14 Wing turns out for Red Dress Day awareness walk
May 3, 14 Wing Greenwood Defence Team and community members joined in a walk to remember “sisters, mothers, daughters.”
14 Wing Defence Indigenous Advisory Group military co-chair Master Corporal Nick Whaley thanked everyone for attending the DIAG’s awareness walk, ahead of the May 5 Red Dress Day.
Red Dress Day, an opportunity for Canadians to honour and bring awareness to the thousands of missing or murdered Indigenous women and girls in Canada.
“We get together to do these things, but this is an opportunity to recognize a long-standing injustice and inaction against missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls,” Whaley said, pausing to catch himself in an emotional moment. “Today is bringing community together, and healing together. We’re here to remind ourselves we must continue to call on government, law enforcement, education – and each other – to change.”
He referred to the 231 calls to action from the 2019 final report of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls: “Only two have been done since then – in over four years,” he said.
“Please come and walk with me and reflect on how we can make a difference.”
Many military members wore red T-shirts under their uniform, while other participants wore red clothing. Along the base’s fitness trail a number of red dresses were hanging, eye-catching visual reminders amid still-colourless spring tree branches and winter-brown ground cover.
The 14 Wing DIAG is preparing to mark Indigenous Awareness Week, celebrated across the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Armed Forces during the third week of May. First celebrated in 1992, IAW is an opportunity to honour, learn from and share knowledge of and First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples. IAW also highlights the significant contributions Indigenous members make to the defence of Canada. Then, June 21, with the summer solstice, comes National Indigenous Peoples Day.
