BWSS Commemorates Prisoners Justice Day
Join us in affirming the lives and self-determination of all survivors of gender-based violence.
“Prisoners Justice Day is…the day to oppose prison violence, police violence, and violence against women and children.”
— Prisoners Justice Day Committee, 2001
August 10th is Prisoners’ Justice Day (PJD).
At BWSS, we know that for many survivors, experiences of domestic violence, sexual assault, and other forms of gender-based violence (GBV) are, as Survived and Punished write, “bound up with systems of incarceration and police violence.” In fact, according to data from the Canadian Association of Elizabeth Fry Societies, 85% of federally sentenced women have a history of physical abuse, while 68% have history of sexual abuse. This rate increases to 90% for Indigenous women.
Racialized women are Canada’s fastest growing prison population, with Black and Indigenous women accounting for more than half of all federally sentenced women, despite making up only 4% and 3% of the country’s adult female population, respectively.
“Trends in prison populations show that criminalization is determined by racist constructions of crime. In Policing Black Lives, Robyn Maynard refers to this as the criminalization of race.”
—Decriminalizing Race, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, 2020
Today, BWSS commemorates PJD, in solidarity with the lives and self-determination of all survivors of gender-based violence.
We are spotlighting 6 crucial resources that take an anti-oppressive, intersectional approach to addressing gender-based violence at its intersections with the violence of prisons, policing and criminalization.
Human Rights in Action: A Handbook for Women and Gender-Diverse People in Federal Prison in Canada
This handbook is designed to give you the tools and resources to defend and advocate for your rights while you are federally incarcerated. This handbook is written specifically for people in prison, but advocates, lawyers, and other allies will also find it useful in their work.
Accessibility Format: Machine Readable PDF
Author/Publisher: Canadian Association of Elizabeth Fry Societies (CAEFS)
Fact Sheet: The Criminalization & Overincarceration of Indigenous Women
This sheet provides an overview on the overincarceration of Indigenous women in federal prisons, as well as its interconnected causes, which include the over-policing and under-protection of Indigenous communities, systemic socioeconomic marginalization, and ongoing colonial policies and institutions.
Accessibility Format: Machine Readable PDF
Author/Publisher: Canadian Association of Elizabeth Fry Societies (CAEFS)
Criminalized Black Women’s Experiences of Intimate Partner Violence in Canada
This study addresses Black women’s victimization and criminalization by examining the ways in which criminalized Black women’s intersecting identities of race, class, and gender influence how they perceive, experience, and respond to intimate partner violence (IPV).
Accessibility Format: Machine Readable PDF
Author/Publisher: Patrina Duhaney
Punished By Design: The Criminalization of Trans & Queer Incarcerated Survivors
This report details how queer, trans, and gender nonconforming people are both disproportionately impacted by the criminal legal system and significantly more likely to be survivors of domestic and/or sexual violence.
Accessibility Format: Machine Readable PDF
Author/Publisher: Survived and Punished
Reproductive (In)Justice in Canadian Federal Prisons for Women
This report highlights how incarceration as a new parent and / or during the period of reproductive age is a barrier to being able to choose to parent and to parent children you do have. By preventing reproduction, dislocating children from their parents to the foster care system, and placing mothers at greater risk to their health and survival, the incarceration of Indigenous women in Canada meets the United Nations (1948) definition of genocide.
Accessibility Format: Machine Readable PDF
Author/Publisher: Canadian Association of Elizabeth Fry Societies
Unravelling the Complexities of Domestic Violence and Criminalization in Black Women’s Lives
This webinar identifies trauma and violence informed frameworks that are both relevant and responsive to the intersecting realities in Black women’s lives, especially with an increasing number of Black women being charged with perpetrating violence against an intimate partner.
Accessibility Format: Captioned Video
Author/Publisher: VAW Learning Network
