The Man Who Would be King (Maker)

Andrew J. Weaver – the leader of the B.C. Green party is poised to be the person in control of at least part of the next B.C. government’s agenda. He or other members of his party were not elected by a significant percentage of the B.C. electorate for that job, nor do they represent a cross section of B.C. voters – in fact all three of their newly won seats come from Vancouver Island. However, because of some perhaps unusual voting patterns, the Green Party may now hold the balance of power in a Liberal minority government. That makes him and his two fellow Green party members a powerful force for shaping a government that has, at least in part, a clear vision of how to run a province from an environmental perspective. The real questions are : is there really a clear vision of how to do that and td they have a mandate to do it?

 

One has to believe that never in their wildest dreams did the Green Party think that in 2017 they would be in such a position. I have to assume that they would have been excited if they had just gained two extra seats. Their primary goal was in all likelihood to get enough seats so that they could become a party as defined by the legislature and therefor get government funding for its operations within the Legislature. They, unlike the two other parties, spent very little, if any time thinking about what policies they would want to be presented in the Throne Speech. It is a giant step to go from a small – perhaps one could say insignificant opposition force within the Legislature - to a party that holds the balance of power.

 

It is interesting to note that their first priority is to be given the status of an official party (a party needs to have four elected members in the legislature before they are awarded that status). Their second stated priority is to have the rules as to who can and cannot contribute to political parties. If the Greens have their way, neither unions nor large corporations will be allowed to donate. While this change is frequently seen as a way of leveling the playing field especially as the Green Party does not accept such donations, one cannot assume that this guarantees that the Green’s coffers will fill at the same rate as the Liberals. In fact I would argue that in other jurisdictions where this policy has become law, dominate parties continue to raise the most money from individuals.  I think that it is worth noting that the first two demands that Weaver made public had to do with how, in his mind, the Green Party could be made stronger. I don’t think his position is unusual or even inappropriate, but they feel more than slightly self-serving.

 

Weaver in more recent days has started to discuss the Green Party’s general opposition to both the building of the Site C dam and the expansion of the Kinder-Morton pipeline.  I suspect that the first item will get a fair amount of support from the general public. Unless someone does a much better job than in the past in selling the concept, there does not appear to be a lot of support for it to be built – at least in the short term. It is an issue internal to B.C. that affects no other province.

 

The Kinder-Morton pipeline is another issue. While it is true that a significant part of the expansion will occur in B.C. and that the highest places of risk in transporting the partially processed oil, including the loading it on to ships, is in B.C., a decision to not allow the pipeline’s construction generally affects people outside of the province. There are thousands of people in Alberta and elsewhere who depend upon the income they earn from oil production. If the pipeline is not built, there will be fewer jobs – jobs that Albertans need to maintain their economy. If Alberta cannot, at least in the short term, earn the money it does from oil revenues, then they will not be able to sustain their economy. Families will be forced to re-locate, small business will not thrive, house prices will continue their downward trend and Alberta as a province will stop paying into the Canadian Equalization Plan. Alberta will not be able to transition to another type of economy if the economy is not vibrant.

 

Whether we like it not, there is a demand for the oil. If it is not shipped through a pipeline, it will be shipped by train – something that is far more dangerous and less well controlled. CN and CP do not need any permission to transport as much oil as they wish through whatever territory they want. Rail transport is not a viable alternative. The only viable alternative to the pipeline is to shut down oil production. And I don’t have a problem with them but...

 

It seems to me that the people who are advocating for less (or no) oil to be shipped from Alberta are the people who will suffer the least from such an embargo. The people who voted for Andrew Weaver will not suffer one little bit if jobs are lost in Alberta or if there is a major train derailment in the Rockies. They will continue to live on their nice island (as I do), driving their generally overly large vehicles and enjoying what traditionally has been the warmest climate in Canada. There will be no cost to them. They will continue to enjoy their pleasant life style AND get the chance to pontificate upon how wonderful they are because they stopped the pipeline. It seems to me that if people like me are opposed to oil productions (and fracking for natural gas), then we should pay some sort of price. Are we prepared to significantly reduce (or stop) our use of gas; are we prepared to invest the millions and millions of dollars in developing affordable alternatives; are we prepared, at least in the short term, to financially support the people of Alberta as they go through a transitional process from oil production to....? Of course, for the majority of people, the answer to those questions is no.

