Feminist
Research
Education
Development
and
Action Centre
The FREDA Centre
for Research on Violence
against Women and Children
for Research on Violence
against Women and Children
A Service Providers' Report
April 2001
COMMUNITY MOBILIZATION PROGRAM
- I) Introduction
- II) Methodology
- III) Commonalities
- IV) Differences
- V) Points of Intervention
- VI) Recommendations
The FREDA Centre for Research on Violence Against Women and Children
recently conducted five roundtables and interviews with service
providers who work with girls from marginalized communities. Participants
serve the following groups: Aboriginal girls, immigrant and refugee
girls, girls with disabilities, queer youth, and street-involved
girls. The research was funded by the National Crime Prevention
Community Mobilization Fund. This report pulls out the
commonalities and differences
between these groups, indicates possible points of intervention,
and documents the service providers' recommendations for change.
This study grew out of a continuing project that examines the
impact of violence on the
girl child.(1) While conducting
research
for that project, FREDA researchers noted a lack of information
and coordination among service providers around strategies for
violence prevention and intervention, and a severe lack of services
designed specifically for girls. Most programs accessible to girls
target youth. These programs are gender-neutral, and do not recognize
the unique vulnerabilities arising from the intersection of age
and gender. Moreover, the programs do not consider the particular
vulnerabilities manifesting from colonization, racism, ableism,
homophobia, and poverty.
The roundtables demonstrate that services and policies fail to
acknowledge that gender socialization begins at an early age.
Service providers also indicated that boys tend to dominate programs
designed for youth, making these programs key sites of vulnerability
for marginalized girls. There is a need for services designed
specifically for girls, and for girl-only spaces where young women
can come together to talk about violence and develop strategies
to improve their circumstances.
The research project began from the premise that "marginalized
girls" is a problematic category because it creates distinctions
that are not grounded in the social reality of girls' lives. Focusing
on marginalized groups has the potential to shift attention away
from systemic and institutionalized oppression. Analysis that
ignores systemic oppression often renders difference as deviant.
FREDA's analysis adopts a framework of interlocking systems of
oppression. Marginalization is meant to refer to differential
degrees of "otherness." This framework respects the
historical and contemporary differences between communities so
that the experiences of marginalized girls are not homogenized.
Emphasis on the intersectionality of systems of oppression ensures
that no one category is monolithic, and no one category is deemed
to play a fundamental role in shaping a girl's identity. FREDA's
analysis also seeks to pull out the commonalities between marginalized
communities to better understand the process of marginalization.
With this knowledge, activists can build coalitions to lobby for
policies and practices that recognize the highly specific circumstances
of girls' lives, and that tackle all of the forms of oppression
that create barriers for girls.(2)
Five roundtables were conducted with 38 service providers, 10
of whom work with street-involved girls, 10 with lesbian, bisexual
and transgender girls, 8 with Aboriginal girls, and 6 with girls
with disabilities. Individual interviews were conducted with 4
service providers who work with immigrant and refugee
girls.(3) Service
providers who work with Aboriginal girls met twice because there
were too many issues to discuss in one meeting.
FREDA researchers facilitated open-ended roundtables. The goals
of the roundtables were to provide a snapshot of girls' lives
and to brainstorm around ways to support girls. Service providers
were asked to comment on the factors influencing girls' identity
formation, their vulnerability to violence, the barriers girls
face, and how girls understand and respond to systemic oppression.
In the interviews, service providers discussed how policies impact
on girls' lives and made recommendations for change.
The tapes were transcribed, and the subsequent analysis focused on the following themes:
- vulnerability to violence;
- how girls are marginalized;
- how girls locate themselves in relation to other groups;
- institutional violence;
- coping mechanisms; and
- possible points of intervention and recommendations for policy change.
This report begins with a discussion of the commonalities between
marginalized girls. A discussion of the issues particular to each
group follows. Finally, I suggest possible points of intervention,
and review the recommendations for change that emerged from each
roundtable.
If I had a video camera, a day in the life of the kinds of violence that is just dealt with all the time. And sometimes they tell me but it's not because, "guess what? A violent thing happened to me." It comes out more as, "Oh a guy on the way here on the Sky Train ... was masturbating" or "when we were walking down the street, some guy rolled down the window and called out a racist comment or a sexist comment." Those kinds of things that they hear together. Then they'll show up at a girl's group and then they go outside and the police drive by and they pull them all over because they went "oink, oink, oink." I can trace it throughout their day.
(Roundtable with Service Providers for Aboriginal Girls)
When asked about the prevalence of violence in the lives of marginalized
girls, the service providers agreed that girls experience a range
of violent acts on a daily basis. Many added that it is impossible
to know how violent their lives are because it is difficult to
determine how girls perceive violence. Violence is so pervasive
that many girls have normalized it as part of their experience.
The boundary between what is violent and what is not is no longer
clear to many girls.
Girls are vulnerable to violence everywhere: in their homes, schools,
group homes, drop-in centres, the streets, squats, and in social
service and criminal justice systems. Caretakers, parents, intimate
partners, people in positions of authority (police, teachers,
social workers), and their peers perpetrate violence. A girl's
vulnerability increases according to her dependency on others
for her survival.
Service providers acknowledged that some of the girls they work
with are violent to each other. The murder of Reena Virk drew
public attention to violence between girls. However, media discussions
of violence between girls ignore the social relations that are
being played out in these
disputes.(4) Public discussions
of girl-to-girl violence rarely consider the power relations that
shape relationships between girls. They discuss violence as though
young people live outside of the oppressive social relations that
shape Canadian society. Strategies for change can only be effective
if they encompass an understanding of how the power relations
that girls have learned from the dominant culture influence the
ways girls treat peers from other social groups.
Adolescence is a time of change for girls. It is a period when
girls form their identities by questioning gender, sexual orientation,
race, and ethnicity. It is a transitional time of life when girls
are caught between the dependency of childhood and an expectation
that they will take responsibility for their actions. Developing
a sense of belonging is central to girls' identity
formation.(5)
Girls who are differently located because of race, sexual orientation
or class have a difficult time fitting in because this society
does not value those who do not conform to the ideals determined
by the dominant
culture.(6) Marginalized girls
negotiate contradictory
messages. Girls are highly sexualized, yet they are expected to
maintain their purity. Young girls are expected to be sexually
innocent, yet media present young girls as sexual beings. There
is a professed concern about child poverty and its ramifications,
but girls who are forced to live on the streets because they are
poor are blamed for making a bad lifestyle choice.
