title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: Since 2004, the majority of prostitutes have been Philippine or Russian women. South Korean sex workers have become less numerous as Filipino and Russian women were a cheaper labor alternative. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, thousands of Russian migrated to Korea to work as sex entertainers in Korean red light districts while thousand others forced were into prostitution for both American soldiers and Korean civilian men and soldiers. Since the mid-1990s, foreigners make up 80–85% of the women working at clubs near military bases. Human traffickers not only brought Russian prostitutes for American and Korean soldiers but also brought in many Russian women through sham marriages with South Korean men. In 2005, Filipina and Russian women became common in many Korean red district and even accounted for 90 percent of all the prostitutes in U.S. military camp towns.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: In 2003, the Korean Ministry of Gender Equality announced that 260,000 women—1 of 25 of young Korean women—may be engaged in the sex industry. However, the Korea Women's Development Institute suggested that from 514,000 to 1.2 million Korean women participate in the prostitution industry. In addition, a similar report by the Korean Institute of Criminology noted that 20% of men in their 20s pay for sex at least four times a month, with 358,000 visiting prostitutes daily.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: In 2004, the South Korean government passed an anti-prostitution law (Special Law on Sex Trade 2004) prohibiting the buying and selling of sex and shutting down brothels. Soon afterward, over 2,500 sex workers demonstrated in the streets to demand the repeal of the law, as they believed it threatened their livelihood. In 2006, the Ministry for Gender Equality, in an attempt to address the issue of demand for prostitutes, offered cash to companies whose male employees pledged not to pay for sex after office parties. The people responsible for this policy claimed that they want to put an end to a culture in which men get drunk at parties and go on to buy sex.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: In 2007 the government announced that sex tourism by Koreans would be made illegal, as well as Korean women going abroad to sell sex. The courts prosecuted 35,000 clients, 2.5 times higher than the number of those who were caught buying sex in 2003. Meanwhile, enforcement is weak and corruption problematic; there is little evidence that new legislation has made much difference, the trade simply finding other ways to carry on its business. However more men are being sent to "John School" for purchasing sex, while a 2010 investigation suggested that 20% of seniors seek out sex workers.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: Following the enactment of the Special Law in 2004, there was a crackdown on red-light districts; while many of the brothels in those areas were forced to close, the crackdown went as quickly as it came, with the result that prostitution was driven more underground but also became a more competitive business with lower prices and more services.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: Red light districts in South Korea can compare to those of Amsterdam and Germany. The four main red light districts in South Korea prior to the Special Law are Cheongnyangni 588, Yongsan Station, and Mia-ri in Seoul and Jagalmadang in Daegu. While not all of them are operating to full capacity, some still exist while being tolerated not only due to the vast amount of money that is involved in the business, but also in an attempt to control the sex industry.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: Other sexual services include 가택 마사지 (gataek massaji), an "in-call" massage where the customer would travel or meet at the masseuse's home or quarters; 키스방 (kiss bang), rooms where customers pay to french kiss and fondle women; and 출장 마사지 (chuljang massaji) or an "out-call" massage where the masseuse travels to the customer's place, love motel, hotel, or other agreed location.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: According to a 2012 study by the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, 3% of runaway youths have been exposed to prostitution, either as a buyer or a prostitute. There have been reported cases of runaway girls who sell sex over internet chat, and live with "families" in "jjimjilbang", or bathhouses, with fellow runaway girls. According to United Voice for Eradication of Prostitution, these teen prostitutes are exposed to such crimes as rape and diseases as syphilis. Recidivism is common, with over half of the girls counseled by the Voice returning to the sex trade, often because of blackmail from former pimps and social ostracism from future husbands and families.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: In contrast to teen prostitution, women in their 50s, 60s, even their 70s called Bacchus Ladies are engaged in prostitution in a park near the Jongno-3 subway station in the heart of Seoul.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: Though as recently as 2004 the government received low marks on the issue, in recent years the government has made significant strides in its enforcement efforts. Human trafficking was outlawed and penalties for prostitution increased; the 2004 "Act on the Prevention of the Sex Trade and Protection of its Victims" was passed, toughening penalties for traffickers, ending deportation of victims, and establishing a number of shelters for victims. As of 2005 there were 144 people serving jail time for human trafficking.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: A US Immigration official conceded in 2006 that "There's a highly organized logistical network between Korea and the United States with recruiters, brokers, intermediaries.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: A Los Angeles police spokesman said that about 90% of the department's 70–80 monthly arrests for prostitution involve Korean women and Los Angeles police estimates that there are 8,000 Korean prostitutes working in that city and its suburbs. According to Timothy Lim, the customers of Korean prostitutes in foreign countries are overwhelmingly non-Korean men in massage parlours, while their customers through out-call services, room salons and hostess bars are often 90-100% Korean. This makes clear that demand for Korean women is driven not only by American men "thirsting" for exotic women, but also by Korean men, especially first generation immigrant men or non-immigrant businessmen.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: A US State Department report titled, "Trafficking in person's report: June 2008", states that in "March 2008, a joint operation between the AFP and DIAC broke up a syndicate in Sydney that allegedly trafficked South Korean women to a legal brothel and was earning more than $2.3 million a year. Police allege the syndicate recruited Korean women through deception about the conditions under which they would be employed, organized their entry into Australia under false pretenses, confiscated their travel documents, and forced them to work up to 20 hours a day in a legal Sydney brothel owned by the syndicate."


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: The US State Department report also states that the South Korean government "fully complies with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking". In 2012, the government continued law enforcement efforts against sex trafficking, and signed MOUs for the Employment Placement System (EPS) with five additional countries and conducted numerous anti-trafficking awareness campaigns. The Korean National Police Agency also cooperated with foreign law enforcement agencies to crack down on human smuggling networks.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: The United States Department of State Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons ranks South Korea as a 'Tier 1' country.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: South Korea is both a source and destination country for human trafficking. The agencies use high salaries to lure young girls to go to Korea and once they arrive they are forced to work as sex slaves.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: Trafficking in Persons Report of the U.S. State Department has mentioned in many occasions that Chinese women are engaged in prostitution in South Korea. The report describes that they are issued a formal visa and are engaged in sexual services and sometimes they are sold as international marriage bribes and are now sexual workers.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: According to MINISTRY OF JUSTICE REPUBLIC OF KOREA as of 2016,There are 212,115 Chinese women(Han Chinese) staying in Korea. According to “Survey for the migrant women employed in the entertainment business in Korea” presented by Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, it is reported that the largest number of women engaged in commercial sex for South Korean men can be found in Han Chinese women.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: Chinese women are engaged in prostitution through the country of South Korea such as Seoul, Incheon, Suwon, Pyeongtaek, Yongin, Siheung, Bucheon, Paju, Uijeongbu,


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: Ansan, Anyang, Cheongju, Dangjin, Cheonan, Daejeon, Asan, Daegu, Busan, Gyeongju, Ulsan, Gwangyang, Changwon, Gangwon Province, Jeolla Province and Jeju Island. Chinese women engaged in prostitution practice their commercial sex not only in the cities but also in the rural areas of which the administrative unit corresponds to town and township.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: According to the Justice Ministry, increasing numbers of Thai women are drawn to illegal "massage work" in the ROK. It estimates that the number of illegal Thai residents soared from 68,449 in 2017 to 122,192 in August 2018. Of the 60,000 who are women, some 50,000 are believed to be working in massage parlors, some of them fronts for prostitution. The owner of one Thai massage parlor in Gangnam said, "Even if I try to run a legitimate business, I have no idea what happens in the room between a client and a masseuse who wants to make more money." Massage parlors are illegal in Korea unless operated by blind people, but around 50,000 offer foot massage, sports massage, and acupressure. They employ some 300,000 workers.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: A report dated 2002 and released in 2003 asserted that Ukrainian sex-workers were the second largest group of foreign women involved into prostitution outside the US military bases in Republic of Korea.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, young Russian girls have been commonly seen in the red-light districts of Korea. They can be found in the bars, strip clubs and coffee shops for entertaining the customers. Between January 2000 and March 2001, approximately 6,000 Russian women entered Korea through Busan port and Gimpo. In 2000, 3,064 Russians entered South Korea on E-6 visas, 2,927 of them women (Jhoty, 2001) Many Korean men actively seek out Russian women because they satisfy not only their desire for dominance over exotic females but also the latent psychological need to overcome their complex. Apart from prostitution many others entered through marriages or sham marriages with Korean men so they could stay legally in South Korea.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: During the Autumn symposium held at Sinyang Humanities Hall of Seoul National University organized by Korean Association of Women's Studies, Jung Jae-won, a senior researcher of Institute for Gender Research of Seoul National University presented the survey results regarding current state of purchase of sexual services practiced by Korean men abroad. According to the survey presentation regarding “international expansion of Korean-type sex industry and commercial sex culture,” Korean men buy sex with Chinese prostitutes all over China. It is estimated that there are more than 100 brothel(KTV) exclusively for South Korean men in Qingdao of China, which is the example of this city only. The survey shows that some brothel(KTV) for Korean men has each 150-300 Chinese women engaged in commercial sex. It is reported that a brothel(KTV) of Shanghai where South Korean men are regular customers has more than 500 Chinese prostitutes.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: In 2007 it was reported that there were 33 online web sites linking Korean men to Chinese prostitutes. Many Korean men have used sex tour in groups with friends and co-workers. In 2013, the Korea Tourism Association filed a complaint with the police against some Internet site for arranging sex service by Chinese prostitutes for Korean men in China.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: According to the 'Center for Women's Human Rights' , Korean high school students have bought Chinese prostitutes for sex while on a school field trip to China.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: South Korean men continue to be a major source of demand for child sex tourism in both Southeast Asia and the Pacific Islands. Child prostitutes in Southeast Asian countries were reportedly patronized mainly by South Korean men, who outstrip Japanese and Chinese as the most numerous sex tourists in the region, with the Philippines, Vietnam, Cambodia, and Thailand mainly seeing South Korean men using child prostitutes.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: The South Korean government has expressed concern over its citizens engaging in prostitution in foreign countries like Australia and the United States.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: Many South Korean women are trafficked to Australia to work as prostitutes with more than a thousand Korean women in the Australian sex industry.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: Thousands of South Korean women are trafficked to the United States to work as prostitutes in massage parlors. American authorities arrested hundreds of Korean women for prostitution in the five years leading up to 2011, with the 2008 Korea-US Visa Waiver Program leading to an additional increase in the number of Korean prostitutes in America. The number of people who operate with trafficking rackets to ship Korean women into the sex trade in America reaches into the thousands.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: A ring of South Korean prostitutes, composed of 21 Korean women ranging in age from 24 to 37, serving Chinese men was busted in Macau in 2015.


