Action4Canada - Exposing BC Gov's anti-white, DEI, Agenda

00:00:00.000 Good morning and welcome to our UBC Learning Circle, Unlearning, Undoing, Systemic White 1.00

00:00:28.760 Supremacy and Indigenous Specific Racism with the BC Office of the Provincial Health Officer

00:00:35.420 with Dr. Kate Youngblood and Dr. Danielle Bainsmith. Today's conversation is presented in

00:00:43.960 partnership with the Center for Excellence in Indigenous Health. We'd like to thank the First

00:00:48.060 Nations Health Authority for generously funding the UBC Learning Circle and allowing us to have

00:00:53.720 these conversations. Before we formally begin, I'd like to acknowledge with respect and gratitude

00:00:59.200 that I'm joining you from the unceded territories of the Muscoom, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh

00:01:03.320 Nations. Please feel free to introduce yourselves in the chat box below. Today's Learning Circle

00:01:10.260 will be exploring the unlearning and undoing systemic white supremacy and Indigenous Specific

00:01:16.200 racism within the BC Office of the Provincial Health Officer with Dr. Kate Youngblood and

00:01:23.580 Dr. Danielle Bainsmith. I'll ask our guests to introduce themselves in just a few moments.

00:01:32.360 For those of you who don't know me, my name is Sarane Squawkin. I'm the Learning Circle Manager.

00:01:37.260 I'm Seelk Okanagan on my mother's side and Hickory Apache on my father's side. I'll be your moderator

00:01:44.320 for today's discussion. Joining us working behind the scenes is Cynthia, our Production Coordinator,

00:01:49.760 and our two work learning students, Kira and Nicole. They'll be in the background interacting

00:01:55.900 with everyone in the chat. Finally, before we get into today's discussion, I'll provide a gentle

00:02:01.660 heads up that the topics covered may be sensitive or emotionally triggering. Please make sure that you

00:02:06.980 feel that you are looking after yourself and if at any point you feel that you need to talk to a friend,

00:02:11.920 elder, counsellor, family member, don't hesitate to do so. We have some prompts in the chat for you if

00:02:17.740 you need additional support. Now I'll turn it over to our guests to introduce themselves.

00:02:21.500 Danielle Baines-Smith,

00:02:27.320 Danielle Baines-Smith,

00:02:31.320 Anichist, 0.99

00:02:35.460 Enichif Nya,

00:02:36.980 Ed 찬owni,

00:02:38.640 caen,

00:02:40.140 Wincinnia,

00:02:40.960 En- flauta,

00:02:41.140 Joninia,

00:02:42.140 καιom Loc 0.90

00:02:50.960 Fort Nelson First Nation, Bain, Pi Masson, Pi Aden, Pi Dumen, Pi Faneuf, Pi Lamirande,

00:02:58.920 Minon de Femi. Good morning. Hello, everybody. It's so wonderful to be with you all on this day.

00:03:06.120 It was very exciting to see so many friendly and familiar names in the chat. And thank you for the

00:03:13.140 shout out to my shirt, which is Native Love Notes. I wore it specially today because who doesn't love

00:03:19.800 a granny hanky? My name is Danielle Bainsmith, and it's a real honor and a privilege to be able to

00:03:25.800 introduce myself with my ancestral languages of Michif and Slavey. I told you that I'm Métis and

00:03:33.640 I'm Echodene. My family ties are in the Red River Valley in Winnipeg, as well as Fort Nelson First

00:03:41.040 Nation. And I live on Lekwungen territories, but this morning I'm calling in from the territories

00:03:48.060 of the Hosseinich Nations, specifically Tseo First Nation. And I'm very, very grateful to be here.

00:03:55.380 I'm a cisgendered hetero lady who uses she and her pronouns, and that creates heteronormative blind

00:04:03.420 spots. So I like to include that as an invitation to any two-spirit relatives in the room today in the

00:04:11.060 circle to an invitation to hold me accountable as those heteronormative ways of being show up.

00:04:18.960 And I don't see them because they're blind spots. So I invite you to hold me accountable and let me

00:04:23.500 know how and when they show up. I get to work as BC's Deputy Provincial Health Officer for Indigenous

00:04:30.220 Health. I'm very grateful to do that. And I'm so excited to be here to share a little bit of what

00:04:37.220 we've been up to over the last year and a half. And so I'm very grateful to be able to do that with

00:04:43.660 my friend and my sidekick, Dr. Kate Youngblood, who will introduce herself in a moment. And it's

00:04:49.600 really, really important for us to also share that none of this would be possible without the full and

00:04:56.620 unwavering support of Dr. Bonnie Henry, who is, of course, BC's Provincial Health Officer and is the

00:05:04.060 person who shows this incredible enabling leadership to let us do this work. So we wanted to honor her

00:05:08.980 today. In addition, acknowledging all of the territories that we're joining from and all of

00:05:15.680 the medicines that are in those lands and waters and how grateful we are. Everything that we're

00:05:21.940 sharing today comes from a really humble place. And we're just really excited to share what we've

00:05:26.880 been learning because it's been, yeah, just exciting work to be a part of. And we want to recognize that

00:05:33.500 it is fully based on the teachings that we've received from elders and mentors and different

00:05:40.980 teachers along the way. So wanting to acknowledge that as well. So I will take a moment to share my

00:05:49.360 screen, which worked in the tech check. So hopefully it's going to work just as smoothly right now.

00:05:54.280 And I will pass it over to Kate while I'm doing that to introduce herself.

00:05:58.540 Kate Youngblood. Hi, everyone. Thank you so much for having me here today. My name is Kate Youngblood.

00:06:07.380 I am a white occupier on the territory of the Hunkuminum and the Squamish-Nitchum-speaking peoples

00:06:13.900 of Musqueam, Tsleil-Waututh and Squamish nations. I'm right by the river today. So really grateful for the

00:06:21.880 rain and that good water. I am a postdoc fellow in the office of the provincial health officer. I am an

00:06:31.500 epidemiologist and mixed methods researcher by training. And I am so glad to work side by side

00:06:38.600 with Danielle and all of our awesome colleagues in the OPHO, including Dr. Henry, and very glad to be

00:06:45.740 here with you today. We've gotten into a discipline of not just acknowledging territory,

00:06:53.480 but also acknowledging rights in our opening. And Danielle, if you could go to the next slide,

00:07:01.580 that'd be great. Okay. So I want to acknowledge that First Nations territory is stretched to every

00:07:09.540 inch of this province, and that inherent rights rooted in connection to land and territory have

00:07:15.800 never been ceded or surrendered here. These inherent rights are upheld in international, national,

00:07:24.020 national and provincial law. And so as a settler person here, I have obligations to these inherent

00:07:33.020 rights. And I recognize that there are long standing First Nations laws and systems integrally

00:07:39.520 tied to the lands and waters of these territories. And I also recognize generations of Indigenous

00:07:46.240 rights holders who are First Nations, Métis, and Inuit from elsewhere in Canada, in Canada. And they

00:07:53.360 also call these lands and waters home. And especially this month, I also want to recognize the descendants

00:08:00.200 of enslaved Africans who now make these territories home. I recognize their work against white supremacy

00:08:07.720 and anti-Black racism. And I am starting to understand my responsibilities in relation to those

00:08:14.980 systems of oppression. And yeah, that's a work in progress for me. So I want to make that acknowledgement

00:08:22.040 as well. Over to you, Danielle. Briefly, what we are working towards is to unlearn inherited and systemic

00:08:31.800 white supremacist ways of thinking to become meaningfully inclusive of diverse worldviews, perspectives,

00:08:37.300 and approaches, and approaches, and to undoing inherited systemic white supremacist approaches

00:08:42.660 that are hardwired into our structures, policies, practices, norms, and values within our office.

00:08:49.380 And so as you will discover as we go through the rest of our sharing this morning, Kate and I love

00:08:55.540 metaphors. And there are many that we find useful in the work. In relation to this kind of overarching

00:09:02.660 purpose to the work, we really think about the unlearning as being able to see more clearly represented

00:09:09.780 by these glasses, to be able to see this sort of insidious white supremacy and anti-indigenous

00:09:15.860 racism that's embedded all around us. And then when we see it, to get to work and start to take actions.

00:09:22.980 And so we represent that with these gloves that we put on. These are reconciliation gloves

00:09:28.500 to remind us that this is really action oriented work. We have a number of guiding principles that

00:09:35.940 help to ground us in the work. And so we acknowledge that systemic white supremacy is an everyday problem

00:09:43.940 that requires everyday attention. And we are very grateful to Joe Gallagher for sharing that teaching

00:09:50.740 with us. Truth comes before reconciliation. So we try and be really disciplined about truth telling.

