Industry Canada's top Yellowknife official, Michael Hurst, should be fired for sending an offensive e-mail to 31 people from work, Northwest Territories' women's groups say.

The Status of Women Council of N.W.T., the Native Women's Association of the N.W.T. and the Yellowknife Women's Centre have written to Industry Canada Minister Maxime Bernier calling for Hurst's dismissal, pointing out that part of Hurst's job involves working with aboriginal women.

"This is nothing but hate propaganda that's allowed to pass using our taxpayers' dollars," Shirley Bonnetrouge said at a special sharing circle Wednesday held by the women's association to deal with the e-mail.

The e-mail invited recipients to pick "Miss Northwest Territories" from four photos of naked or nearly naked women — three were young blonde models while the fourth was an unflattering shot of a much older aboriginal woman.

Nola Moulton couldn't stop from crying after seeing the photo of the aboriginal woman. "To have her displayed like that for people to mock just rips my heart out," she said.

Kathy Paul Drover told the gathering she was ashamed because she had seen a slightly different version of the e-mail a year ago but had not said anything about it.

"When I saw it, it was Miss Saskatchewan. Now it's Miss N.W.T. Next it'll be Miss Nunavut, Miss B.C."

When contacted by CBC News, Hurst said he realizes he made a mistake but refused to do an interview about the e-mail.

His boss in Edmonton would only say an investigation is underway.