title: Prostitution in South Korea

text: In 2013, police broke up a racket trafficking women to Japan from Korea. In 2014, it was reported that websites promoting South Korean prostitutes in Japan have been blocked within South Korea by the government.


title: Trina McGee

text: Trina Colette McGee (formerly known as Trina McGee-Davis) is an American actress best known for her portrayal of Angela Moore on the ABC-TV sitcom "Boy Meets World".


title: Trina McGee

text: Born and raised in the Bronx, New York, McGee is of Haitian descent. She attended Howard University in Washington, D.C. for a time.


title: Trina McGee

text: After appearing in minor film roles and guest-starring in various sitcoms, McGee landed her first recurring TV role as Angela Moore in "Boy Meets World" in 1997. Angela's interracial relationship with Shawn Hunter (played by Rider Strong, to whom McGee is 10 years senior) was unusual for a major network television show at the time, especially one whose target demographic was teenagers. She once remarked that the typical reaction she received from young fans regarding the relationship was overwhelmingly positive and encouraging, often inquiring as to when the characters might reconcile after a breakup. She expressed her personal wish that the relationship would serve as an example of color blindness for the world. In 2015 she reprised the role in one episode for the sequel series "Girl Meets World".


title: Trina McGee

text: In June 2020, McGee did an interview with Yahoo Entertainment where she stated that she experienced racism while starring on "Boy Meets World." She stated that the stars she had incidents with were Will Friedle and Danielle Fishel. She said that she has since made amends with Friedle and Fishel.


title: Venus Xtravaganza

text: Venus Xtravaganza (May 22, 1965 – December 21, 1988) was an American transgender performer. She came to national attention after her appearance in Jennie Livingston's 1990 documentary film "Paris Is Burning", in which her life as a trans woman forms one of the film's several story arcs.


title: Venus Xtravaganza

text: Xtravaganza was born on May 22, 1965, in Jersey City, New Jersey. Her parents were of Italian-American and Puerto Rican descent. She had four brothers. Xtravaganza took the name Venus in her early teens.


title: Venus Xtravaganza

text: Xtravaganza states in "Paris Is Burning" that she began cross-dressing and performing at age 13 or 14, placing her earliest performances around 1978 or 1979. Eventually, her family caught on to her lifestyle, and because she did not "want to embarrass them, ... [she] moved away." She relocated to New York City in order to be able to perform freely. Her ball career began in 1983, when House of Xtravaganza founder Hector Valle invited her to join the house. She stated that he "was the first gay man I ever met."


title: Venus Xtravaganza

text: On her 15th birthday, Valle took her to Greenwich Village, threw her a party, and bought her a cake. After Valle died from AIDS-related complications in 1985, Angie Xtravaganza assumed the role of house mother, and she took on Venus Xtravaganza as her mentee and drag daughter. At the time of filming "Paris Is Burning", Xtravaganza was an aspiring model. She said, "I [want] my sex change to make myself feel complete."


title: Venus Xtravaganza

text: On Christmas Day in 1988, Xtravaganza was found strangled under a bed at the Duchess Hotel in New York. It was estimated that her body had been there for four days upon discovery. Shooting for "Paris Is Burning" was ongoing, and the film's final minutes include Angie Xtravaganza reacting to her death. Angie Xtravaganza said she felt that Venus was one to take too many chances, that she "was too wild with people in the streets," and that she feared "something [was] going to happen to [her]." Angie Xtravaganza was the first person detectives approached with the news of Xtravaganza's death, and it was she who broke the news to the latter's biological parents.


title: Venus Xtravaganza

text: In "Paris Is Burning", Xtravaganza describes a time she narrowly escaped an attack by a man who discovered she was transgender during an intimate encounter, and it is possible her murder occurred during a similar situation. Her killer was never found. She is buried at Holy Cross Cemetery in North Arlington, New Jersey.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: Sigma Alpha Epsilon (), commonly known as SAE, is a North American Greek-letter social college fraternity. It was founded at the University of Alabama on March 9, 1856. Of all existing national social fraternities today, Sigma Alpha Epsilon is the only one founded in the Antebellum South. Its national headquarters, the Levere Memorial Temple, was established on the campus of Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, in 1929. The fraternity's mission statement is "To promote the highest standards of friendship, scholarship and service for our members based upon the ideals set forth by our Founders and as specifically enunciated in our creed."


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: The fraternity has chapters and colonies in 50 states and provinces as of 2011. The creed of Sigma Alpha Epsilon, "The True Gentleman", must be memorized and recited by all prospective members. In March 2014, the fraternity announced that it was eliminating the tradition of pledging following several alcohol- and drug-related incidents.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: Sigma Alpha Epsilon had nine deaths linked to drinking, drugs and hazing between 2006 and 2013, more than any other Greek organization in the United States according to data compiled by Bloomberg. During the 2010s, at least 18 Sigma Alpha Epsilon chapters were suspended, closed, or banned.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: Sigma Alpha Epsilon was founded on March 9, 1856, at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Its founders were Noble Leslie DeVotie, Nathan Elams Cockrell, Samuel Marion Dennis, John Barrett Rudulph, Abner Edwin Patton, Wade Hampton Foster, Thomas Chappell Cook and John Webb Kerr. Their leader was DeVotie, who wrote the ritual, created the grip, and chose the name. Rudulph designed the fraternity badge. Of all existing national social fraternities today, Sigma Alpha Epsilon is the only national fraternity founded in the Antebellum South.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: Founded in a time of intense sectional feeling, Sigma Alpha Epsilon confined its growth to the southern states. By the end of 1857, the fraternity numbered seven chapters. Its first national convention met in the summer of 1858 at Murfreesboro, Tennessee, with four of its eight chapters in attendance. By the time of the outbreak of the American Civil War in 1861, fifteen chapters had been established.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: None of the founders of SAE were members of any other fraternity, although Noble Leslie DeVotie had been invited to join all of the other fraternities at the University of Alabama before founding Sigma Alpha Epsilon.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: The fraternity had fewer than 400 members when the Civil War began. Of those, 369 went to war for the Confederate States and seven for the Union Army. Seventy-four members of the fraternity lost their lives in the war.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: Fraternal history notes that Noble Leslie DeVotie was the first person to die in the Civil War, this is in dispute. DeVotie lost his footing while boarding a steamer at Fort Morgan, Alabama, on February 12, 1861, hit his head and drowned. His body washed ashore three days later. Because Alabama had already seceded from the Union in January of that year, DeVotie is viewed by many to be the first casualty of the war. He is recognized as such by the state of Alabama.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: After the Civil War, only one chapter survived – at tiny Columbian College (which is now George Washington University) in Washington, D.C.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: When a few of the young veterans returned to the Georgia Military Institute and found their college burned to the ground, they decided to enter the University of Georgia in Athens, Georgia. The founding of a chapter there at the end of 1865, along with the re-establishment of the chapter at the University of Virginia, led to the fraternity's revival. Soon, other chapters came back to life and, in 1867, the first post-war convention was held at Nashville, Tennessee, where a half-dozen revived chapters planned the fraternity's future growth.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In the 1870s and early 1880s, more than a score of new chapters were formed. Older chapters died as fast as new ones were established. By 1886, the fraternity had chartered 49 chapters, but few were active. The first northern chapter had been established at Pennsylvania College (now Gettysburg College), in 1883, and a second was placed at Mount Union College in Ohio two years later.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: Soon after, 16-year-old Harry Bunting entered Southwestern Presbyterian University in Clarksville, Tennessee, now known as Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee. He was initiated into the Tennessee Zeta Chapter, which had previously initiated two of his brothers. In just eight years, Harry Bunting and his younger brother, George, emboldened Sigma Alpha Epsilon chapters to increase their membership. They wrote encouraging articles in the fraternity's quarterly journal, "The Record," promoting better chapter standards. Above all, they gave new life to old chapters in the South (including the mother chapter at Alabama) and founded new ones in the North and West. The Buntings were responsible for an explosion of growth, founding nearly 50 chapters of Sigma Alpha Epsilon. When Harry Bunting founded the Northwestern University chapter in 1894, he initiated as a charter member William Collin "Billy" Levere. Bunting passed the torch of leadership to Levere, and for the next three decades, Levere's high spirits brought the fraternity to maturity.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: When Levere died on February 22, 1927, the fraternity's Supreme Council decided to name the new national headquarters building The Levere Memorial Temple. Construction of the Temple, an immense German Gothic structure located near Lake Michigan and across from the Northwestern University campus, was started in 1929, and the building was dedicated in the winter of 1930.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: When the Supreme Council met regularly in the early 1930s at the Temple, educator John O. Moseley, the fraternity's national president, lamented, "We have in the Temple a magnificent school-house. Why can we not have a school?" Accordingly, the economic depression notwithstanding, the fraternity's first Leadership School was held under the direction of Moseley in the summer of 1935. In the last years of Moseley's life, he served the fraternity as its executive secretary, capping an academic career that included two college presidencies.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: The fraternity's international headquarters, also known as the Fraternity Service Center, is maintained at the Levere Memorial Temple in Evanston, Illinois. Honoring all the members of the fraternity who have served their countries in the armed forces since 1856, it was dedicated on December 28, 1930. The building houses a museum on the first floor with a collection of historical photographs, pictures, and collections from private sources. The basement contains the Panhellenic Room, on the ceiling of which are the coats-of-arms of 40 college fraternities and 17 sororities. The niches on the north side contain large murals showing the founding of Phi Beta Kappa in 1776 and that of Sigma Alpha Epsilon in 1856, together with other murals depicting episodes in the history of the fraternity. The Panhellenic Room features a reproduction of Raphael's "The School of Athens", painted by Johannes Waller in the 1930s. Some windows throughout the building depict college and university seals in stained glass from institutions with Sigma Alpha Epsilon chapters.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: The building is used today for ceremonies and receptions by social and academic organizations at Northwestern University. The fraternity hosts a number of national conferences for Sigma Alpha Epsilon members at the temple. The chapel of the Temple, with its vaulted ceiling and stained glass windows by Tiffany is also used for religious services and weddings of Sigma Alpha Epsilon members and others.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In its early days, the government of the Fraternity was vested in a single chapter, designated the Grand Chapter. The first such chapter was North Carolina Xi at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, which was responsible only to the general convention, the last was Tennessee Omega at the University of the South, in Sewanee, Tennessee.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: Today Sigma Alpha Epsilon is governed by Fraternity Conventions which are held biennially. At Conventions, brothers from all over the country come together to consider modifications to the Fraternity Laws, to the Ritual and to elect national officers. Between Conventions, SAE is governed by an all-volunteer Supreme Council; composed of the Eminent Supreme Archon (President), Eminent Supreme Deputy Archon (VP), Eminent Supreme Warden (Treasurer), Eminent Supreme Herald, and Eminent Supreme Chronicler. An Honorary Eminent Supreme Archon is also selected by the Past ESAs. The Executive Director of Sigma Alpha Epsilon (a full-time paid staff position) holds the title of Eminent Supreme Recorder and serves as the Chief Executive Officer of the organization. He is supported by a 25+ person full-time staff based at the Levere Memorial Temple as well as in the field. The Fraternity Convention also elects members to serve on the SAE Foundation Board of Directors (11-members total) and the SAE Financial and Housing Board of Directors (7-members total).


