I’m not going to say that all men who call themselves women are sexual predators. I’m sure that some of these individuals, although deeply disturbed, would not harm anyone other than themselves in their pathetic quest to “become a woman.” However, in today’s political climate, a man who preys on women can find easy pickings in areas that used to be considered safe spaces for women. Men are now allowed in women’s bathrooms, locker rooms, changing rooms, and women’s shelters. Any man who wants to leer at unclothed females of any age can now waltz in wherever he pleases, as long as he says he is a woman. Any woman who objects to a man in her private space is called transphobic. Women have been evicted from shelters for objecting to men being allowed to stay.

Now, a particularly astute sex offender has found a new hunting ground in Windsor, Ontario. A man known as Cody D’Entremont, AKA Desiree Anderson, got into a women’s shelter by claiming to be a woman. Once there, he sexually assaulted a woman. The police captured D’Entremont, but such is the world we live in that he was processed as a woman. A man who sexually assaults women is now in a female holding facility.

Image: Cody D’Entremont mugshot by the Windsor Police.

D’Entremont is not the first man to take advantage of shelter workers’ fear of turning away men who call themselves women. Shane Jacob Green, a convicted sex offender, got into a woman’s shelter by calling himself Stephanie. He made sexually inappropriate comments for the first two days he stayed there. The shelter workers allowed him to stay, and he raped a client. One law enforcement officer who remained anonymous said, “Green really seems to know how the shelter system works and because it’s 2022 and in the current climate, workers at the shelters feel they have to let Green stay.”

Vancouver Rape Relief, Canada’s oldest rape center, lost its city funding because it refused to allow men in their facility. Activists were delighted. They had been after Vancouver Rape Relief for a long time, claiming that the center discriminated against women. Despite the harassment and the pulling of tax funding, Vancouver Rape Relief is hanging tough. Their mission statement includes the following:

We know that people whose behaviour is not consistent with the patriarchal socially imposed definition of manhood or womanhood, including trans people, suffer discrimination and violence. Trans people deserve and must live in safety, and have the equal rights and opportunities that are promised to us all. While some of our core services are not open to people who do not share our life experience of being born females and raised as girls into our current womanhood, we have a collective commitment to see to the safety anyone who calls our crisis line, including trans people.

The center’s employees are willing to talk to men who say they’re women. They’re just not willing to house men with women who are escaping male violence. I salute them.

Pandra Selivanov is the author of The Pardon, a story of forgiveness based on the thief on the cross in the Bible.