As Bandar Osman wrote last week, Indigenous communities are especially important to Canada and the identity it longs to uphold: a country with extremely diverse culture and respect interwoven within it. We do not resemble this ideal as much as we would like to, but it’s not impossible to get there. One of the most important promises of this kind we must continue to hold the Liberal government to is the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women.
I would like to preface my discussion of this issue with the fact that I am not a member of the Indigenous community. I am white, and write from a place of many privileges. But this widespread, national matter is just that—a systemic and violent problem perpetuated in all places across Canada.
Indigenous women have been the victims of mysterious disappearances, violence, and murder for many, many years. The circumstances of these are almost always suspicious. According to a study completed between 2000-08 by the Native Women’s Association of Canada, Native girls and women made up 10 per cent of Canada’s female homicide rate, despite only making up three per cent of the total female population. Keep in mind that this staggering statistic only addresses cases of confirmed homicide. The actual numbers of missing and murdered Indigenous women are believed to be much higher than the 1,181 cases reported by the RCMP between 1980 and 2012.
The National Inquiry is supposed to examine the systemic nature of this horror, looking at how sexism, racism, poverty, illness, addiction, and many other factors have led to so many innocent women being subject to extreme violence and left largely without justice. The study will also go into previous culturally traumatic events inflicted by the Canadian government, like residential schools and the nutritional experiments of the 1960s, to name a few. Having the inquiry underway is a huge step in the right direction, with the Canadian government for the first time acknowledging the disturbing nature of these crimes, how long and often they occur, and how we may prevent them from happening in the future.
Many people still protest the government backing of this endeavour, questioning why the study should focus on Indigenous women when Indigenous men have heightened violence rates as well. Others purport that Indigenous women are more prone to disappear or get themselves in trouble as vulnerable members of a “vagrant culture.”
There are many reasons why these protests are invalid. It is by request of many Indigenous communities that the study be focused on the women of their community. As a matriarchal culture and as a movement led predominantly by Native women justice for women means taking better care of their communities and families, according to Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak Cheif Sheila North Wilson.
The other excuse is based entirely on stereotypes of Indigenous Peoples and ignorance of the vast reach and effects of this problem, and sadly seems to find its way into many of the police cases with violence against Indigenous women.
It is frightening to live in a country where women are mysteriously found at the bottom of rivers or go missing from a walk along the roadside and justice is rarely sought, let alone found. All in all, it is incredibly important not only to hold the Liberal government to their promise of making a thorough investigation of the causes behind one of Canada’s greatest ongoing social issues, but that we make sure something is done with the information that is obtained. This inquiry is not the final resolution to the issue, but will hopefully open the door for justice to be found.
