In this episode, Aubrianna Snow, Audrey Huntley, and Alannah McKay join us to discuss occupying colonial spaces as Indigenous women, justice for MMIWG2S, and the healing power of auntie laughter.
In this episode, Aubrianna Snow, Audrey Huntley, and Alannah McKay join us to discuss occupying colonial spaces as Indigenous women, justice for MMIWG2S, and the healing power of auntie laughter.
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CONTENT NOTE
This episode discusses the epidemic of missing and murdered Indigenous women, girls, trans and two spirit people. Although there are no descriptions of sexual violence on this podcast, any conversation about sexual or gender-based violence can be hard to hear. Listen in a way that feels safe for you. If you need support, there are resources like sexual assault support centres in your community that you can reach out to. See our list here of supports available by province.
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FURTHER LEARNING
Courtney Skye’s Courage To Act’s webinar, Anti-Colonial Approaches to Addressing GBV with Indigenous Communities; and worksheet, Answering Calls for Justice within PSIs from the National Inquiry on MMIWG, are wonderful resources.
For more great Indigenous feminist resources, see:
Violence on the Land, Violence on Our Bodies, from Women's Earth Alliance & Native Youth Sexual Health Network
Red Women Rising: Indigenous Survivors in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, by Carol Muree Martin & Harsha Walia, Downtown Eastside Women's Centre
You Are Made of Medicine, A Mental Health Peer Support Manual for Indigiqueer, Two-Spirit, LGBTQ+, and Gender Non-Conforming Indigenous youth, from the Native Youth Sexual Health Network
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ABOUT OUR GUESTS
Aubrianna Snow (she/her) is a k'taqmkuk lnu'skw visitor in Treaty Six, where she has lived for most of her life. A recent graduate of MacEwan’s Bachelor of Communications program, gender-based violence prevention and community building are passions she’s explored during her time in postsecondary. During her second term as Vice President Student Life at the Students’ Association of MacEwan University (SAMU), Aubrianna founded the Student Voice on Violence Elimination Committee as a means of advocacy to SAMU and to university administration. Prior to her time as an elected student leader, Aubrianna volunteered as a MAVEN Peer Educator on consent and sexual violence with MacEwan’s Office of Sexual Violence Prevention, Education, & Response.
Audrey Huntley (she/her) is a licensed paralegal who works with survivors of violence at Aboriginal Legal Services. She is a storyteller and the co-founder of No More Silence, working with other Indigenous women, trans and two-spirit people. Audrey finds strength in the strong community networks No More Silence is building across Turtle Island and beyond. One of her recent works, the short film Not Just Another Case: When Your Loved One Has Gone Missing or Been Murdered was created to empower Indigenous community members and provide alternatives to the mainstream institutions that fail them. Smudge, Don't Judge: Assisting Trans and Two-Spirit Survivors of Violence, a collaboration with Monica Forrester of Maggie’s Sex Worker Action Project and Trans Pride Canada, is geared to service providers and addresses the homophobia and transphobia that prevents many Indigenous people from reporting or seeking assistance.
Alannah Mckay (she/her/kwe) is an Anishinaabe-Anishininew Ikwe with roots from Berens River, Manitoba and Muskrat Dam, Ontario. She is a daughter, sister, auntie and advocate based in Treaty 1 territory in Winnipeg, MB. Alannah is a student at the University of Manitoba, where she is pursuing an undergraduate degree in Indigenous Studies & Criminology. She is the former Chairperson of the Canadian Federation of Students, where she represented over half a million post-secondary students on a national level. Alannah is the Policy Capacity Coordinator for the Canadian Roots Exchange, a national Indigenous youth-led organization; and a board member for the North Point Douglas Women's Centre, a women-led community non-profit that provides healing and matriarchal leadership in the core of Winnipeg. Alannah’s passion is community building and advocacy work to create safer spaces for Black, Indigenous and People of Colour at the grassroots and national levels.
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CONNECT WITH POSSIBILITY SEEDS
Want to follow our gender justice work? Connect with us on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn, and visit our website at possibilityseeds.ca.
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TRANSCRIPT
Read the episode transcript here.
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CREDITS
Created by Possibility Seeds. Project team: Farrah Khan, Emily Allan, Anoodth Naushan, Laura Murray, and Chenthoori Malankov-Milton. Produced by Vocal Fry Studios. Graphic design by Kitty Rodé with elements from Arzu Haider.
Farrah: Welcome to the first season of Possibility Seeds. We're so glad you're here. I'm Farrah Khan.
We made this podcast for anyone who wants to learn about gender justice activism in Canada. We're hosting multi-generational conversations with leaders who inspire us and fuel our belief that positive change is possible.
Today, we’re so excited to have Alannah McKay, Aubrianna Snow, and Audrey Huntley. Whether it's challenging multiple forms of injustice and oppression, or carving out space for Indigenous women, trans and Two-Spirited people, they really embrace and embody values rooted in resistance.