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In addition, Sigma Alpha Epsilon is governed more locally through Province Conventions. A province is a section of the Realm which is composed of nearby chapters. These provinces meet regularly to discuss issues concerning its individual chapters. Each of the 30 provinces are led by a Province Archon supported by a Province Council.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: At one point, the fraternity had an alumni affiliate called the Diomedians. This organization was founded in 1918 in New York City, and its ritual was first "exemplified" in May 1919 and a National Council with the power to grant charters was established that June. A convention in St. Louis a year and a half later incorporated the Diomedians into the organizational structure of the fraternity and created the "Diomedian degree". By 1923 Diomedian chapters were established in Michigan and Pittsburgh and a Diomedian club-house "designed to furnish a modest home for young men just out of college" was established at 51 West 48th Street in New York.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: Sigma Alpha Epsilon has had nine deaths linked to drinking, drugs and hazing since 2006, more than any other Greek organization, according to data compiled by Bloomberg in 2013. More than 100 chapters have been disciplined since 2007, with at least fifteen suspended or closed since 2010. A potential initiate to the SAE chapter at Salisbury University in Maryland alleged that Justin Stuart was beaten with a paddle, forced to drink alcohol to the point of losing consciousness and confined in a basement for nine hours without access to food, water or a bathroom while being subjected to music torture, an experience described as being "almost like Guantanamo Bay". The allegations were verified by a university investigation that led to the suspension of the chapter on the grounds that it had violated Salisbury policies on alcohol, hazing, and threats or acts of violence.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In May 2013, members of the Arizona State chapter allegedly left an underage member outside a hospital with a note saying "Ive been drinking and I need some help." The 20-year-old survived after nearly 20 shots of tequila resulting in a near lethal blood alcohol content of 0.47%, according to doctors.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: As a result of these incidents, student members pay among the highest rates for liability insurance of any fraternity. In March 2014 JPMorgan Chase stopped managing an investment account of SAE's charitable foundation, with bad publicity from hazing as the likely cause.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In January 2019, a newly-initiated freshman member of the chapter at the University of California, Irvine died from alcohol poisoning with allegations of fraternity hazing rituals still under investigation.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In 2013, the national fraternity organization responded to hazing allegations, stating that it has "zero tolerance for hazing," and that the reported infractions represent a low percentage of its more than 219 chapters and 15,000 college members. Following the 2011 hazing-related death of a Cornell University sophomore who was blindfolded, bound and forced to drink shots of vodka then left dying in the empty fraternity house, a constitutional amendment to ban alcohol at all chapter houses was proposed at the 155th national conference, but the measure failed to reach the two-thirds majority needed.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In March 2014 the fraternity revised its membership process to replace the term "pledge" with "new member" and require that initiation be completed within 96 hours of new members receiving bids. The SAE national president cited efforts to combat hazing, treat all members of the fraternity equally, and to protect the reputation of the fraternity as primary reasons for the change. The fraternity will now be following the True Gentleman Initiative, which will require all members to continue their education of the fraternity throughout all 4 years.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: According to several campus newspapers and the 2015 documentary "The Hunting Ground", students today commonly joke that SAE stands for "sexual assault expected" because of the many members who have been accused of sexual assault.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In 2012, an incident of alleged sexual misconduct with a freshman girl with a member at Louisiana State University (LSU) occurred. Also that same year, the LSU chapter was accused of severely beating pledges. The chapter was suspended until January 2015.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In 2014, a rape allegedly took place at an SAE party at Loyola Marymount University. The national organization reacted by closing the chapter.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In December 2014, Stanford University announced a two-year suspension of SAE housing due to reports of sexual harassment. After a second university investigation found that members had deterred a student from filing a Title IX concern and had intimidated and harassed another student believed to have filed a Title IX complaint, the chapter's housing was "indefinitely" revoked in May 2015.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In January 2015, a victim was hospitalized following allegations of sexual assault at a party at a SAE Iowa State University party. The incident is under investigation by police and the chapter suspended the member suspected of the assault.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In March 2015, Johns Hopkins University suspended the local SAE chapter until Spring 2016 after an alleged sexual assault at one of their parties.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: The Yale University chapter was temporarily banned against use of the university email and bulletin board system as well as association of the fraternity name and the university following "inappropriate comments" made by SAE members.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In February 2017, the SAE chapter at Northwestern University was suspended indefinitely after four women alleged they were given date rape drugs at an SAE party, and two stated they were later sexually assaulted.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In August 2018, the SAE National Fraternity and the chapter at the University of California, Los Angeles were sued for negligence after a member of the ZBT Fraternity assaulted a woman at an SAE event. The lawsuit also encompassed the Zeta Beta Tau fraternity as well as UCLA.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: The founding chapter at the University of Alabama was suspended in 1988 on cocaine-trafficking charges and for violating the university's code against drug use and trafficking. The suspension was lifted in 1990, but with a checklist of improvement goals that the chapter was required to fulfill; in 1992, the chapter was suspended again for failing to meet the outlined goals.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In the fall of 1991, the University of Houston chapter was suspended when the fraternity's president bit off a finger of a female guest's hand during an altercation with her boyfriend at a party held at the fraternity house.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In 1997, the Louisiana State University chapter was suspended after one member died from alcohol poisoning. Another member was praised for rescuing more than a dozen of his passed out brothers from death by ferrying them to the nearest hospital single-handedly.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: The chapter at Southern Methodist University was placed on "deferred suspension" following a drug-related death in 2006, and then again for abuse and hazing that occurred in 2017.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: The chapter at Bucknell University was suspended from 2011 to 2016 and the chapter at Dickinson College from 2012 to 2017 for hazing and alcohol violations.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In spring 2012, the Miami University chapter of SAE was suspended after an early morning "fireworks battle" with the neighboring Phi Kappa Tau house led to Oxford police seizing considerable amounts of drug paraphernalia from both houses. Since the groups were temporarily unrecognized while on suspension, sophomores who were living there under fraternity exemption from Miami's two-year campus housing policy were required to vacate the houses and move on campus. As a result, SAE's national organization sued Miami for $10 million, claiming "severe emotional distress" and "substantial lost income and reputation" for the exiled students. Susan Dlott, judge of the Southern District of Ohio, dismissed SAE's lawsuit in February 2013 with prejudice (meaning it could not be refiled), saying that "...the fraternity failed to submit any facts that supported its claims the public university violated its constitutional rights against unreasonable search and seizure and due process." In November 2015, the Miami SAE chapter was allowed to recolonize by Miami's Interfraternity Council.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In 2013, the chapter at Arizona State University was banned from campus due to repeated hazing and alcohol violations and questionable behavior. Jack Culolias, an ASU freshman and SAE pledge, was kicked out of a bar one night then later found dead in a ditch. The chapter also faced heavy scrutiny when a member nearly died after participating in a tequila drinking contest.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In October 2014, the University of Southern California chapter was closed for reportedly "violating members' health and safety".