00:09:59.540 We endeavor to privilege the voices of BIPOC peoples and in all that we are doing. And the next principle of

00:10:12.260 love and care has been so, so important in the work, especially because we started this work in our

00:10:19.220 office about a year and a half ago. So it was still really in the midst of a very, very difficult

00:10:24.740 time in relation to the pandemic. Certainly, we were very tired, our team members were really tired.

00:10:30.820 And we realized that we were inviting people and asking people to do this very hard, hard work.

00:10:37.140 And so it's necessary to wrap ourselves and one another in love and care. And so that's really,

00:10:44.340 really important to us. And we represent that with this quilt that you see on the screen right now,

00:10:50.580 which was a quilt that was made by Kate's late mom, Jen Gate for her. And so we use that as a symbol

00:10:57.780 to remind us that we wrap ourselves and wrap one another in love and care. We endeavor to be very

00:11:04.180 humble in this work. So we certainly aren't here today, thinking of ourselves as experts in this area,

00:11:11.220 we are infants and babies. And we have so much to learn. And that's why we have open hearts and open

00:11:18.980 minds. We have a willingness to own and attempt to fix harms that are identified. Sometimes the harms we

00:11:26.100 identify are way above our pay grade. And so we, we do do our best to shine a light. And then when we

00:11:33.300 see things that need to be corrected, we do our best to do that. We err on the side of Indigenous rights.

00:11:39.940 And this has been a really, really helpful, helpful principle. What we've discovered in paying closer

00:11:48.180 attention to the dynamics of white supremacy and anti Indigenous racism is that they can be quite

00:11:55.220 gas lighty is a word that has come into our lexicon. So we find that there are situations where our

00:12:03.300 harm alarms go off. And it's not, you know, directly on the surface clear to us, if in fact, this is

00:12:10.820 white supremacy or racism. And so what we have begun to do is to reflect on whatever it is that we're

00:12:18.660 looking at. Is it a policy? Is it an email? Is it a conversation that happened in a meeting? And we

00:12:25.060 choose our next step and our, our path or course to take based on erring on the side of on the side of

00:12:32.980 Indigenous rights. And that's been super helpful to us. We really want to share the lessons that we're

00:12:38.020 learning and learn from others. So that's why we're so grateful to have the invitation to come today.

00:12:42.660 And we are committed to doing our homework, which for us means really connecting with and understanding

00:12:50.660 foundational commitments that we've been given, and that we hold in relation to Indigenous rights

00:12:56.260 holders, and making sure that we know what Indigenous peoples have already told us to do,

00:13:03.300 and that we're doing it. And we'll tell you a little bit more about that in a little bit.

00:13:07.700 Another way that we anchor ourselves in our guiding principles is by looking and remembering this

00:13:16.340 image, this piece of art that was created by Lisa Boivin, a DNA bioethicist. So this,

00:13:22.980 this piece of art is called Sharing Bioethics, and it was published in the Canadian Medical Association

00:13:28.180 Journal in September of 2018. And so it really embodies so many of the principles that were listed on the

00:13:35.860 previous slide, including, you know, helping us see that the work before us is coming together in a

00:13:43.620 good way, with, you know, differing worldviews and differing epistemologies and activating that ethical

00:13:51.380 space of engagement together, and doing that with respect and love and care and humility. And what I

00:14:00.340 really love about this image is that it reminds us, if we're coming to the work from a place on behalf

00:14:06.340 of a settler organization, as I do in my role, or if we're coming from a biomedical model, that it's

00:14:12.500 really important that we are vigilant about de-emphasizing our particular mainstream worldviews,

00:14:20.660 because they are so dominant and, and oppressive. So we need to kind of keep them in check. But

00:14:26.580 another thing that we've learned actually just recently is, we submitted an article for publication

00:14:35.620 in a healthcare leadership journal, and we received feedback from the reviewers. And one of the reviewers

00:14:42.740 described our article, which the article is a description of a piece of our work that Kate will

00:14:48.900 be speaking to in a moment, the reviewer described our work as being hate filled, and representing hate

00:14:58.100 against white settlers. And it was so distressing for us to receive that comment and feedback and to

00:15:06.580 think that somebody was experiencing our work in that way. Because of course, we think about the work

00:15:12.340 as being grounded in love and care. But it also reminded me and this image reminds me to recognize

00:15:19.220 and to be very explicit that this is about different knowledges and wisdoms coming together. And that

00:15:27.220 each of these, you know, or many all of the different worldviews that are at play, and I'm saying many,

00:15:33.140 because I don't want to be pan indigenous in the way that I present this, but recognizing that there are

00:15:38.260 multiple worldviews at play. And we all have gifts that we bring, including from the mainstream settler

00:15:45.620 perspectives and biomedicine. And so this, we've included this slide today, just to have a moment to

00:15:52.500 reflect on that and the ways in which white fragility can show up, and, and the way that we can respond by

00:15:59.060 being really explicit about how we orient ourselves to the work. So I will pass it over to you, Kate.

00:16:08.260 So as Danielle has said, we really rely on a number of metaphors, which help bring clarity

00:16:19.380 to our glasses in this work. And so I'm going to share one here. And I just wanted to pause before I

00:16:25.220 share it. I'm going to talk about a net in this metaphor, and the net is not a positive thing in this

00:16:35.460 context. But I recognize that nets, and we'll talk about copper pots, all have different meanings

00:16:43.140 across Turtle Island. And so this is not to say that there are not other ways in which nets can be

00:16:50.980 helpful and useful. And so I just want to say that at the outset, with our metaphors, we're ascribing

00:16:58.580 meaning to things that also have deeply held meaning within First Nations, Inuit and Métis cultures,

00:17:05.780 and we're not trying to disrupt or co-opt that. So this is a piece of artwork that was

00:17:14.980 in Vancouver during the TED conference in 2014. And I lived just around the corner and I went to visit it

00:17:22.660 often. It's this huge net sculpture made by American artist Janet Echelman. It was 3,500 pounds, I read

00:17:34.580 later and made up of 860,000 knots. And you can see it stretched over what we call the Burrard Inlet,

00:17:43.540 over a Canada place attached to the buildings nearby. And so in this metaphor, we imagine

00:17:51.140 these main lines that you see connected to the buildings as being those

00:17:56.580 really foundational structures of settler colonialism in Canada, the reserve system, the Indian Act,

00:18:05.060 the residential school system, those really big structures that have shaped and formed colonialism

00:18:12.180 in Canada so intensely. But in this metaphor, we also recognize that the hundreds of thousands of

00:18:20.100 knots that make up this net in finer detail are the policies and practices and processes that shape

00:18:29.060 settler colonialism in much finer detail. And so in this metaphor, First Nations, Inuit and Métis people

00:18:36.820 are caught in this net strung high above their traditional territories, which are foundations of laws and

00:18:44.020 culture and governance and health and well being. And so we know that settler laws, imposition of settler 0.91

00:18:54.820 laws has created a segregated system or a race based system or apartheid here in Canada. The Indian Act

00:19:04.340 does not apply to me as a settler. And so settler Canadians are not trapped in this net. And from our

00:19:11.380 vantage point on the seawall, or in the corporate buildings and hotels around Canada place, the

00:19:19.460 vantage point or the way we would look at this net is different. And the nature of the net and the time

00:19:26.660 of day makes the net look different depend on where you're looking at it from. So when I would go during

00:19:33.700 the day, I almost couldn't see the net in the sky, like the clouds are coming through it, it's very

00:19:40.820 ephemeral and hard to see. And then at night, there was a projection and it was lit up so vividly that

00:19:47.540 you just couldn't take your eyes away from this artwork. And for me, that was like, I thought it through and

00:19:55.700 I thought, oh, this is like settler colonialism as well. Because I can walk by most days and not even

00:20:03.140 notice it. But then some days, it's so vivid, like when the news breaks about nations who have done the

00:20:12.100 work of bringing the stories of their mass graves on their traditional territories forward. Or for example,

00:20:20.660 orange shirt day when everybody is wearing their vivid t shirts, I have this moment where it's

00:20:28.820 this net of settler colonialism is lit up so brightly. And I turn my attention and we often hear this

00:20:35.460 question, oh man, like, what can I do? But then the news cycle recedes, we leave the National Day for

00:20:44.420 Truth and Reconciliation, and our attention turns back to our day to day lives.