This society glamorizes youth but denies that girls are the authorities
on their own lives. As a consequence many girls blame themselves,
rather than systemic oppression, for their circumstances. Girls
who have disengaged from mainstream institutions and socially
accepted lifestyles are particularly affected by this lack of
autonomy. Most existing programs are not designed to assist girls,
and few respect girls' choices. Failing to recognize the power
relations between adolescent girls and boys puts girls in situations
that make them vulnerable to violence.
The lack of services for marginalized girls makes them more vulnerable
to violence. Girls who do not conform to the expectations of the
dominant culture tend to be treated as deviants. Services are
more likely to be based on models of social control and punishment
rather than helping girls understand why they are acting out.
These solutions are a response to societal perceptions that youth
are out of control and need to be reformed. Improving services
will require a shift in how adults think about young people that
considers the intersection of multiple forms of oppression. One
service provider's comment about the lack of political will to
help marginalized girls captures the assumptions about class and
gender that inform policy:
If politicians in our country saw that happen to their daughters or their granddaughters, it wouldn't exist. But it's happening to kids that are invisible. They don't count.
(Roundtable with Service Providers working with Street-involved Girls)
In the discussions with service providers and with immigrant and
refugee girls FREDA conducted for the Girl Child project, it became
clear that race, class, sexual orientation and disability trigger
disputes between girls. Girls are fighting for an improved social
location in their peer groups. Fitting into the dominant culture
requires distancing themselves from groups who do not conform
to the white, middle-class, heterosexual, able-bodied standard.
Defending the pecking order protects a group's social location.
Power relations are also played out within cultural groups. As
one service provider explained:
I think there's an expectation that if you don't exert your power over somebody, that you are then on the bottom of the pecking order. I think though as well, in regular, straight society, women are pitted against other women for boys, for grades, for better clothes. It's no different on the street but the level of competition then becomes physical because the only thing that you have left are your fists or your words ... I think that we've created a population of young women who just believe that they need to victimize someone else to get their own power back because what they've been taught is you're either a victim or a victimizer.
(Roundtable with Service Providers working with Street-involved Girls)
These dynamics are rarely discussed in policies, in schools, and
in programs with young people. As a consequence, girls relate
to their peers by reproducing the power relations they learn from
the dominant culture.
Marginalized girls live their lives under scrutiny; they live
under the controlling gaze of the dominant society. Jennifer Kelly
explains that living under the gaze makes marginalized people
visible and invisible. In public spaces, youth who bear the markings
of difference face increased surveillance from the dominant culture.
Young people's defence against the gaze is to make themselves
inconspicuous.(7)
Most young women spend much of their time in school. Schools are
microcosms of the power relations of a broader society. However,
this is rarely acknowledged. Instead, generic bullying policies
mask the racism and sexism that girls face. Drop-out rates for
Aboriginal youth are high. This is disquieting because school
boards receive funding for Aboriginal students. Clearly, those
funds are not being used to ensure that schools and curricula
are sensitive to Aboriginal students. School administrators adhere
to Multiculturalism policies that celebrate difference, but do
not address the problems that arise from a lack of respect for
diversity. There are no spaces for queer girls to explore their
sexual identities. School board autonomy prevents young people
from challenging the heterosexual imperative.
Girls who cannot cope with the isolation they experience in school
often find themselves caught up in other systems. Ironically,
institutions that are supposed to protect girls from vulnerability
are the key sites of surveillance in girls' lives. Girls are distrustful
of systems because of the control they exert over their lives.
The systems are integrated in a way that disempowers those who
turn to them for assistance. Rather than helping girls improve
their circumstances, system coordination creates a web of surveillance
that deters girls from accessing government run social services.
The systems assume that girls who do not conform to middle-class
expectations are deviant. Within the systems, girls are treated
differently according to their position of
privilege.(8) One service
provider described how a girl's social location affects the way
she will be treated in the systems:
I think it's set up though to alienate some children in the interest of others, the whole system ... institutions, penal institutions. ... They're creating it for those people who they've set up to put there. And most of them don't expect their golden children to be there and they end up there. This is where we have the therapists and all the psychologists and the psychiatrists justifying why this person's behaviour would be like this. You never hear such justification for the poor kid or the racialized kids who get institutionalized.
(Interview with Service Provider working with Immigrant and Refugee Girls)
Girls cope with devaluation and violence through resistance and/or
acquiescence. Violence is normalized in their lives, and often
girls do not recognize certain acts as violent. Hence, resistance
often manifests itself as violence.
Many girls lash out against authority figures and other girls
when they get angry at their situation. Girls who do choose to
fight back are often punished. When a girl defends herself from
taunts targeting her marginality, authority figures tend to dismiss
her explanation and blame her for instigating a fight.
Some girls choose not to confront violence. For example, immigrant
and refugee girls may withdraw into themselves rather than fight
against racism. This may seem an easier choice, but the consequence
may be that girls internalize stereotypes, and suffer from low
self-esteem.
Many girls run away if they do not receive support from their
families or communities. Service providers working with queer
youth noted that queer girls leave smaller towns to find more
tolerant communities. Studies have shown that young Aboriginal
women are forced to flee from communities that refuse to address
violence.(9)
Many of these young women end up living on the streets
in the downtown east side where they are more vulnerable to violence.
The mortality rate in Canada for girls and women in prostitution
is 40 times the national average.(10)
Though running away often increases
a girl's vulnerability to violence, many girls consider the move
to be an expression of their independence. The following exchange
between service providers explain girls' rationale for living
on the street and working in the sex trade:
SP: When I was working in [an eastern city], I said to a kid, "Why are you on the street as opposed to home?" ... And she kind of looked at me and she said, "Well you know, I was guaranteed that I'd get beat up every night at home. I might be beat up a couple of times a week on the street." ... So she was safer on the street which was really difficult to think ... but for her, it was safer to be on the street than it was to be at home. And she came from a two-parent home where there were other siblings at home. I don't think that her story is odd. I think it's fairly representative.
SP: I was just thinking of a young girl that I know that, while at home, was sexually assaulted every night by her father. And her way of putting that out was well, "When I'm on the street, at least I get something for it."
(Roundtable with Service Providers working with Street-involved Girls)
Girls often cope with devaluation and violence, with self-harm.
