Last week we were audience to two different lectures that informed us on the different struggles minorities live through in our society. They were concentrated on indigenous women and Muslim women in Quebec.

The first lecture “Climate Change, Pipelines, and Violence Against Women” concentrated on the indigenous culture. Apart from all the economical issues that were presented to me, the thing that struck me the most were all the statistics provided to show us how indigenous women are the ones most endangered by physical violence, and especially male violence in Quebec. I was surprised to learn that all the cultural oppression and violence that these women have suffered for generations can be categorized as a legitimate genocide, and the speakers proved it by providing us with definitions of “genocide” and lots and lots of examples about indigenous society in Quebec. Although this is a subject on which I have not been informed well enough to give an opinion, I can see a clear link between the every day violence indigenous women live though, and the many readings on white male masculinity that I have read in this class, that will be provided in the next paragraph.

The reading “Masculinity” by Michael S. Kimmel, provides a very interesting definition of the general definition of masculinity established in America: unlike a woman. Now, we all know the stereotypical description of the perfect man around here is someone who provides for the family, is good looking, plays sports, etc, as is also provided in the text by Kimmel. What is interesting to me is that the word “Protestant” came up in this well established definition of a man in America. I never really thought about his religion but I see now that it plays a very important part in the issue we are discussing. In the lecture mentioned in the previous paragraph, the speakers provided us with a very quick history lesson on how assimilation of the indigenous people happened around here not that long ago, when Europeans started colonizing the lands. The clergy [the church] was teaching indigenous men how to beat their women, because this is how a woman was treated, at least according to Christianity. The lecturers also showed us a very interesting religious text “Maleus Maleficarum” from 1487, that throughly explains that women are evil creatures, witches that shouldn’t be trusted nor respected, and are created to serve only evil. Now, it is clear that the Protestant ideology of a man in America wasn’t established yesterday and has been around for centuries, I can now clearly see a link between the violence against indigenous women, and generations of religious teachings to men about the ways to treat women. To conclude with an unsettling phrase that however helps get my point across easily: old habits die hard. Thus, the violence against indigenous women hasn’t died yet in our country, through no fault of men on their own, but through generations of horrible religious ideologies forcing men to be “unlike a woman”.

The second speech “Living in the Shadow of the Law 21” focused on Muslim women and their struggles to live with a law that forces them to remove religious symbols of clothing at their jobs (for jobs like teachers, public service officers that carry a weapon, and other authority figures). Although it was never publicly stated, this law clearly targets the Muslim community, seen as they are the ones that display the most visible religious symbols in their clothing, unlike a Christian that could easily hide their tiny little cross under their clothes. This is exactly the point that stuck with me the most from the whole lecture: the inability to hide who you are for certain people. One of the lecturers was a visible Muslim: meaning she wore a hijab (head scarf covering her hair and neck) but she was white, while the other Muslim woman showed her hair but she was black. The latter talked about how it is sometimes very easy for her to hide her religion in situations she evaluates to be dangerous for her career or even her personal well being, solely due to the fact she has no religious symbols in her clothing. But it is however very hard for her to hide her race simply because her skin is black. Now, we need to understand that wearing a scarf is a choice, so of course a white Muslim woman can easily take off her scarf and blend in, but this is a violation of her religious beliefs, therefore it feels very much like the assimilation we discussed in the previous paragraph. Aside the obvious racist factor in this whole story, there is another thing about my readings on masculinity that I would like to talk about.

The two women talked about the feeling of being invisible and not belonging, and not having any culture to relate with if they chose to hide the parts of themselves they physically could. And I, funnily, see a clear connection between this, and the reading “Masculinity as Homophobia” by Kimmel. He talks at long and large about homophobia specifically and how it is, in essence, a fear to be perceived as a woman, a fear of the the unknown, a fear from other men and what they might think of you, an established set of rules to follow in order to be accepted. And I think we can easily relate this concept, if we exclude homosexuality from the picture, to the law 21. It was, simply put, established by men who are afraid of the unknown, afraid to be perceived as too acceptant of other cultures, afraid to be anything else than what the stereotypical man is. Much like a homosexual man feels invisible or not belonging or not being themselves when they are forced to hide their homosexuality from other man, the many religious minorities in Quebec experience the same feelings of cultural assimilation due to this law. If we can understand why a gay man would be afraid to show his true self, we can understand by the same logic why a Muslim woman would too. And we can understand how horrible it must feel.

