I think even with NWAC and what happened with Sisters in Spirit, the focus was on missing and murdered aboriginal women, and that was warranted because of the sheer numbers. The Native Women's Association has changed our department name. We now call it violence prevention and safety. Because we got the funds for Sisters in Spirit, we focused on the missing and murdered, which is the extreme of violence. Now we have to bring it back to look at the high rates of violence in the communities and in the home. I think that's what the committee wants to look at too. Your goal is the root causes of violence. Are you looking at it from that aspect, or is it at the other end of the spectrum?
It's important that we bring it back to the preventative part as well. In the aboriginal community, it's the normalization of violence. There's not enough prevention. NWAC, as I said, was so focused on that. We were mandated to look at the missing and murdered, so we sort of left that by the wayside. We want to now look at that, as well as the missing and murdered. The two are related, but you're addressing one very extreme and one where you could start to look at the preventative aspect.
When we look at the root causes of violence in communities or in the home, it's poverty. Look at divorce rates. One of the main reasons couples get divorced is financial. You can imagine that when you live in poverty day in and day out, it generates a lot of negativity.
Young people now are exposed to violence in the media, but they're also exposed to lifestyle, the life that everybody lives that they don't live. They live in a shack. They might have running water. They don't even have a bedroom. They're exposed through television to a life where everybody has a car. Do you know what I mean? All this generates feelings of frustration because they have no money to do things and no places to go.
The committee has to look at that. The two are related, but they're different.