Honouring the victims of Montréal's École Polytechnique Massacre

December 6, 2022 9:09 AM

Fourteen beams of light will illuminate Mount Royal to commemorate the victims of the École Polytechnique massacre, an anti-feminist mass shooting that occurred 33 years ago on 6 December 1989 at École Polytechnique in Montréal, Québec, Canada.

Fourteen women were murdered; ten women and four men were injured.

Today, the anniversary of the massacre, is commemorated as the National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women (White Ribbon Day).

Previously 2019
Previously 2014
Previously 2012
Previously 2009
Previously 2005

posted by narcissus_and_ambrosia (17 comments total)

There's a meme that goes around Twitter (and I assume Instagram and Facebook) that says Canada has only had 11 school shooting deaths in the country's history (compared to the countless ones in America) and every time I see it it infuriates me. I generally post something like "This is not true, please stop sharing it" and link to info on the Polytechnique massacre. Rather than delete it, I usually get blocked. So frustrating.

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posted by dobbs at 9:25 AM on December 6, 2022 [10 favorites]

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posted by praemunire at 9:53 AM on December 6, 2022 [2 favorites]

The Canadian Coalition for Firearm Rights had the “poly” promo code to get 10% on merch on their site. I don’t have the words to express how much they should fuck off.
posted by WaterAndPixels at 10:27 AM on December 6, 2022 [36 favorites]

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posted by rrrrrrrrrt at 11:14 AM on December 6, 2022

Thank you for posting this, narcissus_and_ambrosia.

WaterandPixels, that is horrific. I feel like there should be someone to report that to, but I don’t know who it would be.

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posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 11:19 AM on December 6, 2022

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+ countless other victims and survivors of misogynist violence

Just a heads-up that the early threads are a rougher read, particularly the 2005 one. Plenty of dismissive denials of the 'lone nut' shooter's misogynist motives, which seemed to be the style at the time. But perhaps understandable (yet not at all excusable) in the context that the loud and vigorous campaign to decouple the massacre from systemic societal violence against women started pretty much immediately; see for example mhum's comment from hurdy gurdy girl's 2013 thread about how supposed feminist Beloved Canadian Media Icon Barbara Frum emphatically refused to recognize the massacre as antifeminist during her newsmagazine show that evening.
posted by hangashore at 11:56 AM on December 6, 2022 [4 favorites]

the general notion that mass targeted killings of women are the result of lone shooters instead of being a facet of a culture of male supremacy from that 2005 thread sure has aged well

imagine if any of those original commenters are back looking at their expressed opinions there, their forever memorialized dismissals of how much an event like this resonated for so many people who have experienced a continuum of gendered violence throughout their lives. a nice takeaway might be that it's worthwhile to maybe shut the fuck up at the very least and, at baseline to apologize and apply corrective measures to any analyses of theirs in the future which might be similarly faulty, dismissive, invalidating, and totally ignorant of other people's feelings

what a nice world that would be, for people to lean towards measured kindness instead of egoistically shitting on people speaking truth to power because those truths might imply that they could be even remotely wrong about something
posted by paimapi at 12:32 PM on December 6, 2022 [8 favorites]

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posted by mark k at 12:54 PM on December 6, 2022

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posted by humbug at 12:55 PM on December 6, 2022

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posted by Kattullus at 2:55 PM on December 6, 2022 [1 favorite]

I've commented on this before but I was living in Montreal when this happened. You could feel it in the entire city the next; this eerie, somber mood that seemed to be universal.
So sad and so tragic, all those young lives filled with so much promise ended by so much misogyny; in the murderer and in the society he took his cues from.
posted by Phlegmco(tm) at 3:48 PM on December 6, 2022 [5 favorites]

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posted by Canageek at 5:43 PM on December 6, 2022

As a woman in science, I remember their murders every year.
posted by hydropsyche at 5:37 AM on December 7, 2022 [2 favorites]

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posted by gentlyepigrams at 7:45 AM on December 7, 2022

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posted by SonInLawOfSam at 7:58 AM on December 7, 2022

. Geneviève Bergeron
. Hélène Colgan
. Nathalie Croteau
. Barbara Daigneault
. Anne-Marie Edward
. Maud Haviernick
. Maryse Laganière
. Maryse Leclair
. Anne-Marie Lemay
. Sonia Pelletier
. Michèle Richard
. Annie St-Arneault
. Annie Turcotte
. Barbara Klucznik-Widajewicz
posted by ChrisR at 8:32 AM on December 7, 2022 [8 favorites]

I had not remembered this until reading the new Louise Penny book, A World of Curiosities. She incorporated this tragedy as a subplot--after obtaining permission from the families of the murdered women and one of the survivors, Nathalie Provost who became a character in the book. I think she handled the inclusion well and it made clear to me not only the tragedy, but how the hard work of the families and survivors made the county examine its gun laws, misogyny, etc. and spurred some important new laws. Like here in the US, there was a lot of misinformation at first and attempts to blame it all on a "lunatic" and not pervasive misogyny and too lax gun laws.

Her acknowledgements go into some more details including her own culpability as a journalist by giving a platform for those who wanted to spread the "lunatic" explanation in the early days after the murders.
posted by agatha_magatha at 10:02 AM on December 7, 2022 [2 favorites]