Tweet

An anonymous poster wrote to CrazyBitchesRus the following: “…no seems to have noticed that NWAC has laid off all the Sisters In Spirit staff. The NWAC SIS department is closed with only an acting director there to write the final report.” Apologies. We have noticed. You're right, we should have posted. Here's what's been happening and how folks can continue to support families of missing and murdered Indigenous women, who have been abandoned by government as well as native leaders.

Background: Since the 1980s more than 500 Indigenous women in Canada have gone missing or been murdered, half of these cases have never been solved. The issue was first raised by Amnesty International in 2004, and for a time the Native Women's Association of Canada (NWAC) championed the issue, under their Sister’s in Spirit campaign.

In the 2010 budget the federal government promised 10 million dollars would be set aside to address violence against Indigenous women. Precious little of that money is actually going where it can help. The lion’s share of the $10M went to the RCMP to set up a national police support centre for missing persons and unidentified remains by 2013. The centre will become the third branch of the Canadian Police Centre for Missing and Exploited Children, but it will NOT have a separate section dedicated for Aboriginal women.

$1.8 M over three years went to NWAC for “public education” – essentially to teach Indigenous women how to avoid violence (blaming the victims are we?). But it was a deal signed with the devil, because in order to get the cash NWAC had to agree never to dump the term “Sister’s in Spirit" and promise to stay away from vigils and advocacy. They also have to dump the database they had been keeping to collect the names and other information about missing and murdered Indigenous women. There is no other database like it. No one else in Canada collects this information, and as we can see from the RCMP they don't plan to. All evidence points to the fact that Indigenous women are at higher risk, no one is addressing the factors that put them at high risk of violence, and the families that NWAC once brought together for their past campaigns have been abandoned.

Despite government attempts to squash the Sisters in spirit movement, families of missing and murdered women have bound together and have continued to hold vigils. They have a fund-raising event coming up in Ottawa on Friday April 29. Details are below, including contact info and they also have a site on facebook. It shoudl be a good event. If your in Ottawa turn out to do what you can.

PROGRESSIVE BLOGGERS

Was Harper Drunk?

Tweet

According to Reuters the normally "wooden" (apt description) Stephen Harper became inexplicably giddy at a G-20 press conference, declaring Canada the envy of the world, stable politics, stable banks, economy rebounding nicely, and ABSOLUTELY NO HISTORY OF COLONIALISM: "We also have no history of colonialism. So we have all of the things that many people admire about the great powers but none of the things that threaten or bother them," he said. (full article below) Ahem. Allow me 50 words or less to refute this.

1. Missing and murdered Indigenous women (Betty Osbourne)with 500+ unsolved cases and counting.
2. Water (a la Kashechewan)+ 120 First Nations communities currently under boil water advisories
3. H1N1, Hand sanitizer and body bags
4. Schools (a la Attawapiskat)
5. Sharon McIvor and Native women's rights.
6.Starlight Tours
7. Residential schools
8. Land claims (Ipperwash, Lubicon Cree)
9. Broken Treaties, (DFO ramming Native fisherman, Burnt Church)
10. Or just read any CBC comments page where Indigenous issues are discussed.

I could mention too, that a few years ago when Stockwell Day was leading the party his bodyguards (aka thugs) decided to shove native protestors. Video

Only a year and a half ago in his apology to Indian Residential school survivors Harper said: "We now recognize that, far too often, these institutions gave rise to abuse or neglect and were inadequately controlled, and we apologize for failing to protect you. Not only did you suffer these abuses as children, but as you became parents, you were powerless to protect your own children from suffering the same experience, and for this we are sorry. The burden of this experience has been on your shoulders for far too long. The burden is properly ours as a government, and as a country. There is no place in Canada for the attitudes that inspired the Indian residential schools system to ever again prevail."

So if he wasn't talking about colonialism, what did he think he was apologizing for?



Every G20 nation wants to be Canada, insists PM
Fri Sep 25, 2009

PITTSBURGH (Reuters) - Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, appearing to forget that his countrymen are generally known for their modesty, declared on Friday that his nation was the envy of the world.

Harper, usually a fairly wooden performer, seized on a routine question at a news conference and used it to deliver an impassioned defense of his 33-million strong nation and how well it has coped with the global economic crisis.

"Canada remains in a very special place in the world. ... We are the one major developed country that no one thinks has any responsibility for this crisis," he said to laughter.

"In fact, on the contrary, they look at our policies as a solution to the crisis. We're the one country in the room everybody would like to be," he said at the end of the summit of the Group of 20 advanced and developing nations in Pittsburgh.

Canada, which was running a budget surplus before the recession and avoided major banking problems, has been less affected by the crisis than many of its partners.

Harper said the other G20 nations "would like to be an advanced developed economy with all the benefits that conveys to its citizens and at the same time not have been the source, or have any of the domestic problems, that created this crisis".

By this stage of his comments, the initial premise of the question had long since vanished and Harper -- who leads the right-leaning Conservative Party -- was focusing on several other factors that in his mind make Canada so irresistible.

"We're so self-effacing as Canadians that we sometimes forget the assets we do have that other people see," he said, speaking with a rare passion.

"We are one of the most stable regimes in history. ... We are unique in that regard," he added, noting Canada had enjoyed more than 150 years of untroubled Parliamentary democracy.

Just in case that was not enough to persuade doubters, Harper threw in some more facts about the geographically second-largest nation in the world.

"We also have no history of colonialism. So we have all of the things that many people admire about the great powers but none of the things that threaten or bother them," he said.

And his final verdict?

"Canada is big enough to make a difference but not big enough to threaten anybody. And that is a huge asset if it's properly used."

(Editing by Leslie Adler)

PROGRESSIVE BLOGGERS