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In April 2015, the University of Arizona chapter was placed under a "cease-and-desist order" by the Sigma Alpha Epsilon headquarters, meaning all activities are suspended until further notice. The chapter was accused of severely hazing and harming students pledging the fraternity.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In July 2015, the University of Richmond (Virginia) chapter was suspended indefinitely "based on repeated incidents that violated the University's policies and risk management procedures." An investigation had been opened in April, when the national organization suspended the chapter after two women were hurt falling from a balcony during a ski trip.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In January 2016, the chapter at Dartmouth College was suspended by the national office and derecognized by the university for violations of health and safety regulations as well as a failure to comply with the national organization's standards. The fraternity was previously cited for hazing violations in 2009 and 2012.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In April 2016, the UMBC chapter was suspended after allegations of alcohol policy violations, property theft and damage, and failure to comply with previous sanctions (also handed for underage drinking, in a party that resulted in 55 police citations). The University's Student Judicial Board determined that the claims were substantiated, and suspended the chapter for four years.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In October 2016, the chapter at Auburn University was suspended for two years after multiple hazing and risk management policy violations over a two-year period.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In November 2017, the SAE chapter at the University of Texas at Austin was suspended for hazing violations. Two years prior, several members from the chapter were accused of beating up a male neighbor complaining about loud music that was playing at their fraternity house during a recruitment event. Only two members were identified and charged with physical assault for the incident. This prompted the chapter to disaffiliate from SAE. The chapter retained the fraternity house and is regulated by its alumni board.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In December 2017, the SAE chapter at the University of Mississippi was suspended due to “health-and-safety concerns and an inability to adhere to the national organization’s standards and expectations." The Mississippi Gamma chapter has been recolonized as of Fall, 2020.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In March 2018, the SAE chapter at the University of Idaho was suspended after an ongoing investigation by the national organization confirmed the chapter's failure to abide by its national guidelines, including certain safety and health violations. The university was made aware of the ongoing investigation in December 2017 after the chapter was put on a cease and desist order by the national fraternity. The university also learned the allegations included hazing and is conducting an additional investigation into that claim as part of the university's student code of conduct process. As part of the closure agreement, the university, in conjunction with SAE's national office, will allow SAE to recolonize in August 2022 under certain conditions, including the expectation that members must keep a dry chapter facility and have a live-in advisor.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In January 2019, the SAE chapter at the University of California, Irvine was suspended after the death of a freshman newly initiated member of the fraternity. In March 2019, the Orange County coroner's office announced that the death was found to have been caused by alcohol poisoning and the chapter was closed indefinitely amidst allegations of fraternity hazing rituals but the details are still under investigation .


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In February 2019, the SAE chapter at Tennessee Technological University was placed on suspension for four to five years, or until all current members have graduated or left Tennessee Tech. The closure follows the death of a Tech graduate and former fraternity member, who died one day after attending the "senior transition night," at the SAE house on Dec. 7, 2018.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In April 2019, the SAE chapter at Vanderbilt University was suspended until 2023 for multiple hazing violations.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In December 2021, eight members of the fraternity at Georgia College and State University were arrested for providing alcohol to minors and one member for hazing. The arrests happened after a SAE pledge was hospitalized due to an alcohol related hazing incident.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In June 2022, the SAE chapter at the University of New Hampshire was suspended pending an investigation into a hazing incident that occurred in April. Arrest warrants were issued for 46 members of the chapter, as well as a warrant charging the chapter itself with student hazing.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In 1982 SAE members at the University of Cincinnati were suspended for a racially insensitive party corresponding with Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In 2002, Syracuse University officials suspended the chapter there after a member appeared in blackface. The member was expelled from the university. The chapter returned after the suspension and in 2006 was found guilty of hazing a new member by the University's Office of Fraternity and Sorority Affairs.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In 2013, SAE pledges at Washington University in St. Louis allegedly recited lyrics to Dr. Dre's "Bitches Ain't Shit" in slam poetry form within close proximity of several African-American students in the university's dining hall. Chapter operations were halted for several months while the chapter was put under investigation due to allegations of racist behavior stemming from the incident. The chapter was fully reinstated following the investigation.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In 2014, the chapter at Clemson University hosted a "Cripmas" party in reference to the Southern California-based African-American crips gang. The chapter "suspended all activity indefinitely", according to the SAE national office.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: Also, in 2014, SAE members at the University of Arizona were suspended for attacking Alpha Epsilon Pi, a Jewish fraternity.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In March 2015, the national organization of Sigma Alpha Epsilon closed the University of Oklahoma chapter after a video surfaced showing members chanting a song which featured the racial slur, "nigger," and made references to lynching and racial segregation. The chant, set to melody of the popular children's song, "If You're Happy and You Know It", declares, "There will never be a nigger at SAE. You can hang him/them from a tree, but he'll/they'll never sign with me." Sigma Alpha Epsilon closed the charter of the involved chapter and suspended its members on March 8, 2015. The University of Oklahoma president, David Boren, simultaneously closed the chapter house, giving members two days to vacate the fraternity's campus dwellings. On March 10, 2015, two students identified in the video were expelled from the university.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In May 2016, the SAE chapter at the University of Wisconsin–Madison was placed on suspension for repeatedly using racist, homophobic, and anti-Semitic slurs, and then ostracizing a black SAE member for speaking up against the chapter's behavior.


title: Sigma Alpha Epsilon

text: In November 2019, the SAE chapter at Duke University was suspended, with specific reasons not being cited.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: The 2014 Royal Rumble was the 27th annual Royal Rumble professional wrestling pay-per-view (PPV) event produced by WWE. It took place on January 26, 2014, at the Consol Energy Center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It was the first Royal Rumble to be held in the city of Pittsburgh. As has been customary since 1993, the Royal Rumble match winner received a world championship match at that year's WrestleMania. For the 2014 event, the winner received a match for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship at WrestleMania XXX; this was the first time since 2002 in which there was only one eligible championship for the Rumble winner to challenge for.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: The event featured five professional wrestling matches, including one match on the Kickoff pre-show. The main event was the 2014 Royal Rumble match. A returning Batista won by last eliminating Roman Reigns to become a two-time Royal Rumble winner. Also on the event's card, Randy Orton successfully defended the WWE World Heavyweight Championship against John Cena, Bray Wyatt defeated Daniel Bryan, and Brock Lesnar defeated Big Show. On the event's Kickoff pre-show, The New Age Outlaws (Road Dogg and Billy Gunn) defeated Goldust and Cody Rhodes to become the new WWE Tag Team Champions.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: The event is known for the overwhelmingly negative crowd response during the Orton–Cena title match, as well as towards the end of (and after) the Royal Rumble match, when the fans booed the Rumble winner Batista, repeatedly chanted for Daniel Bryan (who had competed earlier in the night and was not involved in the main event), and rooted for man in place, Roman Reigns (who was a heel at the time). Fans worldwide (including retired wrestler Mick Foley) voiced their displeasure over social media, and the event was covered by many major news outlets as one of the worst Royal Rumble pay-per-views. However, the bout between Daniel Bryan and Bray Wyatt was highly praised by fans and critics. The event also marked the final WWE pay-per-view appearance of CM Punk, who walked out on the company the next day despite still being under contract, and retired from professional wrestling later that year, until he debuted with rival promotion AEW in August 2021.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: The Royal Rumble is an annual gimmick pay-per-view (PPV), produced every January by WWE since 1988. It is one of the promotion's original four pay-per-views, along with WrestleMania, SummerSlam, and Survivor Series, dubbed the "Big Four". It is named after the Royal Rumble match, a modified battle royal in which the participants enter at timed intervals instead of all beginning in the ring at the same time. The 2014 event was the 27th event in the Royal Rumble chronology and was scheduled to be held on January 26, 2014, at the Consol Energy Center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. On the final episode of "Raw" before the Royal Rumble event, Batista returned to WWE after an absence of nearly four years, and the Royal Rumble match was scheduled to be his first return match.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: The Royal Rumble match generally features 30 wrestlers and the winner traditionally earns a world championship match at that year's WrestleMania. For 2014, the winner received a match for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship at WrestleMania XXX. It was the first Royal Rumble since the 2002 event to only feature one world championship, as the WWE Championship and World Heavyweight Championship were unified as the WWE World Heavyweight Championship at in December 2013.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: The card consisted of five matches, including one on the Kickoff pre-show, that resulted from scripted storylines, where wrestlers portrayed heroes, villains, or less distinguishable characters in scripted events that built tension and culminated in a wrestling match or series of matches, with results predetermined by WWE's writers. Storylines were produced on WWE's weekly television shows, "Raw" and "SmackDown".


