On her blog, former Wildrose Party leader, Danielle Smith, claims that she is leaving radio because "the mob of political correctness thinks nothing of destroying a person’s career and reputation over some perceived slight, real or imagined." 1/n #abpoli
I can only infer what she is referring to, but her use of the Right's favourite code, "political correctness" raises some questions for me. 2/n
What does "slights" actually stand in for? This term serves to minimize the real harms inflicted on groups who are targeted by hate speech or subjected to banalized racist beliefs. 3/n
What kind of "freedom" does she believe is jeopardized, and for whom? Freedom to inflict such harms on others without consequences? Freedom to not have to think about racist and other power relations and where we are situated within them? 4/n
Does she recognize that only privileged individuals ever enjoy such "freedoms"? Racialized and Indigenous persons are never "free" of the consequences of colonial and white supremacist laws, policing, hiring practices, institutions, or daily insults & threats. 5/n
Smith had the privilege of hosting a mass media radio program. How many Indigenous-hosted radio programs does Corus produce? 6/n
None of us is perfect. We all have learning to do. But how are we ever going to create a more just society if privileged middle class white people persist in seeing themselves as the victims of "political correctness" when their assumptions are challenged? 7/n
That's not defending freedom; that's exploiting the status quo to prevent other people from being free. 8/8

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with Laurie Adkin

Laurie Adkin Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @LaurieAdkin

13 Jan
About 1,000 Albertans have written to the Joint Review Panel that will make a recommendation to the federal minister of ECCC on whether or not to approve the proposed open pit coal mine on Grassy Mountain. 1/n @350Canada @RachelNotley @CBCCanada @JustinTrudeau @globeandmail
It is worth reading through these comments, which you can find here: iaac-aeic.gc.ca/050/evaluation… (You can also add your own comment, as a Canadian citizen.) 2/n
Many of the statements are very moving. Albertans feel very passionately about protecting this place, this land, this watershed, the trout, the pines, from the devastating effects of coal mining. 3/n
Read 11 tweets
13 Jan
"Two-thirds of Canada's irrigated agriculture relies on waters from the Eastern Slopes, including the project region."
(Kevin van Tighem, landscape ecologist & conservation biologist, comment to the JRP for the Grassy Mtn coal mine project) 1/n
#WaterNotCoal @JonathanWNV
"Water is so scarce there has been a moratorium on new water licenses in the watershed since 2006." 2/n
@UAlbertaREES @UofA_EAS @ualbertaScience @usaskArtSci @WatershSentinel @battleriver @Oldmanwatershed @SouthSaskRiver @NiitsitapiWater
Van Tighem lucidly sets out reason after reason why the coal mine on Grassy Mtn should NOT be approved. Read his statement here: iaac-aeic.gc.ca/050/evaluation…
3/n
Read 6 tweets
12 Jan
Of 853 individual comments on the Benga mine currently on the Impact Assessment Agency's registry, 97.9 % express strong opposition to the Grassy Mtn strip mine. You can read them for yourself, here: iaac-aeic.gc.ca/050/evaluation…
@thenarwhal @CBCFletch @DrewPAnderson #StoptheBengaMine
I read or scanned all of them. The authors appear to be almost exclusively Albertans, and they are fiercely opposed to the approval of any further coal mining on the eastern slopes. @GeorgeMonbiot @Martin_Lukacs @guardianeco @HMcPhersonMP #abpoli #cdnpoli
The opponents are impressively well-informed about the environmental risks and socioeconomic arguments surrounding the proposed Grassy Mountain coal mine. @ABWilderness @cpawssab @TheTyee @AlbertaViews @ABlawg @ABEnvNet @APTNNews @CBCNews
Read 9 tweets
12 Jan
From Heidi Eijgel to the JRP: "My husband and I farm in SW Alberta. We are entirely dependent on abundant fresh clean water for our lives, and for our operation . . . 1/n #StoptheBengaMine #Alberta #cdnpoli
We plan to retire here, and continue to contribute towards our community, and help the natural part of the world near us in the Rocky Mountains. We are less than an hour downstream from these coal projects . . . 2/n
Without abundant clean water, our community and our farm will have nothing. We are dependent on the natural ecosystem and watershed that our past Alberta Governments protected and this current government revoked without public consultation . . . 3/n
Read 4 tweets
12 Jan
Kate Shakespeare to the JRP:
"Water and food are essential to life and rapidly becoming unstable sources due to climate change . . . The recent pandemic has shown us how tentative global supply chains can be . . . 1/n #StoptheBengaMine
The changing of the coal policy was done without public consultation, as well as the weakening of many other environmental and land protections. Lack of transparency implies that the Alberta government suspects it would not have public support for these projects . . . 2/n
Alberta should be moving towards a sustainable future, providing jobs that are conducive with climate goals. Solar panel and wind turbine farms, even geothermal, are all greener energy sources that could provide jobs . . . 3/n
Read 6 tweets
11 Jan
@CorbLund @jannarden @kdlang We sure could use some help, here. The #UCP govt is permitting strip mining for coal on the eastern slopes of the Rockies. Benga (Riversdale) #GrassyMountain is under prov/federal review. Submissions & comments here: iaac-aeic.gc.ca/050/evaluation… 1/n
We need signatures on this petition to Minister Wilkinson before January 15th: petitions.ourcommons.ca/en/Petition/De… 2/n
The Niitsitapi Water Protectors (Blackfoot Confederacy) have a postcard campaign going to the federal minister: facebook.com/NiitsitapiWate… 3/n
Read 5 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Too expensive? Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal Become our Patreon

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us on Twitter!