The GSA is disheartened to hear of a stabbing rampage incident at the James Smith Cree Nation,
an Indigenous community near Saskatchewan. Our hearts break for all those impacted.
The GSA denounces all forms of violence and all systems of oppression; therefore, demands the
Canadian authorities to “create safer and healthier communities for Indigenous people.”
The current Indigenous community attack has resonance in our society and particularly to
Indigenous communities since Canada has for decades been grappling with undeterred violence
and systemic discrimination against Indigenous people.
This incident at the James Smith Cree Nation is a glaring fact that more needs to be done by
Canadian authorities in terms of creating safer and healthier communities for Indigenous people.
It is also a source of national reckoning, in part because of grim new discoveries like the one last
year of graves of children at a former residential school in British Columbia. For decades
Indigenous children were forced to attend the church-run schools, where they were the victims of
horrific physical and sexual abuses which are a current source of intergenerational trauma in
Indigenous communities. Canada must fix its wrongdoings and not only play lip service to the
intergenerational trauma is has cause these communities but act right to remedy these situations.
These incidents hits hard on our members who are from impacted communities.
The GSA wows to be there for our directly affected members, neighbours, lean on each other,
help grieve and help heal.
As a community-based organization, the GSA will reach out to community leaders in the greater
Ottawa region to offer its’ full support and any assistance that will be needed in the coming days and weeks
by our Indigenous communities.
In Solidarity!
GSA Carleton