{"id":229,"date":"2015-02-18T18:53:00","date_gmt":"2015-02-18T18:53:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rf.podcastfixit.com\/index.php\/2015\/02\/18\/more-important-than-puppies\/"},"modified":"2015-06-01T19:40:36","modified_gmt":"2015-06-01T19:40:36","slug":"more-important-than-puppies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newscoverage.org\/index.php\/2015\/02\/18\/more-important-than-puppies\/","title":{"rendered":"More important than puppies"},"content":{"rendered":"
\nTragic. Did you hear? Beyond sad. What can we do? <\/b><\/i><\/div>\n

<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

\n
<\/i><\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\nQuebecers recently learned that an astonishing 1,200 puppies have gone missing or been killed since the 1980s. That\u2019s three little pups every single month for three decades! How do we accept this? <\/i><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nA thousand families never to see their little tail-waggers again. Surely we\u2019d hear outrage, calls to action. Something must be done to stop this atrocity. For God\u2019s sake, think about the puppies. <\/i><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nTheir big sad eyes… <\/i><\/div>\n

<\/i>
<\/b><\/p>\n

\nBy Joel Ceausu<\/b>
www.thesuburban.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Not like the glassy, frenzied eyes of a dope-addled teen; nor the leery gaze of a sex worker on the stroll of a rotting urban core; not the bloodshot weariness of an alcohol-ravaged single mother. <\/p>\n

Now, forget the bloody puppies. It\u2019s a lie. I made it up. Sue me. <\/p>\n

What is true is that almost 1,200 aboriginal women have been murdered or disappeared in this country in the last 30 years, and very few people seem to talk about it. Over the last few of those years, there have been calls \u2013 increasingly louder \u2013 for a national public inquiry into the tragedy. <\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know if an inquiry is the right answer. It might just serve as mere distraction from issues like abuse, drugs, desperation, poverty, racism, isolation, cultural deracination and the like. Maybe we\u2019ll eventually talk about violence against vulnerable populations, how easy it is to beat and rape and ultimately kill a transient addict, or a native with no Facebook account, and few friends in the big city to notice their selfies have waned. <\/p>\n

Knowing government? Figure three months to get it running; six to gather and hear witnesses; two to navel gaze; and then another six months for a report, followed by three months for government to respond. So a safe bet is two years before we get talking points on how to proceed. It will probably have something to do with cultural sensitivity, community policing, anti-violence initiatives; better outreach to traditional leadership; increased vigilance of transient natives, and a lot of talk about \u2018healing\u2019. <\/p>\n

Ghosts<\/b><\/p>\n

When an RCMP report last year pegged the number at 1,181 reported cases of murdered and missing aboriginal women over 30 years, it was higher than even the Mounties had estimated. I mean, 1,200 people all fitting one single glorious demographic\u2014native and female\u2014are ghosts. Where does one look for the answers? <\/p>\n

The response is to actually LOOK. I knew about this disturbing reality and my mind relegated it to icy dark corners of western Canada. But on second regard, I remember faces I\u2019ve seen in bars, parks and bus stations of this city; soundly cleaved from their roots, where things make sense, by years of booze, sex and forced or self-imposed isolation. It\u2019s easy. It\u2019s almost damn expected that young women can slip away almost unnoticed, that their ephemeral lives vanish into the Canadian ether. <\/p>\n

Who would miss them? The hooker on the next block? The bartender who tosses them monthly? The cops who are fed up with victims who won\u2019t press charges? The shelter that can\u2019t keep track of them? Last spring, a federal government committee submitted a report to the government that responded with a plan that includes cash for shelters, a DNA-based missing person\u2019s index, anti-violence programs in high risk communities, education and added resources for regions targeted by the RCMP.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\nBut the call to inquiry is no mere appeal for cash or personnel. I feel it\u2019s more a plea for an official national imprimatur, the acknowledgement of a national tragedy. Symbolic? Sure, but that makes it no less valid. Symbols go a long way, at least we like to think so: Remember how the whole world engaged in tearful\u2014but feeble\u2014hashtag \u201cbring our girls home\u201d activism when Boko Haram kidnapped hundreds of Nigerian girls? <\/p>\n

If we can call inquiries into doping in sports; Brian Mulroney\u2019s business dealings; the few million stolen by Montreal bureaucrats, engineers and contractors; hell if C\u00f4te St. Luc can have a bloody cat committee, then let\u2019s get this bloody party started… <\/p>\n

Don\u2019t these women and their families merit a bit of the regard we had a few minutes ago for dogs? If it helps, just imagine those big sad eyes. Hell, do whatever works to make this happen.
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Tragic. Did you hear? Beyond sad. What can we do?  Quebecers recently learned that an astonishing 1,200 puppies have gone missing or been killed since the 1980s. That\u2019s three little pups every single month for three decades! How do we accept this?  A thousand families never to see their little tail-waggers again. 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