Drug addiction numbs girls to pain. Slashing and self-mutilation
are ways that girls take control of their lives. Suicide rates
are high among marginalized youth. The suicide rate for Aboriginal
girls is 8 times the national average of non-Aboriginal adolescent
girls.(11) A recent
report by the BC Children's Commission reported
that suicides among immigrant and refugee youth are connected
to cultural and social adjustments.
Aboriginal girls are marginalized because Canada's colonial practices
devalue indigenous peoples and their ways of life. The
prevalence of violence and substance abuse is a consequence of
colonization, which devastated Aboriginal families and cultures.
Extreme poverty in Aboriginal communities puts many First Nations
girls under the gaze of government agencies at an early age.
Understanding how girls perceive the impact of violence in their
lives is difficult. Many Aboriginal girls have internalized negative
stereotypes about Aboriginal peoples, and believe they deserve
to be treated poorly. Some try to distance themselves from their
ancestry to receive better treatment. Many young women do not
consider racist and sexist comments, police harassment, sexual
harassment, and emotional abuse to be forms of violence. There
are so many pressing issues to deal with that violence does not
seem to be a significant barrier.
Rates of suicide and substance abuse are high in Aboriginal communities
because of colonizing practices that destroyed Aboriginal peoples'
sense of self-worth. One service provider explained:
I think that it all goes back to the residential school system that taught us unhealthy and unsafe behaviour. Got rid of all of our coping skills. We don't know what to do.
Despite the prevalence of suicide, many Aboriginal communities
are reluctant to talk about it.
Teachers are not taught to be culturally sensitive. Thus, stereotypes
about Aboriginal peoples influence how teachers treat girls. Service
providers explained that many teachers tend to send Aboriginal
students for psychological testing when they fall behind. Families
will be surveyed because teachers assume that all Aboriginal families
are dysfunctional. Girls who fall behind are labeled with Fetal
Alcohol Syndrome or Fetal Alcohol Effect more quickly. Although
these are serious issues in Aboriginal communities, it is problematic
to assume that the family is the root cause of a girl's problems.
Targeting the family ignores the systemic reasons for increased
violence in Aboriginal families. Misdiagnosing a girl means that
she will not receive proper attention.
Government agencies and social welfare workers rarely consider
the systemic causes of poverty, violence and abuse when they intervene
into Aboriginal families. Hence, the child welfare system is not
a safe place for Aboriginal girls. Violence experienced in foster
homes, and alienation from their families and cultures are among
the reasons that girls become involved in unsafe activities. Experiences
of institutional violence are cumulative. One service provider
described the "institutional rippling effect of the Ministry
for Children and Families" using the experience of a woman
for whom she had advocated:
[She was] a single parent Aboriginal mother who was affected by fetal alcohol syndrome ... her mother died when she was 2 years old. By the time she was 6 years old, she'd already been in quite a few different non-Aboriginal foster placements. ... From the time she was 6 to 12 years old, she was sexually abused by her adoptive parent. By the time she was 12 years old, she was on the street being exploited in the sex trade. And ends up becoming impregnated with 2 children, ends up being charged for prostitution, goes to treatment with the hope that she, by abiding by the court order that it will give her that sense of hope to have her children returned. Goes to treatment centre ... was lonely for the love of her own children. Automatically those staff assumed that she was going to sexually abuse these young children because of their bias towards her because she was in the sex trade. Then is booted out of that treatment centre.
Treatment centres are inadequate because they do not give individuals
enough time to deal with all of the issues they are up against.
One service provider argued that treatment centres "have
a revolving door syndrome," and described them as an "industry
in suffering."
Traditional practices have been introduced to heal individuals
and communities. These services are needed, but the women participating
in the roundtable revealed that some elders are abusing their
positions of power. Some girls are experiencing violence at the
hands of those who promise to heal them. Elders are reproducing
behaviour they learned in residential
schools.(12)
Though it is important
to consider the impact of residential schools, silence and denial
perpetuate the problem. As one service provider explained:
The deep, embedded roots of violence within our community are continuously perpetuated because of the deep layers of denial within any reservation or even within the urban Aboriginal agencies.
Inter-generational abuse must be analyzed as a consequence of
colonization. However, if girls are to be safe, abusers must be
accountable for their actions. Changing internalized colonization
will be difficult because elite groups have formed in many Aboriginal
communities. Advocates and girls are not able to penetrate the
shroud of silence protecting elite community members who are anxious
to defend their position of privilege. Service providers who work
in their home communities are ostracized for trying to expose
abuse in Aboriginal communities. Girls also face resistance because
of family loyalty. One service provider shared her experience:
I remember disclosing when I was 8 years old. I said, "He is sexually abusing me," and I got beaten up and told to shut up. And then when I was being raped when I was 13 and 14, I disclosed and my aunt, my uncle's wife, and her sisters started chasing me around and trying to beat me up because I had disclosed. Those are the very real things that go on on reserve and that hasn't changed.
There are high levels of involvement among Aboriginal girls in
the drug and sex trades. The service providers indicated that
Aboriginal girls are targeted for recruitment for these
trades. There is a long tradition of representing Aboriginal
women as sexually available, yet unworthy of
respectability.(13)
The devaluation of Aboriginal women makes them vulnerable to sexual
exploitation. One service provider explained why so many young
native women were involved in the sex trade:
Sixty percent of young prostitutes are Native. There's a reason for that. It's much easier to dehumanize Native people.
Once girls become involved in criminalized activities, it is difficult
for them to return to their home communities. Some elite members
have internalized colonization, and do not want young people who
are not "respectable" in their communities. Service
providers spoke of one instance where the community refused to
allow a young person who had been street-involved to be buried
in her traditional territory.
Young Aboriginal people have organized to fight racism and continuing
colonization. The service providers argued that girls are marginalized
in the Native Youth Movement because young Native men have adopted
misogynous attitudes. The media is one place where they have learned
these attitudes. The only empowering representations available
to young men of colour glorify misogyny. Hence, young Aboriginal
women are denied power in one of the few venues available to them
to make change.
Defining who is an immigrant is difficult because many white Canadians
assume that if you are not white, then you are an immigrant. Hence,
children of immigrants who were born here, or whose families have
been in Canada for generations, and girls who came to Canada as
very young children are often perceived as "new" immigrants.
