WEBVTT

00:00:01.795 --> 00:00:06.683
I think one of the connections between the tar sands and urban areas like the Downtown Eastside (DTES)

00:00:07.664 --> 00:00:09.168
is particularly that of displacement,

00:00:09.168 --> 00:00:11.072
and particularly the impacts on women.

00:00:11.072 --> 00:00:15.840
And so one of the things that we know a lot and talk a lot about in terms of the tar sands

00:00:15.840 --> 00:00:19.929
is that it's a story of environmental degradation and industrial genocide,

00:00:19.929 --> 00:00:22.681
particularly on Indigenous lands and for Indigenous communities.

00:00:22.681 --> 00:00:24.892
But one of the things that we don't talk a lot about

00:00:24.892 --> 00:00:28.929
is how the tar sands is also a story of displacement and violence against women,

00:00:28.929 --> 00:00:31.280
and again particularly for Indigenous women.

00:00:31.280 --> 00:00:33.977
And so one of the impacts that we're seeing here in Vancouver

00:00:33.977 --> 00:00:36.988
in the DTES which is the poorest postal code in Canada,

00:00:36.988 --> 00:00:39.991
is the ways in which from Alberta and also from BC,

00:00:39.991 --> 00:00:44.546
both provinces that are really heavily resource -extractive in terms of their economies,

00:00:44.546 --> 00:00:50.127
a lot of Indigenous women in particular are being displaced into urban areas like the DTES.

00:00:50.127 --> 00:00:53.919
72% of Indigenous women in BC currently live off-reserve,

00:00:53.919 --> 00:00:59.006
which means that Indigenous women as a result of the resource extraction as well as other factors,

00:00:59.006 --> 00:01:01.803
are ending up in major urban centres,

00:01:01.803 --> 00:01:03.887
And in these urban centres like the DTES

00:01:03.887 --> 00:01:06.906
we're seeing women experiencing really really high rates of violence.

00:01:06.906 --> 00:01:11.897
The DTES is the epicentre of the crisis for missing and murdered Indigenous women,

00:01:11.897 --> 00:01:18.904
it also has extremely high rates of child apprehension, of police violence, of women in the prison system,

00:01:18.904 --> 00:01:21.075
um and also health concerns for women,

00:01:21.075 --> 00:01:23.702
women face a lot of violence in the drug trade and the sex trade,

00:01:23.702 --> 00:01:27.259
and in the informal economies, of the survival [*or "of the surviving?"*] economies,

00:01:27.259 --> 00:01:30.970
this neighbourhood has some of the lowest life expectancy rates,

00:01:30.970 --> 00:01:34.498
and so, um, y'know, we know this about the DTES,

00:01:34.498 --> 00:01:37.754
and we know this about a lot of other major urban centres

00:01:37.754 --> 00:01:41.136
in terms of the vast inequality that exists,

00:01:41.136 --> 00:01:43.010
in terms of homelessness,

00:01:43.010 --> 00:01:45.998
and y'know, what we know as urban slums or urban ghettos.

00:01:45.998 --> 00:01:50.099
But what we don't talk about is what actually brings people into urban centres,

00:01:50.099 --> 00:01:53.479
and what brings people into urban centres, particularly women,

00:01:53.479 --> 00:01:55.152
is displacement from the land.

00:01:55.152 --> 00:02:00.072
And so there's a very clear connection between violence on the land and violence against women in urban areas.

00:02:00.072 --> 00:02:03.574
And there's a very clear connection between resource extraction and its impacts on the land,

00:02:03.574 --> 00:02:07.746
and the forces that displace people, particularly women, into urban areas.