Our episode today will dig deep into the importance of community, storytelling and Indigenous womens’ leadership. We will explore some of the amazing work they've done and reflect on what it means to blossom in places we're told we're not supposed to bloom.
Before we get started, can you share your names, pronouns and a bit about yourselves? I can go first. My name is Farrah Khan. I use she and her pronouns. I'm a gender justice advocate and I love this work.
Alannah, do you wanna lead us in next?
Alannah: Aanii, boozhoo. Hi, hello. My name is Alannah McKay. I use she/her pronouns and I am an Anishinaabe-Anishininew Ikwe with roots from Berens River, Manitoba and Muskrat Dam, Ontario. And I currently reside in treaty one territory in Winnipeg, Manitoba. I am a student at the University of Manitoba majoring in Indigenous Studies and Criminology. I am an advocate for gender-based violence against Indigenous women and an advocate for Indigenous rights in post-secondary education. I am a proud Auntie just trying to pave the way for the next generation while trying to dismantle systems of oppression and the patriarchy. Chi-miigwech for having me here today.
Farrah: Aubrianna?
Aubrianna: Hi folks. I'm Aubrianna. I use she and her pronouns. I am a Mi'kmaq L'nu woman. My roots are in Ktaqmkuk now known as Newfoundland and I've spent almost my entire life as a visitor in treaty six. I am a soon to be former student of MacEwan University, from their Bachelor of Communication Studies program. And I am also the former vice president, student life of the students association of MacEwan University. And I've been engaged in gender-based violence prevention and advocacy work since the, about the beginning of my post-secondary journey back in 2016. And, uh, Wela'liek for having me today. Thank you so much.
Audrey: Aanii, boozhoo. My name's Audrey, I use she/her pronouns. I consider myself a community organizer, probably the last 25 years or so in gender-based justice. But I have been around movement building for 35 years. A bunch of that on the continent of Europe; I'm a mixed ancestry German Scottish Anishinaabe person. I have, unfortunately, no ties to my father's community of origin which is somewhere here in Ontario. But I've pretty much, sort of, built my belonging over the last 20 some plus years of organizing in urban communities of Vancouver and, uh, mostly Toronto, where I have been again since 2011.
Farrah: I'm already so excited to have the three of you on the show, just from your introductions. For me, when I hear you three talk about just the breadth and depth of the work that you've done and the interest you have in it, I keep thinking, okay, so how do we keep doing this work?
Recognizing the fact that organizing around gender-based violence, oppression, inequality can feel daunting, heavy and hard. I'm really curious, what keeps you going in this work? What brings you pleasure or joy while doing this work? Audrey, you've been doing this work for 35 years. What keeps you going? What brings you joy?
Audrey: The short answer is ceremony and connecting to the land. I really, really do not believe that I would still be doing this work if I hadn't co-founded No More Silence and had started building this relationship, that's now over 20 years old, with Wanda White Bird, who's an elder and a knowledge keeper and leads us in ceremony. And everything we do is always with ceremony. And I really don't think that I could just do this without that. And that, to me, means connection to the land. ‘Cause I think like everything we do goes back to the land, whether we're based, you know, in rural communities or whether we're in the city, the land is always with us and part of us.
It's good timing that you asked that question because I'm involved in an exciting project right now that I think is going to give me a lot of time to rejuvenate. Camp Sis, which you may have heard of because it's been around for 25, 30 years or so… and been very quiet maybe in the last couple of decades, but is getting some, like, new spirit infused into it. Uh, one of our members, Doreen Silversmith, who's a Haudenosaunee woman from Six Nations, is the caretaker of the lands there. And I just spent the weekend with her, laying patio stones for a new bunkie that we're building her. And it was just so great to be out on the land and to connect with her. So yeah, I would basically say it's ceremony, land, and then the laughter that we share, because I just seem very lucky to find myself connecting with people who understand that we really need to have a sense of humor in order to keep on keepin’ on. So laughter is really the medicine that keeps me going.
Farrah: I love that there's so much joy and laughter that you can have in work that's so difficult and hard. For you, Alannah, what is bringing you joy in doing this work? Is that the laughter, is it community? I saw your head nodding with a lot of things that Audrey was sharing.
