On December 6, 1989, 14 engineering students were gunned down at a Montreal university for one reason – they were women.
As shocking as this event was, it was not entirely surprising. Gender-based violence is not new. More than 2,000 years ago Roman law gave men authority over the life or death of their wives and the origins of the phrase “rule of thumb” came from the 18th century until the late 19th century when English common law allowed for the discipline of a man’s wife and children, if he used a stick or whip no wider than his thumb.
In more modern times, it was legal for a man to sexually assault his own wife in Canada until 1983! We have had personal computers, cell phones, and the US put men on the moon before women were legally protected from sexual assault by the men they married.
More gender-based violence by the numbers
- Between 2011 and 2021, an average of 102 Canadian women and girls were victims of gender-related homicide each year.
- In 2023, 7,581 women and children were living in shelters for victims of abuse in this country.
- Twenty-nine percent of those women identified as First Nations, Métis or Inuit
- In 2023, 26,777 children and youth (aged 17 years and younger) were victims of police-reported family violence. Of these, more than three in five victims (62%) were girls.
- The rate of family violence against children and youth reached 362 victims per 100,000 population (296 for children aged 11 years and younger, and 485 for youth aged 12 to 17 years) in 2023—the highest rate since comparable data became available in 2009. The rate was nearly twice as high for girls (439) as it was for boys (259) in 2023.
- The rate of non-family violence against children and youth increased 42% (from 575 to 819 victims per 100,000 population) from 2018 to 2023.
- By gender, the highest rate of police-reported intimate partner violence in 2023 was among women and girls aged 12 to 24 years (752 per 100,000 population), a rate nearly seven times higher than that for men and boys of that age group (111)
- The rate of police-reported sexual assault increased 38% between 2017 and 2022.
And while these statistics focus on violence against women, members of the 2SLGBTQI+ community experience alarming rates of violence as well. In 2023, hate crimes based on sexual orientation in Canada increased by 69% over 2022. Since 2016, police-reported hate crimes against this community have increased by 388%!
This is why, on December 6 each year, we remember:
