Political Textiles

 

There has been much chatter on line at times about keeping politics out of (name textile craft).

What people don't seem to realize is that textiles have been political for a very long time.  Colours are also political - see the colours various political parties use.  Colours have psychological effects on people, usually culturally based.  For example in European based cultures, black is the colour used for death and mourning.  In some Asian cultures, it is white.  And so on.

Lately textiles are being used to honour, recognize and remember missing and murdered indigenous women who have disappeared.  Hundreds of them.  Thousands of them.  Red dresses, hung up to represent those missing women, taken from their families, sometimes found, many more times, not.

The First Nations/Indigenous communities are left to wonder and mourn.  And so the Red Dress Project.

Now we have the news of 215 children found in a mass burial in Kamloops, BC.  The outrage is long overdue.  This is not the first mass burial and there will no doubt be many more found.  Thousands of children were taken from their families, by force, some of them never to return to their families.  Those that did frequently suffered from PTSD from being violated - everything from starvation to physical to yes, sexual abuse.  

If you are just finding out about this now, I suggest you begin by exploring the link below to the Red Dress Project, then expand your horizons to discover other abuses perpetrated upon First Nations/Indigenous people.  Urge the current government to implement the measures that were recommended, continue to work on the issues of water on reserves/First Nations communities, and bring the Spirit Bear Plan and Jordan's Principle into effect.

RedDress Project