Alannah: Yeah, for sure. I definitely resonated with quite a few things that Audrey had to say. Community doesn't have to necessarily be where you're originally from, or your family, or like the neighborhood you grew up. It’s the people who kind of bring you in and nurture your growth and that kinship. Those people are a very big part of my community, who have been there for me and challenged me in certain ways and like, call me out if like, something was just, like, not it. And just being able to grow in that aspect, especially when it comes to, like, the work that I do. It is very heavy and very daunting and hard, especially ‘cause I feel like I'm not the first one in my family to navigate it. However, I am the first one within these colonial institutions being able to navigate them on my own. So a lot of folks who, in my family, don't really understand that or resonate with that, but it's like the Indigenous youth who also enter these spaces resonate with that. They face that as well. So just being able to come together and, like, laughter is medicine. If you get, like, a bunch of Indigenous Aunties in our room, you could hear their laughters, like, miles away - I swear. That, like, warms my heart so much. So it's just like when it comes around organizing and advocacy work, that's what, like, consistently keeps me going. And, like, having other leaders and people who done it before me just telling me that, like, my work isn't done, that I still have work to do for my community. Those reminders of, like, coming for everything our ancestors were denied is just 100% that brings me the pleasure and joy in what I do, especially being like an Auntie for sure.
Farrah: Aubrianna. How about for you?
Aubrianna: Goodness. Yeah. Thank you for the question. I can so relate to a lot of what's already been said by Audrey and Alannah, particularly those bits about that, uh, Indigenous Auntie laughter is so precious and, uh, that really keeps me going too. And community is so important, and not just in the sense of the people around you in the work day-to-day and helping you navigate these challenging spaces, but the broader sense of community and kinship with those folks who historically have done this work and paved the way for young activists like myself and Alannah. Also, in conjunction with the folks who have yet to be in these spaces and to navigate these challenges and to walk in these two worlds. It really brings me back down to earth when I see young people and they start engaging, like, even the, uh, High School Too movement, it makes me so happy to see young people engaging with these discussions around gender-based violence prevention and around identity. And I think it's a big piece of my work, and I was raised to prioritize what I can do for the future and for the next seven generations and that's something that really resonates with me. I also have that kind of call of “my work here is not done” because if it's challenging for me, then it's my job to ensure that that burden is a little bit less for some Indigenous woman down the road.
Farrah: I love that the three of you really talked about multi-generational joy. I wanna ask a little bit about how this organizing impacts you and the work that you've been doing. We're gonna start with Alannah. Alannah, you are a first generation university student. And you shared with us how you draw inspiration from your mother and grandmother in your advocacy, whether it's on campuses or the wider community. You were recently chairperson of the Canadian Federation of Students representing half a million students and 65 student unions across the country. Can you tell us what it meant for you to be in this role as a young Indigenous woman? What inspired you to do this work?
Alannah: So, being the chairperson was definitely a wild ride for two years of my life. I was involved with student politics for about four or five years and oftentimes I was the only Indigenous woman in those spaces. I was the first Indigenous woman to occupy the position of chairperson for the Canadian Federation of Students. Before that I did hold many different positions, whether it was at my university or in the grassroots. So it was just, like, wanting to see yourself in other spaces was definitely the thing I grew up with in the back of my mind, wanting to have, like, a role model. I did become an Auntie at the age of six, so my nieces… and definitely draw a lot of inspiration when it comes to me wanting to occupy space and, like, just so that they know that they're able to do this as well. And going back to that, wanting to see yourself within those spaces and those institutions, because, when we look back, a lot of the times we were misrepresented or underrepresented.
So, just wanting to occupy those spaces, kind of make other people, like, uncomfortable. That, yes, I'm here and I'm going to be here. I'm going to say something. I'm a loud, proud Indigenous woman who is going to be here no matter what, have my voice heard no matter what. I will put you in your spot if I have to! Being able to walk in those spaces and going back to that other people paved the way for me and just making sure that, like, people like me are there to help, like, the generation after us, because these spaces are very hard to navigate. Especially here, first generation university student, it's like you're navigating with a blindfold and, like, touching and seeing everything. I was very quiet and very shy and timid when I first went to university. I, like, refused to talk to profs. And then, I don't know, something just switched. I was like, I can't be silent anymore. Like, I grew up seeing all these things and a lot of these narratives that these professors taught within these institutions, I was like, it is not like this! Like, when you come to these communities, this is coming from, like, a non-Indigenous perspective. Like a white cis man who came into these communities and said, well, “they're like this because of this”. And it's just like, no, that's incorrect. Things like intergenerational trauma, violence. We see that often so much growing up, especially in the inner city. Definitely seen it a lot. So just, like, taking what I've seen in growing up, my lived experiences and putting those lived experiences into, like, a more positive framework instead of just looking at it as just trauma. And just, like, making sure that my nieces and my little brother have somebody else to look up to, that we're not the only person in that room.
I have a lot to thank my community for, for helping me and, like, be a voice for my community and pushing me to do better and, like, help me gain those leadership skills to be able to occupy those spaces. Because, as we know, and I think Aubrianna will be able to relate to this, when you're within these colonial institutions, you're very isolated at the beginning until you find those spaces and until you find, like, what works for you and what doesn't.
