#QueerBecky

I was attending the Academy of Acting in Winnipeg a few years ago when I first met B. She was the Director of Photography of the final film project for the course I was acting in. As a result, B and I became friends. She's a skilled photographer, as well as an emerging filmmaker. As it turned out, she too was also originally from Saskatchewan, and held similar political views to my own. We both love our dogs, and her little fur ball, the Baron, has always been a source of strength for her. We are both womyn working in non-traditional fields of work, and aren't afraid to tell stories about the underrepresented people, especially when they are oppressed.

B wrote a script, which took her three days to write the first draft about a young womyn she went to school with who eventually played on Canada's National Women's hockey team. B also fell in love, married a man, and had two beautiful sons. Unfortunately, after her second child was born, she had symptoms of anxiety and depression, as a result of domestic violence. As part of her healing process, she did, from what I understood through our correspondence, seek out help from a psychologist, a psychiatrist, and a psychotherapist.

Unfortunately for her, when she was at her weakest emotionally, was when he decided to strike the worst, taking her two little boys away from her. According to the argument he set forth in court, she was an "unfit mother," and was not providing financially for her two children.

Keep in mind that with the trust she put in her husband's hands, B had decided to become a stay-at-home mother. The love of her career, and her desire to tell the many stories she wanted to tell, was put on hold during the time she cared for her children during their marriage. She loves both of her sons to no end, and wanted to be there for them as they matured. However, by the legal storm thrown at her by her, now estranged, husband, she was in a legal battle for several years to get joint custody of her sons, and have the right to be able to take them on trips outside of Ontario to visit B's family, most of whom reside in Manitoba, and Saskatchewan.

B represented herself. She went into law libraries, studied law books day in and day out, creating the hashtag #attorneyatmom, which documented her legal journey. Once B seemingly won her case in February 2019, it seemed like the battle was over. But unfortunately, it was only the calm before the second, much worse storm.

Keeping her activities in the self-representing low-budget mode (due to a lack of funds), B started some preproduction publicity work, in ways which may be described as a bit racy, on social media. Images of her wearing only shorts, and strategically positioned hockey tape were among her preproduction social media blitz, as well as openly creating a character, #queerbecky, to help garner some attention from potential investors. Not only did her efforts raise a lot of eyebrows from family and friends, but it gave the estranged husband an excuse to call B's mothering skills into doubt. He used the very photos and videos, which she posted of herself on social media, against her, using them as an excuse to keep her sons away from her for several weeks at a time. Also, other problems arose via misinterpretations of her posts made as a joke, which unfortunately soiled her professional reputation, creating frictions between herself, and several unions, and organizations within the film industry.

Keep in mind that several years ago, Eminem also did some things in his music that many considered questionable (songs about killing his wife, and verbal skits featuring a queer pedophile character named Ken Kaniff come to mind). This behaviour, which is abhorrent in today's society, did not prevent the rather offensive, f-bomb dropping rapper from getting his first motion picture, 8 Mile, in 2002. Yet a little bit of hockey tape over a womyn's nipples is considered enough to not only take her family from her, but also her career?

Can we all say this together: DOUBLE STANDARDS SUCK.

When I say her family has been taken away from her, I don't only mean her two sons. I am including the family’s beloved canine companion, the Baron, in there as well, because as I type this out, he, along with the family pet fish, Red Moon, are in another home, away from B.

B is at a point in her life where she has a film script, several film talents backing her project (many of whom I have been told by her are from outside of Canada), but she is still being harassed, being both cyber-stalked online, and through the court system by people allegedly connected to her estranged husband. Save the correspondence from people outside of Ontario (myself included), she is alone.

I refuse to speak of the help B is currently getting from her circle of friends. As this article is in a public forum, and I was taught poker very well by my grandfather to not show one's hand, especially when one is under duress, I can only hope those avenues of help work out for her. Speaking briefly of B's ongoing fight in the courts, and professionally, will hopefully shed some light on what she's gone through, and also lead her, her entire family, and her career, on the sunny path that she's earned.