00:20:49.060 And so that's sort of a really important piece to think about that as settlers, we have this really strong

00:20:57.540 responsibility to keep our eyes on the net and not let that sort of move away from our eyes and our viewpoint on

00:21:10.020 days where it's not lit up so vividly. So this is also a really important part of the story as well.

00:21:19.620 It's installation. And so you can see that there are regular everyday people here in their vests

00:21:27.540 installing this net. The artist herself is not here, Janet Echelman or in the metaphor, Sir Johnny

00:21:36.100 MacDonald and Duncan Campbell Scott and that crew of people who have been so instrumental in the

00:21:43.460 structures of the structures of settler colonialism. And so I think it's really, really important to think

00:21:51.700 about that as people just doing their everyday jobs that install and maintain this net over time.

00:21:58.660 In this frame, you can also see two flags, the Canadian flag and the Union Jack representing this ongoing

00:22:10.180 occupation of Coast Salish territory here. Even the soundtrack, if you were here at noon, every single day, 0.94

00:22:17.460 they blast the first four notes of El Canada, again, representing this ongoing dominion of this

00:22:24.580 unceded territory. And there's a little flyover Canada kiosk which helps us with this metaphor.

00:22:31.300 Even further, we recognize that the net of settler colonialism stretches over the whole

00:22:37.140 geography of what we term colonially as Canada affecting First Nations, Métis and Inuit people from coast to coast to coast.

00:22:48.500 So the artist didn't set out to make this metaphor. We've talked to her and we've asked her permission to share it in this way.

00:22:57.620 So we're really grateful for that. But she also inadvertently offered a comment on where we go from here.

00:23:04.580 So the net is not solid. Indigenous resistance has ensured that there are many holes, despite attempts through history, 0.77

00:23:15.860 to tighten the weave. And instead, what has happened is that settler colonialism has created a really precarious

00:23:23.060 situation. And so we've heard and talked about at different times that just a straight cutting

00:23:30.260 of those major lines would cause tremendous harm. And so instead, the way we are seeing our work

00:23:40.180 for the time being, as the powers that be work on dismantling those big lines, is that

00:23:48.580 each of us working in the settler health system, whether it be academic life or in the health

00:23:55.940 system or in clinical work, we likely have one or more of these colonial knots within our sphere of

00:24:03.780 influence. And so our task is to be able to identify the knots, the colonial knots within our sphere of

00:24:10.100 influence, and begin to untie them with guidance from First Nations, Métis and Inuit people.

00:24:16.340 And this is hard and patient work. And I go back to that guiding principle of everyday work that requires

00:24:25.860 everyday attention to be able to consciously and constructively untie those colonial knots. And so that

00:24:36.820 is the metaphor that we wanted to share. And you'll hear us over and over refer to colonial knots as

00:24:42.900 become a really important shorthand for our work. Back over to you, Danielle. 0.92

00:24:47.860 Thank you, Kate. So the next slide is a truth telling slide. And it is to describe

00:24:58.660 with a little bit more detail what it is that we mean when we use the language of white supremacy,

00:25:05.540 because we recognize that it's language that can create discomfort or does create discomfort for

00:25:12.580 many, if not all people. And so we're sharing this painting that was created by Cree artist Kent

00:25:19.460 Monkman. And this painting is called The Daddies. And it's a recreation of a Robert Harris painting

00:25:27.140 called The Fathers of Confederation. So the original Robert Harris painting was commissioned by Ottawa

00:25:34.020 to celebrate and honor the Charlottetown Conference, which was one of three conferences that ultimately

00:25:40.580 led to the Confederacy of Canada. And the story that I understand is that when Kent Monkman saw the

00:25:47.140 original painting, he was struck by an empty footstool in the foreground. And he saw it as an opportunity

00:25:55.060 to shine a light on the fact that Indigenous peoples were excluded from that really pivotal moment in

00:26:01.060 Canadian history. And he's done that very artfully, obviously, by occupying that space with this

00:26:08.980 androgynous alter ego mischief eagle testicle who's sitting on the Hudson's Bay blanket in her Louboutins. 0.99

00:26:17.140 And so it's really important to think about the truth of that moment and the fact that we were 0.92

00:26:23.060 excluded because of epistemological differences and because of the widely held belief at the time

00:26:30.260 that Western European ways of knowing and being were superior to that of Indigenous peoples. There was a 0.98

00:26:38.260 prevailing ideology of white supremacy and really the truth that's displayed in this picture

00:26:47.060 is that that prevailing ideology is really what forms the bedrock now of the structures and systems

00:26:54.180 that govern our day-to-day lives. And it's, of course, affirming to think that there's nobody

00:27:02.340 that's tuned in today and very few people that actually hold that as a personal belief today in 2023

00:27:11.060 that non-Indigenous peoples are superior to Indigenous peoples. But when we look at our socially constructed lives and experiences,

00:27:23.060 this belief has become and is so deeply embedded that it continues to manifest as these gross disparities

00:27:31.060 in everything that we count, every indicator we look at, including the indicator of leadership.

00:27:38.180 So Kate very diligently went through and sent herself this series of text messages

00:27:46.260 using these emojis to represent the whiteness of leadership in Canada, in BC, and in our Ministry of Health.

00:27:56.980 And so if we're thinking about this from a truth perspective, you know, these text messages can represent

00:28:04.980 really one of two truths. One being that non-Indigenous peoples are superior to Indigenous peoples and 1.00

00:28:13.300 people of colour and are more capable of holding these positions. But of course, we've just agreed that

00:28:20.180 that's not something that we hold as personal beliefs in this present day. And so the second truth

00:28:27.060 that can help us understand this is that these deeply embedded ideologies of white supremacy and racism

00:28:34.340 that were the foundation of this country called Canada continue to confer unearned advantage

00:28:42.180 on a narrow segment of the population and confer unearned disadvantage on Indigenous, Black,

00:28:49.700 and people of colour. And so being subjected to Canadian colonial practices and policies is bad for

00:28:57.540 Indigenous peoples' health and education. What I've presented here on the screen today are two graphs taken

00:29:04.420 from the population health and wellness agenda. One is on life expectancy of status First Nations and

00:29:11.140 other residents in BC and the other is on percentage of students who complete high school within eight

00:29:16.980 years, disaggregated between Indigenous and non-Indigenous students. And so pretty much on any downstream

00:29:25.060 outcome or social determinant health of outcome you choose, Indigenous peoples bear worse. And it's really 1.00

00:29:33.380 important when we look at this graph, I think, to think about a couple of things. One is that while we all

00:29:40.020 agree that this is not okay, that we're striving for at the very least equity, Ibram X. Kendi reminds us

00:29:51.060 that while we may think that this is unjust, we also at the same time see it as normal. We've normalized this.

00:29:58.900 And so that when I read that, or perhaps I heard him say it on a podcast, it really struck me because

00:30:07.140 when we prepare reports like these, this one we did in collaboration with the First Nations Health

00:30:11.460 Authority, and I saw Lindsay Beck on the line. So Lindsay, a shout out because she was instrumental in

00:30:16.420 this project as well. We generate hundreds of charts that we look at, and every so often the data gets put in

00:30:23.860 incorrectly. And so we get a chart where these lines are inverted. And immediately in our guts,

00:30:30.500 everybody around the table says, oh wait, no, this can't be right. There must be an error,

00:30:35.540 because this graph seems to represent that Indigenous peoples are actually doing better

00:30:41.300 than non-Indigenous peoples. And we know somewhere in our guts that that's not, that's not right. 1.00

00:30:48.020 So I just wanted to pause and share that because that was a really profound teaching for me.

00:30:53.300 And then the other thing that I think is really important that we stop and consider when we look

00:30:57.700 at these graphs is to think about the way that we typically and conventionally report findings.

00:31:05.460 And on when we report findings, and especially in relation to Indigenous peoples, we often or almost

00:31:12.820 always are implicitly attributing risk to indigeneity. So we say things based on these types of data that

00:31:21.860 Indigenous students are less likely to complete high school than non-Indigenous students, or First Nations

00:31:28.500 people have a shorter life expectancy than other residents. But if we think about it from the principles

00:31:35.460 of epidemiology, the study of disease patterns and trying to identify risks of different exposures,

00:31:43.940 if we think of a different topic, we say things like the risk of dying from lung cancer is up to 25 times

00:31:50.980 greater among smokers than people who never smoked. And it's really clear in that statement that the

00:31:57.780 exposure that's deemed a risk is smoking. But when we state outcomes of Indigenous peoples,

00:32:06.100 in that same way, we start to conflate Indigenous identity, Indigeneity with risk. 0.51

00:32:13.380 And it's the opposite. Our Indigenous identities, who we are and where we come from, that gives us 0.98

00:32:22.660 strength and resilience. Those are protective factors. The exposure that confers risk on us is the

00:32:29.620 socially constructed reality and experience of being subjected to Canadian colonial practices and

00:32:36.420 policies. And so this really brings us to the work that we've been doing in the OPHO over the last year

00:32:44.820 and a half to begin to arrest white supremacy and racism, and our efforts to center and act upon

00:32:53.860 the foundational commitments that we hold to Indigenous rights holders. So I will pass it back to you, Kate.