Farrah: Lots of nodding heads, lots of feelings with that about taking up space and what spaces are allowed for us, even. And Aubrianna, I want you to build on that. You've also done incredible work. You've always had a deep passion for gender-based violence prevention, community building, student leadership, really shown at MacEwan University where you're involved in student politics as the vice president of your student union. You also started the Student Voices on Violence Elimination committee, as a means of advocating to the university administration. Could you share why it was important to be involved in student politics at MacEwan and how you blended your love for journalism and storytelling in this work? And, like Alannah said, took up space.
Aubrianna: Absolutely. So, to be honest, I really never consciously planned on getting involved in student politics. And, I'm sure other folks can relate to this, but looking at student politics from the outside, it was not a place where I saw myself reflected and I didn't feel like it was accessible to me in a lot of ways. And that even continued into my time in student leadership, but I was brought into this work by other student leaders, and they took the time to sit with me and discuss the issues that were facing students and the way to go forward. And I was really motivated by the various volunteer spaces I've been in on campus prior to my time in student politics and the work going on there. For example, MacEwan's Office of Sexual Violence Prevention, Education and Response was somewhere that became really safe for me on campus and, relating to some of what Alannah said. I felt very isolated in my first year on campus. I'm also a first-generation student and there was not a lot of places to go where it just felt like I could be and bring my whole self to that space without folks expecting some kind of performance or output from me, I guess. And this office was one of them and it was a safe space as a survivor to engage in that healing and start kind of looking at advocacy work.
My love for journalism and storytelling and good communications has really been integral to all my work. My concept of advocacy is really deeply rooted in my survivorship and creating a cohesive narrative around my experiences of violence was definitely one of the most empowering and powerful things to me coming up early in this work. And, as a Mi’kmaw woman, of course I understand my kinship with not only survivors, but also perpetrators of violence and along with every other living and non-living thing on earth. So to me, this work is about making spaces for honest and productive learning and sharing, where we can all begin to see each other as relatives and to understand the care and the responsibility that we owe to one another. And I think stories go a really, really long way in facilitating that and bringing people together and increasing that level of shared understanding. Ultimately I found so much power in my story, and I really hope that all survivors are able to find that power and the safety and security needed to put words to a story and to feel the power that those stories hold both individually and collectively, even if those stories are never shared. There's something about the very existence of a story that brings it to life and holds power and space in community. And that's something that I really just think is so sacred and it's something I wish for everyone.
Farrah: Really, what you're saying is around just the power, those spaces, having them to nourish us and support us. So we can do the work that we wanna do.
Audrey you too have been creating spaces and opportunities for people to do healing for people to have conversation around really hard subjects. You are the co-founder of No More Silence working with other Indigenous women, trans and Two-Spirit people to raise awareness of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls. You also bring Indigenous women from across Canada to share their stories in print and film. I'm thinking of Not Just Another Case: When Your Loved One Has Gone Missing or Been Murdered, as well as Smudge Don't Judge, assisting trans and Two-Spirit survivors of violence.
Could you tell us a bit about the power and importance of storytelling in your activism and helping people share their experiences, resist oppression and create healing and perhaps even justice?
Audrey: Yeah, I mean, there's so many levels in which storytelling can be so powerful and so impactful. I'm, like, noticing behind me that there's a picture of Norma George, and she was one of the first women that I made a feature length documentary about back in 2004. It was just about the time that No More Silence was founded and I was at CBC television. And at that time I had convinced my producers to give me just a really small budget and to put out word that I was asking people to share their stories for CBC television of their missing and murdered. And that was a time where people did not trust the media, for good reason, because it had been just terrible reporting around these issues. It's just slowly starting to get a little bit better, right? But they gave me a little budget and I made these pink posters and I basically drove across the country with my dog. And we had a 1-800 number and I put these posters up in cities and in communities that I traveled through asking people to share their memories and just sort of introduced a little bit of my, who I was and why I was doing it. And I got flooded with response because one of the biggest hurts had been the societal indifference to people's pain, thinking of families, you know? Like, in the five weeks that I was on the road from Toronto, all the way north to the Highway of Tears and BC, and then circling back through Alberta and Saskatchewan. I couldn't get to everybody who wanted to share their memories of their loved ones because they had felt so invisibilized and so not heard. And it was so painful for them. And then, as a result of that, my executive producer, he said, “okay, well, clearly there's a story here”.