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: A highly promoted match featured WWE World Heavyweight Champion Randy Orton defending the title against long-time adversary John Cena. At Survivor Series in November 2013, Orton successfully defended his WWE Championship against Big Show, on the same night the World Heavyweight Champion John Cena defeated Alberto Del Rio to retain his title. After Orton's victory at Survivor Series, Cena came down to the ring with his title, and celebrated with the crowd as The Authority (Triple H, Stephanie McMahon and Kane) looked on, much to Orton's chagrin. The next month, at the pay-per-view, Orton defeated Cena in a Tables, Ladders, and Chairs match to unify the two titles into the new WWE World Heavyweight Championship. On the December 30 episode of "Raw", Cena was awarded a rematch for the title against Orton at the Royal Rumble, with the match stipulation of a traditional one-on-one singles match, except that it could be won by pinfall or submission only. On the January 13 episode of "Raw", Orton suffered an upset loss to Kofi Kingston and took out his frustrations by attacking Cena's father, who was attending the event at ringside.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: On the December 30, 2013 episode of "Raw", Brock Lesnar returned with his manager, Paul Heyman, to announce his intentions to challenge the winner of the upcoming WWE World Heavyweight Championship match between Randy Orton and John Cena at the Royal Rumble. Lesnar then dared any wrestler who disapproved of that notion to challenge him, which was answered by Mark Henry, and a brawl would ensue, ending with Lesnar delivering an F-5 to Henry. The following week on "Raw", Henry challenged Lesnar again, only to have Lesnar dislocate his elbow with the Kimura lock in storyline, which led Big Show to come out afterwards to confront Lesnar. On the January 10 episode of "SmackDown", Big Show issued a challenge to Lesnar, Paul Heyman accepting on behalf of Lesnar and scheduling the match for the Royal Rumble event.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: Announced on WWE.com, Goldust and Cody Rhodes faced The New Age Outlaws (Road Dogg and Billy Gunn) for the WWE Tag Team Championship on the Royal Rumble Kickoff Show preceding the pay-per-view. This match was made when The New Age Outlaws defeated Cody Rhodes and Goldust in a non-title match on the January 17 episode of "SmackDown" due to a distraction from Vickie Guerrero.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: On the October 28, 2013 episode of "Raw", The Wyatt Family (Bray Wyatt, Luke Harper and Erick Rowan) attacked Daniel Bryan backstage, which ignited a feud between the two. The next month at Survivor Series, Bryan teamed with CM Punk and defeated Harper and Rowan. The rivalry between Bryan and the Wyatt Family continued in December, as the latter defeated the former in a 3-on-1 handicap match at TLC, with Wyatt attempting to recruit Bryan in the previous weeks. On the December 30, 2013 episode of "Raw", Bryan defeated Harper and then Rowan in a gauntlet match so that he could face Wyatt, whereupon Harper and Rowan interfered for a disqualification and beat him down, before announcing he would join the Wyatt Family. However, on the January 13, 2014 episode of "Raw" (after Bryan and Bray Wyatt were defeated by The Usos in a steel cage match), Bryan betrayed Wyatt and attacked him, culminating with Bryan hitting his flying knee finishing maneuver on Wyatt. The following week on "Raw", Bryan explained that his joining the Wyatts was a ruse to infiltrate the stable and bide his time to strike, and that he would wrestle Wyatt at the Royal Rumble event.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: Before the show aired live on pay-per-view, the Royal Rumble Kickoff pre-show was shown live on YouTube and other digital platforms. Backstage, the general managers of Raw and SmackDown, Brad Maddox and Vickie Guerrero, respectively, rolled the "Rumble Drum" to give wrestlers their numbers. Alberto Del Rio, R-Truth, The Real Americans (Jack Swagger and Antonio Cesaro), Kofi Kingston, The Great Khali and Damien Sandow picked their numbers during the segment.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: In the pre-show, reigning WWE Tag Team Champions Goldust and Cody Rhodes defended their titles against The New Age Outlaws (Road Dogg and Billy Gunn). Towards the end of the match, Rhodes applied a dropkick to Dogg, but was unaware that Gunn blind-tagged in for the latter. From the back, Gunn entered the ring and delivered a Fame-Ass-er to Rhodes, to win the match and the titles for the Outlaws.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: In the first match on the pay-per-view portion of the show, Bray Wyatt faced Daniel Bryan. Early in the match, the referee saw Bray's Wyatt Family members Luke Harper and Erick Rowan attempting to interfere, so he ejected them from ringside. During the match, Wyatt targeted Bryan's head, ramming it into the ring-post. Bryan later mounted a comeback with a running tornado DDT off the ring apron, planting Wyatt's head on the floor. Wyatt managed to escape Bryan's Yes! Lock submission hold by biting Bryan's hand. To avoid Bryan's running knee, Wyatt rolled out of the ring to the floor. Bryan then attempted a suicide dive but Wyatt caught him and executed a Sister Abigail into the barricade. After another Sister Abigail in the ring, Wyatt scored the pinfall victory.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: In the next match, Brock Lesnar (accompanied by Paul Heyman) faced Big Show. Lesnar attacked Big Show before the match started, and then hit him with a chair. When the match started, Big Show landed his KO Punch, but Lesnar picked up the victory after executing an F-5. Lesnar then continued to attack Big Show with a chair after the match.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: Randy Orton defended the WWE World Heavyweight Championship against John Cena in the show's penultimate match of the night. After both wrestlers failed to win despite executing their RKO, Attitude Adjustment and STF moves, both wrestlers resorted to using their opponent's signature moves but still could not win the match. At the end of the match, Cena again trapped Orton in the STF submission hold, but the lights temporarily went out due to the arrival of The Wyatt Family on the ring apron. Orton took advantage of the distraction to drop Cena with the RKO and win the match.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: The main event was the Royal Rumble match for a WWE World Heavyweight Championship match at WrestleMania XXX. CM Punk and Seth Rollins were entrants #1 and #2; they spent the longest and second longest time in the match (49 and 48 minutes respectively). Kane entered at #5 and targeted Punk, but Punk managed to eliminate him. NXT's Alexander Rusev entered at #6. Kofi Kingston, who entered at #8, had two feats of athleticism to escape elimination; first after he was deposited on the guardrail by Rusev (who caught him when Kingston was thrown out of the ring) he jumped back to the ring apron from the guardrail, and later while he was hanging on to the bottom rope with his feet, he fended off Jack Swagger by snatching Swagger's boot and hitting him with it.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: Rollins' Shield teammates (Dean Ambrose and Roman Reigns) entered at #11 and #15 respectively. Goldust eliminated his brother Cody Rhodes 24 minutes into the match, and was in turn eliminated by Reigns, who had also eliminated Kingston and unannounced entrant Kevin Nash, amongst others. Midway through the match with only Punk and the Shield left in the ring, Sheamus returned to WWE television at #17 and momentarily stopped the Shield's dominance. Los Matadores' mascot El Torito entered at #20, and managed to eliminate Fandango, before being eliminated in turn by Reigns. Pay-per-view commentator John "Bradshaw" Layfield was announced as entrant #24, making it the first time the JBL character had participated in a Royal Rumble. He was eliminated by Reigns while handing his jacket to fellow commentator Michael Cole, whereupon he resumed his commentator role for the rest of the match.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: Batista entered at #28 and quickly eliminated Erick Rowan, Ryback and Alberto Del Rio. The final entrant at #30 was Rey Mysterio, who was eliminated by Rollins. When Ambrose tried to eliminate Reigns, Reigns retaliated by eliminating Ambrose, Rollins and Antonio Cesaro simultaneously, leaving himself, Punk, Sheamus and Batista as the final four. Though already eliminated, Kane returned to ringside and pulled Punk over the top rope to eliminate him, then executed a chokeslam through a broadcast table on Punk. Reigns eliminated Sheamus to set a new record for most eliminations in a Rumble match with 12, but Reigns was then thrown over the top rope by Batista, who won the match.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: The event sold out the Consol Energy Center with 15,715 people in attendance. The official buy total for the 2014 Royal Rumble event was 467,000, which was a decrease of 8.8% from the 512,000 of the previous year's event, but a 5.4% increase from the 443,000 of the 2012 event. This contributed to WWE's PPV revenue of $13.8 million for the first quarter of 2014 compared with $15.1 million for the first quarter of 2013. The 2015 Royal Rumble event received 145,000 purchases, a significant drop from the 2014 event, due to the fact that the latter was held prior to the launch of the WWE Network.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: The negative reaction of the fans attending the event in Pittsburgh was so great that it was reported as one of the major news items coming out of the show, and described as the live audience engineering a "takeover" of the final two hours of the show. During the title match between John Cena and Randy Orton, fans booed both men and chanted for Daniel Bryan, amongst other chants such as "this is awful". The fans continued to chant for Bryan during the Royal Rumble match and so when Rey Mysterio (typically a fan favorite) was revealed as the final entrant (and therefore Bryan's possible participation in the match was ruled out) the fans booed Mysterio, chanted for Bryan and cheered Mysterio's eventual elimination. The crowd continued to boo when there were three wrestlers left in the match, but when only Batista and Roman Reigns remained, they cheered for Reigns (a villainous character at the time) over Batista and later booed Batista's victory as the event drew to a close. After the show went off the air, Batista (who had been presented on-air as a heroic babyface character) mocked Bryan and gestured his middle finger at the crowd. Aaron Oster of "The Baltimore Sun" wrote Mysterio "received more boos than he’s ever had in his WWE career", and in the case of Batista, "besides the fact that a supposed face was getting booed, the boos were stronger than any Rumble winner I can remember, including when Mr. McMahon won in 1999".


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: Fans took to social media to display their displeasure towards the event. The BBC reported that regarding Bryan's exclusion from the Rumble match, "many people have also expressed anger on social media, with the phrases #RoyalRumble, #WWE and Daniel Bryan all trending on Twitter". The "Herald & Review" described the reaction to the event as "WWE's PR nightmare", with the most "liked" comments on WWE's Facebook page within 24 hours of the event including "worst PPV ever", "the sound of WWE dropping the ball" and in reference to the WWE Network, "no Bryan, no buy". Retired wrestler Mick Foley criticized WWE management on social media, stating, "Does WWE actually hate their own audience? I've never been so disgusted with a PPV".


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: Dale Plummer and Nick Tylwalk of Canoe.ca rated the overall event as 6.0 out of 10. The Wyatt-Bryan bout was rated the highest at a "fantastic" 9.5 out of 10, the Cena-Orton bout, described as a "sloppy affair that won’t go down among the best work from either man" received 4.0 out of 10, while the Lesnar-Big Show encounter received 1.0 out of 10. They described the event as "uneven", and that "the disapproval of the fans at the Consol Energy Center at how the Royal Rumble match went down will be the lasting memory for anyone who watched the show".


