Topic: Missing and murdered aboriginal women in Canada Thesis Statement: Given the struggles aboriginals have had to face in Canada, the Canadian government should take action to solve the hundreds of cases of missing and murdered aboriginal women, as it will strengthen the relations between aboriginals and Canadians. Introduction • Opening Hook Line: Aboriginal women deserve basic human rights and attention from the government. • Narrowing towards thesis: “Aboriginal women between 25 and 44 are five times more likely to die a violent death than other women.”( The Tragedy of Missing and Murdered Aboriginal Women in Canada). • Thesis: Given the struggles aboriginals have had to face in Canada, the Canadian government should take action to …show more content…
There are also a high number of Aboriginal women working in the sex trade. • Quote: “Aboriginal women being highly overrepresented as sex trade workers; racism compounds the threat to safety and security faced by all such workers.”(Mann par. 8). Section 2 Heading: The Role of the Authorities Part 1: Canadian Police (RCMP) • Supporting point: The Canadian Police views the Aboriginal community as a community that does not deserve protection because of high crime rates, instead they view it as the rest of the country needing protection from the Aboriginal community. The Canadian Police tends to do very little when an Aboriginal woman is reported missing, they often suggest the family to wait for the missing woman instead of taking immediate action. In addition, few police forces have special protocols they follow when an Aboriginal woman goes missing. • Quote: “[ . . . ] most police officers need a fair and open attitude towards those working in the sex trade and must learn to treat street people as human beings—with dignity and respect.” (Harper par. …show more content…
The amendments were intended to rid the Act of sex discrimination; nonetheless, the provisions still discriminate against women and their children and are damaging for First Nations communities.” (Mann par.11). Part 2: A Deeper Issue than Domestic Violence • Supporting point: The RCMP states that Aboriginal women who were victims of homicide knew their killers in 100 percent of the solved cases. It is a fact that violence in the family is a huge factor in the abundance of missing and murdered Aboriginal women, however, it is not only exclusive to Aboriginal families. Family violence plays a role in the amount of missing and murdered Aboriginal women but a high number of strangers are involved in the crime as well. • Quote: “Between 1980 and 2012, 62 per cent of aboriginal women murders involved a spouse, family member, or "other intimates."But that number increases to 74 per cent in the case of non-aboriginal female homicides.” (Kurjata par.17).
Toronto: Pearson Prentice Hall. The Justice System and Aboriginal People: Child Welfare. n.d. - n.d. - n.d. The Aboriginal Justice Implementation Commission. Retrieved December 12, 2013, from http://www.ajic.mb.ca/volumel/chapter14.html.
In a forthright manner, Yasmin Jiwani and Mary Lyn Young examine the "discursive practices used by the news media" (897) in relationship to the missing and murdered Indigenous women (MMIW) in Canada. Opening their argument, the authors outline their mode of discussion by stating that their paper will look through a feminist lens at the radicalized and sexualized violence that has become nothing short of an epidemic. By specifically focusing their attention towards to MMIW, Jiwani and Young structure their investigation in a documentary-style discussion, which reveals the ideological and systemic racism and sexualisation embedded within North American culture and media towards Aboriginal women. Their mode of appeal explicitly lays out, in a
LaPrairie, C. (1995). Community justice or just communities? Aboriginal communities in search of justice. Canadian Journal of Criminology. 37 (4), 521-535.
In this proposal our team seeks to explore the injustices within the Indian Act. To achieve this our proposed research will examine the target population being the aboriginal woman. The paper will further explore the oppressions faced by the aboriginal women within the Indian Act. In conclusion, this proposal will sum up the negative impact that the Indian Act had on aboriginal women and how it continues to oppress this population within the Canadian National discourse.
During the late sixteen century, when the first fleet arrived to Australia and discovered the free settlers or known as Australian Indigenous inheritors (The Aborigines), the community of aboriginal inhabitants since then have experienced vast levels of discrimination and racism against their gender, race, colour and ethnicity. The term over representations refers to the presents of minority or disproportionate ethnic aboriginal groups represented in the criminal justice system (CJS). This essay will further explain the relationship between aboriginal communities and policing discussed in Blagg (2008) and Cunneen (2007, the three major sources of concern in association to aboriginal over representation in CJS which include; systematic bias,
Generations of native people in Canada have faced suffering and cultural loss as a result of European colonization of their land. Government legislation has impacted the lives of five generations of First Nations people and as a result the fifth generation (from 1980 to present) is working to recover from their crippled cultural identity (Deiter-McArthur 379-380). This current generation is living with the fallout of previous government policies and societal prejudices that linger from four generations previous. Unrepentant, Canada’s ‘Genocide’, and Saskatchewan’s Indian People – Five Generations highlight issues that negatively influence First Nations people. The fifth generation of native people struggle against tremendous adversity in regard to assimilation, integration, separation, and recovering their cultural identity with inadequate assistance from our great nation.
