New book on Ireland’s Catholic-run institutions that imprisoned thousands of women and girls. In Canada, meanwhile, records are blocked by federal & provincial laws. It raises a haunting question: what happened to the babies born in our Magdalene asylums?
www.theguardian.com/books/2026/a...
Cover of the CHRC’s 2025 Annual Report to Parliament. The text on the left reads: “New Report: Explore our new Annual Report”.
Our 2025 Annual Report to Parliament is now available!
After a year that presented Canada with some of the most significant challenges in our nation’s history, it is clear that respect for human rights must be one of the core values we fight for, together. (1/2)
Eugenic ideology shaped laws, abusive institutions, and forced sterilization. Today, federal and provincial disclosure laws still hide the experiences of women and girls in Canada labeled “incorrigible,” blocking access to records.
The U. S. #Incorrigibles Ry Marcattilio-McCracken 👇
Recognition and accountability are essential to restoring dignity and addressing the lasting harm caused by these harmful historical practices. 4/4
Why is Canada lagging behind in doing the same? These practices imposed—and continue to impose—a profound and enduring double burden of shame and trauma on young mothers forced to relinquish their children. 3/4
Other countries have acknowledged and apologized for coerced and forced adoptions of babies born to unmarried mothers in maternity homes. 2/4
🧵Canada Must Confront the Legacy of Forced Adoptions of Babies Born to Unmarried Mothers in Maternity Homes
1/4
🥚
🥚"... Justice Minister Jung Sung-ho said the country’s past adoptions amounted to “forced child trafficking” and that the government will largely refrain from appealing rulings in cases brought by victims seeking compensation for government wrongdoing"
In 1939, Demerson was just 18 years old, when a love story with her Chinese boyfriend Harry Yip turned tragic. Her father, outraged that she would marry a Chinese man, had her arrested & put in jail for one year for being Incorrigible under the Ontario Female Refuges Act.
vimeo.com/254147984/ec...
The article continues: “A crime has been committed here – a crime against humanity,” declared Mr. MacDonald. “Unless the conscience of the people of Ontario is aroused sufficiently to stir the government, our reform institutions will continue to create criminals rather the correct them.”
2/2
🧵Torture at the Ontario Training School for Girls: a 12-year-old brutally abused for 92 days—then incarcerated in the Mercer Reformatory.
Two snippets from the Toronto Star. 👇1/2
Must-read on the class action at the “House of Horrors” in B.C. & the overrepresentation of Indigenous girls 👇
Note: in Ontario, “incorrigible” girls who escaped training schools were committed to the Mercer Reformatory.
www.ctvnews.ca/vancouver/ar...
Child welfare authorities had incredible powers over young girls. As guardians, they could swiftly incarcerate them at the Mercer Reformatory as “incorrigible.” Decisions, including taking children from mothers, went unchecked, and records remain unobtainable.
norma.lexum.com/ipc-cipvp/or...
Cody of Houle Fine Art’s grandmother, Cecile, survived residential schools but faced further injustice—jailed at Mercer while her children were taken in the Sixties Scoop. She died soon after release; her children never knew.
instagram.com/p/DFQqTzuS9qe/
facebook.com/profile.php?...
At 1155 King Street West, now home to Lamport Stadium, once stood the Mercer Reformatory, a grim institution founded in 1880 to “reform” so-called “wretched” women.
@prisonadoptee.bsky.social
www.youtube.com/watch?v=yCbA...
Lecture on those labelled “disabled,” including a discussion on Auxiliary Classes. Many women and girls had been subjected to eugenics-influenced segregated classes in childhood before their imprisonment at Mercer.
More here: ccie.educ.ubc.ca/watch-naviga...
www.youtube.com/watch?v=KAOp...
"...young people – especially working-class, racialized, and those labelled ‘sexually precocious’ – experienced unprecedented intervention from police in the name of protection, prevention, and discipline."
Read more here: ccie.educ.ubc.ca/watch-morali...
www.youtube.com/watch?v=IScs...
The government says proposed changes to Ontario’s Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (FIPPA) will modernize the law, protect privacy, and enhance security. The facts tell a different story. Read the full statement: www.ipc.on.ca/en/media-cen...
B.C. school for girls known as 'house of horror' subject of class-action lawsuit
Lawsuit seeking damages for sexual, physical, mental abuse against girls, many Indigenous, jailed between 1914 and 1973, can proceed
vancouversun.com/news/bc-girl...
🥚Prisoner of the State: Unlawfully Arrested, Illegally Detained, a Punishment to Last a Lifetime by Lily Arthur (2025).
In Canada, adoptees born to mothers detained in institutions remain hidden behind disclosure laws that obscure the truth of their carceral births.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=oFLW...
In a new statement, Commissioner Patricia Kosseim warns that proposed changes to Ontario's Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act would seriously weaken privacy protections, transparency, reduce independent oversight and put Ontarians’ personal information at greater risk.
Statement from Commissioner Patricia Kosseim on proposed changes to Ontario's Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act
www.newswire.ca/news-release...
International tribunal to hear case of missing Indigenous children in Canada - David Suzuki Foundation
davidsuzuki.org/story/intern...
🥚
🥚There has been no federal apology or inquiry to date regarding the 60s Scoop in Canada.
Read more at the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation here
nctr.ca/uncategorize...
@moonlyfe.bsky.social
🚨 @niigaanwewidam.bsky.social and I - along with a dream team of incredible collaborators - are excited to announce a new book challenging residential school denialism!
Truth Before Reconciliation will be released in September with the University of Manitoba Press: uofmpress.ca/books/truth-...
Queen’s Law Professor Lisa Kelly presented a talk, "The Unfinished Revolution in Youth Justice," examining the history of youth laws in Canada, recent reforms, and what the youth experience can teach us about creating a more humane legal system.
Watch: bit.ly/4u71avK
This is gender-based violence. Her extreme abuse was tied to societal judgment of young women and their vulnerabilities. Repeated incarceration after such trauma shows how the system utterly failed to protect her—and countless others. 2/2
🧵One story—and face—of 20,000+ “criminals” at Mercer: records show 8 incarcerations and a brutal attempted murder—left in a field to die. She survived 5 skull fractures, a lost finger, a broken arm—and was still sent back to Mercer.
cPTSD is common in #SixtiesScoop adoptees and survivors of child welfare. More health supports are needed to treat our #adoption and relational racism trauma now 🥚
www.erudit.org/en/journals/...
What is true today was true decades ago. For adoptees seeking records, provincial & federal disclosure laws still hide whether their “juvenile delinquent” mothers were jailed at Mercer, Training Schools, or maternity homes—and even who their fathers were.
www.justiceforgirls.org/issues/crimi...