Because immigrants from racialized communities are scapegoats
for many Canadian social problems, being labeled an immigrant
creates hardships for young women.
It is also important to remember that the immigrant and refugee
community is not a homogenous group. A family's experience in
Canada is shaped by their pre-arrival experiences. Their transition
to a new society will be influenced by whether they chose to leave,
or were fleeing from their country of origin. Not all refugee
claimants are assured status. Thus, the threat of deportation
adds stress to an already unsettling experience. Migration disrupts
familial bonds and roles. One service provider outlined the various
stresses immigrant and refugee families encounter:
[There's the] experience which is the experience of refugees about whether they've been fleeing war-torn areas if they're war-affected children. Some young women have engaged in prostitution. They've had to in order to stay alive. Those things impact. And then you have the impact of the social dynamic, the family from there to here. The dynamics of the family are just really put into turmoil in terms of what was the normal and accepted responses from the community at home and what the differences are here. The expectations and duties and responsibilities here is a huge area. I feel sorry for families who have children who are teenagers when they arrive here because their whole world is changed around.
While there is not a single "immigrant and refugee"
experience, those who immigrate must adapt to the dominant culture
for survival.
Settlement for immigrants who are not white is more stressful
because of racism. Racism is a form of violence. It is an insidious
form of power because it is not acknowledged as a Canadian problem.
The stereotypes informing racist attitudes are inherent to nation-building.
Rather than being identified as racist, these attitudes are considered
"common sense." The internalization of these stereotypes
affects the way girls understand racist violence. Some girls resist
these stereotypes while others have internalized them, thus making
it difficult to confront racism.
Schools are a primary site of violence for girls. Intercultural
tensions among young people are seldom understood as a manifestation
of racist and patriarchal relations. Instead, media and teachers
focus on finding remedies for "bullying." Teachers and
principals tend to blame individuals, or to assume that a poor
home environment is at the root of the problem.
When young people defend themselves against racism, teachers blame
them for provoking fights. In her study of Black Canadian high
school students in Alberta, Jennifer Kelly found that parents
encourage their students to stand up for themselves when they
face unfair treatment. Principals and teachers seldom acknowledge
that disputes have a racialized
edge.(14) As a result, young women
of colour tend to be treated as "bullies." FREDA's interviews
with service providers and immigrant and refugee girls support
this argument. Students also minimize racial violence. One service
provider argues that those born here have internalized racism.
She explained:
There are so many layers to it because you find the kids who are born here whether they're Chinese, South Asian, Black, feel more of an affinity with the mainstream and see immigrant and refugee kids as other. They don't see it as a race thing. They just see these people as different not even realizing that there's a whole thing of where they're thinking.
Physical and verbal violence against immigrant and refugee girls
hinges on determining who is Canadian and who is not. Girls from
immigrant families who have lived in Canada since they were young
or who were born here, distance themselves from recent immigrants
because of the need to "fit into" the dominant white
culture. One service provider explained:
I would say that immediate difference and that immediate identification with Canadianness, who is Canadian as opposed to who's not, who belongs and who doesn't, takes the lead and it moves on to economics. Whether you're okay or whether you're a have-not ... whether you're a scrub or an elite or whatever.
Many of the immigrant and refugee girls interviewed for the Girl
Child project explained the importance of fitting into Canadian
culture. Though most were proud of their cultural identity, they
balanced it with Canadian values so they would not be labeled
an "FOB" (fresh off the boat).
Recent immigrant and refugee girls have a hard time fitting in
because of language barriers, poverty, and bicultural identity
formation. Language is an obvious reason that girls feel marginalized
in the schools. Immigrant and refugee girls tend to be streamed
into alternative classes because they have not yet developed efficient
English skills. ESL classes are limited to urban centres. A Thai
girl, who lives in a small British Columbia Interior town, explained
that for the first two weeks of school she did not understand
a word that was said in her class. When her father explained this
to the teacher, she was placed in remedial classes because ESL
was not available. Girls are taunted for their accents and the
clothes that they wear. Parents who encourage their children to
try to "fit in" often do not have the economic resources
to outfit their children in the designer clothes that are mandatory
in the popular groups.
Immigrant and refugee girls grow up with two sets of cultural
values that often conflict with each other. This has the potential
to create disputes between a girl and her parents. Parents may
use disciplinary measures deemed appropriate in their country
of origin, but considered abusive in Canada. A common conflict
between parents and girls is sexual mores. Sexuality remains taboo
in many immigrant and refugee communities. Though sexuality is
a taboo issue in many immigrant and refugee communities, media
representations of women of colour are highly sexualized. Thus,
immigrant and refugee girls negotiate mixed messages and codes
of silence. Girls in abusive dating relationships may be defying
their parents' cultural values. Thus, they are particularly vulnerable
because they feel unable to turn to their parents for assistance
because they fear their reaction. HIV/AIDS and other sexually
transmitted diseases are rarely discussed. The shame associated
with sexuality and sexually transmitted diseases isolates girls
who need assistance working through these issues from their families
and communities. Many immigrant communities assume that homosexuality
does not exist in their community. Thus, girls who are questioning
their sexual orientation have few supports within their communities.
Immigration places a great deal of stress on families. Consequently,
many families break down. Immigrant and refugee girls who face
violence in their homes are particularly vulnerable because the
media over-reports on family violence in immigrant and refugee
communities. The shame that is associated with family violence,
and the imperative to protect their communities from surveillance
from the dominant culture, make it difficult for girls to seek
assistance.(15) Few
take the time to ask why these families are breaking
down. There is a gap in services available to immigrant and refugee
families. Ministry for Children and Families workers are trained
to intervene in violent families. They are ill-equipped to offer
support when a child is suicidal or exhibiting other dangerous
behaviours. Ministry for Children and Families workers are not
sensitive to the various cultural values that immigrant and refugee
families bring to Canada. Instead, they believe that families
must conform to Canadian values. If a girl is apprehended and
placed in a group home, she faces racism and sexism. Thus, the
services simply replace one form of violence with another that
is insidious and unacknowledged.
Twenty-six percent of all women with disabilities were told they'd be better off if they'd never been born. So if you come from that kind of perspective, that sort of deep conditioning that teaches you that you would have been much better off dead, to how that affects your self-esteem.
Girls with disabilities are inundated with messages that their
lives are not valuable. Genetic testing is recommended to predetermine
whether the child will have a severe disability. Lack of support
systems for families with children with disabilities causes economic
and emotional stress, putting girls at risk. The debate around
Robert Latimer demonstrates how able-bodied people's priorities
take precedence over those of people with disabilities. Instead
of criticizing governments for not supporting families, much of
the discussion has focused on whether Latimer's sentence is too
harsh.
Emotional violence is understated because it does not leave apparent
bruises. Girls may not recognize the neglect and emotional abuse
as violence because girls are socialized to think everything is
their own fault. Disabilities may be the consequence of abuse.
Shaken baby syndrome, emotional abuse and sexual abuse cause emotional
and developmental disabilities later in life. One service provider
explained that she did not know how early abuse contributed to
her own disabilities.
Girls with invisible disabilities (for example, mental and emotional
disabilities, deafness, brain injuries, learning disabilities)
experience marginalization differently. Since people do not immediately
recognize the disability, they tend to respond negatively to girls
when they react differently than expected. If girls are articulate,
people often do not believe they have a disability.
Abuse begins at a young age for many girls with disabilities.
Too often, it is a part of their relationship with those on whom
they are dependent. DAWN reports that 54% of women with disabilities
have experienced physical or sexual violence. The rate of sexual
assault for girls with disabilities is quadruple the national
average.(16) Girls
with physical disabilities are particularly vulnerable
to violence because they are completely dependent on their caregivers.
One service provider described the uniqueness of their vulnerability:
[All children] have dependence on our parents or caregivers. But I think that for a lot of girl children with disabilities, that dependence is at such an increased level. And if you tell, what is going to happen? There's that really strong fear which happens with all children but I think maybe it's at a higher level for children with disabilities because they're so dependent on their caregivers for sometimes their very lives.
Some girls with disabilities have only known violent relationships. This skews their perception about informed consent. One service provider explained:
It [abuse] starts very young - and I'm not necessarily even just talking about sexual abuse - but if you've had that training as a very young person that violence is a way of life, which, unfortunately a lot of the times, can be our abusers or people very close to them. As you move along in your life and get a little older, consent is a really abstract kind of idea because how can you consent really fully, consent to anything? It's almost like a kind of brainwashing.
Violence and sexual exploitation are rampant in group homes and
institutions for young people with disabilities. Girls learn exploitative
behaviour and reproduce power relations by exploiting younger
people. One service provider used the example of Jericho Hill
to illustrate how violence becomes normalized:
At Jericho Hill School ... abuse was happening for a number of years. And so what eventually happened was it became a cultural norm for the deaf community. It got down from older people, older kids abusing younger kids. So I think there's a cultural element to it in terms of how it evolved.
The persistent belief that only a "horrible creature"
would harm someone with a disability makes it difficult for girls
to find someone to believe them when they disclose. Coupled with
this is the lack of credibility accorded to girls with emotional
and developmental disabilities. Their disclosure is often dismissed
as a manifestation of their disability.
Girls with learning disabilities and developmental disabilities
do not have the ability to communicate abuse. Deaf girls have
difficulties explaining their violence because the vocabulary
to discuss abuse is limited. Those who they trust enough to confide
in may not understand sign language well enough to understand
their disclosure.
Girls with mental and emotional disabilities are vulnerable to
sexual exploitation. Service providers indicated that girls with
fetal alcohol system are targeted, and often other girls pimp
them out. In these cases, girls are reproducing behaviour they
learned in group homes. The impact of the disability on a girl's
judgment, compounded by drastic exploitation, means that she is
unable to recognize that she is hurting someone else. The power
relations among girls in this social group need to be addressed.
As one service provider explained:
It was really hard for people to believe that and so then it's not getting acknowledged either. That it's something that has to be looked at. So they're also sort of being silenced again by ignoring these things that young women are capable of doing.
Girls with developmental disabilities often participate in bullying
at schools. Like other students, they participate to be accepted
by their peers. Their bullying tends to be more exaggerated because
it is harder for them to fit into the group.
Lesbian,
Bisexual, and Transgender Girls
If I called every kid who ever used the term fag or gay or dyke in school every time they did it, I would just spend my whole day standing in the hall doing that. It's inexhaustible.
Homophobic slurs and attitudes are so pervasive that young girls
who come out expect a negative reaction. Young people dismiss
insults hurled at lesbian, bisexual and transgender girls as
"jokes." One service provider pointed out that even
if a comment "slipped" just once, the emotional impact
of the insult could not be reversed. Many queer girls remain closeted
to protect themselves from harassment. If they do come out to
friends, they become fearful of being outed by their peer group.
Thus, an experience meant to confirm identity is fraught with
fear.
There are few spaces to express sexual identity outside of the
heterosexual norm. As one service provider explained:
It doesn't even have to be overt where the kids are obvious. Simply, within the schools there's no culture for gay and lesbian youth. Like where do I learn to date? How do I know if this girl likes me and where do I go to find out? It's just not allowed. ... And that's real ... maybe even more damaging than "You're a dyke."
The denial of queer identity is behind homophobic violence ranging
from verbal harassment to physical threats. Girls who are questioning
their sexual identity are expected to try out heterosexual relationships
before they can confirm a queer identity. When girls identify
as lesbian, bisexual, or transgender, it is unlikely that they
will be taken seriously. Nervous parents want to believe that
it is a just a phase. The homophobic and misogynist belief that
lesbians just need "one good man" makes girls vulnerable
to verbal taunts. Once service provider fears that threats of
rape and gang rape of queer girls to "teach her a lesson"
are actually carried out far too frequently.
Queer girls may cope with homophobia by remaining closeted. This
makes them vulnerable to violence in intimate relationships. For
queer girls, being in a relationship is the only way to validate
their identity. Hence, a lesbian girl may be more willing to tolerate
abuse from her partner. If she is not out, she will be reluctant
to turn to her family for assistance. Abusive partners can control
a girl by threatening to out her. Violence between young women
is not taken seriously because their relationship is dismissed
as "puppy love." If a girl's first experience in a relationship
is abusive, she may associate violence with sexual relationships.
Service providers agreed that the queer community's reluctance
to discuss violence in lesbian relationships increases girls'
vulnerability to intimate violence.
