May 5 is the national day of awareness for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons. A virtual talking circle today will center on how Native women have worked to address and end the epidemic.
For more, KDLG heard from Amber Webb, who has worked to raise awareness of Bristol Bay’s missing and murdered people for years. Webb and her sister, Tiffany, are holding a virtual talking circle today at noon today.
Here is the Zoom link: MMIWG2s+ - Honoring Grassroots Efforts Across North America, Past and Present with Amber Webb and Tiffany Webb
Other events around town today also aim to raise awareness about MMIP.
SAFE, Bristol Bay’s shelter, will have a table with information and resources at the AC store in downtown Dillingham starting at noon.
The Bristol Bay Native Association is giving out red MMIP shirts to those who share their support. People who take a photo of themselves wearing red for MMIP and MMIW awareness can send them to Evelyn Larson at elarson@bbna.com by 3:00 pm. BBNA Family Services has red MMIP shirts available at the annex. To pick up a shirt call BBNA or email Evelyn to ensure someone is available.
More resources are at the bottom of this article.
Amber Webb talked with KDLG's Izzy Ross about what people can expect at the talking circle. This interview was lightly edited for length and clarity.
Izzy Ross: You and Tiffany Webb are holding a talking circle at noon. Can you talk a little bit about what that event is about and how people can participate?
Amber Webb: Yeah, so we're hosting a talking circle to share some information about the MMIW movement. And really looking at the roots of that movement and how that movement started with Indigenous women, and it's always been led by Indigenous women. So we really want to honor the people who spent their whole life advocating for future generations, and some of them are no longer with us. So it's really about helping people understand what murdered and missing Indigenous women, girls and Two Spirit people — what that is, what is at the root of that, and what can we do to make changes? How can we be a part of a solution?
Ross: What can people expect in that discussion? What can people expect to to hear and learn about?
Webb: So we're going to talk about some of the early leaders of violence prevention, like Tillie Black Bear who I believe she started the first shelter in the United States for Native women, and really fought hard to make sure that VAWA — the Violence Against Women Act — had inclusion for Indigenous women in it. Because when it was first laid out in the early 90s, tribal communities were almost completely left out of it. They didn't have access to the funding and the way it was written, it left them out. So she did a lot of work around that.
We'll learn about different activists who fought really hard. And a lot of the time, the reason that Native women have fought is because either they've experienced violence, they've lost a loved one, or they see these issues playing out in their communities, and then they couldn't just sit with that and let that be the experience that generations ahead of them had.
And so I would definitely be prepared to take a little bit of time afterwards to do whatever kind of self care you need to do. And remember that it's okay to cry, it's okay to let out those emotions when you feel them. And that we're all fighting this fight together. And I think the most important thing that people should understand is that the only way that we're going to change the reality is if we can support each other, and if we can be unified. That's really at the source of the work that I do in every other aspect of my life: How, as Native people, can we take care of each other and support each other so that people who experience trauma don't have to suffer alone? And so that people stop thinking that we are at risk or vulnerable and start understanding that no, we're actually targeted. This violence is targeted. And that's the most important thing.
Ross: Just talking about this, the framing is often kind of skewed and gives people not an entirely accurate picture of what the situation actually is and what people are actually dealing with.
Webb: Yeah, so violence against Native women comes from everywhere, and it happens everywhere that Native women exist. And the reason that it happens is tied into colonization and racism, and it began at contact. And it has continued since then.
Some of what we'll talk about as what is gender-based violence. So gender-based violence is violence directed towards somebody because of their gender. And so generally speaking, the UN recognizes this as a public health issue, and they recognize that it affects colonized people. It affects indigenous people all over the world disproportionately, because of the way that racism and colonization affects power dynamics in communities. So we talk a little bit about that.
And then anything that we can do to reaffirm our traditional roles in our communities and in our families, and really uplift those, will make a difference. So sometimes that can be confronting hateful language. Sometimes it's confronting misunderstood language. Sometimes it means looking at the policies in your organization and making sure that the Native women who work there are paid at a comparable rate to other people in your workplace. Sometimes it's really understanding inside yourself when you have biases. If you see a case in the news about a Native woman who's been killed, and you assume that she was somehow at fault, or that somehow her death might have been related to substance misuse, that is a bias that does not accurately show what the issue was like. And really putting the responsibility — don't say, 'women are assaulted,' say, 'men assault women.' So changing the language really is powerful.
What can people do? I think a really big thing that we can do in our communities that will help with any number of issues that we face that contribute to violence is addressing lateral oppression inside yourself, and inside your own family. And then if you look at how lateral oppression plays out in your family, that takes our power. And if we empower each other, then we start to see all kinds of other ways that we can protect each other. And that's really powerful thing.
One really powerful thing that anybody can do is examine your own privilege. If you did not spend your whole life being afraid that somebody was going to harm you, that's a privilege. If you had parents that took care of you, that's a privilege. If you have intergenerational wealth, so if you inherited money or resources from your family, that's a privilege. And look at how that shapes the way that you see the world. If you start to understand power dynamics through that kind of a lens, you'd be amazed how big of a difference you can make just in your daily life and the decisions that you make.
Ross: I think that's all extremely helpful when people are thinking about this epidemic and thinking, you know, what can I do? I think it's helpful to have some of these tools to start addressing it in your own life.
So this talking circle starts at 12 noon, Alaska time, we have a Zoom link on kdlg.org along with this interview. For those who can't make this meeting, I know that you and Tiffany both do a lot of work throughout the year, talking about different factors and different forces related to this issue. What are some other resources people can tap into? Or where could they look out for more information?
Webb: Data for Indigenous Justice is an organization that collects data, they do a lot of work around data sovereignty and can assist people in finding resources. So if you have a loved one who was missing or who was murdered, I encourage you to reach out to them and share your information. And you can find our information online. The Sovereign Bodies Institute is another organization that works with loved ones of people who have been murdered or are missing. We're really working hard to create our own databases that show what these issues look like in our communities more accurately, and to have some autonomy over how that information is used.
- Alaska Native Women's Resource Center
- Alaska Network on Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault
- StrongHearts Native Helpline
If you're looking at healing work, you can go to the Native Wellness Institute's website. I encourage people to if you have a chance, check out the Calricaraq program out of the Yukon Kuskokwim Health Corporation. And then if you ever get a chance to go to one of their Calricaraq trainings, those are really powerful.
We also can give presentations about historic trauma, understanding lateral oppression, and then what are the solutions? How can we be a part of solutions? So if people are interested in having a presentation like that at their organization, they can reach out to us at the [BBAHC's Kanakanak] hospital for that as well. We have a Talking Circle every Monday at 10 a.m. from 10 to 11, 11:30 a.m., where we discuss different issues related to healing and substance misuse, and wellness. We try to cover a lot of different topics in that talking circle.
Ross: Got it. Lots of resources for folks to delve into. Amber Webb, thank you so much for taking some time to talk today.
Webb: Yeah, thank you. Thanks for having me. I appreciate it.
Get in touch with the author at izzy@kdlg.org or 907-842-2200.