In conclusion, I would like to say that this a a very small fragment of a very big problem but it is the only one I feel comfortable enough discussing. Although, I think that the readings by Kimmel make a very good connection with the problems that minorities are experiencing in our society and make it easier to understand both these issues, and masculinity as we study it in class.

I don’t see myself as a political person and I don’t like to get myself involved in any political arguments ,but surprisingly I found myself very interested in the topics that Lucy and Jen discussed during the presentation of climate change, pipelines, and violence against women.
It caught my attention when they talked about how Indigenous women and girls are representing16% of all female homicides in Canada, while constituting only 4% of the female population in Canada,and how 80% of people displaced by climate change are women.knowing that women are excluded from making decisions about climate change although they are the highest percentage of people who are affected by climate change.
Throughout this course we learned a lot of men stereotypes who take advantage of the power they have to achieve their plans and uses their power over the people who doesn’t have any power or who are ignored by the government or society.after this presentation I learned a lot about topics that never interested me, and I know now that even one voice could make a difference.

There’s a very meaningful sentence I learned in my life it’s which is you always have to listen to both side of a story.Before the presentation of living in the shadow of law 21.I agreed with bill 21 because I thought it is better for us to deal with people without knowing their religions and it was better to resolve decisions away from racial discrimination in order to fight sectarianism.Nadia and Laity spoke about a lot of problems and obstacles that faced them because of racist people, and how they were dealing with difficulties only because of their religion, nationality or color.after hearing Nadia’s story, how bill 21 affected her life,work,and future, to develop in a career she chose and loved made me change my mind about agreeing to this law.In my opinion, there are many people who don’t reveal their beliefs or religion to public but at the same time they are racist to people from other religions.In conclusion we cannot fight racism with a law that affects specific people more than others and is preventing them from performing their religions duties and beliefs.

International Women’s Week sought to raise awareness of the obstacles than many women around the world face on a recurring basis. Vanier College organised several presentations relating to many different issues stemming from this subject. Two such presentations will be discussed in this post: Living in the Shadow of Law 21, and Climate Change, Pipelines, and Violence against Women.

Climate Change, Pipelines, and Violence against Women

During the first presentation, we learned about the struggles that Indigenous people face when pipeline projects are built on their native territories.

Firstly, the pipelines create tremendous environmental deterioration, due to their construction and occasional leaks. Many First Peoples value nature as being very important to them and seek to protect it; these projects can therefore be very culturally destructive.

Secondly, it was mentioned that, during the construction and maintenance of these projects, many female Natives get raped by male workers of oil companies, in so-called “man camps”. This can be explained by Kilmartin’s classification of some men as being “aggressive and adventurous”, resorting to violence to assert their masculinity if need be.

Finally, it came to our attention that climate change affects women heavily, more so than men.

Living in the Shadow of Law 21

During the next presentation, we explored the lives of two Muslim women, Nadia Naqvi and Laïty Fary Ndiaye, who have been facing difficulties in the wake of Bill 21, a bill seeking to affirm the laicity of the State by prohibiting certain individuals from wearing religious symbols in jobs considered to be in position of authority.

First of all, the speakers believed that the law encourages hostility towards Muslims. Nadia Naqvi, for instance, affirmed that the bill can reanimate feelings and instances of islamophobia, which escalated drastically after 9/11.

Furthermore, they suggested that the law particularly impacts Muslim women, due to the impossibility to hide a hijab, contrary to other religious symbols than can be hidden.

Thirdly, the speakers mentioned that the bill can hurt the teaching profession. Since Quebec already has a lack of teachers, this law can add to the lack of workers in this professional field.

Finally, the presenters asserted that young students do not see religion, they see the teacher.

During International Women’s Week, I attended two presentations in the auditorium from Indigenous and Muslim women speaking on their daily lives and dealing with struggles that they must face. I also attended a presentation speaking on climate change in Canada, and how Indigenous women are victimized in society and are subject to brutal attacks and even murder. These presentations had some interesting facts and included things which I did not know of before which is what made them interesting to me.

To begin, we listened to Nadia Naqvi, a Muslim teacher and public speaker which told us her story and her struggles, including what life is like in her shoes. At the start of her career, Nadia received countless racial slurs and insults towards her and her religion and appearance just because she is Muslim. She also spoke on her life before becoming a teacher, and how her and her family were constantly seen as a danger to society as people at restaurants, stores, and public areas viewed them in a certain way. When the Canadian government announced Bill 21 and what it stands for, Nadia decided to start a new route in her life and to become a public speaker and voice for all indigenous and Muslim women who would be the most affected by it. Nadia began reaching out to news broadcasts and did many interviews in order to spread her voice and reach across Canada to raise awareness for Muslim and Indigenous women which are as well, being targeted by this law and this discrimination against them and their culture/religion.

