In the natural order of things, fourteen young women students in Montreal would now be in their creative primes, leading professional lives as engineers; building and making. But the natural order was perverted ten years ago today, and the country mourns those women, instead of celebrating them.

Most Canadians first heard the names of Anne Marie Edward, Genevieve Bergeron, and Anne St. Arneault, only when the screaming ambulances came too late to save them. A man who blamed women for his troubles separated the male and female engineering students at the Ecole Polytechnic and opened fire, taking the lives of Helen Cogan, Sonia Pelletier, and Maude Haviernick.

Today Montreal held a memorial service and the flags were at half-staff across the country. At Women's College Hospital, in Toronto, people gathered to light candles to remember the victims.

In the House of Commons, members rose for a minutes' silence in memory of Anne Marie Lemay, Barbara Daignault, and Maryse Leclair.

Now Canadians wear white ribbons to condemn violence against women and remember Natalie Croteau, Michele Richard, and Annie Turcotte.