STOP REPEATING DESTRUCTIVE DENIALISM
Unconscionable dithering on climate action and on Indigenous rights has caused immense and wholly needless pain, conflict and disruption for Canadians in recent weeks. It’s 2020. Scientists say we absolutely must transition to safe energy as quickly as humanly possible, just to give humanity a decent chance at a future (not to guarantee a livable future, which is already out of reach).
Despite this, multiple levels of government — and three different self-styled progressive parties — are prepared to trample the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP), to force through yet another pipeline on behalf of brazen and unrepentant fossil fuel profiteers. All in the middle of a climate crisis.
Worse yet, in a flailing attempt to shore up their transparently myopic stance, fossil interests — and their allies in politics and the media — are blasting out vicious invective to confuse and divide Canadians, with a wilful and criminal disregard for any resulting violence.
We need look no further than recent propaganda from fossil fuel companies and their allies, including endorsements of sexual violence against teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg, and acts of brutal physical violence against earth protectors. Moreover, this petro-cabal has gleefully spread outright fabrications to vilify Indigenous protectors and their allies, such as claims of “paid protestors” and epithets like “thug”; one premier went so far as to tell the public that earth protectors were brandishing “AK47s”, an inflammatory claim for which zero evidence was provided.
These propagandists should reasonably know that they are putting lives at risk. Indeed, the fossil industry pours huge amounts of cash and effort into convincing the public that “energy” means only fossil fuels, that “jobs” must be fossil fuel jobs, that safe alternatives do not exist, and that regular folks acting out of concern for their children and the planet are funded by foreign interests, hell-bent on destroying all that is good in the world. We do not need to argue that this is a grossly irresponsible invitation to violence — because we can point to several examples where earth protectors, merely repeating science and/or defending UNDRIP, have been threatened, intimidated and attacked people who have been made angry and confused by fossil propaganda specifically designed to make us angry, confused and divided.
This isn’t complex. We recognize that anti-vaccine propaganda, for instance, is harmful and should not be spread — by media, by politicians, or anyone — because it can literally kill. Anti-Indigenous rhetoric and climate denialism are obviously no different. It’s time that the industry, politicians and the media renounce this dangerous disinformation. Stop saying it, stop repeating it and stop letting it go uncorrected. The future of all life on earth literally depends on it. Patrick Yancey Antigonish