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: James Caldwell of the "Pro Wrestling Torch Newsletter" rated the Royal Rumble match 2.5 stars out of 5, commenting that "well, that back-fired". He wrote that the "Rumble peaked about three-fourths through, then fell off the table at the end", and described the Rumble winner Batista as "out-of-shape". Caldwell also rated the Bryan-Wyatt match 4.0 stars out of 5, describing it as "easily Bray's best WWE TV match, great chemistry from both wrestlers" in front of a "hot, invested crowd". Caldwell chose not to rate the Lesnar-Show match, commenting that it was necessarily short due to Show being injured going into the match. Lastly, Caldwell rated the Orton-Cena title match 2.0 stars out of 5.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: Benjamin Tucker, who attended the event and is also from the "Pro Wrestling Torch Newsletter", rated the entire event 6.0 out of 10, saying "the show began great but slowly lost steam before ending in a roar of jeers". For the Rumble match, Tucker said that "the first two-thirds especially were exciting, with several wrestlers being spotlighted well", "until lower-level players kept coming out in the final half of the match". Tucker felt that "Roman Reigns was the star of the match, even outclassing Batista. Where Batista stumbled around the ring like... well, an old, retired wrestler, Roman Reigns looked like an absolute monster". For the opening match, Tucker felt that the "deliberate pace didn't hurt the match in the slightest. Instead, it allowed Bray to keep using his character while in a competitive, big match situation". For the rest of the matches, Tucker wrote that "Lesnar looked like a relentless beast", while "Orton and Cena put on their most lifeless performance ever together. There was very little story to the match" and "no creativity at all".


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: The following year's Royal Rumble was similarly marked by an extreme negative audience reaction towards the Rumble match and its winner, which some media outlets described as being even worse than the 2014 event. When Daniel Bryan was eliminated in the first half of the match, the crowd repeatedly chanted his name for the second half of the match while booing other wrestlers making their entrance to the match, including eventual winner Roman Reigns. Reigns, who had been portrayed as a heroic character, was booed after winning the main event, even after he received The Rock's endorsement, and The Rock was heckled for helping Reigns. Also, many fans took to social media to display their displeasure at Bryan's elimination and the winner of the Rumble match.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: After the Royal Rumble event, CM Punk did not appear and was not mentioned on "Raw" the next day. Despite being advertised for the "SmackDown" taping on Tuesday, he also did not appear in front of the live audience. By Wednesday, WWE.com stopped advertising Punk for future events. It was reported by the "Wrestling Observer" that on Monday, Punk had legitimately walked out on WWE when he informed Vince McMahon that he was "going home". On February 20, McMahon indicated to investors that Punk was "taking a sabbatical". However, in an interview published in late May, Punk indicated that he had retired; he was questioned "How does it feel to be retired at 35?" and replied with "It feels good." Punk's WWE contract subsequently expired in July 2014, thus making the Royal Rumble his final on-screen appearance.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: However, on an episode of Colt Cabana's "Art of Wrestling" podcast released in November 2014, Punk said that he was suspended for two months after walking out on the company in January and that after the suspension ended, nobody from WWE contacted him. Punk also told that when he reached out to them for unpaid royalties, he was given a run-around by company executives until he was handed his termination papers and was fired by WWE on his wedding day with April Mendez (better known as AJ Lee) in June 2014. The manner of firing was the last straw for Punk, stating that he would never return to WWE and that following a legal settlement with WWE there would be no further working relationship between them. The settlement included Punk giving WWE permission to sell his remaining merchandise. Punk subsequently signed a contract to compete in the UFC in 2015. Punk has not appeared on WWE programming since then, though he did have multiple appearances on WWE Backstage, a show broadcast by Fox Sports, who have a television deal with WWE. However, on August 20, 2021, Punk returned to professional wrestling when he signed with All Elite Wrestling during "The First Dance" edition of its weekly program "Rampage".


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: The post-Rumble "Raw" on January 27 began with Triple H and Stephanie McMahon (The Authority) addressing the Rumble event and mocking the audience for not getting what they wanted. When Daniel Bryan came out and confronted them about not being inserted into the Rumble match, and then demanded to be inserted into the Elimination Chamber match and refused to leave the ring until they did, he was attacked by the Shield, but was then saved by John Cena and Sheamus. As a result, Bryan, Cena and Sheamus later teamed together to take on the Shield in a 6-man tag match in which all three members of the winning team qualified to participate in the Elimination Chamber match (in which Randy Orton would defend his WWE World Heavyweight Championship) at the eponymous pay-per-view. During that match, The Wyatt Family interfered, causing the Shield to be disqualified and thus Bryan, Cena and Sheamus qualified for the Chamber match. Cesaro and a returning Christian also qualified for the Chamber match by defeating Dolph Ziggler and Jack Swagger respectively. For costing them the spots in the Chamber match, the Shield vowed revenge against the Wyatt Family, which set up a match between the groups at the Elimination Chamber pay-per-view.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: At Elimination Chamber, Randy Orton retained his WWE World Heavyweight Championship by winning the Elimination Chamber match against Daniel Bryan, John Cena, Cesaro, Christian and Sheamus. During the Elimination Chamber match, the Wyatt Family once again interfered to cause Cena's elimination from the match. Also at Elimination Chamber, Batista defeated Alberto Del Rio, with the negative audience reaction to Batista continuing, even prompting the audience to cheer Del Rio. Meanwhile, Bray Wyatt was victorious once again with the Wyatt Family defeating the Shield.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: Because of the boisterous negative reaction, Batista responded to the audience on the February 28 episode of "SmackDown", saying he didn't come back to be liked, only to be the next WWE World Heavyweight Champion, thus turning into a villain in the process. The scheduled WrestleMania XXX main event was Orton versus Batista for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship. However, on the March 10 episode of "Raw", Bryan and multiple fans "occupied" the ring and refused to leave, resulting in an irate Triple H agreeing to Bryan's demand for a match at WrestleMania, with the stipulation that the winner would be inserted into the WWE World Heavyweight Championship match at the event. At WrestleMania, Bryan was added to the match after defeating Triple H in the opening contest of the show, and would ultimately win the triple threat match, forcing Batista to submit and win the WWE World Heavyweight Championship. On May 12, Daniel Bryan announced that due to injuries, he would require neck surgery, which he underwent on May 15. Bryan was stripped of the WWE World Heavyweight Championship by the Authority on June 9 as he was not healthy enough to defend his championship.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: Cody Rhodes and Goldust failed to regain the WWE Tag Team Championship from The New Age Outlaws on the post-Rumble "Raw", as the match ended in no contest after Brock Lesnar attacked Rhodes and Goldust. The following week, they received another rematch for the titles in a steel cage match, which the Outlaws won. The Outlaws' reign ended on the March 3 episode of "Raw", when The Usos won the Tag Team Championship.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: Following Elimination Chamber, Wyatt feuded with Cena, with Wyatt wanting to prove that Cena's heroic act was a facade characteristic of "this era of lies" while also trying to turn Cena into a "monster". Wyatt went on to accept Cena's challenge for a match at WrestleMania XXX, which Cena won despite interference from Luke Harper and Erick Rowan. In May at Extreme Rules, Wyatt defeated Cena in a steel cage match, after repeated interference from the rest of The Wyatt Family and a "demonic" child. Their feud ended at Payback on June 1, where, in a Last Man Standing match, Cena buried Wyatt under multiple equipment cases to win the match. Cena won the vacated WWE World Heavyweight Championship at Money in the Bank on June 29.


title: Royal Rumble (2014)

text: On the February 24 episode of "Raw", Brock Lesnar and his manager Paul Heyman voiced their complaints about Lesnar not being in the WWE World Heavyweight Championship match at WrestleMania. Instead, the Authority offered Lesnar a contract to face anyone else at WrestleMania. They were interrupted by a returning Undertaker, who confronted Lesnar. While Lesnar signed the contract for a match at WrestleMania with The Undertaker as his opponent, The Undertaker accepted Lesnar's challenge by stabbing Lesnar with a pen and chokeslamming him through a table. This set up a match where Lesnar would attempt to break the Undertaker's 21–0 undefeated streak at WrestleMania. Lesnar defeated Undertaker after executing three F5s, thus ending the streak. In August 2014, Lesnar defeated John Cena at SummerSlam, capturing the WWE World Heavyweight Championship in the process.


title: Gang signal

text: A gang signal, also known as a gang sign, is a verbal or visual way gang members identify their affiliation. This can take many forms including slogans, hand signs, colored clothing and graffiti. The wearer usually favors, or is in, that particular gang. Many of these, especially slogans and hand signs, have become part of popular culture, especially in African American hip hop culture.


title: Gang signal

text: "Throwing up" a gang sign (e.g., "Stacking", "page", "gang walk") with the hands is one of the most known and obvious forms of "claiming" or stating the gang one is affiliated with. It is used in many situations where other identifiers may not be possible or appropriate, and it can also show that a gang member is in the area to "do business" as opposed to just passing through. Usually these signs are made by formation of the fingers on one or both hands to make some sort of symbol or letter. It can also serve to relay more specific information, such as what set they represent within a larger gang or in which activities they are currently taking part. Individual letters can be used to tell stories when flashed in rapid succession, each representing a word beginning with that letter. These signs, because they are displayed only when wanted (as opposed to the types of identifiers above), are usually the most consistent across various areas. Many of these hand signals are quite close to other common hand signs, and this can cause confusion among gang members, non-gang members, and anti-gang authorities.


title: Gang signal

text: Another identifier that can be displayed only when desired is a gang handshake, which usually includes some component of the gang hand signs and/or other hand and finger symbols.


title: Gang signal

text: Clothing is a strong signal that all gangs show. The clothing gangs wear allows rival gangs to identify who is friend and who is foe. For example, the uniforms for many Hispanic gangs are standard and easily recognizable. Gangs such as the Latin Kings would wear long yellow T-shirts, baggy pants, and either a bandana or a hat, sometimes both. Black gang members are generally more individualistic with their clothing. The gang would wear specific clothing and certain accessories that would match their crew's colors. Most gang members wear brands such as Pro Club, Dickies, and Levi's.


title: Gang signal

text: Bandanas can be worn in various types of colors and ways. This is done by gang members to signify which gang they are affiliated with. The most popular bandana colors are red, blue, black, white, grey, and yellow. It is typically worn on the left or right back pockets of gang members. They can also be worn as a camp mask by wrapping around the head so only the eyes show.


