Hello: I just saw your e-mail about the women on the DTES. I am hoping to tell the stories of some of them. I work for a company that is doing profiles of all of the women -- who they were before they ended up there or what they were like -- and would like to hear from people who knew them. You mentioned Georgina. Did you know her? I wondered if you knew any of the other women too? You can e-mail me at this site or the above address. Thanks - Alison

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it is so sad that it took the murder of so many women to allow any 1 of them to be recognized as the PERSON she is. In her life before DTES, her struggles while surviving in DTES and her going missing from the DTES.
Vanished Voices is the best site i have ever viewed re: our lost sisters because it relieves all the media glare and judgemental garbage of people that have not one clue about how fortunate their lives are and how unfortunate the lives of many others have become.
Deborah Jardine created an avenue for the ones who live in fear of us suffering misery that perhaps they may of felt we self-deserved. It is our choice to be addicts, to be raped, beaten, ignored when missing, dumped as garbage when murdered.
So many in society don't even look at the DTES MISSING WOMAN'S Posters anymore. So many have become desentized to even being shocked at the discovery of the Pig Farm. In fact i cringe at hearing the reference uses. It implicates the woman as pigs. Where they suffered their final indignities and death needs not be the headlines. The person accused has been personalized by the media but it is still just cold police line-up photos of hardened faces that people see as the murdered or missing women.
Women are not bic lighters. To be considered disposable because you live in the 10 blocks known as DTES is "head up my ass" syndrome.
I grew up on the streets of East Vancouver in the 60s, i was in that Willingdon School For Girls so i spent a hell of alot of my youth walking the streets.
People think we like this life, that we have no feelings, no hope. That we never weep silent tears when we are all alone with ourselves at the end of the day and we have no place to go. Of course we use drugs! To stay numb from the overwhelming feelings of worthlesness and the cold wet night we have ahead of us.
The nice folks have a couple glasses of wine / brandy or what ever dressed up all pretty DRUG they are taking to help them ease their stress and help them sleep; so why is it so difficult for so many "educated" people to comprehend that surviving in the DTES without much resources to get out makes the desire to kill our pain with substances any less.

This site allows everyone to see the human being behind the cold picture of the Missing Woman's poster.
They are someone's Mother, Daughter, Sister. They were all very different people not just drug addicts and prostitutes ok. And so what if in there last day that is the common bond they shared, these woman are people not just pictures. The Georgina i knew sure the hell did not look like the picture we are seeing today. I remember her when she was clean, pregnant, proud to be a Mom after getting her son back. I remember the worry her husband and friends suffered when she would relapse and head downtown. I remember the warmth she so freely passed along in her smiles. Why must society be introduced to her as just another drug addicted prostitute with a criminal record who was murdered at a Pig Farm?
None of these women were just another anything! They were women the same as every other human being. Vulnerable to all the same things as everyone else. It is only how they were stolen from us that has given them identy to people that would never of given them a second glance when passing her on the street.
And, surprise because you might of passed anyone of them on your very own street in your very own nice part of town. Not everyone who sufferes mental health isues, substance abuse issues and poverty were born in the 10 blocks considered the DTES.
We come from all over Canada and then some. We come from all different kinds of families and lifestyles. We are not all native, we were not all raped by our fathers and we were not all brought up poor.
No person wakes up one day and decides he / she wants to leave the comforts of a nice life to become a drug addict. Not every person is able to make adult choices for themselves even though their age allows them to.
Not any person deserves to be selected as my next murder victim just because they are caught up in the DTES the likelyhood of anyone giving a dam about her is slim and none. These women were selected because of where they lived not because of who they were.

I hope that someone close to every woman listed on this web-site gets a short life story told in their memory. Personalize her, tell us who she really was because it is so unfair that she is being judged by where she was murdered or where she went missing from.

There will never be Justice enough to sedate me for the injustice and indignities suffered by our lost sisters, their family and friends.
How many times can you sentence 1 Pig Farmer to LIFE?
He is clearly going to be condidered a DO if not a SDO so enough media personalizing Willy, lets ensure NO movie deal is ever allowed and lets start introducing the women as real human lost beings instead of calling them victims.

I wish every family my deepest heartfelf best.

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