This week I wanted to address the issue of the Willie Pickton case and his victims. In  the video we watched in class we learned about Dawn in particular, this video really struck me because so often we forget that these women were real people, who had lives and people who loved them. The Media circus so often only uses these stories for entertainment value. This makes people seem so far away, and unreal. Going off this point I’d like to address the fact that after the trials many crime drama shows like criminal minds created story lines based off of the Pickton case. To me this seems wrong, this makes these women’s stories no longer about the suffering of them and their families but rather about some shows story line and ratings. It also emphasizes the gore and violence of the murders opposed to the aftermath. Exploiting these stories and transforming them into something for people to consume, detracts from the suffering of these women’s families and further separates their stories from the public.

I feel like in order for these women’s stories to be taken seriously the media must stop putting an emphasis on turning these events into a spectacle. We must not turn them into something to consume for entertainment. This issue is an important one to tackle because so often when we hear stories on the news or watch them played out on television shows, we often forget that these are real people whose stories deserve to be heard. And that in order to stop things like this from happening we have to address the root of the problem, and that is environments like the Downtown East side.

This brings me to my third point about the video I would like to discuss what her brother said about the police not caring because these women were poor and often had drug problems. I feel like this speaks volumes about what is wrong with our society today. Instead of trying to help people who have fallen down so often our society blames and shames them, making recovery extremely difficult. This scenario seems to happen more often to First Nations women, which can create unfortunate and untrue stereotypes that again make us forget that these are real people. I can remember clearly when the Pickton trial was being played on T.V, someone said to me that the reason he was able to get away with this for so long was because the women he preyed on were “poor drug addicted runways, who no cared about when they went missing” from the evidence in the movie obviously this was not the case women like Dawn had plenty of people who cared about her, they just didn’t have the socio-economic status to garner attention. This is a problem because it makes women like Dawn, who need the most help from society the most vulnerable. And when they get victimized society blames them for being addicted to drug or being prostitutes instead of looking at what they could have don’t to help out women like Dawn. This is why marches like the one they held today are so important because they force people to take notice of these women as people not just as drug addicts on the fringe of society. And it forces us to take responsibility for the treatment of these women.

To sum everything up we as a society must stop blaming the victims and instead focus on helping them up so that crimes like this wont happen anymore.

To be honest im still not sure if i liked Three Day Road or not. On one hand the writing is very lyrical and poignant and i have to admit the story itself is very moving. However there were a few problematic issues i personally feel as though the Joseph Boyden maybe presented a very narrow picture of Indigenous people. I feel like the character of Niska plays into the whole “mystical native” stereotype? i also feel as though the book doesn’t give the reader a overall picture of what was happening to indigenous people at that time as Xavier and Niska’s living situation was quite different from the majority of indigenous people at this time. Maybe the author chose to write them this way to try and show the struggle of native people to still live in their traditional ways. However im not really sure about that.

One thing about the book that i did find interesting, was the fact that Niska sufferd from epilepsy. I thought the attitude that the clan had towards this dieses was interesting to compare with the current european attitude about epilepsy. European tradition tends to shame epilepsy for a long time it was thought to be a sign that you were possessed by the devil. And the majority of people who suffered from this dieses suffered in silence. While the understanding of epilepsy has increased since then it is still considered an embarrassing secret. For example my nana suffered from epilepsy and the only reason that her husband found out was because she had a seizure in front of him. this shows that epilepsy was still ver misunderstood. In contrast Niska’s tribe believes that it gives her mystical powers that allow her to see the future amongst other things. While this gift is not welcomed by Niska she acknowledges that it gives her a certain power and status within her community.

I found this interesting mainly because of my personal connection but also because so often we get stuck in this trap of thinking that only westren values and practices are worth learning and practicing. And we forget that our society is extremely problematic when it comes to a lot of issues. Often the west is too proud to look at what other cultures were doing well and learn from them. This reminds us that no society or way of life is without flaws and we must learn from every culture.

The propaganda film for residential schools uses many different techniques in order to promote the schools. The film makes sure to include many shots of the children smiling and laughing in order to make it look like they were enjoying their time and that they were glad to be at the school. The video completely glosses over the fact that these children were removed from their homes without consent and were unable to contact their families. This film also talks about how the schools taught the students how to speak English it also glorifies their education system in general and how it would help integrate the indigenous students into Canadian society. However as we learned in class the children there were mostly taught labour skills like doing laundry, sewing and other domestic chores. The schools wanted to train the students for hard labour and jobs that generally didn’t pay a lot and were considered to be for the lower class.

The music the video uses is also important in terms of persuading the audience that these schools are a good thing. The score is very triumphant and positive which emphasises how the government endorsing these schools is a positive thing for Canada. It is also important to note that this video was made in 1955 when residential schools were becoming more mainstream and popular. Because of this we have to assume that the purpose of the video was to convince the public that these schools were a positive thing and to deemphasize the horrors of the residential schools.

The video also promotes the Church of England and converting the children to Christianity. The film negates to mention how the forced the children to abandon their traditional ways. And forbid them from practicing their own forms of religion and cultural practices. Stripping them of their cultural identity.

The propaganda film for residential schools uses many different techniques in order to promote the schools. The film makes sure to include many shots of the children smiling and laughing in order to make it look like they were enjoying their time and that they were glad to be at the school. The video completely glosses over the fact that these children were removed from their homes without consent and were unable to contact their families. This film also talks about how the schools taught the students how to speak English it also glorifies their education system in general and how it would help integrate the indigenous students into Canadian society. However as we learned in class the children there were mostly taught labour skills like doing laundry, sewing and other domestic chores. The schools wanted to train the students for hard labour and jobs that generally didn’t pay a lot and were considered to be for the lower class.

The music the video uses is also important in terms of persuading the audience that these schools are a good thing. The score is very triumphant and positive which emphasises how the government endorsing these schools is a positive thing for Canada. It is also important to note that this video was made in 1955 when residential schools were becoming more mainstream and popular. Because of this we have to assume that the purpose of the video was to convince the public that these schools were a positive thing and to deemphasize the horrors of the residential schools.

The video also promotes the Church of England and converting the children to Christianity. The film negates to mention how the forced the children to abandon their traditional ways. And forbid them from practicing their own forms of religion and cultural practices. Stripping them of their cultural identity.