Sexual identity is not considered to be an integral piece of one's
identity; rather, it is considered a choice. The denial of homosexuality
in many cultural groups means that girls have few spaces where
they can feel whole. One service provider explained:
Sometimes it's presented as though they have to make a choice. That I have to be part of my culture or religion or I can be a lesbian and we recently, at the centre, just acknowledged [Rosh Hashanah] and had a young woman come in and go ... "I get to be Jewish when I'm at home, and I get to be a lesbian here. I get to be both at the same time."
Even queer spaces, like alternative media, contribute to the marginalization
of girls of colour because most of the images are of white women.
The role models available for young queer women tend to present
one queer look. One service provider explained that not all girls
are comfortable presenting themselves as "out there":
Generally the spokespeople who are in front of the cameras debating for lesbian and gay rights and things, they are older first. There are very few young and if they are young, they are short haired and ... they're butch. Not butch in a negative way but they're strong, dominant, short haired women and they're out there carrying the banners. ... So for teenage girls, if they don't feel butch, then they can't be lesbians because the only thing they see is butch.
The women's space issue remains contentious, and continues to
marginalize transgender girls. The heterosexual imperative influences
how girls present themselves. Queer youth that can pass are able
to protect themselves, but make themselves vulnerable to being
ostracized by the queer community. Bisexual girls still receive
verbal harassment for reaping the benefits of both straight and
queer communities.
Poverty and the war against the poor create an atmosphere where
it is more acceptable to act violently toward street-involved
girls than it is to treat them with respect. Girls face insults,
stares and glares, and physical threats from the general population
daily. One service provider shared the following story:
In our office we had two young women just talking about the violence they experienced panhandling. They just started having a conversation about it. And what they described, if that had gone on in a domestic context, that would be considered pretty severe abuse on a daily basis.
Violence is so pervasive in the lives of street-involved girls
that they "have to be numb to basically survive." The
boundary between violence and what girls need to do to survive
on the streets is blurred. One service provider explained:
They don't recognize it necessarily as violence. They recognize it as part of the expectations of their daily existence. So that if you ask them if they live in a violent situation, they'll tell you no and yet you know that for that night's sleep, they were probably raped, but they don't attach that to violence as an issue.
Addiction makes girls vulnerable to being controlled by their
boyfriends. Again, the boundaries between intimacy and exploitation
are blurred. Girls often identify a boy who is pushing drugs on
them and/or pimping them as an intimate partner. Many girls take
the risks involved in the drug trade for their partners.
Activities which street-involved girls use to survive are criminalized.
Panhandling makes girls vulnerable not only to harassment from
passers-by, but also to police brutality. Once they enter the
criminal justice system, they face violence ranging from humiliating
treatment from public officials to exploitation in group homes.
Police and doctors blame street-involved girls for their predicaments
because they assume the girls have chosen a dangerous lifestyle
and must live with the consequence of that choice. Police harassment
of street-involved girls is prevalent. Streetinvolved girls
are treated as though they abdicated their rights when they became
part of the street community.
Girls who need assistance are reluctant to access services because
they do not want a record and are afraid to be incarcerated. Institutions
are not safe for girls. Group homes are co-ed, and boys tend to
hold control over girls. Service providers pointed out that many
girls are brought into street activity after they have been placed
in a group home.
Violence within the peer group establishes who has the power in
the group. Violence occurs within gender groups. Girls will develop
a gang mentality against other young women as well. Girls who
are poor will differentiate themselves from street-involved youth
that are perceived to be middle-class. Girls are most vulnerable
to control from their male peers. The service providers who participated
in the roundtable concurred that boys control young street communities.
Violence and controlling girls' sexuality are ways boys assert
their power over girls. One service provider explained how girls
gain some control over their lives:
In the squats, it's just a given. I've heard young women say, "Just choose now who you're going to have sex with because you're going to have sex with somebody to stay here because that's the way it's run. The guys are making that really clear. That's just the trade-off and that's the power in the squats."
The lack of funding for programs for street-involved girls sends
girls the message that their lives are not valued. One service
provider explained how better services could improve street-involved
girls' esteem:
Self-blaming is quite an important point for them. They need to understand that there are services that are available out there, resources and agencies, transition houses that are willing to help them.
School administrators and teachers need to abandon the notion
that students enter the school system tabula rasa. Kelly
explains that students come to school as raced, gendered and classed,
and continue to learn these subjectivities within the school
environment.(17)
Teachers who do not acknowledge that racism, sexism, and classism
are inherent parts of the school system are complicit in the reproduction
of power relations.
Curricula need to move away from the multicultural emphasis on
difference. Marvin Wideen and Kathleen Barnard argue that multiculturalism
policies are dangerous because they give the illusion that something
is being done to harmonize inter-cultural relations, but do not
address the inequalities that emanate from the lack of respect
for diversity. Moreover, multiculturalism contributes to the othering
of cultures that do not conform to the dominant White culture,
and thus strengthen its position as
truly "Canadian."(18)
The provincial government needs to take a more proactive stance
in promoting equity for girls from marginalized communities. Zero-tolerance
and bullying policies are insufficient because they mask the power
relations behind school violence. Furthermore, school policies
are gender-blind, and thus perpetuate patriarchal relations in
the school system. Girls who are questioning their sexual identity
need support within the school system. For this to happen, both
the Ministry of Education and the schools must take a more proactive
stance in combating homophobia.
Girls who are the targets of violence are further alienated because
their realities are not reflected in current policies. This will
not end until we listen to girls. Consultations with girls should
serve as the foundation of strategies for change. Consultations
should make girls aware of their rights, and encourage them to
develop strategies for change that will protect their inherent
rights.
Girls are outsiders because of their age and gender. They are
not given authority or respect. Their problems are minimized as
self-absorbed and
frivolous.(19) Interviews
with service providers
and girls reveal that girls' lives are complex. The intersection
of multiple systems of oppression shapes girls' lives from birth
and girls begin to negotiate gender, race and class relations
at an early age. They are highly sexualized, but are not given
autonomy to determine their own sexuality.
In interviews conducted by community researchers, many of the racialized girls were beginning to articulate how gender, race and class marginalized certain social groups. Some girls indicated that having a place where they could talk about sexism and racism would help them negotiate these power relations.(20) Most service providers agreed that girls need a place where they can feel safe from judgment and surveillance. When given the opportunity, girls can identify the barriers they face and propose strategies for change.