00:33:00.740 Thank you, Danielle. And so when we think about where do we go forward from these truths in our work, and I

00:33:13.700 shared in the beginning that I understand that I have obligations and responsibilities in relation to

00:33:22.980 Indigenous inherent rights. And I also talked about colonial knots and that we have a responsibility as

00:33:32.260 people working in the settler health system to untie the knots within our sphere of influence. 0.51

00:33:38.260 And we often find that the immediate thing to do is to go out and ask how we would do that.

00:33:47.780 But we recognize that we have been given very clear instructions about what to do.

00:33:56.580 So we understand also that sometimes this work is framed as benevolence or a moral obligation.

00:34:06.260 But actually, it's a legal obligation and an obligation under international and provincial law.

00:34:16.980 So we have these obligations. We're all treaty people. Our Constitution talks about these responsibilities.

00:34:25.140 Now in our province, we have UN Declaration law, and we have stated commitments by our governments as well.

00:34:33.620 We've also got a very clear framework of this work. The TRC process let us know that the UN Declaration

00:34:44.580 is the framework for reconciliation. And in addition, we've also received nearly 1000

00:34:53.540 very specific instructions of how to do this work. And so, as I move through these why, what and how.

00:35:03.140 I'm conscious of the fact that all the work that has been done to provide these obligations,

00:35:13.540 framework and instructions has been done by First Nations, Inuit and Métis people, and has been resisted at

00:35:21.700 every step by Canadian governments. So one example is that Canada chose to resist the signing of the UN

00:35:35.140 UN Declaration on the rights of the UN Declaration on the rights of Indigenous peoples.

00:35:39.300 There was, yeah, there's a whole history of that, that has taken place of that resistance to Indigenous work.

00:35:48.900 So then, I see now that our work as the settler health system is in this orange bucket, and this is where

00:35:57.620 we are trying to do our work in the Office of the Provincial Health Officer.

00:36:01.620 So in that, it's to do the implementation of these obligations, framework and instructions. So asking,

00:36:09.620 in my sphere of influence, how are we upholding or undermining these commitments? How will we

00:36:15.940 hardwire in accountability and action? And are we holding space for this work? And if not, how will we hold

00:36:24.340 this space moving forward? Thank you, Kate. This slide, I'm particularly excited about because this

00:36:39.540 insight that came about through doing this work together has been so profoundly helpful and relieving

00:36:47.700 for me as somebody who's been working in health and working with a vision of being a part of advancing

00:36:59.700 the health and wellness of Indigenous peoples for 20 years. Being able to understand what work and whose

00:37:07.940 work has been revelatory for me. And so basically, just to share kind of a personal,

00:37:17.380 the personal take on it, for quite some time, I've had these harm alarms ringing when we talk about

00:37:25.380 Indigenous health and Indigenous health programs and were, you know, kind of put off to the side as

00:37:33.140 kind of this other thing that's doing. And I hadn't quite figured out why it was that I was resistant to

00:37:38.740 that language, why it didn't sit particularly well. It's in my job title, and it gives me a little bit of

00:37:44.740 that harm alarm. And so through our many conversations and doing this work, we came to this realization that

00:37:53.220 in this shared effort and on this journey towards truth and reconciliation, there are in fact a couple

00:38:01.300 of different buckets of work, and they are interconnected. And so, and we've represented them

00:38:09.940 here with a cedar basket and a copper pot. So I'm going to talk to you a little bit about the cedar basket

00:38:15.780 pieces of work, and then pass it over to Kate to speak to the copper pot. But essentially,

00:38:21.860 it was this realization that as First Nations, Métis and Inuit people, and as settlers, we both have

00:38:30.020 important, heavy lifting work to do, but it's a different type of work. And we can't, one cannot do

00:38:38.580 the other. So the basket that you see on the slide was made by Gail Blaney, who's from the Tla'Aman 0.97

00:38:48.820 nation. And she has given us permission to share the image of her basket in this way. And we're using it to

00:38:56.580 represent the work of First Nations, Métis and Inuit people in relation to reconciliation. And

00:39:02.820 essentially, it is about cultural continuity and maintaining our indigeneity. And so it's about

00:39:12.340 revitalizing and reclaiming our languages, our stewardship responsibilities to our lands, our cultural

00:39:21.860 ceremonies and practices, all of the things that were violently have been violently taken away from

00:39:28.500 us, and attempted to be. Oh, I've got a friend who uses the term genocided, which I which I kind of

00:39:37.780 like. And so that is, is our work in relation to reconciliation. And it's important work, it's hard work.

00:39:45.700 And so it's not to be conflated with the work of settlers and settler systems organizations, which we

00:39:54.020 represent here with the Copper Pot, and I'll pass it over to Kate to talk a little bit more about that.

00:39:58.980 Kate- As I'm just going to add to that, Danielle, because I'm learning how to understand that basket work.

00:40:13.220 And so I understand that one of the things that happens to Indigenous people working in mainstream

00:40:20.580 health systems, often with a title of a Department of Indigenous Health or Indigenous in the title,

00:40:29.220 is that in addition to that sacred work of basket that we're representing here with the basket that has

00:40:37.940 been here on these territories since time immemorial. Indigenous people are often also asked to do the work of

00:40:48.660 cultural safety and anti-racism work within that portfolio. And what happens then is that their energy

00:41:00.260 and resources are taken away from the basket work. And in that way, settlers and settler systems are again

00:41:13.780 centered. And also, as settlers, we are shirking our responsibility to dismantle the systems of harm that

00:41:23.460 we have imposed and created here. And so as we started to talk through this, I started to see my work and my

00:41:32.500 responsibility in relation to cultural safety, cultural humility, anti-white supremacy and anti-Indigenous

00:41:41.060 specific racism as represented in its own bucket. And I took a picture of this copper pot that my dad

00:41:50.820 brought to Canada recently from Holland, it was made in my grandpa's machine shop. And it represents,

00:42:02.820 for me, sort of a set of worldviews that's very new here in Canada. They're not the worldviews and

00:42:11.300 perspectives that have been here for thousands of years. And I also pause because I heard from a good

00:42:18.900 friend of mine about the copper pots in the work of water keepers in Anishinaabe territory. So I want to

00:42:31.540 recognize that there is copper pot basket work too. But I do want to say we are representing this idea of

00:42:41.220 settler work in guidance, with guidance from First Nations, Métis and Inuit people as copper pot work. 0.70

00:42:49.460 And that is rightfully ours as settler people.

00:42:55.460 May I just add one other thought? Thank you. Yeah, because I think that that's so helpful and that

00:43:01.060 does help clarify for me or bring some clarity that the harm alarm around the Indigenous health is that

00:43:08.340 it does, it leaves settlers out of that problem solving and implementing work because we are just

00:43:16.740 centering Indigenous peoples. And I think I also want to honour that I saw my friend, my very close

00:43:23.780 friend, Leah Walker, in the circle today. And she has reminded us as well that while these are distinct

00:43:32.420 buckets of work, we do absolutely have to do them together that we are, you know, we're working in

00:43:38.100 this together. So we don't want to kind of give the impression that we're saying that these are things

00:43:43.300 that, you know, that that we are, again, kind of separated, we are doing the work together.

00:43:49.300 Okay, I'll take a moment to get back to move to the next slide.

00:43:56.500 So in terms of how we're thinking through our copper pot work at the OPHO, we've called on

00:44:04.020 the inimitable Dr. Kamara Jones, she's the former president of the American Public Health Association.

00:44:12.900 And while she was in that role, she launched a campaign against racism. And she offered us

00:44:20.820 three tasks that every health organization should move through. And those tasks are first to name racism

00:44:28.820 and white supremacy, ask how they're operating in our sphere of influence, and then organizing and

00:44:35.140 strategizing to act. And this is a framework that we're using to move through over and over again,

00:44:42.420 as we undertake this work in the OPHO. And I'm also very glad Jodi Wilson-Raybould

00:44:51.380 has just shared her true reconciliation book, the latest book, and she uses the three tasks of learn,

00:45:01.700 understand and act, which really maps onto these three tasks as well. And so what we're thinking

00:45:09.940 is that we're receiving this guidance very clear from public health experts, and also from BC First

00:45:17.780 Nations people, that those are three tasks that are really valuable to this work.

