Editor:
In the opinion of Shaun Thomas, individuals have no need to speak out about regional issues with placards, megaphones or sensationalized protests.
For a person who works in the media, this is indeed a surprise and shock as Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms states in 2.b that all Canadians have the fundamental freedoms of “thought, belief, opinion, and expression, including freedom of the media of communication”. To take the assault on free speak even lower, Mr. Thomas says that this kind of free speech is “fear mongering” — the selling of fear as one might sell fish. Since the article chose LNG as an example, we might look at the millions of dollars that 11 LNG corporations (permits approved by the National Energy Board) have for advertising (selling) and juxtapose that against individual citizens of our region who have read data around fossil fuels and certainly do pay attention to the reports of scientists.
In light of the United Nations report (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) just released, it seems our good citizens have justification to highlight issues of the many LNG projects and to refute the hard sell by corporations, newspapers, Christy Clark, and Steven Harper, etc. The warning from the majority of top climate scientists in the world is that emissions, mainly caused by fossil fuels, have to drop dramatically and probably to zero by the end of the century.
The U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon states, “Science has spoken. There is no ambiguity in their (the scientists) message. Leaders must act.”
Carol Brown, Prince Rupert