 

The Greens have this rather scary opportunity to demand implementation of their election platform– in spite of the fact that only a small percentage of people voted for them. While that might be great for the planet – and for that reason I support them – it is not democracy.

Cultural Appropriation

To be absolutely clear – there is no doubt that the western/industrial/mainly European world has for centuries felt entirely free to use/appropriate anything from another culture it felt like. It has done so without any consideration of what such appropriation felt like to those of that culture. Clothing designers, musicians, writers, movie producers and others have all felt entitled to use another culture’s images or stories to enhance their product. Groups such as the Rainbow Family or those Europeans who are so immersed in First Nation culture that one argued with me that “he was more Indian than the Indians” have assumed that because some of their values are, if not aligned with traditional North American First Nation’s values, are at least parallel to them, that that gives them the right to use any part of that culture that they want to. No matter how distorted that use becomes. Such appropriation is at best profoundly misguided.

 

In the last week or so there has been a significant amount of discussion within the various media in Canada on the issue of cultural appropriation. It appears to have all started when an editor of a magazine, attempted (he says) through humour to initiate a discussion as to when can an non-aboriginal Canadian use Aboriginal character, story lines and other artifacts in their creative works. His words were, very understandably, not appreciated by the Aboriginal community. Other non-aboriginal writers got involved in the discussion and some of them such as Jonathan Kay, editor-in-chief of the Walrus have also faced some public censure.

 

One of Kay’s points was that it does little good to call someone a racist just because they have appropriate a piece of another’s culture. I think he is right in that while the act of appropriation may be and perhaps should be labelled a racists act – if the individual did so not understanding why such appropriation is potentially harmful – is he or she a racist? I don’t think so.

 

Those of us who are of the elite – and by that I mean of European decent – and certainly people of a certain age - have been raised in a world where certain things were understood. To be clear – these were cultural understandings. A white person in Alabama in 1960 would have assumed that there would be/should be two drinking fountains – one labelled for white use, one labelled for non-whites. Clearly that is horrendously racist. But the white person could not have recognized that because it was the only world they knew. Similarly, I grew up playing “cowboy and Indians”. No one wanted to be the Indians – they always lost. My world view of First Nations people was in general formed by television and perhaps some books (my father’s boyhood books by G. A. Henty that I devoured as a boy were more than a little bit racists). While the play activity may have very clear racist overtones – the act of playing “cowboy and Indians” did not make me a racist. However, now that I know better, if I allowed my son or grandchildren to play such games, without me having a conversation with them to redirect them – then I would quite clearly be a racist. As a human I have the capacity to learn and to adapt to new cultural understanding. I, on occasion, may need some time to make those adaptations.

 

There are some (many?) people who in spite of ample exposure to the other side of the issue, refuse to deviate from their long held cultural beliefs. For example, they continue to believe that as white people, they have the right, if not the obligation to be in charge and to decide what is right for other people; that their skin colour alone makes them and their culture better in every aspect. These people and their activities need to be clearly labelled as being what they are: racist. But I would argue that there are far more people who are struggling with the issue of what is or is not okay. We search out information; we want to talk with those Canadians from First Nation communities; we acknowledge that we have been wrong in our approaches and our attitudes. The last thing we want to do is to oppress or hurt someone. And we need help to understand.

 

Is it fair that the victims of oppression are continually required to educate me and folks like me? Is it right that the very people who have had so much of their culture denigrated or more likely completely destroyed have to defend what is theirs? Is it even reasonable to ask those peoples to have patience with me and to not get angry or frustrated as I fumble my way though it all? Probably not.

 

But if not them – then who?