After listening to her speech, I concluded that Bill 21 is a greater issue than other make it seem as. It is stripping people of their form of expression and way of dressing and portraying themselves in society. Although the said goal of this law is to have equality of men and women in some form of authority like being a teacher, it actually does not promote this at all. Nadia goes on to elaborate on this fact as she states that it is a law which victimizes those that look like her and portray their religion like she does. She states that wearing hijab is her decision and that as an individual in society living in Canada, she should be allowed to live life and appear to others any way that she wishes to. These interviews which Nadia has done have been widely spread across Canada as she now has a great following which look up to her and agree that this bill is not one that betters Canada as a country and becoming more equal, instead it is punishing and more discriminating.

Another subject which was also discussed during these presentations were the murders of indigenous women and violence against all women as a whole in Canada. This speech Was very intense and the entire room was silent as it discussed cases of missing and murdered indigenous women, and the crisis of it getting worse and worse as years progress. This subject included facts about Indigenous women and their struggles In being victimized in society. Lucy Everett and Jen Gobby discussed both of these matters and introduced a couple women and even younger girls which have been killed from brutal attacks by racists and people which have a hatred for women like them. This presentation surprised me as I was not aware of this matter and it was a complete shock to see the amount of people and victims affected by this horrible tradegy which keeps on happening. This further proves the point of how stories and horrible events like this are pushed under the rug and forgotten about in society. These events must be broadcasdted and widely swpread throughout Canada to share their story and to feel protected by others as this is a great issue which needs to be stopped immediately. I definetly learned a lot from this presentation as it portrayed all struggles not only women go through, but also the struggles that certain nationalities of women go through, making the situation way worse and drastic. I think that these presentations over the past week greatly helped gain a better knowledge about women in Canada, and the issues which are pushed under the rug which need to be brought to light and spoken about in order to spark change for the better. 

In Kimmel’s text on Masculinity, he discusses gender and its overall idea in society. The presentations during International Women’s Week discussed the same issues when looking at femininity and the female gender being seen as inferior, even to this day. This has been an ongoing issue from just looking at males and females. Kimmel also speaks on masculinity and says that there are many masculinities and not just one, as not all men are the same and act in the same way. Men are seen to act a certain type of way and to take on a role of being strong and not showing much emotion. This is the same way that women also are seen to act in a certain way in society as being the ones that should cook and clean and have the man in the house take care of bigger tasks. This has changed throughout the years as women have progressed and broken the barrier between male and females a little more than before. However, there is still a long way to go. I think that these presentations during International Women’s Week are important as they show how women in society have progressed into bigger roles, but there is still work to be done. I enjoyed attended them and I did learn more on women in general, along with the bigger issues which must be spoken about and spread throughout the entire world to hopefully help billions of women across the world to stand up for themselves and to be strong in times when strength is the hardest to have.

An International Women’s week held in the auditorium where four great women spoke mostly about Indigenous and Muslim women. It separated into two days of conferences. They taught me a lot of things that I didn’t know about and heard their stories.

Indigenous people are the first ones who have settled here in Canada. I found out that Indigenous women are 12 times more likely to be murdered than non-Indigenous women and that 90% of visible sex workers are Indigenous. Also, Indigenous people has an intergenerational trauma and has a colonization as gendered oppression and have experienced genocide. These facts relate to the masculinity that men are likely to sex assault women. They abuse their power to these things because for men, it’s okay to do it. Just like in the episode of Fifth Estate: Lone Wolf, one woman said that her boss will pay her double if she sleeps or have sex with him. And it’s the Status & Achievement, a sexual conquest for them. Furthermore, two indigenous siblings, Aamjiwreaang and Sarnia, have taken an action against climate change and other indigenous women on the front line. “We are not defending nature we are nature defending itself.” This shows that men are not the only who can do things. It’s not just by biological sex differences because in Kimmel: Masculinity, “gender is not an emanation of identity rather than it is an emergent property of interactions, coerced us by others”. It’s the person’s will to do such things.

