I think this is an important aspect of #bcekxn2024 #bcpoli

Chris Alemany🇺🇦🇨🇦🇪🇸

I think this is an important aspect of #bcelxn2024 #bcpoli

In BC today it matters electorally if a politician has gained the confidence of First Nations. Prominent northern BC NDP MLA Nathan Cullen, a former MP and federal NDP leadership candidate (runner up to Jagmeet Singh), lost his race for reelection to the Conservatives. Why?

Apparently one aspect is he ran afoul with many First Nations in that region over the last term.

While I am disappointed in that result, I am glad the First Nations communities are having a real impact on the democratic process they are forced into.

If he had not lost that confidence, perhaps the result would have been 47 to 44 and his party would have a majority government.

Janis La Couvée

@chris this absolutely does not explain North Island, unless you have some skinny that I don't have.

Idealistic Pragmatist :mstdn:

@chris oh wow. I had missed that Cullen was one of the ones turfed. I knew him well, back when I was involved with the federal NDP. I liked him quite a lot. I appreciate your explanation, though.

Chris Alemany🇺🇦🇨🇦🇪🇸

@lacouvee No. In that space I think we see the deep rural divide. The impact of Facebook. The impact of deep loss of support from the forest industry for the NDP as jobs evaporate and blame is put on environmentalists rather than the capitalists who extracted our resources and ran.

Chris Alemany🇺🇦🇨🇦🇪🇸

@IPEdmonton I think he was really good people and even had a shot of being PM, I think. I'm not sure that he deserved his fate last night, but he did wear some mistakes the NDP made up there I think.

[email protected] :mstdnca:

@chris What’s your source on this? How did Cullen, a popular pol in his part of the world (& beyond) from what I’ve heard, “run afoul?” And if that’s the case, how does electing a Con (part of a crazy crew, if not one themselves) make things better? Do we now that FN votes were the difference? Or are we just seeing what we’re seeing elsewhere: the rural/urban wedge intensified/amplified as another version of culture warfare? Or simply as an expression of two solitudes?

Chris Alemany🇺🇦🇨🇦🇪🇸

@hanspetermeyer my source is a prominent First Nations community member here who I would trust implicitly with his estimation. I don't have specifics, and the specifics might not be public in any case, or at least not easily googled.

Chris Alemany🇺🇦🇨🇦🇪🇸

@hanspetermeyer I do think that the rural/urban divide also played a huge role.

[email protected] :mstdnca:

@lacouvee @chris This rings truer for me as a reason for the blue/orange-green map. Oganized labour stopped being a force, & loggers morphed into contractors. And NDP hasn’t seemed to have understood how to make the connex. I worked w this “new” logger culture for a number of years. They were/are struggling. Very ltd scope for political action (or imagination) beyond survival (while the majors flourished, as per usual). #Bcpoli #bcelxn2024 #forestry

[email protected] :mstdnca:

@chris This has long been a divide in BC. And esp as rural resource players (workers as well as business owners) saw largely urban environmentalist movement threatening “their” backyard & God-given (or Crown-given) rights to make a living. IWA had some social conscience & engaged w enviros to some ltd extent during/after the “war in the woods.” That war history needs to be written. It may help us get past the urban/rural divide (which Cons will exploit)
#bcpoli #bcelxn2024

Ms. Que Banh

@hanspetermeyer @chris I don't know how to deprogram industry folks who believe environmentalists are the reason they are out of jobs when it's the piss poor BC forestry policies & capitalist greed that are the cause. People like me have fought for forestry reform for decades so folks can have sustainable jobs without feeling they need to be a part of large scale ecocide to earn an honest living. It's the swinging door BC governments that has repeatedly failed to change their outdated policies to truly help workers transition to more sustainable & ethically responsible work.

Theresa

@hanspetermeyer @chris both Kootenay ridings went NDP, we are rural and resource based. I think lots of progressive folks live in rural areas...and lots of conservative voters live in Metro Vancouver according to my map. I think this rural/urban divide myth stopped mattering a while back.

[email protected] :mstdnca:

@chris @PhoenixSerenity Thanks for your efforts. I really do think it has a lot to do with a rural get-away-from-complexity impulse. Many of us are here in small towns & rural areas b/c we want life simplified. And generally it is. The rethink required from “resource extraction” to “rural stewardship” is NOT about simplifying-at least in the short term. And it costs. 1/2

[email protected] :mstdnca:

@PhoenixSerenity @chris And rural businesses & families are paying the (short term) cost. A real rural strategy will be a long-term thing. Who can afford that? Not small businesses. Not families. Not rural & small town local govts. Not provincial govts on a 3-5 year election cycle. And the sowers of discontent (fascists & fellow-travellers) reap the whirlwind (and esp their funders & cronies). 2/2

#bcpoli #bcelxn2024 #forestry #rural #smalltowns #community

Ms. Que Banh

@hanspetermeyer @chris The provincial government has had many opportunities to help workers dependent on resource extraction industries & they have chosen not to. There's still billions going to corporate welfare for industry screw ups & that's money that could be spent on helping workers move to sustainable jobs. The biggest problem is lack of political will to make any progressive changes & both swinging door governments have that in common.

Janis La Couvée

@chris oh so true - once every last tree is cut, those companies will move on to "greener" pastures in countries with fewer environmental protections. They talk about "fibre supply" as if it didn't mean that the trees they are cutting are getting smaller and smaller. They will never again have the volumes of the 50s 60s 70s

[email protected] :mstdnca:

@chris @PhoenixSerenity Political will, yes. Political opportunity? Not so much. Recall the Harcourt NDP govt of the 90s, to my mind the most visionary &pragmatic of recent BC govts. Big steps forward in forestry policy/ practices. This may have precipitated the “war in the woods,” or maybe led the way to post-war pragmatism? Govt leadership: rarely appreciated except in crisis or hindsight. Timing is everything. In the meantime…
##bcpoli #bcelxn2024 #forestry

Ms. Que Banh

@hanspetermeyer @chris I remember it well - I was part of that blockade. It was my first.
I also remember when BC Liberals changed BC Forestry policies & we are still stuck with those shit clauses with cutblocks/TFL. Horgan never tried to change them when he had majority powers & it's because he's an ecocidal profiteer.
There has been no political will exercised since I became eligible to vote, decades ago - except when it benefits corporate lobbyists & politicians who take lobbyist monies instead of actually serving citizens.

[email protected] :mstdnca:

@chris @PhoenixSerenity Thank you for that.
But I can tell you, as a logger from late 1970s, a treeplanter from 1990s, a researcher/writer/photographer of the forest industry in the 2000s, the BC Liberals didn’t undo all the good work you & your fellow travellers inspired. Much has changed for the better & coastal communities (& forests) are better for it.
As for Horgan, I’m no fan. Now we press Eby (w Green leverage) to make BC better.

#bcpoli #bcelxn2024

Chris Alemany🇺🇦🇨🇦🇪🇸

@hanspetermeyer @PhoenixSerenity it gives me hope that there are resource folks (alot!) that get it.