Speaking notes from “Missing and Murdered Women: What can the law do?” #MMIW

kwetoday

Speaking notes from “Missing and Murdered Women: What can the law do?” panel at the Law Union of Ontario Annual Conference (March 2014).[1]

From an Indigenous Feminist approach, my perspectives are informed by my experiences in politics as the VP women’s representative for Aboriginal People’s Commission with the Liberal Party of Canada. During this term, I drafted a resolution which was adopted unanimously by the party at their last convention. A previous resolution was drafted by the National Women’s Liberal Commission which assumed violence only occurs in the home and that violence is a private issue that happens only to mothers and their children which is problematic in and of itself. What about single Indigenous women with no kids, like myself? The current government also assumes that Indigenous women are the most vulnerable in Canadian society. Yet, Sherene Razack (1998) argues that feminism needs to question how their responses…

View original post 1,512 more words