Canada Missing Women

The issue of violence against Aboriginal women is my chosen subtopic that strongly contributes to the history of Aboriginal women’s struggle for rights and identity in Canada. To search relevant newspaper articles for this topic, the databases that were used were Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe, as well as Canadian Newsstand Major Dailies. The reason these two databases were chosen was because Canadian Newsstand offered articles from multiple newspapers in the country, therefore providing me with diverse news in different provinces other than Ontario. The article I obtained from Canadian Newsstand was Canada Called on to Stop Violence Against Aboriginal Women from the Leader Post newspaper in Saskatchewan. Lexis Nexus provided one article I

Canada is a nation of opportunity and freedom. People from all around the world immigrate to Canada to start a new life, to get away from war or poverty. Canada opens their arms to them and accepts them, and gives them money to get them started. But how about those who were here from the very beginning, before anyone else landed in Canada; the ones that are called First Nation people, or Aboriginals? What is the government doing for them? Why are First Nations people suffering the worst in Canada? “55.6% of the poor are aboriginals and a lot of them live in reserves around Canada that Canadian government have put them in. For those who leave the reserves to get a better living the suffer from racism from Canadian society” (“Aboriginal”).

For the past forty years, women have been reported murdered or missing along the highway 16 corridor in Northern British Columbia. The 724- kilometer stretch of road from Prince George to Prince Rupert was given the name “the highway of tears”. In the documentary Highway of Tears by Matt Smiley, the focus of the documentary was to set out and find the root cause of the disappearances and murders and to shed light on the real issue of violence against women and systematic racism in the justice system. The documentary looks at true stories of women who have gone missing or have been murdered along the highway of tears. The documentary focuses on how the highway of tears is the core of a much larger problem of how the indigenous population has been treated since colonialism. (Smiley, 2015) This essay will focus on summarizing the documentary, showing the correlation between the injustice the women and their families have faced and the mainstream and critical theories of victimization, and provide a critical reflection.

In Canada, there has been an on going concern in the matter of missing and murdered Indigenous women. Although many First nations individuals have many barriers placed upon them by society, the government and many other institutions. Indigenous women face many of these barriers very harshly. Aboriginal women are vulnerable to many different forms of abuse because of not only being female but also due to issues such as poverty. First nations citizens have been faced with extreme difficulties throughout every aspect of their lives. These difficulties ultimately include the discrimination they face daily from police services, lack of resources in order to assist their need, etc. There have been many problems which have lead up to the social problem of missing and murdered Indigenous women which include the historical upbringing of our First nations population, and unfortunately through recent factors as well. Theories like the feminist theory assist in the debunking of this problem and give us a brief insight into the situation. To this day, the very serious issue of missing and murdered Indigenous women is a key issue, which has been left with many cases unsolved. This in part clearly demonstrates the lack of efforts put in place by Canadian police in order to combat this problem. A case, which raised serious problems in North America, is the case of Lisa, a young Metis woman who at the age of fifteen disappeared walking home from a shopping trip, to which she was never found.

Aboriginal persons in Canada have been facing oppression ever since colonization began. Even when Canada gained independence from the British Empire, the oppression continued and still goes on today. One major contributing factor to the oppression of Aboriginal people in Canada is the actions taken by the Government. The Government of Canada has in fact mistreated and found to be partaking in wrongdoing when dealing with the Aboriginal population in this country. With this ugly truth being revealed, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission had to be tasked with discovering and revealing past wrongdoing by a government in the hope of resolving conflict left over from the past. (cite)

Canada ­as a nation is known to the world for being loving, courteous, and typically very welcoming of all ethnicities. Nevertheless, the treatment of Canada’s Indigenous population over the past decades, appears to suggest otherwise. Indigenous people have been tormented and oppressed by the Canadian society for hundreds of years and remain to live under discrimination resulting in cultural brutality. This, and more, has caused severe negative cultural consequences, psychological and sociological effects. The history of the seclusion of Indigenous people has played a prominent aspect in the development and impact of how Indigenous people are treated and perceived in today’s society. Unfortunately, our history with respect to the treatment of Indigenous communities is not something in which we should take pride in. The Indian Act of 1876 is an excellent model of how the behavior of racial and cultural superiority attributed to the destruction of Indigenous culture and beliefs. The Indian Act established by the Canadian government is a policy of Aboriginal assimilation which compels Indigenous parents under threat of prosecution to integrate their children into Residential Schools. As a nation, we are reminded by past actions that has prompted the weakening of the identity of Indigenous peoples. Residential schools has also contributed to the annihilation of Indigenous culture which was to kill the Indian in the child by isolating them from the influence of their parents and

The Government of Canada preaches about being a free nation for equality for all yet they continue to ignore the 1200-4000 missing and/or murder Indigenous women in the past 30 years. These women are trapped in a cycle of poverty, abuse and fear and this will only continue to get worse.