00:45:26.740 So where are we trying to go in the short term, we are doing a two year project, we're at a year and a

00:45:33.780 half in. Obviously, this is the work of us as a generation of health leaders. But our goals at the

00:45:42.900 outset of the unlearning and doing project in the OPHO were to be able to see the net and our

00:45:49.700 relationship to the net, to know which knots existed in our sphere exists within our sphere of influence,

00:45:56.900 both as individuals and as a collective at work, and to understand the path forward that's been

00:46:03.060 identified by Indigenous peoples, those foundational commitments, and to know which foundational

00:46:09.540 commitments and those specific instructions that fall within our responsibility as a unit, as a team,

00:46:16.740 and as an individual. And then to create these ongoing processes to identify knots, to activate a

00:46:24.500 culturally safe response to untie a knot when one is identified, and to assess new actions to make sure

00:46:30.820 they're not creating new knots. And Danielle, I don't know, I hope that it's okay that I share this, but like

00:46:36.260 when I first came into the office, I did witness the process that was in place was that

00:46:46.420 Danielle was the only Indigenous person working in our office at that time. And so she was responsible 1.00

00:46:53.860 for putting that lens, those glasses, to any documents or materials that were coming through her desk.

00:47:03.140 And that when a colonial knot, like Danielle, I understand that your harm alarms would go off, 1.00

00:47:11.860 because that responsibility was on you to sort of identify colonial knots and move forward.

00:47:19.300 And so now where we're at is that people in the office, we all understand that we all have responsibility

00:47:27.300 to identify colonial knots, and that we do as much work as we can, we do as much homework as we can,

00:47:36.020 before it arrives on Danielle's desk, or any of our other Indigenous colleagues' desks,

00:47:41.460 to reduce those instances of harm alarms. So I think I'm passing back to you, or do I still?

00:47:51.620 I think it's going to go to you, actually, for the next one. But I just wanted to say, because that's been

00:47:59.060 so huge. It's been incredible to feel that level of support and that we are actually all as a team

00:48:09.540 turning our attention to this work. And I work as a functional medicine doctor. A little part of my work

00:48:18.500 is around that. And it's amazing to me when you start working with somebody to deal with the root

00:48:24.660 causes of their illness or whatever they're dealing with, that when you start dealing with the root

00:48:30.340 causes, so many people, you know, get better. And they had like an initial complaint or thing that

00:48:36.900 was really bothering them, but they start to get better, better. And then they say, wow, I had no idea

00:48:42.340 that I was actually feeling that bad. Like I, you know, you just kind of, they had gotten used to that

00:48:48.660 baseline. And so for me over, especially over the last six months where this is really kind of

00:48:54.660 permeated the whole team. It's been, it's been so uplifting. And I didn't realize, actually, that

00:49:03.940 how heavy that load was until, you know, I get to sit in meetings now, or I get to review documents

00:49:11.140 where my teammates have been the ones to see the colonial knot. And they've been the ones to say the

00:49:16.580 hard thing. And they've been the one to, you know, look through the foundational commitments and pull

00:49:21.300 out the different specific direction that relates whether it's a call to action or from the DRIPA

00:49:27.460 action plan here in BC. And it has just like really filled my heart, and just contributed to my own

00:49:36.420 sense of balance and resilience in the work. So I'm glad that you brought that up, Kate, because it's been, I've

00:49:43.060 had lots of heart warms, rather than harm alarms, heart warms. Okay, so I'll move it forward for you, Kate here.

00:49:52.180 So one of the first tasks that we did was we wanted to see where we were at as an office in relation to

00:50:02.100 the foundational commitments to Indigenous peoples that I shared earlier. And so we did a benchmarking

00:50:07.940 activity in June 2022. And these pies talk are about sort of engagement with foundational commitments.

00:50:16.580 So people could be not aware, heard of it, read it, engaged with it, or taken action in OPHO work.

00:50:24.740 And the place that we're trying to go is if these, each of these pies was the darkest color.

00:50:31.300 And that's sort of where we're aiming to go. And so you can see here that in this initial check in with

00:50:44.020 us as a collective, we were had variable knowledge and variable awareness of the existing instructions

00:50:52.980 that we've received here in BC. And we also, at the same time, ask people to reflect on what supports

00:51:01.780 them to engage with foundational commitments, what hinders them from engaging with foundational

00:51:08.980 commitments, and what do they need that they don't have already. And so I'll pass it over to you,

00:51:15.620 Danielle, to talk about what people told us. Yes. So we came up with this handful of pragmatic findings

00:51:25.140 to arrest white supremacy and Indigenous specific racism in our office. And in the palm, two key

00:51:33.620 takeaways for us is that starting conversations with our grounding principles brings a sacredness to the

00:51:40.660 work that helps us move forward when the work is hard or heavy, or we're not quite sure on which

00:51:47.940 direction to go next when we're feeling stuck. Going back to those grounding principles always lights

00:51:53.860 away for us. Also that starting conversations with the inherent rights of Indigenous peoples shifts the tone

00:52:03.300 and really illuminates our obligations. And so we've been quite disciplined in that. Colonial knots abound. 0.82

00:52:13.620 They're everywhere. When you start looking for them, they show up everywhere. As Kate just mentioned,

00:52:20.660 there is a variable knowledge across our across our team in relation to foundational commitments.

00:52:27.700 Enabling leadership has been such a critical piece to being able to do this work. And it just happened

00:52:35.780 to land on the middle finger. It was not intentional. But we think that's quite funny. Dr. Henry has been so

00:52:45.140 supportive. And what has really enabled people to get on board and lean into this work is that she has been so

00:52:54.660 vocal in the office outside of the office and giving really clear direction to the team that this work

00:53:03.940 is priority. This work is really important. And so I need you as the leader of this team to pick up this work.

00:53:12.340 And because we are grounded in love and care, that doesn't mean that I'm asking you to pick up this work

00:53:18.740 and add it to the mountain of work that you are already doing. It means that I'm asking you to pick

00:53:24.260 up this work. And I understand that means you've got to put another piece of work down for now. And that

00:53:29.780 means that our deadlines and our timelines are going to get delayed. And so she has really had our backs in

00:53:38.740 that and really, really helped change the culture of the office and also just positioning this work as

00:53:47.060 so important. Operational support has been a key factor. So having Kate with us full time is something

00:53:56.500 that the staff and team members have really, really appreciated. We recognize that there's like the

00:54:02.980 importance of this sort of basket and copper pot and having this duo of leadership of Kate and myself

00:54:10.340 has been really, really important. And many of our settler team members have commented how it's been

00:54:17.380 helpful to them to have Kate, who's a settler, a white occupier, who's, you know, perhaps farther

00:54:23.540 along in her journey towards reconciliation that they can connect with and ask questions that they may not

00:54:29.140 feel comfortable bringing to me. And then the last finding is that there is this high, high level of

00:54:36.420 commitment across our team to making things right and contributing to truth and reconciliation and

00:54:44.100 upholding those foundational commitments. And people are asking for clear guidance. What does that mean

00:54:50.500 for me at my desk in my role in the activities that I carry out on a daily basis? And so

00:54:57.780 yesterday we just had this epiphany as we move forward in this work and we're getting to this

00:55:05.540 place of undertaking a policy and process review that we're going to start. We started many clubs over

00:55:12.180 the last year and a half, Unlearning Club and Not Cruise. And our latest club that we're just starting

00:55:18.340 is the Inky Pinky Club. So it's going to be the Inky Pinky Clear Guidance Club. So reps from different

00:55:26.020 parts of our office will come together to figure out how to write down and how to look at our written

00:55:31.380 documents and write them in anti-racist ways that uphold Indigenous self-determination and

00:55:38.260 inherent rights. So those are some of the findings. One of the pieces that was also has been very helpful

00:55:44.180 to us is to clarify our vision and what it is that we believe and that we're working towards. So

00:55:51.940 we recognize the inherent rights and title of BC First Nations and the inherent rights of all First

00:55:58.820 Nations, Métis and Inuit people now living in BC. We acknowledge that these rights can only be fully

00:56:06.660 exercised when the ecosystems in which they are embedded are vibrant, biodiverse and loved and cared for.

00:56:15.700 And so we share a collective responsibility to the health and wellness of these territories.

