MACY Releases “Finding the Way Back” & “Lied To” To Prevent Suicide
Today the Manitoba Advocate for Children and Youth released a report and music video that tackles the topic of preventing suicide among male youth in Manitoba. The report is called Finding the Way Back: An aggregate investigation of 45 boys who died by suicide or homicide in Manitoba and suggests 5 ways that we can prevent these tragedies from happening. The song “Lied To” By Tyson T & Michael Breland features 2 First Nations young men from Thompson Manitoba who shared their truths about living in these systems.
This is a very important topic and touches very close to home for me as many of the young people I work with are this very demographic. Many will know from my public talks that I have had many personal encounters with suicide and that ongoing tragedy is why I work as hard as I do to create hope and change systems. Please read the full report!
I was honoured to be interviewed for this report alongside a community parent from Fearless R2W, what I call a Super Dad, and shared some of our ideas and thoughts on how we could address suicide. We talked about how child welfare and other systems of family separation cause ongoing harm that is not addressed, treated or healed - creating the conditions, circumstances and opportunity for the hopelessness described in the report to creep in and take young lives.
I also want to thank MACY for including the musical component to this report, I wish all reports would incorporate music and the arts like they have done with this one.
Recommendations
Through the powers described in The Advocate for Children and Youth Act (ACYA), the Manitoba Advocate is empowered to make recommendations to the government or any public body or other person the Advocate considers appropriate (s.31(2)(a)). Special reports, like this one, can be summaries of child death reviews or investigations and completed for the purposes of improving the effectiveness and responsiveness of designated services. The Manitoba Advocate is responsible for monitoring and reporting publicly on compliance with recommendations made under the ACYA
The following is directly from the report:
The Department of Families cooperate with the Departments of Health and Seniors Care and Mental Health, Wellness and Recovery, along with each of the Child and Family Services authorities to implement evidence-based and culturally safe interventions for parents with substance use disorders with the goal of reducing apprehensions by enhancing substance use supports for parents and communities, in alignment with Calls to Action 1 and 5 of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
The Department of Education continue work on an Indigenous Inclusion Strategy, in collaboration with all school divisions, First Nations and Metis youth, governments, and communities, and include culturally appropriate school engagement initiatives tailored to Indigenous boys with the purpose of closing the achievement gap and increasing high-school completion rates.
The Department of Education, in consultation with school divisions and relevant stakeholders, demonstrate the development or continuation of sustainable initiatives in anti-racist education generally, and anti-Indigenous racism specifically, for all students, administrators, teachers, and support staff in Manitoba schools to enhance understanding of racism in education with a view to eradicate inequities and system barriers.
The Government of Manitoba, in collaboration with the Government of Canada, extensively and inclusively consult with communities throughout Manitoba to update, fund, and implement a comprehensive provincial youth gang prevention strategy.
The Department of Health and Seniors Care, together with front-line addiction service providers in Manitoba, Healthy Child
Manitoba (now the Social Innovation Office), Indigenous communities, and subject matter experts on addictions, immediately respond to the lack of effective substance use treatment services for youth by prioritizing the development and implementation of a youth addiction action strategy. This strategy should be based on best practice evidence with the objective of ensuring that children and youth across Manitoba can exercise their right to the highest attainable standards of health.
For this digital storytelling project, the Manitoba Advocate for Children and Youth (MACY) asked two Youth Ambassador Advisory Squad (YAAS!) members, Michael Breland and Trevor Merasty (Tyson T), to speak their truths by creating a video to describe their experiences in provincial care. "Lied To" is a new song written and performed by Michael Breland and Trevor Merasty.
Their song answers two questions:
What is your truth as a young Indigenous male living in Thompson, MB?
What is your truth as a male youth previously involved with (CFS, justice, school, other) systems?
“They hate the way that we move...Haters mad its nothing new. I can see right through the lies. I ain’t too surprised. You took the longest time to go be wasting mine, now I gotta go break the ties cause it’s in my nature to turn the tide, yeah!”
