How ICE enforces a tradition of terror and patriarchy |
For centuries, the subjugation of women’s bodies has been foundational to building empires like Canada and the United States. The texts I’ve been studying for my masters thesis on the sprawling concepts of evil and fascism show this clearly. And yet, I’m left baffled at how the same ideologies that brought us the witch trials, the inquisitions and the slavetrade are perpetuating bloodshed and suffering today, despite everything we know and all the battles fought.
Today’s violence by the hands of immigration enforcement isn’t new or just a Trump problem, like some political centrists maintain. It’s the security machine functioning exactly as designed on white supremacy and violent misogyny.
Over the last few years, there are countless examples of such violence. In 2025, immigration officer David Courvelle sexually abused a Nicaraguan woman known as C.H. by coercing her into sex in exchange for food and letters from her daughter. In 2014, a 19-year-old woman was detained after fleeing domestic violence in Honduras. She was groomed and raped by a guard who bribed her for sex. In 2018, The Intercept reviewed 1,224 cases of abuse, a small portion of the overall complaints, in immigration detention in the United States, showing the systemic nature of this abuse.
When Jonathan Ross, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent in the United States, murdered poet and writer Renee Good in January, it was more violent misogyny. Only this time it wasn’t hidden behind a concrete wall. After Ross shot Good in the face, he called her a “fucking bitch”, his unabashed contempt and hatred toward a woman who refused to cower in his presence broadcast for us all to see.
These are acts of patriarchal violence, misogyny and state-sanctioned murder. Many people are rightfully horrified at the news, yet they turn inward to hide away from the violence. If we truly want to stop it, we have to first face the truth about patriarchal and white nationalist ideology—even those who feel they aren’t impacted by it.
The security machine of the state
The security machine of Canada and the United States includes the police, the military, immigration enforcement, and any institution whose purpose is to criminalize people and enforce laws. In these systems, women’s bodies, particularly those of racialized women, exist as territory to be policed, controlled, and violated. This is part of a tradition that goes back hundreds of years.
In the 16th century, the false and non-scientific creation of “race” as a human category was created. Race was key for the newly emerging system of capitalism because it allowed for entire groups of humans to be subjugated based on their region, the colour of their skin or the texture of their hair. By having categories of people to exploit based on “racial science” (long since debunked), wealth could be hoarded by the........