graeme
native peoples and shale gas in New Brunswick
Posted on: 11/04/2013 14:31
There's a very dangerous situation developing in New Brunswick - made worse by the provincial newspapers and a corrupt government - and by the racism distributed by the federal government. (Have you see the Harper pamphlet on native peoples?)
Native people are opposed to the development of shale gas on environmental and health grounds. Shale gas companies are determined to develop it on native land just like all other land. A leader in this is our provincial robber baron who also owns both the newspapers and the government.
A recent, peaceful blockade ended with the intervention of a hundred or so armed RCMP plus "paramilitary" snipers. They discovered three guns where the native peoples had camped out. The premier referred to it as an "armed camp".
The premier has announced he intends to go ahead with development, and he calls for law and order.
Sounds nice, depending on who writes the laws and gives the order. The death camps for European Jews were an example of law and order.
Weren't the American and French revolutions attacks on law and order?
Must we do what a government tells us we must? Is law and order, by definition, good?
Wasn't Jesus crucified because some influential people say Him as a threat to law and order. Should chuuches always support law and order?
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En passant, the blockade has dangerous implications for all of Canada. If there's violence, we stand to drop a long way in world esteem.
For the natives, the key will be to oppose law and order - but without violence because in any violence, they lose to the government and the shale gas companies. To win, they have to be peaceful. And I'm sure the government and the shale gas companies are aware of that, and will do there best to make sure it isn't peaceful.
The alternative is they simply accept action which, they are convinced, will damage life and environment for uncountable generations. One of only two government studies confirmed this. It was carred out by the province's chief medical officer, and was completely ignored.
The government then turned to a local professor with price tag to write a more congenial report - which he did to great attention and praise from the newspapers.
Alas! It was discovered a couple of weeks ago that
1. He was not a world famour ecologist.
2. He was not an ecologist at all, though he had taught it for years at a local university, and occuped the Irving Chair in Ecology. He had faked his credentials.
3. His graduate degrees were in Education.
None of this, of course, had any effect on the government's position or the attitude of the provincial newspapers.
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Would - should - a preacher take on such a subject as law and order for a sermon?
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Comments
Jim Kenney
Posted on: 11/04/2013 18:32
The stance I take is to lift up what is known, frame the issue as completely as I can including options people have, and leave it to the congregation to decide individually what they are prepared to do. On my own time, I would find ways to support the First Nations people, just as I am attending the TRC meeting in Calgary tomorrow.
graeme
Posted on: 11/09/2013 14:56
And you would, I know, remind people to place the issue in a religious context. (That's not sarcasm: I'm quite sure that is what you do.) It does have a religious context - and it's an important one.
In the case of native peoples here, I'm beginning to realixe just how ugly this is. I don't think it was by accident they decided to drill on native lands. There is a profound if unadknowledged prejudice against native peoples in Canada. I well remember Harper's pamphlet of about a year ago when he attempted, probably with success, to stif up that racism. In speeches, he has virtually declared was on them.
The shale gas companies are quite ruthless, even murderous. The want violence - but violence in which they would be within the law (if only in a literal sense). A few dead natives might suit them quite well.
graeme
Posted on: 11/12/2013 21:20
I've discovered and/or have thought over a few of the details of this case.
1. The RCMP now has a fleet of armoured personnel carriers, the bulk of them concentrated in BC.
2. fossil fuel companies and their politicians are determined to go ahead on pipelines and on shale gas no matter what the consequences. BC is going to be a lively place with native feelings about pipelines.
3. Harper declared war on native peoples about a year ago. It was particularly nasty with a racist pamphlet they distributed in New Brunswick - and perhaps in the rest of Canada. Parker is a single-minded ideologue, and extremely irresponsible and dangerous.
4. The "paramilitaries" used against native peoples in NB were a branch of the RCMP. One of their armoured personnel carriers was used down here.
5. The paramilitaries represent a militarization of policing which has been pronounced in the US. At least some forces are now armed with military vehicles, the police much more heavily armed and with more powerful weapons, and they now train in urban warfare.
As a final touch, some city police units in the US now wear camouflage outfits. These are more symbolic than useful since they are straight copies of military camouflage, and of almost no value in any settled area - and not much even in the woods for police work. But they do represent a strong change in the role of police - and the military style outfit might be part of the propaganda for it.
In the US, the police are being redesigned to fight the new enemy - the American people. And I think the use of the police against native peoples in NB was a sign that it is happening here, too. (As recently revealed, we have also vastly expanded our domestic espionage system to keep track of terrorists like environmentalists. And our domestic spies work very, very closely with the NSA in the US.)
6. It is quite possible, even likely, that what happened in NB was training for the big war coming in BC.