Living in Canada, there is a long past with the Indigenous people. The relationship between the white and First Nations community is one that is damaged because of our shameful actions in the 1800’s. Unnecessary measures were taken when the Canadian government planned to assimilate the Aboriginal people. Through the Indian Act and Residential schools the government attempted to take away their culture and “kill the Indian in the child.” The Indian Act allowed the government to take control over the people, the residential schools took away their culture and tore apart their families, and now we are left with not only a broken relationship between the First Nations people but they are trying to put back together their lives while still living with a harsh reality of their past.
It is the belief of first nations that the healing process and renewal of relationships are the essential ingredients for the building of healthy First Nations communities. First nations realize that the current justice process does not address the real issues at hand nor does it fit into their traditional forms of achieving justice. In fact, the current justice process systematically removes the offenders from their people and communities effectively severing all ties and ...
“In about half of the Dominion, the aboriginal rights of Indians have arguably been extinguished by treaty” (Sanders, 13). The traditions and culture of Aboriginals are vanishing at a quick pace, and along it is their wealth. If the Canadian Government restore Native rights over resource development once again, Aboriginals would be able to gain back wealth and help with the poverty in their societies. “An influential lobby group with close ties to the federal Conservatives is recommending that Ottawa ditch the Indian Act and give First Nations more control over their land in order to end aboriginal poverty once and for all” (End First). This recommendation would increase the income within Native communities, helping them jump out of
Comack, E. (2012). Racialized policing: Aboriginal people's encounters with the police. Black Point, Nova Scotia: Fernwood Publishing.
Fleras, Augie. “Aboriginal Peoples in Canada: Repairing the Relationship.” Chapter 7 of Unequal Relations: An Introduction to Race, Ethnic and Aboriginal Dynamics in Canada. 6th ed. Toronto: Pearson, 2010. 162-210. Print.
Canada likes to paint an image of peace, justice and equality for all, when, in reality, the treatment of Aboriginal peoples in our country has been anything but. Laden with incomprehensible assimilation and destruction, the history of Canada is a shameful story of dismantlement of Indian rights, of blatant lies and mistrust, and of complete lack of interest in the well-being of First Nations peoples. Though some breakthroughs were made over the years, the overall arching story fits into Cardinal’s description exactly. “Clearly something must be done,” states Murray Sinclair (p. 184, 1994). And that ‘something’ he refers to is drastic change. It is evident, therefore, that Harold Cardinal’s statement is an accurate summarization of the Indigenous/non-Indigenous relationship in
No community in Canada comes into conflict with criminal justice system officials more disproportionately than Aboriginals (Dickson-Gilmore, 2011, p.77). Indeed, Aboriginal Canadians are often subject to both overt and unintended discrimination from Canadian law enforcement due in large part to institutionalized reputations as chronic substance abusers who are incapable of reform (Dickson-Gilmore, 2011, p.77-78). One of the more startling contemporary examples of this is the case of Frank Paul; a Mi’kmaq Canadian who was left to die in a Vancouver alley by officers of the Vancouver Police Department after being denied refuge in a police “drunk tank”. Not surprisingly, this event garnered significant controversy and public outcry amongst Canada’s Aboriginal population who have long been subject to over-policing and persistent overrepresentation as offenders in the Canadian criminal justice system (Jiwani & Dickson-Gilmore, 2011, p.43 & 81).
Do you know that despite Canada being called multicultural and accepting, Canada’s history reveals many secrets that contradicts this statement? Such an example are Canadian aboriginals, who have faced many struggles by Canadian society; losing their rights, freedoms and almost, their culture. However, Native people still made many contributions to Canadian society. Despite the efforts being made to recognize aboriginals in the present day; the attitudes of European Canadians, acts of discrimination from the government, and the effects caused by the past still seen today have proven that Canadians should not be proud of Canada’s history with respect to human rights since 1914. First, is because of the attitudes of European Canadians towards aboriginals, which were mostly cruel and inhumane.
The documentary Finding Dawn by Christine Welsh portrayed the violence and discrimination experienced by Aboriginal women and girls in Canada as a national tragedy. The national tragedy is illustrated as the overlooked murders and disappearances of an estimated 500 Aboriginal women in Canada over the past 30 years (Finding Dawn, 2006). It was apparent while viewing this documentary that embedded historical, social and economic factors have negatively contributed to this national tragedy receiving meager attention in Canada. Thus, the issues presented in Finding Dawn is in fact a representation of wider social problems correlating to issues of oppression, ethnocentrism, racism and assimilation in our society.