Drever spoke. Every MLA rose Wednesday to applaud her passionate statement against harassment of women in politics.

Then they sat down and got on with business. That’s the trouble. Every responsible person deplores this problem. Very little is done about it.

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Nobody knows better than Drever that the insults and threats only get worse.

The attacks are “nasty, gender-based and demeaning,” she told the legislature. “It’s no wonder so many women fear choosing politics as their career.

“For many women, things often escalate further. Name calling, violent messages, rape, sexual assault and even the threat of targeting family members are sent through online threats to feminists regularly.”

Drever told me Thursday that when she was deluged with hate messages last year, she took some threats to the police.

“I was told that there was nothing they could do. They were telling me the threat needs to be very specific about how they were going to harm me.