Defence minister slams cadet letter referring to breasts as ‘developing bits’

The strongly worded condemnation comes after the mother of a 13-year-old girl revealed the letter and told the CBC she believed it sexualized young girls and imposed different standards on them than their male counterparts.

The document also spells out guidelines for acceptable hair, makeup and body piercings.

Canada’s top soldier, Gen. Jonathan Vance, also criticized the leaflet and said he would try to make sure materials distributed by cadet organizations show more respect to members of the Canadian Armed Forces.

“While we expect all cadets to dress appropriately and professionally, this letter used language that is completely unacceptable and not in keeping with Operation Honour,” he said in a statement.

“This document does not reflect the high standard expected of the program. To the members of the 510 Lions and their parents, please accept my personal apologies.”

The squadron did not respond to a request for comment.

Brig.-Gen. Kelly Woiden, commander of the national cadet program, said he has ordered that the document be rescinded and that regional cadet support units determine if they have material that uses similarly offensive language.

Woiden said the guidebook sends a bad message to young girls interested in joining the cadet program, which has about 1,100 squadrons representing 53,000 cadets. He believes it was produced locally as a way to introduce people to the cadet program.

“It’s a very sexualized response — the four Bs is not a vocabulary that we utilize to describe any kind of dress and deportment,” he said in an interview form Ottawa, adding that he was trying to contact the officer in charge of the 510 squadron.

“It’s not a good message and I find I’m personally a little bit angry at its content.”

The revelation comes at a time when the Canadian Forces are stepping up efforts to stamp out what retired justice Marie Deschamps described as an “underlying sexual culture” in the military. In her report in April 2015, she described an environment that was hostile to women and left victims of sexual assault and harassment to fend for themselves. In response, military leaders promised to take immediate action to root out unacceptable behaviour.

Randall Garrison, the NDP defence critic, said the leaflet shows that more work is needed to shift what he called the “sexualized nature” of the military culture.

“Training is offered to all leaders — including leaders in the reserves — to help kind of eliminate this kind of approach to problems in the military,” he said. “So obviously, somebody either hasn’t had the training yet or failed the training.”

– By Alison Auld in Halifax

The Canadian Press

by Canadian Press

Defence minister slams cadet letter referring to breasts as ‘developing bits’

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