Ongoing Issues & Conflicts in 2SLGBTQQIA+ Communities
Researched and written by Chelsea Bannatyne, 2024
“There’s no homosexuality, there’s no heterosexuality. Before contact, there was just human sexuality” - Lee Maracle[i]
The lived and intersecting realities of Indigenous 2SLGBTQQIA+ people across Turtle Island have long been afflicted with rights violations, indifference and multiple forms of violence. Indigenous 2SLGBTQQIA+ people are recognized as the “first sexual and gender minority in Turtle Island”[ii]; however, this marginal status was not always the case. In many pre-contact Indigenous societies, “Two-Spirit people served important community functions and held positions of high regard and prestige”[iii] such as “sacred or ceremonial roles in healing, being pipe carriers or being visionaries”[iv]. Yet the current status and health and well-being of Indigenous 2SLGBTQQIA+ people in Canada continues to be compromised by historic and contemporary colonial policies and strategies derived from Judeo-Christian morality frameworks.
Canada formally acknowledges that “discrimination based on sexual orientation, sex characteristics, gender identity and expression dates back to the country’s earliest foundations, when settlers imposed European norms of gender and sexuality onto Two-Spirit peoples as tools of colonization”[v]. The Final Report of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls (2019) demonstrates that the act of colonialism was in fact gendered and “shaped the lives of women, girls and 2SLGBTQQIA+ people in distinct ways”[vi] contributing to “persistent violations of their cultural, health, security and justice-related rights” [vii]. It is important to note that for many Indigenous Peoples colonization is not viewed as an event of the past but is, rather, ongoing. Colonialism has been sustained through Canadian legislation and policies such as the Indian Act of 1876, the Indian Residential School System, and The Sixties Scoop. It has been further maintained through colonial institutions such as “the military, the church, the education system, the health system, police and emergency responders and the justice system”[viii] and through the child and welfare system. These structures have, in a myriad of ways, severely disrupted “alternative constructions of gender, the survival of ceremonies, and cultural practices and the education of the younger generation”[ix] and remain the root of the violence, homophobia, transphobia and injustice Indigenous 2SLGBTQQIA+ face in their lives, within their families and communities and through navigating a society that continues to devalue their existence.
The Indian Act was one of the foundational tools for establishing colonial rule and was particularly damaging to Indigenous women and 2SLGBTQQIA+ people as it was “responsible for the erasure of multiple gender traditions through legally binding Indian status with Christian patriarchal marriage”[x]. Additionally, the Indian Act “codified the right to educate and assimilate Indigenous children and consequently, expanded the reach of the Indian Residential School system[xi]. The schools were “deliberately built far from Indigenous communities to minimize contact and increase children’s sense of alienation from their families and cultures”[xii] in an attempt to “kill the Indian in the child”[xiii]. The schools played a primary role in enforcing a hierarchical gender binary which had a devastating effect on Two-Spirit children and their sense of identity[xiv]. It is well documented that while attending these schools children were subjected to neglect and multiple forms of abuse (sexual, physical, emotional and spiritual). The Indian Residential Schools are widely condemned for committing “cultural genocide” as evidenced in the attempts to “cause Aboriginal peoples to cease to exist as distinct legal, social, cultural, religious, and racial entities in Canada”[xv]. Members of the Two-Spirit community along with other Indigenous activists criticized the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) for its exclusion of Two-Spirit people. It is noted that there were only “two mentions of two-spirit people in all the publications of the TRC, and none of the 94 Calls to Action mention Two-Spirit, 2SLGBTQQIA Indigenous people, discrimination based on gender identity, or sexuality”[xvi]. This exclusion is another form of erasure faced by Indigenous 2SLGBTQQIA+ people. It is demonstrative of how embedded colonial heteronormativity is within Canadian society that even in a process of reconciliation, Two-Spirit people remained invisible.
Today, Indigenous 2SLGBTQQIA+ people are often targeted for violence and sexual assault. They are at higher risk for depression, mental illness, substance use disorders, self-harm, suicide, and are disproportionately affected by STIs and blood borne infections. [i] Moreover, studies reveal that within the Indigenous 2SLGBTQQIA+ communities violence varies with “Two-Spirit men reporting a lifetime prevalence of physical assault and sexual assault; young Two-Spirit men report higher rates of physical and sexual violence than their Indigenous heterosexual peers”[ii] while Two-Spirit women have reported the effects of assault, including incidents with multiple perpetrators, on their mental health.[iii]
Indigenous activists and scholars alike have called the above burdens a consequence of “Triple oppression”[iv] due to the prevailing racist, sexist and homophobic attitudes. Unfortunately, these “colonial beliefs have been internalized by many Indigenous communities, leading to 2SLGBTQQIA+ people feeling unsafe, unwelcome and cut off from their communities and families”[v]. These concerns have resulted in many 2SLGBTQQIA+ members leaving their home communities in search of acceptance, safety and inclusion in urban centres[vi]. For some Indigenous 2SLGBTQQIA+ relocation has had “positive effects for Two-Spirit identity formation”[vii] but also presents “challenges including difficulties finding housing, employment, dealing with racism and exploitation, experiencing dating/relationship violence and encountering barriers when accessing services”[viii]. In addition to that, other forms of violence were “sometimes the result of gangs, drugs and unstable situations related to poverty”[ix]. The Final Report of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous women and Girls highlights how the experiences of violence and discrimination differ amongst Indigenous people due to overlapping oppressions – “Inuit, Métis and First Nations women do not always face the same kind of discrimination or threat. In addition, non-binary people, including those who identify as 2SLGBTQQIA+ may encounter individual, institutional, and systemic violence differently”[x].