And, it was also around the time when the Amnesty report first came out, that Bev Jacobs worked on the first time that it was framed as a human rights issue, Stolen Sisters report. And so I got to talk about Norma George and I made this documentary that was supposed to be investigative, actually was mentored by the Fifth Estate people, and we solved her murder! And I realized that you can actually solve murders. It's not that hard. It's simply that the police who are supposed to do it don't care. This was a 13 year cold case and we solved this murder, and we were able to tell this family what happened to Norma. Not only that, we got her bible back that she carried with her everywhere and that she wrote her personal notes in. So 14 years later was able to give that to her mother. And we ended up not being able to air the story of who killed her, because it would have been too dangerous for people who were still alive. And so we turned it into a story of the sisters. When we went back to her home community of Takla Landing, and they showed us the headstones of Norma and her brother, neither of which had been laid because they had both been killed in the same year and in that community, according to their traditions, you couldn't finish the grieving ritual if you hadn't seen the bodies because they did open casket wakes. And the RCMP had told them not to open Norma’s casket. And ‘cause there's a lot of, you know, internalized colonialism around residential schools and so on and so forth, no one dared to disobey the RCMP. And so they were never allowed to place the headstones of either of them, and it was like they were frozen in their grief. And because the film aired and talked a lot about that, we got contacted by a woman who at that time was the Aboriginal police liaison in Ottawa. And she made a couple of phone calls, and the officers that were involved in investigating her case flew up to the community with her autopsy pictures and showed them to clan Elders so that they, finally, were able to lay the headstones.
So you can have all kinds of different impacts. Like it can just be simply validating people's pain and making it visible, which is so rare, and you can have these kind of repercussions that I'm talking about. We recently made Not Just Another Case. How many years are there in between there, like 2004 and 2017? We made Not Just Another Case to give people the tools to solve their own murders, to find the missing on their own, and, if it comes to that point where someone is actually charged, arrested, and in standing trial, how to go through that process, how to survive court. And all with, like, the rich experiences that so many people across the country have that I was able to gather. So yeah, there's so many different ways that storytelling can be important and impactful.
Farrah: I think all our mouths dropped when you were just like, casually said, “oh yeah, we, we solved this case”. What I appreciate about what the three of you have named is: if no one else is going to do it, we're going to step in and do it with the knowledge our community has and build on that knowledge, build on each other's skills, learn from each other. All of that. It just speaks to the lack of support for Indigenous women, girls and trans and Two-Spirit folks, but also the resilience and brilliance of the community to be like, “oh yeah, you're not going to take care of us? We're taking care of ourselves”.
Before the show, we asked each of you to come up with some questions for each other. Audrey, Aubrianna has a question for you.
Aubrianna: How can we best include diverse global perspectives and make space for individual and collective identities on the path forward for gender justice?
Audrey: So I think the premise that No More Silence work with, whether it's international - and I think of international as nations, being Cree and Mi'kmaq and Anishnawbe, not just like folks that I met in Palestine or folks that I've met in Chiapas. So I think the premise has to be that it has to be locally driven. So, it really has to be driven by the needs of the people in the place where you're working. So when No More Silence, you know, decided to do a database project, we didn't try to gather names in BC or in treaty six, where you are, like, no, the people who are based there, they know best how to do that. Or like looking at what happens around February 14th. I'm always also thinking of the Aunties and the grannies that started this work in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside. And we have borrowed from their incredible leadership and the way they've inspired us and modeled the work. But some of it just doesn't apply to where we are. So you always have to shape it to meet the local needs and not try to put something on a place that comes from somewhere else. So, you know, you can meet and exchange and learn, and there'll be a lot of similarities and parallels, but you have to, like, apply it based on what's happening around you.
Farrah: Audrey, your question for Alannah.
Audrey: Have you noticed any change in societal responses to missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls, trans, and Two-Spirit people post inquiry?
Alannah: Honestly, I'm going to have to say no, because it's been quite a few years. Being someone who grew up in the inner city in Winnipeg center, and I have a lot of young Indigenous women in my family... I was shook to my core when I found out about Tina Fontaine, because, you know, that was just the neighborhood next over to me, right? Like I feel like a lot of the things would have been more implemented instead of it being like, grassroots driven. It’s always Indigenous folks, Indigenous leaders and Indigenous organizations paving the way for these institutions to just co-opt the work of Indigenous people in general.
It can’t come from Indigenous people in our communities because we have a lot of mourning to do. A lot of, like, still finding our kin and, like, work to do for ourselves and our communities. That this is something that non-Indigenous folks and institutions should be taking on. We can't be the ones at the forefront of those things and leading those, just for it to get co-opted and other things would be taken away from us when we asked for funding, we ask for one thing and another thing gets taken away. When it comes to those leaderships and who decides to take that on, our governments are definitely not taking those into perspective when it comes to that, right? Because a lot of the work does fall on our backs and it can get heavy because, not only that, we do have our communities to go to as well and attend to them when these things happen. And it happens every single day. And it's, like, in the news, so it hurts, right? So when this happens to one person, it just doesn't happen to their family, it happens to the whole community. And then a whole community is being so cognizant of, like, what is happening and feeling unsafe. As an Indigenous woman, you can't walk anywhere because you don't feel safe. And, like, from a young age, I was taught to always remember where I am. And I'm really good at, like, navigating directions. If I go into a new city, I always, like, am so self aware of my surroundings. Things like that are always going to be instilled in, like, young Indigenous women, my nieces. They text me “I'm on my way home. I'm on the bus”, like things like that. And we have to do that because we have to be there for each other. So I'm going to say nothing really changes. For the government, it's like a piece of paper, it's there, but they're not doing anything about it. I shouldn't have to worry about looking over my shoulder all the time.
