English - Ontario Association of Children's Aid Societies

has been used to explain the cycle of violence among families. Social Learning Theory
is described as the observations of others; that we imitate behaviour that we observe.
How the parents respond to conflict will help shape whether or not the child learns
violent behaviour during the most critical developmental learning stages.
What we learn to see as “normal” when we are children, we pass on to our own children.
Children who learn that . . . ​sexual abuse is “normal”, and who have never dealt with the
feelings that come from this, may inflict physical and sexual abuse on their own children.
The unhealthy ways of behaving that people use to protect themselves can be passed on
to children, without them even knowing they are doing so. This is the legacy of physical
and sexual abuse in residential schools (Aboriginal Healing Foundation, 1999).
What happens when an entire generation of children has been exposed to violent
behaviours through historical experiences The action of protecting the child by
removing the child from his/her home and community does not in fact protect
him/her in the long term. Each child has a right to his/her cultural identity and that
identity is rooted in his/her family and community. Child welfare professionals can be
participants in supporting the healing process for the family and community.
In our view, the primary impact of family violence and abuse in Aboriginal communities
is the metastasizing of violence into community life, and the gradual generation of
a “culture of violence.” The term “culture of violence” means that the lived patterns of
human interactions, as well as the belief and values that support them, are infused with
violence to such a degree that violence has become a distinguishing characteristic of
community life . . . ​. Widespread family violence and abuse in Aboriginal communities
has, since the days of residential school, passed through at least three and sometimes four
generations in which chronic abuse and violence has been allowed to flourish and spread.
This means that for multiple generations, children have been raised who were “incubated
in terror” (Perry, 2001), or at least in persistent fear, unease and intermittent trauma . . . ​.
The spread of lateral violence within communities is now becoming a serious concern of
Aboriginal leaders (Federation Saskatchewan Indian Nations, 2001). The critical point is
that one of the primary sources of this pattern, both in terms of its origins and its
perpetuation, is the violence and abuse that occurs in Aboriginal families
(Bopp, Bopp & Lane, 2003).
LATERAL VIOLENCE
Lateral violence has impacted Indigenous peoples throughout the world to the
point of where we harm each other in our communities and workplaces on a daily
basis. That violence includes gossip, shaming of others, blaming, backstabbing,
family feuds and attempts at socially isolating others. This form of violence occurs
when out of anger and frustration, an oppressed group turns on itself and begins to
violate each other (Mohawk Rod Jeffries, 2009).
Lateral violence is described as organized, harmful behaviours that we do to each
other collectively as part of an oppressed group; within our families, within our
organizations, and within our communities. Lateral violence is also referred to as
‘internalized colonialism’.
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