Suicide In Canada

In April of 2016 the remote First Nation of Attawapiskat was forced to declare a state of emergency when eleven members of the community attempted suicide in a single night. This was not an isolated event, many of the forty-nine First Nations that make up Nishnawbe-Aski Nation in Northern Ontario have dealt with generations of disproportionately high rates of suicide in contrast to both the national average and other First Nations across Canada. In the seven months prior to April 2016 there were more than 100 reported attempts in Attawapiskat alone (Russell, 2017). This paper will examine the way in which the media has reported on youth suicide, primarily focusing on Attawapiskat. There are many factors that have led to this climate, including,

but not limited to, intergenerational trauma from the multiple government enacted assimilation policies and programs, inadequate funding, and lack of self-determination.
The organization Journalists for Human Rights has released two reports on the media’s coverage of Indigenous people, issues and culture in Ontario.

The first report was titled Buried Voices: Media Coverage of Aboriginal Issues in Ontario was released in August of 2013 and the second report released in March of 2016 was titled Buried Voices: Changing Tones. These reports have found, through qualitative analysis, a steady increase in the number of Indigenous stories written by Ontarian journalists. However, this increase in coverage still fails to adequately represent the Indigenous population. As Indigenous people account for approximately 2% of the population of Ontario, but only 0.5% of media engages with Indigenous issues (JHR, 2016, p. 6). A remaining problem with the coverage is that it is focused on current issues indigenous people are facing, but not on why they are facing them. The media needs to do a better job explaining to the general public as to why Indigenous people in Canada are suffering. The failure in doing so creates a uniformed society that perpetuates myths or negative stereotypes of Indigenous people in

Canada.
Natan Obed, the president of Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, discussed, from his own perspective as an Inuit man, how the solutions to the suicide epidemic are not as convoluted as the government makes them out to be. Indigenous people in Canada face a higher risk of suicide due to “colonization, historical and intergenerational trauma, childhood exposure to physical and sexual violence, overcrowded housing, poor educational attainment, poverty, food insecurity and exposure to suicide” (Obed, 2016, para 6). Even just one of these issues negatively impacts a person’s life, so we can understand that when Indigenous people experience a combination or all of these factors why it would have such a detrimental impact of communities. When these factors are addressed there is a direct correlation to the decline in suicide attempts. This article is significant because it outlines how government inaction and lack of political willpower perpetuates suicide. Without addressing each of the previously listed issues directly the cycle of harm continues, regardless of how much more money the federal government promises after each incident.
In the article “1 Year After Suicide Crisis, Attawapiskat Still Lacking Mental Health Resources” from Global News reflects what has happened in the community since it was forced to declare the state of emergency. Despite the international outcry surrounding the rates of suicidal behavior in youths there has not been very much change in the community despite the federal government’s promises. The article quotes Cindy Blackstock who believes that Canada is too “reactive” in these sensitive times when they should really be “proactive,” it should not take the repeated deaths or near deaths of Canadian children to enact change in the federal government’s policies (Russell, 2017). The mental health workers promised to the community by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau had still not arrived a full year later due to the preexisting housing crisis in the community. This left the grieving community without the support any other Canadian living in the southern portions of the country would have easy access to. Jackie Hookimaw, the great aunt, of a 13-year-old Sheridan Hookimaw of Attawapiskat who committed suicide in October of 2015 said, “Suicide is a symptom of oppression that we live through” (Russell, 2017) acknowledging the situation Indigenous people have been placed in at the hands of the Crown and Canadian government. A settler-based publication using the quote shows how the rhetoric surrounding Indigenous issues in Canada is changing. Previous generations would never have used a blunt quotation discussing the racism indigenous people face in Canada.
Another settler-based media source, The Canadian Press, published an article “Health Canada Offers Support in Wake of Recent Suicides in Northern Ontario” that reported on the response from Health Canada following the suicides of four people in Pikangikum, Nibinamik and Fort Severn First Nations.

These communities are also a part of the greater Nishnawbe Aski Nation. The article discusses how the funding and resources that were promised by the government following the deaths had not yet appeared despite being publicly announced. The content and theme of this article is not uncommon. There are dozens of articles that discuss how following crisis in Indigenous communities the government promises change which satisfies the general public’s outrage, but the communities never see the results. A lot of settler media also focus on mental health supports in the communities. While mental heath resources are extremely important they fail to acknowledge that the Indigenous perspective of health is vastly different to the Western or settler approach. Indigenous health is holistic and places great importance on overall wellness meaning that all aspects of their life must be healthy and balanced. Whereas the Western concepts of health is highly segmented. The failure of the government to approach this issue from an Indigenous perspective is not conducive to fixing the problem. First Nations need to have self-determination so that they can decide how to heal their communities, and it will

have to be a holistic approach free from further Western imposition.
Hallett et al.’s report Aboriginal Language Knowledge and Youth Suicide (2007) studied First Nations in British Columbia. They found in communities that are able to prioritize “cultural continuity” reported better overall well-being as well as lower, to no reports of suicide. Cultural continuity fosters self-assurance in the new generations negating behaviors that may lead to suicidal thoughts. Chandler and Lalonde’s 2009 study of the correlations between cultural continuity and suicidal behaviors, again done in British Columbia, notes that their data shows that “youth suicide is not an Aboriginal problem, but a problem confined to only select Aboriginal communities” (p.1). Inferring that youth suicide is not an inherent Indigenous problem, but one that had been created in some communities due to increased risk factors. Attawapiskat has not been able to secure the same levels of cultural continuity as some of the BC Bands with no reported suicides, because the community has had to face many other complex and overarching problems first, such as the housing crisis and clean water. With having to focus on these dire needs first, there are no remaining physical and emotional resources to foster that.
The federal government’s compliancy in regard to helping elicit change in helping First Nations communities free themselves from the compounding cycle of intergenerational trauma and inequality needs to be formally addressed. Ontario’s media needs to improve the quantity of Indigenous issues, people and culture they publish but they also need to discuss Indigenous issues without Western imposition.