00:56:21.460 And we actively work to uphold the inherent rights of Indigenous peoples by taking actions on specific

00:56:27.540 foundational commitments made to Indigenous peoples, for example UNDRIP, TRC, Missing and Murdered Indigenous

00:56:34.820 Women and Girls and In Plain Sight, being trustworthy in relationships with Indigenous partners,

00:56:41.300 and taking anti-racist actions in all aspects of our work. So we will give you a snapshot

00:56:50.340 of the tools that we're using. So there's many, many different activities and tools that we're,

00:56:56.500 that we've undertaken in these different domains. And we've got a whole other slide deck that goes into

00:57:05.460 more detail at the tail end of this. But rather than keep talking at you, we just want to give you

00:57:14.500 this to kind of have a snapshot of some of the things that we're doing for folks that might want to ask

00:57:20.580 about that in the Q&A if there's a specific thing that you're interested in. We're really, really

00:57:27.380 particularly proud I think of number nine Indigenous recruitment and retention because as Kate mentioned

00:57:34.820 for many, many years, I was the only Indigenous team member at the office of the PHO and before me

00:57:42.020 that was Dr. Adams. So for several decades, this office has been exceptionally effective at keeping

00:57:49.780 Indigenous peoples out just by, you know, conducting or doing things in that status quo sort of way. So 1.00

00:57:57.540 we've been quite assertive and aggressive in terms of disrupting or dismantling the status quo there.

00:58:05.940 So you've seen this and I just want to quickly come back to our guiding principles and draw out

00:58:11.940 love and care and doing our homework as we think of a couple of calls to action as we close

00:58:18.740 today. So what is one act of love and care that you can take for yourself later today?

00:58:27.940 Whatever that might be for you, we invite you to just take a moment and think about that,

00:58:33.780 recognizing that this has been, again, hard, hard work that we're all doing together

00:58:39.940 and that that will help prepare you and give you the strength and resilience that you might need

00:58:45.540 for the next call to action, which is we're inviting everybody in the next week to identify

00:58:51.540 one thing that you can commit to doing as in terms of doing your homework to unlearn and undo

00:58:58.260 white supremacy in your sphere of influence. And so that might be going to one of those

00:59:05.140 foundational commitment documents and really having a look through to pull out the ones that are

00:59:10.100 relevant to your particular area of work. So, Kate, I'll just pause for a moment to see if there's

00:59:17.620 anything else that you wanted to say before we close and pass it back to Sarane to moderate a conversation.

00:59:29.460 Thank you, Danielle. I have no further comments, Your Honour.

00:59:35.460 Perfect. So, with Sarane's permission, I will stop sharing and then I will reshare again if people

00:59:46.820 have like more specific questions about the tools and we can use that as a backup.

00:59:54.980 Thank you so much, Danielle. I don't know if I actually can share again.

00:59:59.060 It might be beyond my technological ability, but... That sounds good. We have quite a few questions

01:00:05.380 here. I'll start with the first one. First one is, how is racism, colonialism, imperialism, and capitalism

01:00:16.580 are interrelated? How can we dismantle these systems of oppression effectively?

01:00:26.340 Do you want me to go first, Kate? Yes.

01:00:29.140 One colonial knot at a time is sort of the way that we've been working towards it and approaching it. And I

01:00:39.060 think that's an excellent comment. I agree that all of those systems of oppression are linked and, you know,

01:00:48.660 provide fuel to the fire of the one that's sitting next to it. I think what we've found in the work is

01:00:56.260 that by working together to see colonial knots and then beginning to untie them is that it really does,

01:01:04.420 you begin to see how that colonial knot is connected to the one next to it. And it really becomes an exercise

01:01:11.940 in truth-telling and examining why are the systems and structures the way that they are.

01:01:20.180 And so you kind of start to see how all of those things are connected. And I would say that I mentioned

01:01:26.740 how heartwarming it's been to have this like transformation in terms of the way that my teammates

01:01:33.780 are working in relation to this, these pieces of work, it's been so, so profoundly different. And I would

01:01:44.420 also say that it's been, I think, one of the reasons that people have engaged in this way is because by

01:01:54.100 doing it one colonial knot at a time, you feel empowered. You all of a sudden feel like you do have

01:02:01.460 agency and you are implicated and you can start to see how you are, you know, enabling these different

01:02:09.140 systems of oppression, even when you think that you're not, or you can't imagine that you are.

01:02:14.740 I did see one question or comment in the chat about, you know, being somebody who's come from away,

01:02:21.300 being a newcomer or an immigrant and feeling like you're not sure how to relate to this because you're

01:02:26.820 not a part of colonialism. And yet, we all are, regardless of who we are, where we come from,

01:02:35.220 by virtue of participating in day to day Canadian society, life and norms and construction, we,

01:02:45.140 we all participate in this. And it just happens to be, as I mentioned earlier, very gaslighting,

01:02:51.380 we don't see it. So I think that has been one of the really powerful,

01:02:56.820 tools and ways that that net metaphor has helped us is by making it feasible to untie one colonial

01:03:05.060 knot at a time. And then you start to see the web and the net more clearly. The other comment that

01:03:11.140 we've heard is that the net metaphor can be very helpful because one, again, it helps you to feel

01:03:17.380 empowered and see how you can contribute, but it also brings people together. So we're not saying,

01:03:23.540 oh, you're a bad person, because you, you know, are somebody who upholds this policy, we're saying,

01:03:31.300 oh, there's like this policy is riddled with colonial knots, like, let's come together and work on untying

01:03:37.220 them together. So it does seem to at least in our team, have navigated some of that defensiveness,

01:03:44.980 which is really natural, right, when you're, when you're talking about this, this topic. Kate,

01:03:50.660 do you have other thoughts to add?

01:03:54.900 Yeah, I think you've really captured it when you talked about how we are all

01:04:02.340 affected by, or sort of in this system of colonialism. And one part of our discussion

01:04:08.500 that came up a lot as we were beginning to work. So Danielle lives on Lekwungen territory,

01:04:13.140 and I live on Musqueam territory. I have a little piece of paper that says that I own

01:04:18.980 the townhouse that I live in. I pay taxes every year, and none of that money is going to Musqueam.

01:04:28.260 And so even in that simple way of like, accepting the fact that that paper means that I own my house,

01:04:39.540 and the fact that I don't pay any of my taxes to the First Nation government connected to this territory,

01:04:49.620 means that I am part of this system. And that's just like one way out of the like, those hundreds of

01:04:58.820 thousands of colonial knots, the ways that I'm involved. And so that was just sort of like a

01:05:06.180 concrete example of I think what you're talking about, Danielle. And so you've talked about how you

01:05:11.540 don't pay Lekwungen taxes. So even as a First Nations and Métis woman, there are ways in which 0.60

01:05:22.420 you're conferred some advantage and unearned disadvantage, like we're, we're in it, like

01:05:29.140 it's here, it's everywhere, it's in every nook and cranny, regardless of where we come from.

01:05:34.740 I'm a first generation immigrant, and I am absolutely part of it.

01:05:39.940 Yeah, I think, I think I'll just, I know there's other questions too, but I think it is about that,

01:05:45.940 that I am participating in the occupation of Lekwungen territories, even though I'm an Indigenous

01:05:51.860 person, I'm still participating in this occupation. And so finding ways to see that, I think, and then

01:05:58.260 participate in cash back and finding other avenues. And the City of Victoria has established a

01:06:05.060 reconciliation fund that property owners in the City of Victoria can contribute to while they're

01:06:12.180 paying their property taxes. So I think there's, those are all the ways, but I think the question

01:06:17.220 is right, like it's everywhere, and it's interconnected with all of those different systems. And so

01:06:22.420 it's about going back to Joe Gallagher's teaching of, you know, these are everyday problems that require

01:06:28.980 our everyday attention, and seeing them and being mindful about how we participate, and then how we

01:06:36.820 can resist that, or shift that participation.

01:06:42.980 Thank you for answering that. And I, like I totally agree, like we are, as Indigenous people and non-Indigenous

01:06:48.980 people and people of colour and BIPOC uphold the system of colonial colonialism, and that's, to 1.00

01:06:58.900 dismantle it is having to dismantle other parts of the system. So thank you for answering that. And then

01:07:05.460 our next question is, can you, can people call your office to help navigate a person's experience with

01:07:14.580 healthcare system, like help navigate a pushy MHO who wants information?

01:07:22.820 Yes, if it's related to a medical health officer, so the way that things are structured in BC,

01:07:30.260 obviously there's like a whole complaints process if you're going for clinical care at a, you know,

01:07:36.740 so for clinical care for public health care, the local medical health officers work in health

01:07:43.700 authorities typically, and so they report both to their chief medical health officer in the health

01:07:49.780 authority, but then also have reporting responsibilities to Dr. Henry in the office of the PHO.

