TORONTO (Guardian) -- After a string of violent incidents involving police officers, activists and ordinary people across Canada have joined the global chorus calling for a reckoning with racism, policing, inequality and the long reach of history.
In recent weeks, a black woman fell to her death after police were called to her flat in Toronto; an Indigenous woman suffering a mental health crisis was shot dead by an officer in New Brunswick and footage emerged showing Royal Canadian Mounted Police officers in Alberta forcing a First Nations chief to the ground and punching him in the head. On Friday evening, an Indigenous man was shot dead by the RCMP in New Brunswick.
Activists and historians argue that before change can come, Canadians must first accept a tarnished history and the persistent structural inequities that it has bequeathed the nation.
The numbers are clear: black and Indigenous peoples in Canada are disproportionately overrepresented in prisons and jails across the country. As students, they face harsher discipline in schools and are suspended at a higher rate than white students. In Toronto, the country’s largest city, black residents are 20 times more likely to be shot by police.
On Thursday, Justin Trudeau said it was clear systemic racism was present in the country’s federal police force.
Some argue that Canada’s national police force is itself emblematic of racism.
"The RCMP was not created to protect Indigenous people. It was created to protect white settlers from Indigenous folks – while suppressing our ceremonies and implementing laws that sought to decimate us,” said Brooks Arcand-Paul, a Cree lawyer and executive on the Indigenous Bar Association.
"Even today, the police will always look at Indigenous people and Black folks in our territories as potentially requiring some kind of suppression.”
Protesters have highlighted the case of Chantel Moore, 26, who was fatally shot last month by officers during a mental health "wellness check” and Regis Korchinski-Paquet, who fell to her death after police responded to a mental health emergency. But Arcand-Paul said her death was only the latest in a litany of cases where Indigenous lives are lost and families denied justice. He points to the case of Gerald Stanley, a white farmer who shot Colten Boushie, an indigenous man, in the head – but was acquitted by an all-white jury.
"When we talk about systemic racism, we’re not just trying to lay the blame on the RCMP. It’s the entire structure that is causing continued violence against black and Indigenous bodies in this country,” said Arcand-Paul.
In recent weeks, a black woman fell to her death after police were called to her flat in Toronto; an Indigenous woman suffering a mental health crisis was shot dead by an officer in New Brunswick and footage emerged showing Royal Canadian Mounted Police officers in Alberta forcing a First Nations chief to the ground and punching him in the head. On Friday evening, an Indigenous man was shot dead by the RCMP in New Brunswick.
Activists and historians argue that before change can come, Canadians must first accept a tarnished history and the persistent structural inequities that it has bequeathed the nation.
The numbers are clear: black and Indigenous peoples in Canada are disproportionately overrepresented in prisons and jails across the country. As students, they face harsher discipline in schools and are suspended at a higher rate than white students. In Toronto, the country’s largest city, black residents are 20 times more likely to be shot by police.
On Thursday, Justin Trudeau said it was clear systemic racism was present in the country’s federal police force.
Some argue that Canada’s national police force is itself emblematic of racism.
"The RCMP was not created to protect Indigenous people. It was created to protect white settlers from Indigenous folks – while suppressing our ceremonies and implementing laws that sought to decimate us,” said Brooks Arcand-Paul, a Cree lawyer and executive on the Indigenous Bar Association.
"Even today, the police will always look at Indigenous people and Black folks in our territories as potentially requiring some kind of suppression.”
Protesters have highlighted the case of Chantel Moore, 26, who was fatally shot last month by officers during a mental health "wellness check” and Regis Korchinski-Paquet, who fell to her death after police responded to a mental health emergency. But Arcand-Paul said her death was only the latest in a litany of cases where Indigenous lives are lost and families denied justice. He points to the case of Gerald Stanley, a white farmer who shot Colten Boushie, an indigenous man, in the head – but was acquitted by an all-white jury.
"When we talk about systemic racism, we’re not just trying to lay the blame on the RCMP. It’s the entire structure that is causing continued violence against black and Indigenous bodies in this country,” said Arcand-Paul.
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