As the days darken, and the pandemic surges, I sometimes have trouble remembering what day of the week it is, let alone the date.
But I never forget this date: December 6, 1989.
Because on that day in Montreal something horrifying happened.
Fourteen young women killed just because they were women, and had enraged their killer by daring to dream about being engineers.
It was such an obvious case of murderous targeted misogyny, but the media and much of society preferred to call the killer a madman. They didn't take misogyny seriously.
So despite that horror, thirty-one years later misogyny is still rampant and murderous.
Alek Minassian would consider carrying out the deadly Toronto van attack again, and next time would aim for a higher “kill count,” a court heard Wednesday.
“If I were to pick a specific target it would probably be women between the ages of 18 and 30,” the now-28-year-old told a medical assessor in a psychiatric assessment last year.
And is still killing women and poisoning our society.
Luckily, after the horror of the Harper years, we now have a Canadian leader who supports women's rights.
These women had promising lives ahead of them, but they were cut short - because they were women. The fact that this gender-based violence ever existed in our country is tragic. Sadly, it still exists. We must keep working to end it for good. https://t.co/SVfSSTUg7l pic.twitter.com/6ZXAizWjq3
— Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) December 6, 2020
As do most young Canadians, who may have not been born when the women were killed...
But will help keep their precious legacy alive.
On what is now the National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women...
This year the vigils had to be virtual for obvious reasons, and like everything else were more subdued than in other years.
But last night fourteen columns of light did rise again into the sky from the top of Mount Royal.
And as usual it was a really moving sight,
One that always gives me hope that those murdered young women did not die in vain.
Their lives were so short, and ended so brutally.
But thirty-one years later they're still inspiring Canadians to build a better and more peaceful country, free from the curse of gender-based violence.
So they will live forever, and never be forgotten...
4 comments:
Thanks for the post Simon.IT has been a long journey with frequent Con inspired backsliding, but progress has been made and the unwavering desire not to give up is still strong.
RT
Hi RT....Thank you for reading this post. I knew hardly anyone would read it, and I was right. But it has been a long struggle, and no issue caused me more ugliness. Standing up for the legacy of the women and their families and loved ones brought the gun lobby down on my head, with more death threats than I have ever received. So I cherish the progress that has been made, and intend to keep on doing what I’m doing as long as I can....
I don't know whether no one would read this post or not, Simon. I did and have in the years I've followed your blog. As much as it left me sickened and speechless when this murderous rampage occurred, I am still at a loss as to what to say. Maybe it's the fourteen beams of light pointed toward the heavens that invokes the memory of fourteen women in the prime of their lives, lives that should have never been taken away. We cant change that but we can and have taken measures to guard against it ever happening again. For the sake of all women, we must never let our guards down.
JD
Hi JD....The only reason I mentioned that I didn't expect many people to read this post is because I have come to realize that Canada is a very misogynistic country, which explains among other things why so many men support the Cons while most women support the Liberals and the NDP. But the other reason I mentioned that is because of the the long battle to honour the dead women which exposed to the underbelly of this country. I was deluged and I mean deluged with violent comments including many barely veiled death threats. But it's OK, I don't bother to check how many are reading my posts. I write what I write, and march to the sound of my own drum...
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