01:07:55.540 So those would be kind of the two avenues if you're experiencing difficulties would be to go

01:08:02.100 to sort of the chief medical health officer in the health authority, and you could also reach out to

01:08:08.260 us as well. And I'm sorry to hear that. That's, that sucks. But colonial, colonial knots abound.

01:08:16.020 We've got lots of work to do. And if, maybe just to let people know that, as part of that inky, pinky,

01:08:22.980 clear guidance club that's getting started, one of the pieces of work that Amber Louie, who is a Tanaha nurse,

01:08:32.180 that's working with us as an MPH student, has been working on is looking at the medical health officer

01:08:38.340 practice standard or standard of practice as one place that we can really start to bring our,

01:08:44.340 put on our glasses and really look for the ways in which it's not yet fully upholding Indigenous

01:08:51.300 rights and self-determination and foundational commitments. So that is a piece of work that we're,

01:08:56.820 that we are actively working on.

01:08:59.060 Great. Thank you so much. So we have another question from a healthcare provider.

01:09:09.060 So the, they're seeking to work with patients to identify consistently impacts of systemic and

01:09:16.420 environmental factors impacting their health. Maybe we should incorporate as part of the social history,

01:09:23.140 the identifying factors of acting against and as a productive health. How has there been discussion?

01:09:30.180 Oh, sorry. Has there been any discussion around this topic?

01:09:34.820 Sorry, that was like a long question.

01:09:36.100 It was long. And so I'm like scrolling back. Is it at the top? I might do better reading it.

01:09:43.380 Okay. I think Cynthia can paste it for you. 0.82

01:09:47.060 Oh, okay. Sorry guys. Sometimes I will say to you that my husband was also messaging me

01:09:58.660 to see if I was free to talk. And I was like, no, I'm decidedly not free at this moment.

01:10:04.180 Okay. To identify consistently.

01:10:12.740 Yes. Yeah. Okay. So I, I, I understand the question a little bit better now, I think. So

01:10:18.580 I think actually what I would say in response to this is that the population health and wellness

01:10:25.300 agenda that we worked with first nations health authority on developing and the baseline report

01:10:31.540 came out in 2021 is probably a really, um, good resource to go and have a look at in that, um,

01:10:38.260 that was, um, or that agenda was really meant to be a departure from sort of typical population

01:10:46.260 and public health reporting and a first attempt to, uh, embody or bring to life that Lisa Boyvin

01:10:54.100 picture of, of multiple worldviews, um, kind of sharing their gifts on a given topic.

01:11:00.100 And so as it relates to your question about, um, risk factors and protective factors, um, that agenda

01:11:08.580 has a visualization of a, of an ecosystem and talks about roots of wellness and what are those

01:11:15.300 deepest roots of wellness? Um, and essentially we were asking ourselves, what do we as first nations

01:11:20.820 people need more of to restore our natural balance and health and wellness? And what do we need less

01:11:26.420 of what are the things that are getting in the way? And so this ecosystem emerged where these deepest

01:11:32.100 roots of wellness are the things that make us uniquely who we are as Denet, Naha, Tlingit, Simshan,

01:11:38.980 um, Nahiyo, Anishinaabe. It's, you know, our culture, our language, our lands, um, in the shallower soil,

01:11:46.180 there's these shallower roots of wellness, which are all of those mainstream settler systems that we need 1.00

01:11:51.860 to interact with in a good way. Um, they need to be free of racism and discrimination for us to get

01:11:57.700 our basic needs met, housing, education, healthcare, justice, uh, family unity. Um, and when those roots

01:12:05.140 of wellness are well nourished, then we thrive in mind, body, and spirit. And that's represented on top

01:12:10.580 of the soil with an intergenerational family that's out on the land harvesting foods and medicines.

01:12:15.860 So I think, um, that I absolutely think that there's, uh, a need, um, and it's not my thought,

01:12:22.900 uh, we've been told by, um, in that context by BC First Nations that our, um, what contributes to our

01:12:29.780 wellness as First Nations people is much broader in our understanding than it is in the typical

01:12:36.900 mainstream biomedical sense. So we do need to think about, um, our connection to our land, uh,

01:12:43.220 our, uh, you know, our languages, uh, are we, um, in balance with all of our relations? So,

01:12:49.780 um, I'm not sure if I'm directly answering the question, but I would, um, I guess I'm just giving

01:12:54.260 a shout out to that publication as, um, as something that, um, also has some helpful teachings,

01:13:00.100 I think, as we try and think more holistically about how do we advance, um, First Nations, specifically

01:13:06.740 health and wellness, because that was a First Nations report. Do you have thoughts, Kate?

01:13:13.220 Thank you for that. Um, so our next question is, could the framework for the work be shared as,

01:13:22.900 so we can apply or explore how to define our own organizational framework?

01:13:30.180 Yes. Yes, absolutely. So we can, we can certainly, um, share the slides from today, um, including that,

01:13:37.700 like, uh, bonus part two that we didn't actually speak to the slides, but has a little bit more

01:13:43.220 information there. So we'd be very happy to share that. Um, we're also in the process of developing

01:13:50.020 our own tab on the Office of the PHO website where we can house a number of these different, uh, resources.

01:13:57.940 And, um, we, we hope that we will be able to continue to work with that particular journal to, um, publish

01:14:04.980 the article that was in relation to that net metaphor of settler colonialism. Um, so yeah,

01:14:10.500 we absolutely want to make anything that we have shared or anything that we've been working on

01:14:15.700 available to people. We just haven't quite landed on the, the easiest way, but certainly sharing the

01:14:20.420 slide deck is, is we can do that.

01:14:27.940 Um, our next question is, um, the province is planning to introduce an entity in anti-racism

01:14:34.500 legislation, um, complementing the first piece of anti-racism data act. What would you like to see

01:14:42.180 in the legislation to combat systemic racism in the healthcare sector?

01:14:48.420 Oh, that's a great, um, great question. Do you want to go ahead, Kate?

01:14:52.100 Yeah, I think this is such an important one. And, um, to go to what Danielle was talking about,

01:15:00.500 um, in terms of indigeneity as a risk factor, um, and not a risk factor, but, um,

01:15:08.100 the fact that settler colonialism is the risk factor, indigenous specific racism is the risk factor,

01:15:13.860 um, in the health disparities that we see. And so one of the things that we talk about, um,

01:15:20.420 um, is that it is important for us to collect, um, identity data, um, and that's sort of within the,

01:15:30.340 um, grandmother's teachings, um, document from the, uh, office of the human rights commissioner.

01:15:38.820 And so that's really important, but we think that there is need for, um, another layer where we can

01:15:46.820 actually begin to measure racism within, um, BC, uh, in a more systematic way across, um, different

01:16:00.580 domains. And I'm getting detailed in my brain, so that's why I'm slowing down. Um, but Dr. Kamara Jones,

01:16:07.220 um, she talks about, um, the mechanisms of, uh, racism being structures, policies, practices, norms,

01:16:14.820 and values. And so, um, I think about, uh, some of the work that has happened with the CEDAR project.

01:16:22.900 Um, Vicky, I know you're here, um, in terms of measuring racism that, uh, young indigenous people

01:16:29.620 who've used drugs, um, has shown sort of like the dynamics of racism in the

01:16:37.140 and how it shows up in people's lives and affects their health. So in my head, it's not enough just

01:16:42.660 to say, is this person, um, an indigenous person, um, uh, a black person or from a different sort of

01:16:52.180 race or ethnicity, but rather we also need to get better at actually, uh, documenting and measuring

01:16:59.540 racism so that we can see those patterns of colonial knots and, um, how they impact health

01:17:07.380 and get more targeted in our untying of those knots, um, where they are in the system. We recognize that

01:17:14.740 they're everywhere right now. Um, but I think that's really important. Um, and Lori Harding, I also,

01:17:21.380 uh, recognize your work in doing this as well. I saw that you're here. So thank you.

01:17:26.740 And I can just add, I think, um, what I would like to see, um, as a result of the work. So,

01:17:36.900 so regardless of kind of what legislative tool, how it shows up is, um, really establishing that

01:17:43.060 governance piece so that, um, black indigenous people of color are a part of the governance,

01:17:50.260 certainly. And that's the piece of work that's underway right now with the anti-racism data act and

01:17:54.980 and the steering committee for that is, you know, how do we establish the governance of those pieces,

01:18:01.300 um, which I think is like so critical. And then I think what, yeah, in terms of what's in the act,

01:18:07.380 it's exactly what Kate just said. It's sort of like the elements of, um, the tasks that Camara Jones

01:18:12.660 has set out for us is that, you know, that the act names racism, um, that it, uh, asks

01:18:19.700 everybody to really do that, um, hard internal facing work of like, how is it operating here?