We're not safe within these societies, no matter where we are. It doesn't matter if we’re occupying these spaces. We're still facing misogyny and patriarchy, right? And there's, like, no addressing the systematic racism and gender based violence without Indigenous women, Two-Spirit, non-binary and trans folks, because we disproportionately face that violence within these societies.
Farrah: Audrey what’s your question for Aubrianna?
Audrey: How much of your work involves creating space for inclusion of trans, non-binary, gender fluid, and Two-Spirit community members?
Aubrianna: I think that's such an important part of the work that is really overlooked, especially in a lot of colonial organizing spaces. It seems often that the conversation around gender-based violence and particularly, for the missing and murdered discussion as well, that a lot of the weight of victimhood falls onto the shoulders of women and girls, but that's not true. Everybody is impacted by gender-based violence and its intersections with colonialism and patriarchy. And I think that's especially true for sexually and gender diverse folks. Having folks who live at those intersections and experience the interplay of patriarchy and homophobia and transphobia, along with all of the other countless systems that, that we're fighting, they offer such a valuable perspective and I think it's so important to be intentional in the work about making those spaces and reaching out and engaging in that community work. With Two-Spirit folks, with folks who are gender and sexually diverse, but also with folks of all various backgrounds, because ultimately this is community work at its very core and the community does include everyone. So, I think, moving forward without that kind of inclusivity in any way, really just defeats the purpose of a lot of the work that we're doing.
Farrah: Do you, after listening to each other talk about these pieces, is there any question you have for each other that you're like, “I wanna know more about this”, or “I wanna understand this more”. Alannah’s making one in her head right now. I can see it.
Alannah: Yeah. I'm trying to think of something definitely for Audrey, because I keep thinking about how you said, like, “we stopped waiting for police, we’re taking the initiative”. We definitely see that happening across, like, the country in so-called Canada. Because I'm a board member for North Port Douglas Women's Center, it’s like right in the inner city of Winnipeg, and we have, like, a mama bear clan who walks through and patrols the streets. Like every Thursday, Friday, Saturday night they have medicine walks and then they also do house calls instead of, like, the police and things like that. They try to, like, assist, like, young woman who are intoxicated in the streets. And I kind of wanna, like, hear your perspective in navigating those things where you are and how it helped you to be able to take those initiatives on your own, like wherever you're located.
Audrey: For me, it's been important to be outside of institutions as much as possible and to be independent of government funding. To find allies, if you need to raise funds, who are well-placed. In Toronto, we're lucky to be working with some folks from a group called SURJ Showing Up for Racial Justice, who, um, basically are white people who know how to mobilize other white people who may be like progressive, but not be like activists and not have time, but be well-placed to put some money where their mouth is. And funnel money to racialized communities is basically what they do. So we don't have any constraints. Because that's the difference I see between my day job, I worked for Aboriginal Legal Services, we’re funded by Legal Aid Ontario. Even with just that project, Not Just Another Case, that was a collaboration between ALS and No More Silence. And I had the freedom to do what I wanted in production, but then we got a commemoration grant to go around and show the film and always having to check in with the funders, these periodic reports and having like our timeline dictated by them. It's just so annoying. And not the way that I prefer to work. I mean, I was grateful to be in a workplace that allows me to do that on salaried work time. I don't want to, like, not appear grateful for that, but there's whole other possibilities when you're not needing to look over your shoulder. Your work should never be driven by the fear of losing funding.
Farrah: I think Audrey, you and I are part of those conversations back in the day about “the revolution will not be funded”, the whole conversations around divesting from grants, government grants, all those things, and the pressure that it alleviates to not always have to worry about that. I really think that's important to name because there's such a thing when we shape, sometimes, our work based on what the government wants or what funders want and not what we actually need as a community.
So for Aubrianna, Alannah and Audrey, what would you say to a young Indigenous person beginning to organize? Think about wanting to take action on gender justice.