On the 2nd day, the topic was about Living in the Shadow of Law 21 where were two incredible women in front of us shared their stories. First woman named Nadia Naqui who was born and raised in Quebec. Nadia is proud to be Muslim, and when she was young until she grew up, she witnessed the islamophobia of other people and it has been present all along. Fortunately, she has a father who was there to guide and discipline her. It’s a kind of father who is a “Good family man” providing economical and emotional support for their family. Furthermore, in 2019 the Bill 21 became a law, Nadia campaign the rights of every Muslims with the Bouchard-Taylor Commission and wants to keep her rights to wear hijab while teaching. Apart from it, Laïty Fary Ndiaye, she is a black Muslim who talked about more of the Law 21. She said that the Law 21 supposed to respect the laïcity. She joined a collective group. A collective group who recognizes different women like different religions. She is a part of it, and it shows that they have emotional or social support from each other by helping one another when they need help, and it’s a relationship basic for everyone.

The one thing in common for Indigenous women and Muslim women is that they have been harassed, people have been sexist and misogyny. For Indigenous women, a lot of them got raped and went missing. For Muslim women, they get harassed and people have been racists because of their religion. We think that in Canada, there are less racial stereotypes and an equality of gender roles, but the sad part is that it’s still there invisible in our society. It’s rare, and yet institutionalized (or systematic) racism persists (Omi and Winant, 1993). Therefore, I’m hoping that this racialization will disappear little by little and hoping that the government will act.

Throughout the first International Women’s week, Lucy Everett and Jen Gobby talked about the indigenous society. They talked about men abusing indigenous woman. They were forced to go to these reserves where they were taken away from their culture and families. They were also abused in that place as well. These men present violent characteristic which is also talked about in Kilmartin’s definition of “adventurous and aggressive” men.

In the second presentation we went to, Nadia had issues with her culture and especially wearing a hijab. She talked about how her parents immigrated to Canada and her father was mostly discriminated by white men. For example, she explained how he got beat up from his car and that the police were unable to capture the perpetrator. The people that witnessed it happen were trying to catch the person as well but he went in the next bus and the bus driver wouldn’t stop the vehicle.On the 2nd day, the topic was about Living in the Shadow of Law 21 where were two incredible women in front of us shared their stories. Nadia claims to be a proud Muslim, even after all the trauma her and her family has been through. In 2019 the Bill 21 became a law, Nadia is doing a campaign for the rights of every Muslims in order to wear her hijab while teaching at John Rennie High School. There was also Laïty Fary Ndiaye, who is a black Muslim. Laïty says that the Law 21 was supposed to respect the laïcity. She is part of a collective group that talks about different women with different religions. These women are there for emotional support and help each other through what they have to go through on a daily basis.

These two presentations helped me learn and understand that everyone faces many obstacles either because of their religion,race,etc. From what we learned in class, masculinity always played a major role in our society.Which for indigenous people and muslim women can be relatable to each other.Everyone is goes through different expectations,realities and injustices because of what society expects us to be. These issues are still present today, when it shouldn’t be.Our generation shouldn’t let these things happen and should make changes for our future.

In the first presentation, We learned about problems about Climate change, pipelines and specifically violence to women’s. It is so sad to see how the Government of Canada mistreating indigenous community and also it is so bad to see how indigenous men abusing their own women in their community. Indigenous men are thought to abuse women by the European who colonize them before.

The Government of Canada are trying to rule the lands of Indigenous people and its been so bad to see how they are treating these indigenous people in terms of this. Indigenous women are mostly violated,killed and sexually abused than other color of women. There were a presentation when Indigenous women hang some red dresses and clothes that were wear by the Indigenous women who got sexually violated and killed. Those present love,hate and mercy on what is happening to their community specially for the women and the Family who lose their love one’s, and It is so devastating to see just how some Government soldiers or police taking down all the red dresses and clothes that has been hanged.

The presentation that hurt me the most is this event. The event that shown how Indigenous community are mistreated. It really shows how we badly treated some of the community in our world. We are human and we all are the same inside and outside. No one should be treated differently in our world. They must know how to be equal in terms of Human rights specifically for Indigenous Women.

What I learned from the gendered experiences of both Indigenous and Muslim women is that the Quebec government has an ‘us versus them’ mentality towards non-caucasians, especially women.

In the talk about Indigenous women, the speakers Lucy and Jen connected the issues of climate change, pipelines and violence against women, and the issue became simple: the government does not actually care about the Indigenous community. The plans on the pipelines and oil sands did not have the consent of the Indigenous community, on which they would be invading their territory (their reserves) for the dirty process of oil extraction, which damages their way of life as well as their territory. In addition, the ‘man camps’ are often places of sexual assault of Indigenous women, who are statistically raped and murdered many times more frequently than women of other ethnicities. Through all this, it is clear that the message sent is that the opinion of Indigenous People’s does not matter to the government, nor does their health or safety.

