Police women in the RCMP

See also: The price of doing business

In touch with the RCMP's feminine side

OCTOBER 1999

Troop 17 brought the first female constables into the Force 25 years ago. The remaining members talk about how they've fared since then.

BY BRENDA ZANIN

On September 16, 1974, thirty-two young women made Canadian history when they were sworn in across the country and headed for Depot Division in Regina for training. At the end of six tough months, 30 graduates stood in the glare of publicity as Canada's first female Mounties.

For 25 years they carved out a career for themselves, avoiding as best they could the pitfalls and hazards of their singular path. Some have been able to observe female RCMP officers making their way with greater ease thanks to their ground-breaking efforts. Others have never worked alongside another female officer for their entire service. Some would do it all again in a heartbeat; others are not so sure. All talked about the constant challenge of proving themselves in the face of considerable skepticism.

"You had to start all over again every time you changed places," says Cst Cheryl Lafosse, general duty constable in B Division. "Whenever you were transferred, you had to start at the bottom."

Every member experiences the feeling of being the lowest person on the totem pole at some point in their career. Female members learned that for them, there were no assumptions to be made about the brotherhood of the RCMP. At every new posting, they had to discover by trial and error which male members would believe in their role, which ones would withhold judgment and which would be openly hostile to their presence.

"One member told me he didn't believe in female members in the RCMP," recalls Sgt Betty Glassman of E Division. Often "treated like a bimbette," she threw herself into her work without complaining, striving over the next year to prove herself worthy. "When it came time for me to leave that posting, that same member came up to me and said 'I was wrong. I would have you on my team any time.' "

Seven years later, on plain clothes duty, Glassman was repeatedly bypassed for serious criminal investigations. Finally, after two years of hard work and tremendous patience, she was reluctantly asked to join a homicide team when a crisis arose. Her colleagues realized she was capable of handling tough customers, investigations and 16-hour days. "It appeared that nobody was prepared to give you an opportunity unless forced to," she says. "It began with our inception into the Force and continues today."

Cst Pat Clark of D Division says people often mistook her for the dog catcher or the mail carrier when she went out in uniform. When they had a police problem, they didn't approach her. "They said they wanted to talk to a 'real' Mountie," she says. "But now, people know who you are. There's a much greater acceptance of female members."

RCMP managers often hesitated to assign hard police tasks to the newly-graduated young women under their command. "Some were paternalistic. They weren't being vindictive, and they didn't think this was being negative," says Sgt Janet Watson of F Division. "They thought they were doing us a favour, but they weren't," since she says this deprived them of different learning opportunities.

"Even today there's the 'yeah but' part," says Cpl Gail Courtney of B Division. "They say, 'if we get a call to a bar, will you back us up?' They'd rather hear a husky male voice saying over the air 'I'm on my way!' rather than a soft female voice." What members are realizing today is that women have a different contribution to make, even in volatile situations. "When we deal with conflict, we have more patience and we're more compassionate," Courtney points out. "We know our strengths and weaknesses. Like they always said in Depot, 'your strongest muscle is your tongue — use it!' Women are more willing to talk their way out of a physical confrontation."

Cst Barb Alexander of E Division remembers the loneliness of her first posting. "You're not one of the guys. You're not one of the secretaries. You're not one of the wives. You're something different." As a shy person in a new community, she felt totally isolated. "You couldn't go out with just anyone. You were such an oddity."

"It's a lot easier for female members today," says Cst Bette-Jo Nesbitt, who has just retired from "working in the trenches" of general duties in K Division. Cpl Eva Miller of Headquarters agrees, "A lot of members now know that women can function as well as men. They're no longer a pretty little thing." The fact that male and female troop mates train together from the outset levels the playing field for everyone, concludes Miller.

"In the new generation, women are getting into more male dominated roles and proving themselves equally competent," says Courtney. And, when they encounter problems, "today they're more willing to say, 'hey that's not right!'," says Glassman. "There's a different mentality." The fact that they are represented in higher ranks also gives women a stronger voice, Clark says. "We carry more weight now."

Some members need to realize that "we don't think like men," says Cpl Cheryl Joyce of Depot. "There are still a lot of members out there who are still dealing with this. With respect to women in particular, there are still things that can be improved but they will come as our numbers continue to increase."

For those members who married and had children, there were additional challenges. "At times, the Force might have made it more difficult than it had to," recalls Cpl Sharon Sisson in H Division, a mother of two. Maternity leave was a hard sell to some. "People thought maternity leave was a holiday and female members were getting preferential treatment," Miller says. "It was very archaic."

"Knowing what I know now, I might have waited a while longer before joining," says Miller. "We were an unwanted commodity. Nobody knew how to treat us. You don't change a culture overnight." For Nesbitt, retirement is a welcome step. "I'm glad I'm retiring. A lot of my career has been interesting, but some of it has been hell. It was hard being the first. Everything we did was new and had to be tested. Some girls have no idea what we've gone through. I'm looking forward to leading a normal life."

But to have lasted 25 years in the RCMP gives Depot's Cpl Karen Adams a "great sense of accomplishment. If I had to redo every day I've spent in the RCMP, I'd do it all over again," she says. "You have to go after your dream. My first posting was to the roughest detachment in Manitoba, and I had to see if I would survive. Young female members of today don't have to blaze the path that we had to. That makes it worth it for me. I'm very proud to be one of the first."

Sgt Patty Lawrence of E Division says "joining the RCMP was the best thing I've ever done in my life. Despite the downsides, the good people I worked with far outweighed any of the negative aspects. There were a lot of things you had to overcome, and you worked hard because you had to. At first I didn't think I was going to like it too much, but I really love police work. I'd definitely do it all over again."