Aubrianna: There's so many things I would say. Ultimately, my main message would just be around self preservation and protection because ultimately, like, this work is sacred, but like the people doing it are what's most sacred and this work can be really draining and can be really tough. And it can be really hard to navigate colonial spaces and spaces where the topic of discussion is your victimization or your experiences or your collective identity. And I think ultimately just making space for yourself and ensuring that you're listening to that voice inside you, because I know that it's always there for me. If I'm in a new situation and there's something inside me saying, oh, I didn't know, this is not right. Like I need to take a step back. It's been a lot of hard lessons for me to learn to listen to that voice and to prioritize my own self care above a lot of this work. And ultimately, I think it's important to remember that it is really easy to be full of energy and full of passion around this work, but it's also important to sometimes put the brakes on a little bit and reevaluate your own perspective and the spaces that you're engaging in, just because ultimately you have more work to do. It's not about running to the finish line and fixing all of gender-based violence and saving the world today. There is more work to come and you need to kind of pace yourself and, you know, Rome wasn't built in a day and we're not gonna disassemble colonialism in a day, either.
Farrah: Alannah, for you, what kind of message would you want Indigenous youth that are starting this work?
Alannah: For me at least I did not realize that a lot of the work that I was doing kind of revolved around gender justice and Indigenous feminism. It was just like, okay, well, I was raised this way. I didn't know the word matriarchy, but that's how my mom raised me, right? I was to respect women. And for people to respect me as well and respect my body and that I am very sacred. And like, she didn't directly say that, but it was like some ways, the way I grew up, it was embedded in the way I thought. And, for a lot of other people, ‘cause the intergenerational trauma, we're not taught directly about these kinds of things. We kind of just, like, have to navigate it, learn it as we go. And we don't realize that our lived experiences falls under these, like, categories.
Oftentimes it takes, like, healing to come to terms with some of these things. And growing up, I didn't identify or use titles such as advocate or leader or anything because I was, like, kind of refusing. And then I was going about, like, these colonial ways of, like, what they identified as a leader. And I internalized a lot of structural racism and I feel like a lot of Indigenous youth who either come from the communities up north or grew up in the inner city or urban areas, if they have the same experience, like, you don't know until you, like, learn about it in your terms, until you come to the realization.
So, for those who are, like, going towards it and kind of grew up around unhealthy relationships in our communities, we seen that. And a lot of those things we had to unlearn and relearn, right? Like, kind of, learning about what kind of community you grew up in and unlearning those intergenerational trauma things that affected you throughout your life. And that was, like, put onto you unknowingly, right? And, like, empowering those Indigenous youth to learn about their Indigeneity, where they come from and how they got to where they are. And learning about how trauma affects our lineage and, like, how it affects our personalities. ‘Cause where you unknowingly go about life until a certain point when we're ready to face it.
So, for me, I would say find your community if you can't find one, build it. There's other people. You're most likely not alone when it comes to certain things like this. There's other people who want to support you. It just takes one person to say something and other people will definitely follow if they align with what you have to say, right? Empowering others so you can empower other people as well, right? Definitely take, like, a grassroots approach because I feel like grassroots, like definitely come from community is at the heart. And I definitely would recommend for young Indigenous women who are trying to explore their Indigeneity, or Two-Spirits, or our trans kin that it's just, like, about community and finding those places, right? And learning and healing yourself.
Farrah: Audrey. What about for you?
Audrey: Yeah, I feel like I don't have much to add. It's… so much wisdom has been shared by those two that I really just agree. For me, work goes better when the emphasis is on our process. Don't let anybody ever tell you it's about the end result and that we have to meet this deadline or we have to get this press release out. If something is harming somebody within our own work, because of the way we're doing the work, we have to stop right there and address that. And so what if we miss a deadline? I just think it's really, really important and that that can get lost in the urgency that,you know, sometimes outside circumstances create. Whether it's, like, looking for funding or trying to meet a media deadline. Trust your gut feeling if something is not okay.
I just think it's more important to be looking at our inner structures and how we're treating each other. If we're in it for the long haul, as has already been said, you know, it's a marathon, it's not a sprint. And that's all part of that because burnout is real and I've seen so many people walk away from movements, feeling harmed by movements. And I hated that, you know, I've seen the same kind of dynamics play out over and over again in the last 35 years, it doesn't change. We are human and we will make the same mistakes. All we can do is, like, get better at how we address them.
Farrah: So we're getting to our last question. Our work at Possibility Seeds is really centered on dreaming about new visions of gender justice into existence. What gender justice possibilities are you currently dreaming of? And what would you love to see rebranded to existence?
Aubrianna: Personally speaking, I think I often get caught up in the internal discussion of what's not working, and the systems that I'm in that are frustrating me, and what needs to go, and that burn it all down mentality is often very present in my brain. But I've been thinking a lot lately about what happens after the burning down and the tearing down of all of these systems that we're fighting against? And, ultimately, I think what I really want to see is more spaces for community and self discovery and healing. And I think there's so much to be had in the positive aspects of the pursuit of gender justice, those things that add a plus to your life, whether it's that ability to communicate or that ability to be in community and share in those healing spaces. I think a really good path forward is not going to come from a reductive state of mind. And I think looking at how to build people up and how to address the issues and the vulnerabilities that contribute to gender-based violence in the first place, starting at the root is what I really wanna see.