Secondly, Nadia Naqvi explains how law 21 has affected her life and career. Since the government has itself passed a law based on the erasing of cultural and religious symbols, the (ignorant and unfortunately misinformed) citizens of Quebec will follow suite the ideologies portrayed through this racist law. The law prevents people who wear any religious symbols as a religious requirement working in the public sector. Under this law, Nadia cannot get promoted while her Caucasian colleagues can, solely because of the garment she wears on her head, the hijab. This is a discrimination enforced by the government, and she has faced other racist comments throughout her entire life as well.

These examples of oppression can connect to our course because we know that the systems put into place are gendered institutions. These institutions are not made for women to thrive or have their voice be heard. The Quebec government is acting exactly how the institutions do: oppressing women, not letting their voice be heard, and disregarding concern of their health, safety and livelihood.

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In our first presentation, we learnt about climate change, pipelines and violence against women. Unbeknownst to me, all of these things are related to each other. It all comes down to the violence against women in indigenous communities. The Canadian government is illegally setting themselves up on the protected land to force the projects that the indigenous community has already rejected. These men who settle on the land actually harm these women, there has been a direct correlation between these camps and the women. Also, going further back in history, we learnt that homophobia and these more toxic ideals of men and women were brought with colonialism. Indigenous communities had high respect for their women and actually celebrated their LGBTQ+ community, which is known as 2 spirited. I believe the whole concept of the men setting up and taking what they want from the women (as well as their homophobia) directly correlates to Kilmartin’s anti femininity theory. Showing any compassion or emotion would be too “feminine” and that shows weakness as a man. They have to be stoic and be strong to assert their masculinity. Anything other than that would allude to maybe homosexuality or being less of a man, which is not what they’d want.

In the second presentation, two women told us explicitly about their personal experiences with racism being Muslim women in Canada. Mrs. Nadia noticeably faced more outright aggression seeing as she wears the hijab. It seemed that these women faced more discrimination for being a different race rather than being women. HOWEVER, it all stems from the same place of hatred! Why can’t these women live their lives in peace instead of fearing aggressions every day over their religion or race? Bill 21 disabled women and men from wearing certain religious symbols but enabled racists to feel more powerful in speaking out against other people. In taking down this Bill, it would give people the choice of wearing or not wearing their items and remaining unbothered!

My takeaway from everything is that the world is very far from any kind of equality. We are HUGE steps away from women being as respected as men or white people having the same rights as other races. It’s going to take another hundred years for any significant changes to come about because there isn’t enough activism. Ms.Nadia said that an important question to ask ourselves is if we’d want to be a bystander or ally. Every single person needs to work together as allies for our world to be a better place for all!

I learned a lot about our oppressive and racist society while attending both conferences during the international women’s week on Monday march 2nd and Wednesday march 4th. In the first conference, I was able to understand the pain of indigenous women and the problem the oil industry and climate change is affecting their already endangered lives. The problems they have already been encountering since America was colonized, including decolonization, racism and unwanted violence have gotten even worse recently because of climate. Big oil companies are destroying their lands and occupying big establishments for primarily white male workers that are completely disrespecting and ruining their livelihood.

In the second conference titled “Living in the Shadow of Law 21”, I listened to the rocky and difficult journey Muslim women have had since their immigration to Canada. I now understand the difficulty and unfair violence against them just because of their religion, skin color or country of origin. The Law 21, mostly targeting hijab wearing women, is wanting to force them to remove it if they work in a governmental owned job field. This is constantly threatening them and their religion for no other reason than a religious piece of clothing, and causing unnecessary racism. An example of this are ignorant remarks and experiences the speakers have been told. Nadia Naqvi has had multiple teachers that have said racist remarks about her been fellow colleges for no reason or students that have screamed “Allahu Akbar”, implying she was a terrorist just because of her religion.

Throughout these presentation, I was able to make a few parallels with the readings we have read during the semester. The main thing is the stereotypes placed on males when they born, such as liking the color blue and sports, are the same type placed on Muslim women by the rest of society: they are all terrorists, violent and need to make a big deal to pray all the time, which is very obviously false.

In conclusion, what I take from these presentations is that our western is still heavily biased towards predominantly Caucasian males, and that anyone who doesn’t fit these standards is considered different and inferior.