Last night I participated in an action designed to raise awareness and ire in regards to violence against aboriginal women and girls in Canada. As some of the shirts they had made for the event stated, First Nations women are 5 times more likely than other women to be subject to violence and 3 times more likely to be murdered by their intimate partners – although maybe those two numbers are reversed, I can’t remember. At any rate – that’s scary! And very big.
The idea of the action was to wear shirts with a message or statistic on one side, and a letter on the other. We then walked a few blocks from the Exchange district to the MTS Centre on Portage Avenue. There was a hockey game last night, so lots of folks who don’t normally dare to tread downtown past dusk were out. We walked in the bright yellow shirts, attracting lots of stares from passersby, then lined up to spell out ‘NO MORE STOLEN SISTERS’ in front of the main doors.
And then watched the reactions of the crowd. Which were mixed. Most people stood watching, saying nothing, as we lined up, then looked to see what the shirts said and went back to talking, glancing over occasionally. One guy walked down our lineup shaking all of our hands, and I couldn’t tell if he was being sarcastic in doing so or if he was genuine. Probably the former, but whatever. Some folks actually clapped and cheered – I noticed that the people I could see doing this were First Nations men, which is great. While we were on our way from Ace Art to the arena, one dude who walked past us read the shirts, then yelled ” Stop violence against aboriginal women and girls? FUCK that shit!” And threw something at a pole? It was one of those moments that makes me think, ‘Oh, right. There is a reason that we’re still doing this.’
I think a lot about ally-ship – how can I be a good ally to First Nations folks, queer folks, racialized folks, immigrants and refugees? Last night felt like good ally practice; participants were white/male/female/First Nations/African Canadian. As feminists, we grapple with the question of men’s involvement in our movement. We do not want to be dependent on members of the oppressor group to change our circumstances. On the other hand, where will we get if men don’t have a stake in social change? Fucking nowhere, that’s where. We’d have to move to some island in the middle of nowhere and live like the Amazons of yore, kidnapping dudes to reproduce. And this is not my utopia. So I, personally, am of the opinion that we need men in our movement – not as leaders, because we’re capable of that, but certainly as allies and friends and lovers. We need men to spread the word that hurting women is wrong, and that equality is great! Yeah! So, yes, it felt good to be in that action last night.