Farrah: Alannah, what are you dreaming of?
Alannah: The first word that comes to mind is matriarchy. I absolutely love that word, it resonates with me so much. There's words in Anishinaabemowin that are like ogimaakwe and it just seems like head woman, leader, but it's, like, for the woman. I always think of words like that, those are the first words that always come to my mind. And obviously my ancestors and the strong women before me, Two-Spirit, non-binary, definitely occupy my mind. And I just think about, like, the things my granny had to face within, like, residential school or the things that my mom had to face in abusive relationships or my sister as well, and how those things came down generationally. And, like, how just making sure that those kinds of things are being rectified in some way, whether that be within the institutions that we currently have… Because, like, as much as I wish we could burn it all down and dismantle it all right now, like that would be amazing, but unfortunately we're just not there yet. But trying to reclaim those societal things, such as matriarchy and putting women, Two-Spirit, non-binary folks, and trans folks within those spaces without hurting them and making sure that those spaces are safe and making sure that we are able to thrive. And, I keep hearing this, it's just like, we don't want to be resilient anymore. We're done being resilient. We're passing resilience. We want to thrive. And we should be thriving and we're going to be thriving. We're there. We're already doing it. We're out here to thrive and just do better and slowly, but surely ,take everything down and reclaim those things. And making sure that the words like make matriarchy and ogimaakwe are there and making white men uncomfortable.
Farrah: Audrey, how do you even follow that up?
Audrey: Well, it's so exciting to hear these words because what was just put out there by Alannah is like what I see as, like, the main difference in when I started doing this work. You know, in these past 35 years, a lot of healing has happened. And so the landscape has shifted where we can hear someone dreaming like that. Whereas really, when I came back to Turtle Island, people were barely surviving. Like it really was barely, barely, it was just like being in crisis mode all the time. So it feels amazing to be, and to see people who can talk about thriving. Who can dream big because they're not just constantly, you know, trying to save a life. Concretely, like I just remember being so overwhelmed when I came back from Europe and landed in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside. And my time was pretty much spent up with going to funerals, or hospitals, or navigating ongoing crisis all the time. And that's changed. We see that in the arts, we see that in the films that are being made by Indigenous people, it's beautiful.
So when I dream, I want to believe that there's a world where we won't need carceral punishment. I dream about abolition and I dream about land being, you know, protected and not having to, like, build camps to stop pipelines, but like actually be healing our mother, the land. That being a priority for everybody. I haven't found the solution to it yet, what continues to exist is that people often equate justice with carceral punishment. Like they often equate these horrors that have happened with needing, like, the toughest jail sentence to somehow feel like that justice has been done. And, you know, if a loved one of mine had been murdered I'm sure that I would have those feelings, you know. And I do even, like, even with regards to Tina Fontaine or Colten Boushie, you know, when those murderers just get off, you know, when there's impunity. It is horrible, it's sickening. Right? And it just, like, underlines how we feel not cared for and that marked juxtaposition when it's a white person and the killer is found, and this is the difference. And yet I want to believe that there's going to be a world where we won't need that.
So I had these difficult conversations with, some of the women that I've been involved with over the years, starting from Bev Jacobs, to Christa Big Canoe who works in the legal system, to Krysta Williams from the Native Youth Sexual Health Network, to Terri Monture at Six Nations. And we were talking about dreaming about abolition and it all went back to Indigenous forms of justice. And that was exciting, revitalizing our own forms of justice, which were not based on retribution, but rather restitution, which is completely missing in the landscape. You know, like, we’re seeing little children graves uncovered, like we're in this heartbreaking time. We're coming up to the anniversary of the 215 and there's been no restitution. Like, I think Truth and Reconciliation is dead. I think that most people get that that was a scam. A sham. But there's so much wisdom to be had from these traditional ways. Like, first of all, you always have to look at the context is why has someone been violent? We know that from the generational cycles of trauma from residential school in our own communities. But even settlers who become violent, there's a reason for why they became that way. And so addressing that and creating a world where nobody has to end up like that. But hearing the stories of, well, in that case, if someone's life was taken and the person who took that life would be responsible for that family for the rest of their life and would have to plow their fields or, like, hunt for that family and actually make restitution, which doesn't happen at all in the carceral system. So, there's no wonder, you know, that nobody ever finds closure. The kernel of that is looking at revitalizing Indigenous forms of justice and seeing them predominate again.
Farrah: I hope that all these dreams go into existence because it is the world that we need to be living in now.
Thanks so much to our guests for joining us today and thank you for listening. We hope that what we talked about today will inspire you to plant seeds of change in your own communities. Visit us at possibilityseeds.ca and follow us on social media @PossibilitySeeds. Stay tuned for our next episode.