MANITOULIN ISLAND, ONT.—Before the brawl, there was a breakup. It was typical teenage drama; a boy and girl had parted ways and feelings were hurt. Then one person accused the other of having herpes and soon, ugly rumours of an STD outbreak were spreading through the school and across social media.Over the next week, tensions mounted at Manitoulin Secondary School (MSS) and on Sept. 14, they suddenly exploded into a massive lunchtime brawl. Snippets of the violence were captured in videos shared on Snapchat: boys punching girls and girls punching boys; kids being pushed or thrown to the ground; a teenager violently slammed into a parked car.The clash lasted for an hour, with as many as 50 students either gawking at the violence or jumping into the fray. Nobody was seriously injured but the brawl left a slew of criminal charges in its wake and exposed deeper divisions that lurk beneath the friendly face of this small island community.Residents have largely split into two perspectives. For some, this was just a typical case of high school melodrama that spiralled out of control. But others say the fight and its aftermath are symptomatic of a bigger problem that can’t be ignored: anti-Indigenous racism.Manitoulin Island — a scenic community of 13,255 people located two hours southwest of Sudbury — is a wedge of land bisecting Lake Huron and Georgian Bay. It is considered a sacred place by First Nations people surrounding the Great Lakes. An 1862 treaty opened Manitoulin to white settlement, and self-identified Aboriginal people now make up 41 per cent of islanders who responded to the latest census. At MSS, the island’s only public high school, 30 per cent of students are Indigenous.TOP STORIES. IN YOUR INBOX: For the day’s top news from the Star’s award-winning journalists, sign up for our daily headlines newsletter.In the eyes of Manitoulin’s First Nations leadership, there were blatant racial overtones to the brawl ...
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