12 Aug Real series: Cyndia Mondésir

How would you describe feminism in Canada?

A lot of people think that feminism in Canada is not needed anymore. However, there are still many instances where women face discrimination. For example, Male violence against women, lack of access to education, childcare, pay wage gap, women in poverty, etc. I think Canada’s feminism needs to be more radical and more intersectional. I believe that our “feminist” government also needs to demonstrate their beliefs by creating policies to help women with all sorts of identities. There needs to be concrete actions taken in order to fix these problems, and the diverse women need to be at the forefront of the decision-making. Our government should continue to finance women’s groups, to hear their voices, to include them in policy-making, and to use their research and their tools to make a difference. With that said, I think we can get there. As a whole, the Trudeau government has done a lot of good for the feminist movement in Canada. 

If I were to criticize the feminist movement as a whole, I would address the excessive policing of the language. I completely agree that language is important, but we cannot afford to be fighting over minuscule details all the time. As long as someone isn’t speaking out of hate and they are keeping an open mind, I think it’s important to hear them out and try to understand different perspectives. It can be damaging if we are shutting people out because of their lack of knowledge of the most accurate terminology. I think as a movement we need to learn how to have respectful debates, where we can discuss different opinions, ideas and realities without necessarily agreeing but still being respectful. 

In what ways have you helped your community? 

Right out of high school, I worked a lot with youth and that work was very important to me. I was able to mentor youth from grades 9 to 12, where we discussed healthy relationships, consent, body image, violence and all those types of things. It was a place where I was able to share my experiences and my knowledge, but also a place where I could also learn from them. It meant a lot to me knowing how much I had impacted them. We would have conversations and try to find similar grounds, all by being respectful, even when we didn’t necessarily agree with each other. That is earlier work that I’ve always been proud of, and which has influenced my work at CRIAW and The Feminist Word magazine. At CRIAW, I can work with young women and give them a safe space to express themselves where they feel like what they have to say is valued. I feel like women have a lot to offer and we need to give them more platforms to be able to speak out.