SHAW RUINED LEGACY OF ACTIVISM
Travis Shaw deserves every minute of his 14-month jail sentence for luring a vulnerable teenaged boy. He met a 12-year-old autistic boy at a public event in 2014, developed a friendship through social media and then, starting when the boy was 13, sexualized their connection with messages, images and videos. Shaw successfully badgered the boy long enough for him to send images and videos of himself back but, thankfully, was unsuccessful in arranging an in-person meeting.
Perhaps worst of all, Shaw showed a guarded acceptance of the damage he caused the boy during pre-sentence assessments, provincial court judge Michael Brecknell told the court. In other words, Shaw knew he had done something wrong, but doesn’t seem fully convinced he is completely at fault.
The boy, meanwhile, has suffered “significant and lasting trauma,” Breckhell said.
Now nearly 16, the boy’s outbursts at home have become so violent that RCMP has had to intervene multiple times. At school, he has targeted students and teachers with homophobic attacks.
Furthermore, after the boy’s mother found out about Shaw’s messages and turned over her son’s electronic devices to police, the boy was reluctant to help with the investigation. Certainly part of that was sympathy, due to Shaw’s battle with brain cancer, but it also smacks of the well-documented concern many victims develop towards their abusers.
In the near and distant future, when most of his classmates are adults and look back at their teenaged years, there will be fond memories of first loves, great friendships, foolish adventures and few regrets. When this boy does this, Shaw’s face will fill much of that frame. That’s what Shaw stole from him and it can never be returned.
While we root for this boy on his road to recovery, we can still hope that Shaw is able to turn his life around, as well.
Shaw’s brain cancer forced him to end his drag queen career in 2015 and the court was told that he was mixing alcohol with the medication he was taking to treat the tumour at the time of the offence.
Prior to his illness, Shaw (or perhaps more accurately his alter ego Foxy De-Rossi) helped change the discussion in Prince George around sexual orientation and gender identity. De-Rossi first appeared in the pages of The Citizen in 2004, leading to a full-page Saturday feature by Frank Peebles on Jan. 15, 2005. The feature included a glossary to define transvestite, transexual and transgender. Before DeRossi, those words were rarely used in public conversations in Prince George. Photographs of a beautiful, confident Shaw in full Foxy mode accompanied the insightful story.
It was a bold statement, since Prince George city council had still been squabbling about Gay Pride proclamations less than three years earlier. Five years later, Shaw (as Foxy) and then-mayor Dan Rogers met with the School District 57 Gay-Straight Alliance Youth Group, a historic meeting and a huge step forward for social progress in Prince George.
Sadly, based on some emails sent to The Citizen and comments on Facebook, some members of Prince George’s LGBTQ community would like to whitewash Shaw right out of their movement’s history by diminishing his past involvement. Whether they like it or not, Foxy De-Rossi was a big deal and Prince George is a better city because of Shaw’s relentless advocacy, which included two efforts at running for a seat on city council.
There is no reconciling that work, however, with Shaw’s crime.
The fact he was a mentor to local youth and frequently attended meetings of the Gay-Straight Alliance group, once so commendable, now looks predatory.
Not only has he committed a despicable crime, Shaw has ruined his commendable legacy of community activism.
What a shame.
Hopefully long and difficult professional therapy can help his troubled victim gain control of his life back and help him develop into a decent man, something he had a much better chance of becoming before being ensnared by the likes of Shaw.