This does not mean that adults should not be involved. One service
provider expressed vehement opposition to peer counselling. She
explained:
I think it's a terrible abrogation of our responsibilities as adults. ... I've seen and experienced many, many times ... where kids are in over their heads, kids are engaging in all kinds of stuff, and their peers don't know how to respond to them. And the teachers don't want to know the real depth of the problem because they would have to act on it.
There can be a balance between peer support and adult intervention.
Adults have the responsibility to empower young women to help
themselves. Adults have access to the resources needed to instigate
groups, and knowledge about human rights to pass on to young women.
Groups for girls should focus on problems identified by the girls,
but adults should be aware of their responsibility to ensure that
girls get the assistance they require. These groups could be organized
in schools and in community centres.
Adolescence is idealized as a carefree time. Hence, many assume
that there is something wrong with girls who do not fit. They
are constructed as deviants, and programs for them often expect
them to conform to the ideals of the dominant culture. Thus, traditional
services perpetuate the power relations that marginalize girls.
Traditional services for girls need to start from the premise
that the power relations that shape adult lives also affect young
people.
Marginalized girls are vulnerable to various forms of violence.
There is a lack of services for girls who are in violent relationships.
Those that do exist do not respect a girl's ability to make decisions
about her own life.
Some girls resist violence by engaging in dangerous or criminalized
activities. Services that target youth who are engaged these activities
are gender neutral. This puts girls in more danger because it
ignores the power relations between girls and boys. Incarceration
is often a remedy used to protect girls from dangerous situations.
Group homes are co-ed and dangerous for girls.
Traditional services provide a "quick fix," and expect
girls to demonstrate positive changes in a few weeks. One service
provider argued that this is an unrealistic expectation because
years of abuse and marginalization cannot be cured in a few weeks.
Thus, as they currently exist, intervention programs set girls
up for failure. This makes them more vulnerable to violence since
they believe that they have failed yet again.
1) A systemic analysis of the systems is needed to determine how
power relations are perpetuated. Girls need to have input in this
process. Girls who have been through the systems should be brought
together to discuss the merits and problems of programs for youth.
Their ideas should propel new initiatives for girls.
2) There is no room in the systems for a girl to assert what she
thinks is best for her. Too many services do not recognize rights
as inherent to young people. Services for girls must adopt a human
rights framework. Girls need education about their rights, as
do service providers who base their advocacy on the inherent rights
of the child.
3) Girls need safe spaces where they can talk about how sexism,
racism, ableism, poverty and homophobia impact on their lives.
Counsellors from different cultures and backgrounds should staff
the spaces.
4) Policies to train systems workers and teachers to be sensitive
to the needs of marginalized girls exist, but are not implemented
effectively. There needs to be mechanisms to enforce these policies.
5) Canada has no national housing policy. A housing policy is
required that considers the needs of young people who have been
forced to flee from their families or communities because of violence.
1) There are not enough treatment centres for Aboriginal women.
Workers in treatment centres need training to understand how violence
intersects with self-harm.
2) There is a lack of holistic healing for youth. Services for
Aboriginal survivors of sexual violence must be based on Aboriginal
values, but must not homogenize the Aboriginal experience. Services
that intervene on behalf of Aboriginal children remove them from
their homes, and discard the parents who also need assistance.
3) Girls need programs and services that will allow them to circumvent
the code of silence in Aboriginal communities. A 1-800 number
should be available for Aboriginal youth. This could alleviate
the isolation of girls living on reserves, where it is difficult
for girls to disclose.
4) Girls need training to take control of their sexuality. A general
curriculum on sexual violence should be introduced at the elementary
level.
5) Governments should fund independent services developed at the
grass-roots level. Services must be non-judgmental, and must not
restrict access based on substance abuse.
6) Too many Aboriginal girls are not completing high school. This
is unacceptable since school boards receive funding for each Aboriginal
child. School boards should be more accountable to Aboriginal
children, and must change the curricula to serve the Aboriginal
students in their communities.
Immigrant
and Refugee Interviews
1) Support groups are needed to facilitate cultural adaptation.
Programs should provide information for both parents and girls.
This information should be designed to alleviate tensions between
parents and girls who are living biculturally.
2) Teachers must be more active in monitoring and addressing racism
in the schools. Teachers need anti-racist training so that they
can monitor their own behaviour.
3) Anti-racist curricula should replace multiculturalism. Girls
need to learn how to deconstruct negative stereotypes that are
prevalent in the media so that they will not internalize them.
4) There is a lack of culturally sensitive services for girls.
Funds should be allocated to communities to develop and implement
better services of this kind.
5) Girls from immigrant and refugee communities need information
about HIV/AIDS. Programs dealing with HIV/AIDS need to learn how
to address the particular needs of immigrant and refugee youth.
6) Mandatory reporting and removal of the child makes many girls
unwilling to disclose violence. Girls need places where they can
talk about abuse without fearing the impact that disclosing will
have on her and her family.
Roundtable
with Service Providers for Girls with Disabilities
1) The inability to communicate their needs marginalizes girls
with disabilities in a unique way. This is particularly true for
girls with learning disabilities, emotional disabilities and mental
disabilities. Girls with disabilities need education on their
rights that are tailored to their needs.
2) There is a serious lack of services for girls with disabilities.
Girls need support to improve their self-esteem. They need a place
to talk about violence and sexual exploitation. The programs must
consider the harm that girls do to each other.
3) The age of consent puts girls with disabilities at risk. In
cases where a girl has been sexually exploited, service providers
must consider a girl's experiences of abuse, and her ability to
comprehend her circumstances.
4) Some services remain inaccessible. Funds must be allocated
to ensure that all services are accessible to girls with various
disabilities.
Roundtable
with Service Providers for Queer Girls
1) Service providers need more training on the issues queer youth
face. Services tend to assume that girls are straight, unless
the girl comes out. This is confusing for girls who are questioning
their identity.
2) There is a lack of resources for queer youth. There should
be more drop-ins and spaces where young people can come together
to break the prevalence of the heterosexual norm.
3) There is a tendency for queer girls to self-harm. Girls need
counselling to improve their selfesteem. The Mental Health
Act makes counselling inaccessible. Currently, accessing services
is difficult unless one is suicidal. Mental health solutions should
steer away from psychiatric diagnoses that label girls as deviant.
4) The Infant's Act gives parents control over their children's sexuality. Girls need autonomy over their sexual identity. Peer run programs in schools would be an effective way for girls to develop a their self-esteem.