When considering the poorer socio-economic and health outcomes of Indigenous people in general, and more specifically with 2SLGBTQQIA+ people, one must do so holistically. For instance, mental health is interconnected with a person’s spiritual, emotional, and physical attributes as well as their familial and community relationships and access to cultural supports. Research has determined that attending Residential Schools is “a source of abusive family dynamics and [causes] struggles with depression, emotional dysregulation, and self-destructive behaviour”[xi]. The rates of anxiety and depression are “elevated among Two-Spirit people in comparison with cis-hetero Indigenous peers”. Also, one “health study of urban Indigenous people found that 70% of Two-Spirit adults had considered suicide compared with 50% of their cis-hetero Indigenous peers” with another “study finding higher suicidal ideation among women (57%) than men (42.86%)”[xii]. Studies related to Indigenous 2SLGBTQQIA+ accessing health services reveal that “two-spirit people report having an unmet mental health need at rates ranging from 16.62% to 65%” and that of those “who do access services find them to be inadequate for Indigenous people”[xiii]. This unfortunate reality, as mentioned before, is “connected to homophobia, transphobia, isolation and lack of connection, as well as their experiences of homelessness, violence, or past trauma”[xiv]. Colonialism in all its forms has been detrimental to the current health and well-being of all Indigenous people in general and it has manifested itself as a constant and distinct threat in the day-to-day lives of 2SLGBTQQIA+ people.
[i] Community Based Research Centre, p.2
[ii] National Aboriginal Health Organization, p.3
[iii] Ibid.
[iv] Government of Canada, 2SLGBTQQIA Action plan, 2022, p.14
[v] MMIWG, 2019, p.229
[vi] MMIWG, 2019, p.230
[vii] MMIWG, 2019, p.77.
[viii] MMIWG, 2019, p.232.
[ix] Depelteau & Giroux, p. 227
[x] Reconciliation Education “What are Truth & Reconciliation”
[xi] Ibid.
[xii] [RCAP, 1996] as cited by Bombay, 2014.
[xiii] Blankestijn 2021, p.32
[xiv] Ibid., 2014
[xv] Blankestijn, 2021, p.34-35
Blankestijn, J. A. (2021). Intersecting Indigenous Identities: Recognition of Two-Spirit Identity in Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Process (Doctoral dissertation).
Bombay A, Matheson K, Anisman H. The intergenerational effects of Indian Residential Schools: Implications for the concept of historical trauma. Transcultural Psychiatry. 2014;51(3):320-338.
Brotman, S., Ryan, B., Jalbert, Y., & Rowe, B. (2002). Reclaiming space-regaining health: The health care experiences of two-spirit people in Canada. Journal of Gay & Lesbian Social Services, 14(1), 67-87.
Canada, G. of C. (2022, September 9). Federal 2SLGBTQI+ Action Plan 2022. Government of Canada: Women and Gender Equality Canada. https://women-gender-equality.canada.ca/en/free-to-be-me/federal-2slgbtqi-plus-action-plan/federal-2slgbtqi-plus-action-plan-2022.html#reconciliation
Depelteau, J., & Giroux, D. (2022). LGBTQ Issues as Indigenous Politics: Two-Spirit Mobilization in Canada. Queerly Canadian: An Introductory Reader in Sexuality Studies, 222.
Education, R. (n.d.). What Are The Truth & Reconciliation Commission’s 94 Calls to Action & How Are We working Toward achieving Them today? Reconciliation Education – Official Distributor of 4 Seasons of Reconciliation. https://www.reconciliationeducation.ca/what-are-truth-and-reconciliation-commission-94-calls-to-action
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McLeod, E. A., Mordoch, Dr. E., Chartier, C., & Guillas, R. S. (n.d.). Returning to the Circle - University of Manitoba. University of Manitoba/Winnipeg Suicide Prevention Network . https://umanitoba.ca/Returning-to-the-circle.pdf
National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls. (2019). Reclaiming power and place. The final report of the national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls. The National Inquiry. https://www.mmiwg-ffada.ca/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Final_Report_Vol_1a-1.pdf
National Aboriginal Health Organization. (n.d.). Suicide prevention and Two-Spirited People . University of Ottawa. https://ruor.uottawa.ca/bitstream/10393/30544/1/Suicide_Prevention_2Spirited_People_Guide_2012.pdf
Robinson, M. (2022). Recent insights into the mental health needs of two-spirit people. Current opinion in psychology, 101494.
Ristock, J., Zoccole, A., Passante, L., & Potskin, J. (2019). Impacts of colonization on Indigenous Two-Spirit/LGBTQ Canadians’ experiences of migration, mobility and relationship violence. Sexualities, 22(5-6), 767-784.
Scheim, A. I., Jackson, R., James, L., Dopler, T. S., Pyne, J., & Bauer, G. R. (2013). Barriers to well-being for Aboriginal gender-diverse people: results from the Trans PULSE Project in Ontario, Canada. Ethnicity and Inequalities in Health and Social Care, 6(4), 108-120.
Thoms, J. M. (2007). Leading an Extraordinary Life: Wise Practices for an HIV prevention campaign with Two-Spirit men.