WATCH ABOVE: A festival participant is alleging that inappropriate videos were taken of dancers during the 48th Scotiabank Caribbean Carnival. The alleged victims are trying to out the suspects to prevent it from happening again. Christina Stevens reports.
TORONTO — A performer at this year’s Scotiabank Toronto Caribbean Carnival says she confronted several men who were allegedly taking inappropriate photos and videos of dancers during the parade.
Alicia Rose said she was dressed up in costume in an area for performers and was about to go through the judging process when she spotted four men in an area where wristbands were required.
“We were seeing people in the section who were not dressed up at all and they were clearly what we call ‘stormers’ who just kind of come into the parade even though they’re not part of the parade,” she said.
“We were asking them to leave and telling them that they have to go and that we were about to be judged and we’re about to cross the stage and these four guys in particular just ignored us and laughed at us and just kept going.”
Rose said the men had “no respect” for what the performers were doing, which is when she noticed two of the men also had cameras and were filming up the dresses of performers on the parade route.
“They had those little kind of GoPro cameras and were filming between girls legs as they were dancing,” she said.
“People think that just because we’re dressed in a certain way that this gives them the right to kind of take these kind of photos or act inappropriately. This is a cultural experience for us and this is an event of celebration and to come in and do something like that is just so incredibly disrespectful and it’s scary.”
Rose said she reported the men to Toronto police posted the pictures of the men to a Facebook group called “Save Toronto Carnival” and she said it “took off.”
“I’m not sure how much can actually be done but if we can even just let them know that the world is watching and you can’t act like that,” she said.
“It totally changes the energy of the day … you feel like you’re part of a community and to have these kind of invaders come in … you feel on guard, you feel worried, you feel like you have to be careful of what you’re doing.”
Stephen Weir, head of communications for the event, said he felt “shock” and “dismay” after hearing about the alleged incident.
“We go to extreme lengths to protect all of the participants, male and female, from unwanted criminal activity, whether it be a camera, whether it be anything else,” he said.
“So, to have something happen after everything we did is unfortunate and it’s going to cause us another year of trying to decide, ‘Ok what’s the next step to ensure that people can take part in this parade without any fear of anything happening.'”
Weir said he believed the incident happened on Princess Avenue along the parade route and that organizers had set up three metre high fences to keep trespassers out of the performer area.
“Nobody should get over that fence and onto the parade route,” he said, adding that there were parade marshalls, Toronto police and security guards on hand.
“But the fences were breached and people got onto the route.”
Weir said he’s not sure what organizers have to do to try to get the public to realize that the performers are there to put on a show, but not to interact with the public.
“So we really try to make it safe and it’s unbelievable the layer we go to try and keep people out,” he said, adding that he personally ejected eight people over trespassing and camera-related issues.
“Now, when the fence gets breached, then people get on the parade route with cameras and the whole security system falls apart.”
“We’re not just trying to make sure that women aren’t sort of sexually exploited by cameramen, we also want to make sure that these cameramen aren’t taking all of these pictures and selling them on the Internet and in this particular case it sounds more like perverts.”
Toronto police told Global News they had received a complaint on the alleged incident, but could not confirm any other details.
Weir said the security of the performer area was an ongoing issue, but it’s something they will continue to work to improve.
“It’s really concerning to us and it’s something that we’re going to address again,” he said.
“We had a few incidents but given the size of the parade it was pretty good this year, but pretty good does not cut it in this case.”
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