With concerts and music festivals in full swing once again, Rage Against the Machine is using the stage to highlight injustices against Indigenous people in Canada.
While performing at this year’s Bluesfest last Friday in Ottawa, the U.S. rap-rock band displayed statistics on the violence experienced by Indigenous community members across the country.
The band also highlighted statistics involving missing and murdered Indigenous women at the annual music festival in Ottawa.
“In Canada, Indigenous women and girls are 16 times more likely to be murdered or to disappear than white women are,” concert-goers were able to read at another point during the show.
Violence against Indigenous women has been a longstanding issue in Canada, with advocates calling on the federal government to do more to prevent their deaths.
A report published in 2019 as a result of a national inquiry said the thousands of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls in Canada amounts to a “genocide.”.
Other phrases were also displayed behind the band as they played, including “Settler-colonialism is murder,” and “Land Back.”. »