In a year of uncertainty and loss, we’re pausing once again today to remember one of our nation’s greatest tragedies. On December 6, 1989, the lives of 14 brilliant women were cut short by an act of misogyny.
The Montreal Massacre, the mass shooting at École Polytechnique, lives on as an example of devastating femicide — the killing of women because they are women — and of how gender-based violence is a strikingly common experience for women and gender-diverse people.
In 2020, the memory of this tragedy comes into sharp focus, as risks of violence have spiked during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Social isolation measures can mean that abusers are in closer proximity and can exert more control, and the signs of violence are obscured behind closed doors. The elevated stressors many families are facing right now can also lead to rising tensions at home.
Red flags are in the data: Women’s Shelters Canada found that 52 per cent of the shelters they surveyed reported seeing clients who have experienced more severe violence in the pandemic. Statistics Canada reported a bump in domestic disturbance police calls.
But we can’t blame the virus for this alone. Women’s high risk of violence in private is directly related to their public position. Gender equality gains over the last 30 years have proven shaky. The gender pay gap persists, and it’s worse for Indigenous women, Black women, newcomer women, and women with disabilities. And, this year, women are being pushed out of paid work at historic rates.
In 1989, these inequities set the stage for the Montreal Massacre. More recently, it led to the Toronto van attack, and was inextricably linked to the Nova Scotia shootings.
Now, an inclusive, co-ordinated national action plan on gender-based violence is more critical than ever.
The plan must include stricter firearms legislation, given that the single greatest risk factor for fatal domestic violence is gun ownership. The Liberal government has promised to adopt a “red flag law” to remove firearms from abusers, but this needs to be accompanied by an overhaul of the current inconsistent approach, which will require substantial funding for things like public education on the risks of guns in the home and better training of police and the courts.
And this plan must fund community-based violence prevention and intervention. For too long, Canada has prioritized funding institutions like police and prisons, but these institutions cannot stop the abuse before it starts.
It’s encouraging that the federal government has recognized the high risk of violence and has allocated emergency funding to service providers. Now it’s time to move forward on a Canada-wide action plan that makes gender-based violence a national priority.
Reflecting on lives lost to preventable violence is important. But the greatest way to honour stolen lives is through concrete action. So much is at risk today. What we do now will prove exactly what we’ve learned from past tragedies, and what we hope our future will hold.
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