5) The province needs to be more proactive in promoting education
programs which combat homophobia and in supporting peer programs
in the schools. It should protect the rights of youth over the
autonomy of the school boards.
Roundtable
with Service Providers for Street-involved Girls
1) Street-involved girls need gender-specific programming. Group
homes, treatment centres, and detox centres should not be co-ed.
This puts girls at risk of sexual exploitation. They may also
be uncomfortable with male workers because of past sexual exploitation.
Girls need a space where they feel safe from sexual exploitation
and violence.
2) Programs for street-involved girls tend to address an immediate
problem, then send girls back to violent and dangerous situations.
A long-term social safety net is needed which supports girls after
they leave centres and group homes.
3) Girls need advocates to help them through the social welfare
system. Advocates should help girls understand how systemic oppressions
work so they do not blame themselves. Advocates should follow
the feminist principle that women need to be in control of their
own lives. Women under 18 deserve the same respect.
4) Foster homes are alienating places. Girls who have been removed
from their homes are placed with families who are instructed not
to bond with them. Their feelings of alienation are exacerbated
when they are exploited in those homes. The foster care system
needs to be radically altered if it is to provide effective interventions
for girls. A mechanism that protects girls who have been assaulted
in homes must be developed for the foster home system.
5) Street-involved girls need medical services that are not judgmental.
Doctors and nurses need training about the vulnerabilities street-involved
girls face. Service providers indicated that a lesbian only medical
centre is needed because many street-involved girls identify as
queer.
Recommendations
for Structural Change
1) Programs for girls are developed on a piecemeal basis. Federal
and provincial governments must develop a coordinated mandate
to help girls in crisis. Programs should be developed in collaboration
with communities at the grass-roots level. Senior levels should
guarantee adequate resources so that local groups can identify
needs and implement programs.
2) The few programs that exist for girls rely on short-term funding.
Governments need to commit resources for long-term programs for
girls.
3) Programs for girls should not be based on delinquency models.
This model focuses on the manifestation of girls' marginalization
rather than the root causes. Age, sexism, racism, homophobia,
ableism and colonization are relational systems of oppression.
Policy makers must incorporate theories of intersectionality into
program development in order to create programs that address the
unique vulnerabilities of girls.
Endnotes
1. Yasmin Jiwani, et al., Violence Prevention and the Girl Child: Final Report December 1999, Funded by Status of Women Canada.
2. Yasmin Jiwani, Violence Against Marginalized Girls: A Review of the Current Literature. Vancouver: FREDA Centre for Research on Violence Against Women and Children, 1998.
3. Three of these interviews were conducted by AMSSA.
4. Yasmin Jiwani, "The Murder of Reena Virk: The Erasure of Race," Kinesis December/January 1998, page 3.
5. Sonia Manhas, "Intersecting Influences: Bicultural Identity Development among Girls of Colour, A Preliminary Analysis," in Yasmin Jiwani, Violence Prevention & the Girl Child: Project Status Report. Vancouver: FREDA Centre, September 2000.
6. For a further analysis of how needing to "fit in" makes girls more vulnerable to violence, see Yasmin Jiwani, "The Girl Child: Having to 'Fit.'" October 1998. Available at: www.harbour.sfu.ca/freda/articles/fit.htm
7. Jennifer Kelly, Under the Gaze: Learning to be Black in White Society. Halifax: Fernwood Publishing, 1998, page 19.
8. See Brenna Bhandar, "A Guilty Verdict against the Odds: Privileging White Middle-Class Femininity in the Trial of Kelly Ellard for the Murder of Reena Virk," in Yasmin Jiwani, Violence Prevention & the Girl Child: Project Status Report. Vancouver: FREDA Centre, September 2000.
9. Carol LaPrairie, Seen But Not Heard: Native People in the Inner City, Ottawa: Department of Justice, 1994; Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples, Aboriginal People in Urban Centres: Report of the National Round Table on Aboriginal Urban Issues, Ottawa: Minister of Supply and Services Canada, 1993.
10. Sylvie Davis with Martha Shaffer. "Prostitution in Canada: The Invisible Menace or the Menace of Invisibility?" 1994. Available at: www.walnet.org/csis/papers/sdavis.html
11. National Forum on Health. "An Overview of Women's Health." Canada Health Action: Building on the Legacy. Ottawa, ON: National Forum on Health, 1997.
12. Dian Million provides a thoughtful analysis of residential school narratives and inter-generational abuse. See "Telling Secrets: Sex, Power and Narratives in the Social Construction of Indian Residential School Histories," an unpublished paper presented at "What Difference does Nation Make? Canadian/American Cultures of Sexuality and Consumption, the Weatherhead Centre for International Affairs & the Department of Women's Studies, Harvard University, March 10, 1999. Another version of this paper is published in Canadian Woman Studies/les cahiers de la femme, 20, 2 (Summer 2000): 92-107.
13. See Jean Barman, "Taming Aboriginal Sexuality: Gender, Power, and Race in British Columbia, 1850-1900," in BC Studies, 115/116 (Autumn/Winter 1997/98): 237-266.
14. Kelly, especially Chapter 4, (supra Note 7).
15. Himani Bannerji, "A Question of Silence: Reflections of Violence Against Women in Communities of Colour," in Scratching the Surface: Canadian Anti-Racist Thought, ed. Enakshi Dua and Angela Robertson, Toronto: Women's Press, 1999: 261-277; and Yasmin Jiwani, "On the Outskirts of Empire: Race and Gender in Canadian TV News," in Painting the Maple: Essays on Race, Gender and the Construction of Canada, ed. Veronica Strong-Boag, et al., Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1998: 53-68.
16. Sherene Razack, "From Consent to Responsibility, from Pity to Respect: Subtexts in Cases of Sexual Violence involving Girls and Women with Developmental Disabilities," Law and Social Inquiry, 19, 4 (Fall 1994): 891-922.
17. Kelly, page 128, (supra Note 7).
18. Marvin Wideen and Kathleen A. Barnard, Impacts of Immigration on Education in British Columbia: An Analysis of Efforts to Implement Policies of Multiculturalism in Schools. Vancouver: Research on Immigration and Integration in the Metropolis: January 1999. Available at: riim.metropolis.net/
19. Sherrie A. Inness, Running For their Lives: Girls, Cultural Identity, and Stories of Survival. Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000.
20. None of the girls identified as queer or as having a disability. These issues did not come up in the interviews with girls.