A look into the fierce activist and namesake of OUTLaws’ annual drag show
CW: suicide, death, mental health, violence against sex workers, violence of child welfare
When asked about the highlights of Osgoode, many cite the Wendy Babcock Drag Show, a night of performances by fantastic Toronto drag queens and fun. In the past, the show has been known to be a night to remember, a creation of a queer space that is unlike the rest of law school. Students also know of Wendy’s name in association of the bursary and now social justice award. The drag show is a fundraiser for the Wendy Babcock Scholarship, and this year will be hosted on February 27 at the Helliwell Centre.
However, few may know the extent of the fierce and passionate activist that was Wendy Babcock herself. She advocated for sex workers’ rights, trans rights, harm reduction, mental health and child welfare reform, ending violence against women, ‘reclaiming the streets’, and supporting Indigenous rights. She was known for never turning her advocacy off, whether it was during her time as a sex worker, a student at the Assaulted Women’s and Children’s Counsellor Advocate Program at George Brown College, a front-line harm reduction worker, a mother in her fight to get her son back from the Children’s Aid Society, or as a law student at Osgoode Hall Law School.
Wendy was constantly found on the front lines at rallies, demos, and vigils. She founded the Bad Date Coalition in Toronto, a safety tool for sex workers which reports attackers of violent acts committed against sex workers. She worked at Street Health with homeless people in the city and at the Safer Stroll Outreach Project based in Regent Park to empower sex workers through peer-led community support. She also co-initiated a partnership with Toronto Police Services to ensure sex workers could report incidents of sexual assault without fear of persecution from the police, which led her to win the Public Health Champion award from the City of Toronto.
After being encouraged to apply to Osgoode by her supervisor at Street Health, Wendy was accepted to Osgoode after scoring in the 98th percentile on the LSAT and without a high school diploma.
Before coming to law school, Wendy testified at the R. v. Bedford constitutional challenge of Canada’s sex work laws, at the Ontario Superior Court of Justice. Lead counsel on this case and then Osgoode professor, Alan Young, represented sex workers in the case that eventually made it to the Supreme Court striking down the unconstitutional bawdy-house and related legislation. As a spokesperson for Sex Professionals of Canada at the trial, Wendy remarked on the “urban genocide” which threatened thousands of sex workers across the country.
“I think this court challenge, if it wins, can actually save lives,” she said then, demonstrating her belief that the law could be used to change the system.
In her first-semester, Wendy was sitting in Alan Young’s criminal law class where he began to describe a case of a “prostitute.” Wendy immediately corrected him to say “sex worker.”
Wendy did not stop advocating for sex workers just because she was in an academic space and learning from the celebrated lawyer, famous for the case striking down indirect criminalization of sex work. Her own experience of being on the other side of the law as a sex worker and also through her experiences with the child welfare system, was a drive towards her want to be a lawyer herself.
“Some people see the most obvious barriers that laws can impose on people,” she said, in a Toronto Star profile of her a few years ago. “I can see the other barriers.”
Coming to law school was a very personal decision for her, and not as simple as wanting to “help everyone.”
“I want to go to law school because it was really shitty growing up and this would make me feel better. If I could change it, I could heal.”
If you do a simple web search of Wendy to learn a little bit about her legacy before heading to the drag show, you will learn that she died in her early thirties in 2011, by suicide. You will be confronted with sensationalist and damage-centered headlines of mainstream media. They frame her story of one as homelessness, poverty, as a survivor of violence, of having her son taken away from her by child welfare, and her life as a young sex worker. You will learn that she was suffering with mental illness for a long time due to abuse, poverty, and trauma of losing a son. You will learn that Osgoode was somewhere she stood out, and with its overwhelming workload and tuition, could not provide her the support she needed to thrive.
However, her friends say that they did not want Wendy to become a sensationalist headline. Along with her constant activism, Wendy is remembered to be a joyful and humorous presence in her friends’ lives. She kept people laughing with her constant jokes, saying ‘a blow job is better than no job’ and ‘I couldn’t get OSAP, so I got HoSAP because it was better than NoSAP.’
She was known to be extremely patient and wanted to always help people understand why sex workers deserved respect, compassion, and freedom from stigma and violence. She believed anyone could change their mind. And her classmates believed she could “move mountains.”
In the lead up to the Wendy Babcock Drag Show this year, we honour Wendy for her fierce and never-ending activism. On February 27, don’t just remember her as the name to a fun night for queers and allies to attend. Don’t just remember her as the name of the scholarship for which you might apply to. Her activism existed before and after she entered the law school. Let us honour her by making space for others like her at Osgoode and beyond. Let us continue her work, to diligently remove barriers for sex workers, homeless people, trans people, people with children and parents separated by child welfare, and people with mental health struggles.
When you buy ticket for the drag show, commit yourself to be accountable to Wendy’s legacy this February 27th.