01:18:28.980 Like asking, telling those truths of like, how is it operating here? And then obviously organizing

01:18:35.060 and strategizing to act, um, are so, uh, so important. And so those are the elements that I

01:18:41.780 hope the act would, um, you know, uh, create as, as the momentum, as, as the things, the activities

01:18:48.660 that people need to, uh, carry out.

01:18:56.420 Thank you for that. And, um, our next question is, are you able to share more detail on the recruitment

01:19:02.260 and retention checklist on how this work is creating space for indigenous peoples to bring their whole

01:19:07.780 authentic selves into the office of the PHO? Yes. So I will qualify it and say, I'm not sure

01:19:17.140 that we are totally at the place where, um, where our indigenous teammates can bring their whole

01:19:23.220 authentic selves to the workplace. Like every time I'm not, I'm not sure that we're there yet. I will say

01:19:30.100 that when, um, Kate came on board to start this, um, work together, we had, um, we were at the place

01:19:37.060 where we were, um, exploring indigenous exclusive to indigenous exclusive postings. And I said to Kate

01:19:44.580 that my, my goal was, um, at a minimum that the teammates that joined us would not be harmed by,

01:19:53.540 uh, working in our office. So, um, I think that's sort of where we're at. So I just want to qualify

01:19:59.540 and, and, um, acknowledge that again, we're humble. We're not saying that we're experts and we're doing

01:20:04.740 this perfectly. This is like a very incremental process. Um, the reconciliation checklist is in

01:20:10.820 the slide deck. So if, um, that gets circulated, you'll see the elements that are in there. Um,

01:20:16.100 the things that really became so apparent to us, at least within the PSA, um, hiring structure

01:20:22.740 is that, um, most of the indigenous preference statements, or at least let me speak to our office.

01:20:30.500 So, um, in our office, when in plain sight came out, um, in November, 2020, one of the ways we

01:20:36.500 responded was by saying, okay, we need to address the fact that we have very few indigenous teammates.

01:20:42.900 So we put in place a few different things. We were going to include, um, the indigenous applicant

01:20:48.820 advisory service. We were going to include the indigenous preference statement, um, and, um, and

01:20:54.500 indigenous core competencies. When Kate came on, um, uh, a year later, um, and we still hadn't hired

01:21:01.540 any indigenous peoples, um, Kate did an audit. So she just counted like how many times were we doing

01:21:07.380 the things that we said that we do? Um, and that wasn't great. We hadn't kind of hit consistency

01:21:12.660 across the board and we weren't enacting the indigenous preference statement. And so then we

01:21:18.260 wanted to find out like, why aren't we using this? Why isn't it yielding, um, indigenous, uh, like

01:21:23.620 hiring of indigenous teammates. And it turns out that it's very disincentivized in the PSA structure

01:21:30.180 of doing things because, um, and, and our hiring managers were being discouraged from enacting it

01:21:35.700 because it could result in an unsuccessful, um, posting because you might, uh, narrow down to a couple

01:21:43.060 of candidates. They may not, uh, be successful through the last few stages of the hiring competition,

01:21:48.420 or they may take work elsewhere. And so that was a big risk from a hiring manager perspective. So

01:21:53.940 again, that's where Dr. Henry, our very favorite Dr. Henry said, um, I don't care. We're going to take

01:21:59.860 those risks. We're going to enact this preference. And if that means that our hiring gets delayed,

01:22:04.820 that means that our timelines get protracted and that's okay because this is so important. So that's a

01:22:10.500 a bit of how it played out is that we, through counting and actually going back and saying,

01:22:15.140 like, how are we doing? We were able to discover that actually many of the things we had in place

01:22:20.660 were very performative. One, we weren't doing them all the time and they were performative and we needed

01:22:25.300 a few other elements like that enabling leadership to actually transform that into a meaningful action.

01:22:31.940 So we now have, um, myself and three full-time indigenous teammates and we also have, um, three

01:22:38.340 indigenous students that are working with us. So it's made a big, um, big difference.

01:22:42.500 I know we're getting down to the end of the hour. Kate, did you have other things that you want to say?

01:22:48.980 Um, I think that, that asking how is it operating here is like one of the really big tools in that

01:22:55.140 moment. So that counting allowed us to see. And, um, I just also want to recognize then, um, our colleagues in

01:23:04.580 the office, the hiring managers got their elbows out because over and over and over they were told in

01:23:12.420 not by from within our office, but sort of they were, um, impeded from, uh, doing the direction that

01:23:20.020 they were being given, um, to uphold indigenous preference statement and that kind of thing. So

01:23:26.980 I just want to recognize the amount of work, the, like the discipline, the stamina that it takes,

01:23:35.300 um, to do these tasks. And that's why we, um, go back to Joe's, um, everyday, uh, action requiring

01:23:44.420 everyday attention. So it took 13 months from the moment where there was a decision to do an indigenous

01:23:51.700 exclusive hire till the moment our colleagues started work because of the bureaucracy, um, that,

01:23:58.980 uh, tried to uphold the status quo, um, and keep that person out. So, um, those, yeah, those little

01:24:06.980 elbows, our colleagues have their elbows out. I, I see them on this call and I just want to recognize them.

01:24:16.020 Definitely. And like hiring is definitely one of the things that we can do for reconciliation

01:24:20.660 is incorporating more indigenous peoples in leadership positions, which is great to hear

01:24:25.220 that we're having more, um, on the team. And then, um, we just have, sorry, uh, sorry, our last question

01:24:36.420 here is just wondering, um, during the beginning and the recognition regarding anti-Black racism as well

01:24:43.940 and how colonialism here is stolen people on stolen land, how do we best support dismantling these

01:24:50.420 specific yet deeply entwined racisms and colonial violences? And how do we work together and

01:24:56.820 recognize the intersectional experiences, especially of Afro-Indigenous people?

01:25:05.140 We don't know yet. Um, but we are like, again, open hearts, open minds, and that's a piece, um, kind of

01:25:13.780 extension of this work that we're really, um, looking forward to learning with others, um, who hold that

01:25:21.460 expertise, which we don't hold. And so I think as Kate was mentioning earlier, um, we are embarking on

01:25:28.820 the very earliest steps of measuring racism, including, um, bringing together, um, hosting a series of three

01:25:38.260 conversations with, um, leaders from, uh, many different groups and communities, uh, to be able

01:25:45.940 to understand that together. Because I would say that our work has really been done through the lens

01:25:51.860 of settler colonialism and has really focused on upholding the inherent rights of Indigenous peoples.

01:25:57.700 And we recognize, as you've mentioned in your comment about these intersectionalities and that while we,

01:26:02.980 um, experience, um, we all encounter white supremacy and racism in these interactions with

01:26:10.660 mainstream systems, um, they do impact us in different ways. And so we do need, uh, you know,

01:26:16.740 a very diverse, um, again, governance structure, uh, to be able to have those conversations and, and

01:26:24.260 understand how we do that work together. So, yeah, the short answer for me would be, um, we don't know

01:26:29.060 yet, but we have open hearts, open minds, very humble and eager to work with others. So please

01:26:34.180 reach out if that's an area of interest for you. And, um, yeah, because we were just getting started.

01:26:43.060 Great. Thank you so much. That was our last question. Um, I just wanted to say thank you

01:26:47.620 to all our guests and to everyone for joining us today. And thank you so much, Dr. Kay Youngblood and Dr.

01:26:54.660 Danielle Bain-Smith for the amazing discussion. It was great to learn about unlearning and, um,

01:27:01.380 incorporating ways to increase Indigenous health into your guys's, um, presentation. And just before

01:27:08.820 we end the webinar, we love to bring your attention to our upcoming webinars. Um, we have the Indigenous

01:27:17.140 health leadership, um, program on February 16th. And then Art Makes Tangible, The Pain Inside Our Bodies

01:27:25.940 with, uh, Sharifa Marsden. That's on February 28th. Um, all our webinars are free to sign up for on our

01:27:32.660 website at www.learningcircle.ubc.ca. And thank you everyone for letting us, for joining us today. And

01:27:40.500 we look forward to seeing everyone at our next learning circle. Lynn lived. Thank you. Awesome.

Action4Canada - November 06, 2023

Exposing BC Gov's anti-white, DEI, Agenda

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