title: Gang signal

text: Gang members will often get tattoos to represent their gang, or subset of a gang which can include markings related to the street their set is from, or a nickname of the neighborhood given by a gang. For example, members of the Maniac Latin Disciples set known as "Rata World" may get a tattoo of the street their set originates from.


title: Gang signal

text: Around the 1970s to 1990s, it was common for some of Chicago's strongest street gangs to create custom varsity sweaters to represent their gang. This trend however eventually died out due to gang members in the Chicago area being robbed, beaten, or even killed by rival gangs due to the increased status of having an rival's varsity jacket- the implication being that the victim was too weak or cowardly to keep it.


title: Gang signal

text: Another common gang identifier in 1970s to 1990s Chicago were business cards. Street gangs often used these cards in order to present themselves as businessmen, or in the case of gangs like the Almighty Gaylords, were used to intimidate rivals with text telling rival gang members to hand over their gang sweaters.


title: Gang signal

text: Outlaw motorcycle clubs, and even some street gangs from New York City and New Zealand have been known to wears vests with patches representing their gangs. These vests can come in a variety of materials such as denim or leather.


title: Gang signal

text: Tracksuits are common among street gangs and criminals in Russia since the 1980s. They later become a staple feature of a criminal-derived subculture known as gopnik.


title: Type 22 frigate

text: The Type 22 frigate also known as the "Broadsword" class was a class of frigates built for the British Royal Navy. Fourteen were built in total, with production divided into three batches.


title: Type 22 frigate

text: Initially intended to be anti-submarine warfare frigates as part of NATO contribution, the ships became general purpose warships.


title: Type 22 frigate

text: Five Type 22s were scrapped and two more were sunk as targets. The seven other vessels were sold to the Brazilian, Romanian and Chilean navies; five of these remain in service, one was sunk as a target and one sold for scrap.


title: Type 22 frigate

text: It was originally envisaged that all Type 22s would have names beginning with 'B' ("Broadsword", etc.), following the 'A' names used for Type 21 frigates ("Amazon", etc.). This changed after the Falklands War when two replacement ships were ordered for the destroyers sunk ("Sheffield" and "Coventry") and were named to commemorate them. Another vessel ordered earlier but not yet started, which was to be named "Bloodhound" was renamed "London".


title: Type 22 frigate

text: The alphabetical progression was re-established with the Batch 3 ships ("Cornwall", etc.) before being temporarily abandoned with the Type 23 class, named after Dukedoms ("Norfolk", "Lancaster", etc.). The Royal Navy's latest escort class – the Type 45 or "Daring" class – have re-introduced the alphabetical progression, using destroyer names from the 1930s and 1950s.


title: Type 22 frigate

text: The names selected for the four Batch 3 ships were a mixture: two, "Cornwall" and "Cumberland", revived County-class names previously carried both by First World War-era armoured cruisers, and by Second World War-era heavy cruisers. The other Batch 3s, "Chatham" and "Campbeltown", were Town names, the former reviving a 1911 light cruiser name, and the latter commemorating famous for participation in the St Nazaire Raid in 1942; the name for HMS "Chatham" was selected as a salute to the Medway town, where the Chatham Dockyard, established in 1570, had closed in 1984.


title: Type 22 frigate

text: The Type 22 was designed to be a specialist anti-submarine warfare vessel as part of the Royal Navy's contribution to NATO. During Royal Navy service the ships evolved into general purpose frigates with weapons for use against other surface ships, aircraft and submarines. They were built in three batches giving rise to three sub-classes, the first "Broadsword" of four ships, the second "Boxer" of six ships and the third and final, "Cornwall" of four ships. During their Royal Navy service the ships had enhanced command, control and co-ordination facilities that resulted in their often being used as flagships on deployments.


title: Type 22 frigate

text: The four "Broadsword"s were sold to Brazil in the mid 1990s. In the early 2000s Romania acquired and modernised two of the Batch 2 ships, while a third was purchased by Chile.


title: Type 22 frigate

text: Following the cancellation of the aircraft carrier programme CVA-01 in 1966, the Royal Navy undertook a reappraisal of the surface fleet, and concluded that the following five new ship types were required:


title: Type 22 frigate

text: Of these, the air defence destroyer appeared to had been given highest priority, the imperative being to get Sea Dart to sea in numbers to replace the air defence capability which would be lost with the retirement of the carrier fleet.


title: Type 22 frigate

text: Due to the workload of the Admiralty design department in the 1960s, a private design (Type 21) was purchased as an interim stop-gap whilst the Type 22 was under development. The design process, already hampered by the priority given to the Type 21 and the urgently needed Type 42, was further protracted by attempts to produce a common Anglo-Dutch design. The first Type 22 order was placed in 1972 with Yarrow Shipbuilders; Yarrow undertook much of the detailed design work whilst overall responsibility remained with the Ship Department at Bath.


title: Type 22 frigate

text: The length of the first four Type 22s was dictated by the dimensions of the undercover Frigate Refit Complex at Devonport Dockyard. The ships would be powered by a combination of Olympus and Tyne gas turbines in a COGOG (combined gas turbine or gas turbine) arrangement. Machinery spaces were sited as far aft as possible to minimise shaft lengths. The after configuration was dictated by the requirement for a large hangar and a full-width flight deck. Electrical power was provided by GEC generators powered by four Paxman Ventura 16YJCAZ diesel engines, each rated at 1MW.


title: Type 22 frigate

text: Weapons fit was determined by the primary ASW role combined with a perceived need for a general purpose capability. The principal ASW weapons systems were the ship's Westland Lynx helicopter and triple torpedo tubes (STWS), with the large Type 2016 sonar a key part of the sensor fit. Air defence was provided in the form of two 'six-pack' launchers for the Seawolf (GWS 25) point-defence missile system. Surface warfare requirements were met by the provision of four Exocet missile launchers, the standard RN fit at that time. A pair of 40 mm L/60 Bofors were fitted in the first batch for patrolling and "junk-busting" on summer Indian Ocean deployments, but proved an impediment in the Falklands War where Type 22 captains considered they interfered with concentrating on the Seawolf setup.


title: Type 22 frigate

text: The "Broadsword" design was unique to the Royal Navy in lacking a main gun armament. Although some of the "Leander"-class frigates had lost their main gun armament during upgrades, was the first to be designed from the beginning without a large-calibre gun turret.


title: Type 22 frigate

text: Ordering of Type 22s proceeded slowly, in part because of the comparatively high unit cost of the ships. The unit cost of the last Type 12Ms () had been about £10m; Type 21s cost around £20m each; when the first Type 22s were ordered, unit costs were estimated at £30m though, by the time that the first ship ("Broadsword") commissioned in 1979, inflation had driven this figure up to £68m, which was far higher than the cost of the contemporary Type 42s (, also commissioned in 1979, cost £40m).


title: Type 22 frigate

text: After the first four ("Batch I") ships, the design was "stretched", with the Frigate Refit Complex suitably enlarged. Visually, and in addition to the increase in length, the biggest difference was the sharply raked stem, usually indicative of bow sonar though none of the Batch II ships was thus fitted. An important addition to the Batch II group was a new computer assisted command system (CACS-1), replacing the CAAIS fitted to the Batch I ships. This could track up to 500 targets, including those detected by the ships' new Type 2031Z passive towed array sonar and ESM The most significant change in this group of six Type 22 frigates is much more sophisticated electronic warfare systems, particularly the Classic Outboard system for the intercept of Soviet naval and submarine communications. This very sophisticated and specialised versions of the Type 22 were specifically approved by the Prime Minister James Callaghan. The larger hull also improved sea keeping, but never achieved the expected quietness with towed arrays due to failure to raft mount the diesel generators. This would be important in operations in the Greenland-Iceland-UK gap where the ships were expected to play an important role in preventing and monitoring the passage of Soviet naval units at a critical stage of the Cold War. A revised machinery installation was adopted from onwards, with Rolls-Royce Spey turbines replacing the previous Rolls-Royce Olympus. The future machinery arrangement would be Combined Gas turbine And Gas turbine (COGAG). Further improvements from HMS "Brave" onwards included a taller helicopter hangar, giving the ships the ability to carry a single Westland Sea King or EH101 Merlin instead of two Lynx. By 1982, the quoted unit cost of a Type 22 had risen to £127m.


title: Type 22 frigate

text: "Broadsword" and "Brilliant" participated in the Falklands War and replacements for the ships lost in the South Atlantic were all Type 22s.


title: Type 22 frigate

text: The four Batch III ships – "Cornwall", "Cumberland", "Campbeltown" and "Chatham" – were completed to a revised design which reflected lessons learned in the Falklands War. The weapons fit was changed, becoming more optimised for a general warfare role. The only major weapon systems shared with the previous vessels were the pair of six-cell Seawolf launchers and the torpedo tubes. The ships were fitted with a 4.5-inch (113 mm) Mk.8 gun, primarily to provide naval gunfire support for forces on land. Exocet was replaced by the superior Harpoon with eight GWS 60 missile launchers fitted laterally abaft the bridge, and each ship carried a 30 mm Goalkeeper CIWS to provide last-ditch defence against anti-ship missiles.


title: Type 22 frigate

text: Electrical power in Batch 3 ships is provided by Paxman Valenta 12RPA200 diesel engines, replacing the Ventura engines used on earlier ships.


title: Type 22 frigate

text: In their final form, the Type 22s were the largest frigates built to date for the Royal Navy. Reflecting this, Type 22s were often deployed as flagships for NATO Task Groups.


title: Type 22 frigate

text: On 11 January 1985, Mr. Dalyell asked the Secretary of State for Defence: "what is the latest cost estimate of a type 22 frigate, with stores, spare parts and ammunition." The Secretary of State for Defence, Mr. Lee, replied: "The average cost of a batch III type 22 frigate is currently estimated at about £140 million at 1984–85 prices. The cost of embarked helicopters, the first outfit of stores, spare parts and ammunition are estimated at about £18 million at the same price level."


