What is Red Dress Day?
Red Dress Day, the National Day of Awareness for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls and Two-Spirit People (MMIWG2S), is observed annually on May 5.
The day is marked by people hanging red dresses from trees, windows, fences and balconies. Dangling limply on hangers without women to wear them, the dresses are visual reminders of the thousands of missing Indigenous people in Canada.
The National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls, in its 2019 report, said the crisis constitutes a genocide of Indigenous people.
“Indigenous women are 12 times more likely to be murdered or go missing than other women in Canada, and 16 times more likely to be killed or disappear than white women,” according to a Globe story that referred to the public inquiry.
“The report cited research from Statistics Canada showing Indigenous women and girls accounted for almost a quarter of female homicide victims between 2001 and 2015,” though they represent only 5 per cent of women in Canada.
The first Red Dress Day was observed in 2010, after artist Jaime Black launched her continuing REDress art installation. Black collects and hangs red dresses in public spaces to bring awareness to the MMIWG2S crisis, and the dresses have come to symbolize the issue. Red dresses are also used as a symbol of honour, at places like the Winnipeg landfill where First Nations’ women’s bodies were recently found.
Full Article: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-red-dress-day-2023-mmiwg2s/
