Social Justice

Canadian First Nations demand action on missing and murdered women

The government must be pressured to hold good on its promises.

Published

9 years ago

February 20, 2016

“Even though the grave has silenced my granddaughter’s voice, I will continue to speak for her,” vows Renee Hess of Helyna Rivera, a Mohawk woman who was murdered in the U.S.-Canada border city of Buffalo, N.Y. on Aug. 10, 2011.

Hess was one of many family and community members at the 2015 Strawberry Ceremony, an annual Valentine’s Day event organized to mourn and protest the brutal rapes, killings, and disappearances of over 1,100 indigenous women since 1981.

Although Native women and girls make up only 4.3 percent of Canada’s female population, they account for 16 percent of female homicides and 11.3 percent of missing women.

State indifference. For years, activists have called upon the Canadian government to address violence against indigenous women. Victims’ families demand federal action, like improving public transportation so women aren’t forced to walk long distances at night or hitchhike. But seldom are these demands taken seriously. “[An investigation] isn’t really high on our radar, to be honest,” said then-Prime Minister Stephen Harper in 2014.

Aboriginal Minister Bernard Valcourt justified the inaction by stating that 70 percent of indigenous women are murdered by a relative or acquaintance — therefore not the government’s problem. Though Valcourt implies a propensity to violence by Native men, the fact is 75 percent of white women are murdered by someone they know. And it is widely believed that strangers or serial killers are responsible for many of the unsolved murders, including 18 or more committed on the Highway of Tears — a section of Highway 16 between Prince George and Prince Rupert, British Columbia.

Courts have also failed to produce justice. In 2011, Cindy Gladue bled to death in a hotel bathtub from a 4-inch internal vaginal tear. Suspect Brad Barton argued that because Gladue was a sex worker, the injury was an accident during consensual “rough sex.” Though there was no evidence to support the conclusion, the jury acquitted Barton and he walked free in March 2015.

A new leaf? In December 2015, new Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced a national inquiry into the deaths and disappearances. This is a major victory. Trudeau’s Liberal Party government promises a two-year, $40 million commitment that will include retrying previous cases.

The government must be pressured to hold good on its promises. The last thing needed is another fruitless study: 40 have already been conducted. Of the 700 recommendations for government action that emerged from the research, 99 percent were ignored. It is clear that any inquiry must be accompanied by active follow-through. This should include scrutiny of Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) apathy toward women who file domestic violence reports, and long-standing charges of sexual harassment and violence by the RCMP against indigenous women. (The RCMP is also being investigated for treatment of women in its own ranks. Hundreds of female cops have complained of sexual harassment on the job.)

Pressure for the inquiry came from many sources, including new Alberta Premier Rachel Notley, a leader of the New Democratic Party, who decried Harper’s years of indifference and issued an official apology for generations of forced assimilation policies by the Alberta government. Notley vows to address the causes of the violence.

The historic disregard for indigenous lives spans a wide range of political issues, and these rapes and murders must be addressed within the context of the larger movement for aboriginal rights. For example, economic discrimination and lack of education hit women the hardest, and are often the reason why women like Cindy Gladue — a mother of four — are forced to become sex workers.

Silent no more. Numerous national and local groups have fought to stop the deaths and disappearances. The Native Women’s Association of Canada has a high focus on the issue and educates about how the dire status of indigenous women is rooted in colonization, cultural genocide, poverty, addiction, and limited legal rights.

No More Silence was founded in Toronto in 2011 and organizes the Strawberry Ceremony. It has brought together groups such as Toronto Sex Workers Action Project, Idle No More Toronto, Outburst! Young Muslim Women Project, and Chocolate Woman Collective to call for initiatives to protect indigenous women. These include safe spaces for sex workers; and full decriminalization of sex work, rather than current “Nordic model” laws that penalize prostitutes by outlawing their customers. Unionizing sex workers would also help them to act in their own defense.

Families of Sisters in Spirit is an autonomous, all-volunteer group that has worked with the Native Youth Sexual Health Network to hold events that draw attention to missing and murdered indigenous women, girls, trans and two-spirit people and to support their families and communities.

Other solutions that would contribute to the security of Indigenous women and all First Nations people include reparations to overcome economic inequality, initiatives to reverse cultural destruction of Native communities, and an all-out offensive against the racist sexism that dehumanizes and devalues Native women.

By Sarah Scott

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Politics

Lil Scrappy, Big Freedia, Mia X, Cookie Nasty, and more artists partner with Hip Hop Caucus for a Political Rap Cypher

Released just under one week before the most important presidential election of our time, these rappers focused on issue advocacy and dropped powerful bars on the importance of voting, voting rights and democracy, civil rights, economic justice, and environmental justice – all issues that affect people of color the most and some of the pressing issues and deciding factors in this year’s election.

Published

6 days ago

October 30, 2024

Unheard Voices Staff

Photo Source: Hip-Hop Caucus

Some of hip hop’s most influential voices, Lil Scrappy, Big Freedia Mia X, Lee Merritt, Cookie Nasty, and Trae Crockett have joined musical forces to partner with Hip Hop Caucus to release a powerful political cypher as a final push to encourage people to head to polls and vote.

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Hip Hop political cypher

The power of voting

Hip Hop Caucus is no stranger to leveraging the power of music, celebrity, and activism, launching their Respect My Vote! Campaign and Tour earlier this year, which included activists to reach and educate communities of color about political and social issues, and mobilize people to vote for the change they want to see on November 5.

The message is clear that we cannot afford not to cast our ballots this election, with Mia X stating, “Say it with my chest, imma step for my rights, 10 toes down …my choice, my freedoms my voice, my votes and “if you don’t vote you don’t matter”.

Watch the cypher

Health & Wellness

Amber Nicole Thurman died from delayed care due to Georgia’s abortion laws, says family

Thurman died after waiting 20 hours in pain for a hospital to treat a rare complication from taking an abortion pill, she had to obtain in North Carolina.

Published

1 week ago

October 28, 2024

Unheard Voices Staff

Amber Nicole Thurman (Photo Source: GoFundMe)

Amber Nicole Thurman was a vibrant, healthy 28-year-old Georgia woman who tragically died due to abortion laws and medical neglect, her family says.

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Amber Nicole Thurman’s life could have been preventable

According to reports, Thurman died after waiting 20 hours in pain for a hospital to treat a rare complication from taking an abortion pill that she had to obtain in North Carolina. She needed a routine procedure, a dilation and curettage (D&C), to clear residual tissue from her uterus.

Did abortion laws cause problems for the mother?

But she reportedly couldn’t get the help she needed. New abortion laws in Georgia made conducting this essential medical procedure a felony unless in an emergency situation.

Georgia’s LIFE Act took effect after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe vs. Wade in 2022 and banned abortions after a fetal heartbeat can be detected, effectively prohibiting abortions beyond around six weeks of pregnancy, and criminalized performing one with limited exceptions.

Thurman had sought help at a local hospital in Stockbridge, Georgia. Even as Thurman developed sepsis, her family says doctors at the hospital did not evacuate the remaining fetal tissue in her uterus with the (D&C). Unfortunately, she later died on the operating table, reports ProPublica.

After Thurman’s death, a Fulton County Superior Court judge struck down the law, stating the law violates Georgia’s Constitution, reports NewsWeek.

ProPublica reported that Georgia’s maternal mortality committee also found that Thurman’s death was completely preventable. When her family learned this, they were devastated once again and their grief intensified affirming that Amber should not have died.

GoFundMe

As Thurman’s family struggles to cope with their grief and anger, they are striving to care for Amber’s son the way she wanted and have started a GoFundMe.

“The funds through this site will support Amber’s son for his immediate needs and for his future. This includes mental health and grief counseling for him and Amber’s family,” the GoFundMe reads.

According to the family, the funds will also support the family’s fight for justice for Amber and women’s rights over their own bodies.

“Amber was a devoted mother to her 6-year-old son and had dreams of becoming a nurse while she worked as a medical assistant. Amber hoped to provide a bright future for herself and her son, but that was stolen from her, and we cannot stand by as this happens to more women.”

Visit the GoFundMe to donate and for more information.

Social Justice

Exonerated ‘Central Park Five’ sue Trump for defamation after debate comments

The lawsuit stems from Trump’s remarks during the presidential debate last month.

Published

2 weeks ago

October 23, 2024

Unheard Voices Staff

Photo Source: BET Networks YouTube Creative commons license (https://youtu.be/1UF0LPJU-FM?si=PGm-NKtWqJuU2YHN)

The five men from the infamous Central Park case who call themselves the Exonerated Five have filed a defamation lawsuit against Donald Trump.

The lawsuit stems from his remarks during the presidential debate last month.

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Exonerated Five lawsuit against Donald Trump

During the Sept. 10 debate in Pennsylvania, Trump said the five men, Antron McCray, Kevin Richardson, Yusef Salaam, Raymond Santana and Korey Wise, pleaded guilty when they were tried in connection with the assault and rape of a woman who had been running in Central Park on April 19, 1989, and that the victim had died.

During the debate he said: “They admitted, they said, they pled guilty. And I said, well, if they pled guilty they badly hurt a person, killed a person ultimately. And if they pled guilty, then they pled we’re not guilty.”

At the time of the trials, each men had actually pleaded not guilty, and the victim of the attack survived.

According to the complaint, Trump’s statements are “demonstrably false,” adding that “Plaintiffs never pled guilty to any crime and were subsequently cleared of all wrongdoing. Further the victims of the Central Park assaults were not killed.”

The complaint further added that the men, now in their 50s, have “suffered injuries as a result of Defendant Trump’s false and defamatory statements.”

Falsely accused

The Exonerated Five, who were just teenagers when they were indicted, had always maintained their innocence throughout their separate trials and incarceration.

Each were charged with the assault of the female jogger, as well as other assaults and robberies in Central Park.

They five spent years in prison before they were exonerated in 2002 after DNA evidence linked another man, a serial rapist, to the crime. The city agreed in a legal settlement to pay the exonerated men $41 million.

This happened during a time of heightened racial tensions coupled with the case dominating headlines. Trump, then a real estate mogul, had taken out large ads in newspapers referencing the case calling for New York to bring back the death penalty.

The defamation suit was filed in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

The complaint noted that Salaam, a New York City Council member representing District 9, was at the debate and in the room when Trump made the statements.

In the lawsuit the men did not specify damages and asked for a trial to determine the amount.