Editor
I want to applaud regular Tribune, Black Press commentator, Tom Fletcher regarding his Jan.4 Tribune Weekend Edition column headlined “Is gas the enviro-villain of 2013”.
There has been a great American Lobby effort to paint Canada’s Oil Sands as the world’s worst environmental disaster — couple this with an effort to possibly also paint proposed shipments of Liquid Natural Gas as the next worse thing that could happen to the world.
Spearheading the negative propaganda are rich, powerful and very influential anti Canadian, American lobby groups that view Canada as their exclusive playground and don’t want this playground, in their opinion, impacted by any Canadian Government’s efforts to provide social programs for its citizens by the marketing of Canada’s assets.
For those that do not think that these powerful American lobby groups are manipulating Canadian’s, think again.
Tom Fletcher, in his column, mentions the “The Great Bear Rain Forest” and the “Spirit Bear.”
Both of these phrases are California-based marketing tools. In almost 25 years up to the 1980s, serving the Central Coast of British Columbia, not once did I hear any native or non-native refer to the Central Coast as the Great Bear Rain Forest, or the Kermode Bear, referred to as a Sprit Bear. Both of these names came about during a period of time when a major logging company during the late 1980s attempted to log an area on King Island on the Central Coast.
Bella Coola hereditary chief Ed Moody, now deceased, protested that the logging was occurring on sacred native ground. Fair enough, his cause was taken up and supported by protest groups looking for a cause all the way to California. Ed Moody both a friend and former customer was invited to California, gaining broad support for his cause.
It was here that the name Great Bear Rain Forest, and Spirit Bear were contrived.
Couple this with the claim that the logging was occurring in old growth forests.
Forests that had been pre logged starting in the early 1900s by Pacific Mills limited of Ocean Falls and because of the damp coastal climate had regenerated to the point that to a novice, with closed eyes to the moss covered rotting stumps, these forests appear like old growth.
Using the heavy hammer of a vast American population, environmentally manipulating Canadians, it seems, is an American pastime.
Doug Wilson
Williams Lake