“Where are they taking me, mom?! Help!” These were the screams of an Aboriginal child when he was dragged to a car that drove him away from his family. Aboriginal kids were forcefully abducted and placed at poorly built and equipped residential schools. Residential schools are a network of boarding schools for Indigenous peoples. Like a disease, these schools spread so fast on Canadian land. They were every Indigenous child’s nightmare. Kids who attended were traumatized due to the mental, physical, and sexual abuse they suffered. Canadians felt superior to Aboriginals which lead them to use their power excessively to civilize these communities. This issue is considered to be one of the darkest chapters in Canadian history. It has a significant impact on Aboriginal communities. Indians suffered a loss of culture and identity. This issue violates various human rights such as; Freedom of language, freedom of culture and religion, freedom of choice, and the freedom of safety and health. The two groups in this controversy are the aggressors; Canadian government, and it’s churches, and the victims; the aboriginals. The question is, is the Canadian government doing enough to make it up to those who suffered the ill effects of residential schools?

Abigail Andrews. Amanda Bartlett. Amber Guiboche. The list of missing and murdered Indigenous women goes on (CBC, 2016). With an independent national inquiry now underway, hope is in the air to expose the social and historical factors to decode the systemic causes of violence that these women experience, and the impacts of institutional practices and polices.

“These folks have been victimized twice. Once when their daughters, their sisters, their mothers have gone missing. And then, a second time when the justice system has utterly failed them in the pursuit of the justice they so rightly deserve. There can be no solution until we get to the truth in the heart of the matter, that this is a complex issue. The sources of this violence against Aboriginal women and girls is complex, but it… there’s no possibility of finding those solutions unless we actually have the truth on the table. And the resistance from this government time and time again, to have the courage and the leadership to approach this conversation and find that truth… is yet a third victimization of these families” (Pope C. & Smiley M., 2015)

On October 15th 2013 the United Nations special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples, James Anaya, released a statement upon the conclusion of his visit to Canada. In his statement, Anaya reveals that “from all I have learned, I can only conclude that Canada faces a crisis when it comes to the situation of indigenous peoples of the country” (2013:8). Even though Canada was one of the first countries to extend constitutional protection to the rights of indigenous people, Canadian aboriginals experience a well-being gap. Aboriginal teens are more likely to commit suicide; Aboriginal women are

Women no matter where they are in the world are too often victims of violence. They face higher rates than men both if it is sexual assault, stalking, or severe spousal abuse and usually the results are that women will end up extremely injured or dead. With young women suffering the highest rates of violence, Aboriginal women in particular face an increased risk of violence compared to non-Aboriginal women. Aboriginal women in Canada are three times more likely to experience crucial and severe violence compared to non-Aboriginal women. Most of these women end up missing and murdered. The predicaments of missing and murdered Aboriginal women has brought tremendous pain and suffering in homes, in families and throughout Aboriginal communities. Many sources and factors have contributed to hindering solving this issue. Media and discrimination have long been known to have played a huge role in this tragedy.

She argues that women face many institutional and societal barriers. In this regard, I will give examples of the institutional and structural barriers such as “The Indian Act” which have significantly affected Indigenous women in Canada in many ways including social, economic and political. While comparing feminists and Indigenous feminists, I think that Native women are different in several ways including social, cultural, historical, political and economic; therefore, Indigenous feminism is a way of practicing the values that they have been taught and inherited from their

In 2016 the Prime Minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau, established the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls (MMIWG). The primary goal of the MMIWG is to “ examine and report on the systemic causes of all forms of violence against Indigenous women and girls”(Find The Truth). This National Inquiry is of the utmost importance for most indigenous peoples, and it was highly sought after for quite some time. Now that Trudeau has established the Inquiry, who does it affect? Also, while the indigenous peoples rejoice at the new found hope, what does any of this have to do with the rest of Canada?

In April 1995 Pamela George, an Ojibway women, was brutally murdered in Saskatchewan. Her murderers Steven Kummerfield and Alex Ternowetsky, young middle-class white men, were convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to merely six and a half years in prison. George’s story is one of the many Indigenous women who have been murdered or missing over the past years. There are over 580 cases of missing and murdered Indigenous women, close to half are put aside and left unsolved. Only 53% of these cases have lead to charges of homicide (Klement 8). Drastically, statistics indicate that Aboriginals are faced with more hardships throughout their life compared to the average Canadian. Indigenous groups, particularly women, suffer from a lower rate of education, higher suicide rates and an array of health risks. This paper will examine the role settler colonization history has played in perpetuating conditions for violence to indigenous women, many of which are still experienced today. This will be accomplished by first assessing the history of settler colonization and its negative repercussions. Secondly, it will use Sherene Razak’s concept of “spatial segregation,” to illustrate how state institutions have facilitated violence through space, race and the law. Lastly, this paper will use evidence from the film “Finding Dawn” to further demonstrate how violence towards indigenous women is institutionally produced.