title: Type 22 frigate

text: In February 1998, in response to a written question in parliament by Mike Hancock, the Minister of State for the Armed Forces, Dr John Reid said: "Type 22 frigates achieved approximately 82 to 86 per cent. average availability for operational service in each of the last five years. This discounts time spent in planned maintenance."


title: Type 22 frigate

text: In May 2000, the Secretary of State for Defence was asked the planned service life of "London", "Beaver, " Boxer, and " Brave" and the forecast date for withdrawal from Royal Navy service, "prior to the decision in the Strategic Defence Review to dispose of them." The Minister of State for the Armed Forces, John Spellar, replied in a written answer: "The planned service for each ship was 18 years" and The additional information is given in the table." Note that the 18 years was dated from the date of acceptance, not the date first commissioned.


title: Type 22 frigate

text: In July 2000, the Secretary of State for Defence was asked when he planned to withdraw the remaining Type 22 Batch II frigates from service. The Minister of State for the Armed Forces, John Spellar, replied that HMS "Sheffield" would be withdrawn in 2012 and superseded by a Type 45 destroyer, "Coventry" in 2001 superseded by HMS "St. Albans", a Type 23 frigate


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: The 2004 Canadian federal election was held on June 28, 2004, to elect members to the House of Commons of Canada of the 38th Parliament of Canada. The Liberal government of Prime Minister Paul Martin lost its majority but was able to continue in office as a minority government after the election. This was the first election contested by the newly amalgamated Conservative Party of Canada, after it was formed by the two right-of-centre parties, the Progressive Conservative Party and the Canadian Alliance.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: On May 23, 2004, the governor general, Adrienne Clarkson, on the advice of Martin, ordered the dissolution of the House of Commons, triggering an early election despite the Liberals being only three and a half years into their five-year mandate. Earlier, the election result was widely expected to be a fourth consecutive majority government for the Liberals, but early in 2004 Liberal popularity fell sharply due to the emerging details of the sponsorship scandal. Polls even started to indicate the possibility of a Conservative minority government. In the end, the Liberals won a minority government, though they were well short of a majority and lost nearly three dozen seats.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: On election day, polling times were arranged to allow results from most provinces to be announced more or less simultaneously, with the exception of Atlantic Canada, whose results were known before the close of polling in other provinces due to the British Columbia Supreme Court's decision in "R v Bryan".


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: Until the sponsorship scandal, most pundits were predicting that new Prime Minister Paul Martin would lead the Liberal Party of Canada to a fourth majority government, possibly setting a record for number of seats won.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: However, polls released immediately after the scandal broke showed Liberal support down as much as 10% nationwide, with greater declines in its heartland of Quebec and Ontario. Although there was some recovery in Ontario and Atlantic Canada, Liberal hopes of making unprecedented gains in the west faded. The unpopularity of some provincial Liberal parties may also have had an effect on federal Liberal fortunes. In Ontario, for instance, the provincial Liberal government introduced an unpopular budget the week of the expected election call, and their federal counterparts then fell into a statistical dead heat with the Conservatives in polls there. The Liberals were also harmed by high-profile party infighting that had been plaguing the party since Martin's earlier ejection from Cabinet by now-former Prime Minister Jean Chrétien.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: In the final months of 2003, the Progressive Conservatives and the Canadian Alliance were running a distant third and fourth, respectively, in public opinion polls.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: Many pundits predicted that the combination of the popular and fiscally conservative Martin, along with continued vote-splitting on the right, could have led to the almost total annihilation of the Progressive Conservatives and Canadian Alliance. This fear prompted those two parties to form a united Conservative Party of Canada, which was approved by the members of the Canadian Alliance on December 5, 2003, and controversially by the delegates of the Progressive Conservatives on December 6, 2003.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: The new Conservative Party pulled well ahead of the NDP in the polls just before the election, although its support remained below the combined support that the Progressive Conservatives and the Alliance had as separate parties. On March 20, the Conservatives elected Stephen Harper as their new leader.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: The Conservatives gained more ground in polls after Harper became leader, and the poll results in the weeks before the election had them within one to two points of the Liberals, sometimes ahead, sometimes behind them. Party supporters hoped that the voters would react negatively to the Liberal attacks on what they called Harper's "hidden agenda", and that anger over the sponsorship scandal and other Liberal failures would translate to success at the polls.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: Late in the campaign, the Conservatives began to lose some momentum, in part due to remarks made by MPs. Scott Reid, the party's language critic, said that the policy of official bilingualism was unrealistic and needed to be reformed. Rob Merrifield, health critic, suggested that women ought to have mandatory family counseling before they choose to have an abortion. Randy White was quoted as saying "to heck with the courts" in reference to "Reference Re Same-Sex Marriage", suggesting the party would overturn same-sex marriage. Cheryl Gallant drew controversy when she compared abortion to the beheading of Iraq War hostage Nick Berg, and called for the repeal of recently-amended hate laws that include sexual orientation as one of the protected groups. Additionally, the Liberal Party began airing controversial TV ads. Harper was also criticized for his position supporting the American-led 2003 invasion of Iraq. The term "hidden agenda", used commonly in the 2000 election to refer to Stockwell Day, began surfacing with increasing regularity with regard to Harper's history of supporting privatized health care. Further damaging the Conservative campaign was a press release from Conservative headquarters that suggested that Paul Martin supported child pornography. The momentum began to swing against his party, although some polls suggested it was neck and neck right up until election day.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: Although on the eve of the election the party was polling slightly ahead of the Liberals everywhere west of Quebec, it had dropped in support, polling behind or on par with Liberals everywhere except the West (Alberta, British Columbia, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba), where it held onto its traditional support.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: All together the new Conservatives fell from the combined Canadian Alliance-Progressive Conservative vote in 2000 of 37%, to only 29% of the vote, yet still gained 21 extra seats, finishing in second-place with 99 seats.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: Before the announcement of the union of the right-of-centre parties, some were predicting that the New Democratic Party (Canada) would form the official opposition because the NDP was polling ahead of both right-of-centre parties. A new leader (Jack Layton) and clear social democratic policies helped revitalize the NDP. Polls suggested that the NDP had returned to the 18% to 20% level of support it enjoyed in the 1984 election and 1988 election. Layton suggested that the NDP would break their previous record of 43 seats won under former leader Ed Broadbent.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: The NDP focused the campaign on winning ridings in Canada's urban centres, hoping especially to win seats in central Toronto, Hamilton, Ottawa and Winnipeg. The party's platform was built to cater to these regions and much of Layton's time was spent in these areas.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: The campaign stumbled early when Layton blamed the deaths of homeless people on Paul Martin, prompting the Liberals to accuse the NDP of negative campaigning. The NDP benefited from the decline in Liberal support, but not to the same extent as the Conservatives. There was an increasing prospect that NDP voters would switch to the Liberals to block a Conservative government. This concern did not manifest itself in the polls, however, and the NDP remained at somewhat below 20 percent mark in the polls for most of the campaign.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: The NDP achieved 15% of the popular vote, its highest in 16 years. However, it only won 19 seats in the House of Commons, two less than the 21 won in 1997, and far short of the 40 predicted. There was criticism that Layton's focus on urban issues and gay rights marginalized the party's traditional emphasis on the poor, the working class, and rural Canadians. Long-time MP Lorne Nystrom and several other incumbents from the Prairie provinces were defeated, with the NDP being shut out of Saskatchewan for the first time since 1965. Layton won his own seat in a tight race, while Broadbent was returned to Parliament after many years of absence.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: The Bloc Québécois (BQ) had managed their best showing back in 1993, but they lost seats to the Liberals in 1997 and 2000, prompting pundits to suggest a decline in support for Quebec sovereignty. The Bloc continued to slide in the polls in most of 2003 after the election of the federalist Quebec Liberal Party at the National Assembly of Quebec under Jean Charest, and during the long run-up to Paul Martin becoming leader of the federal Liberals.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: However, things progressively changed during 2003, partly because of the decline in popularity of the Liberal Party of Quebec government of Jean Charest, and partly because support for independence in Quebec rose again (49% in March). The tide took its sharp turn when, in February 2004, the sponsorship scandal (uncovered in considerable part by the Bloc) hit the Liberal federal government.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: These events led to a resurgence of the BQ, putting it ahead of the pack once again: according to an Ipsos-Reid poll carried out for "The Globe and Mail" and CTV between the June 4 and 8, 50% of Quebecers intended to vote for the BQ against 24% for the Liberals.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: Speculation was ongoing about the possibility of the Bloc forming alliances with other opposition parties or with an eventual minority government to promote its goals of social democracy and respect of the autonomy of provinces. Leader Gilles Duceppe stated that the Bloc, as before, would co-operate with other opposition parties or with the government when interests were found to be in common, but that the Bloc would not participate in a coalition government.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: The Greens ran candidates in all 308 ridings for the first time in its history. The party won twice as many votes in this election than it had over the previous 21 years of its history combined, although it failed to win a seat. It also spent more money than in the previous 21 years, and although much of this money was borrowed, the Greens' share of the popular vote enabled them to receive federal funding.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: These are the official slogans for the 2004 campaigns. The optional parts of the mottos (sometimes not used for efficiency) are put in brackets.


title: 2004 Canadian federal election

text: In 2004, a federal party required 155 of the 308 seats to form a majority government in Canada. The Liberals came short of this number, winning 135. Until extremely close ridings were decided on the west coast, it appeared as though the Liberals' seat total, if combined with that of the left-wing New Democratic Party (NDP), would be sufficient to hold a majority in the House of Commons. In the end, the Conservatives won Vancouver Island North, West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast, and New Westminster-Coquitlam, after trailing in all three ridings, as preliminary results were announced through the evening.