Boycott call moves beyond the bounds of civility
Although I generally see myself as relatively mild-mannered, eco-colonialism is one thing that makes me want to scream, “shut up and get out.”
A perfect example of eco-colonialism is the call this week by the San Francisco-based Corporate Ethics International for American tourists to boycott Alberta. Using billboards and websites, CEI is urging tourists to boycott the site of what they term “the most destructive energy project on earth.”
Now many people, of course, have misgivings about the oil sands. However, what makes the CEI campaign so offensive, and so worthy of the term eco-colonialism, is that it is directed at a target outside the United States.
The boycott appeal imposes no costs whatsoever on American consumers. It comes from one of the richest cities in the world, in the world’s wealthiest country, a city and country whose DNA is based on automobiles. But, instead of directing their firepower to American patterns of energy production and consumption, everything is directed to a foreign target. Is the appeal for Americans to do more to address environmental concerns? No. Instead, Alberta is the easy target, a cheap shot. Are Americans being asked to change their own behavior? Of course not.
Will Americans be inconvenienced? Well, perhaps the small group of wealthy tourists, CEI’s explicit target, who might have been planning a holiday trip to Alberta. Fortunately for them, there is no boycott advocated for the eco-centres of Vale, Vegas and Palm Springs, all within reach via California’s crowded freeways.
CEI claims on its website that the “Tar Sands are the poster child for why the US needs to end its addiction to oil, and this campaign is the foundation for the movement that will ultimately achieve that goal.”
But, it is nothing of the kind. It lets Americans off the hook, substituting attacks on a foreign target for concrete action at home. This is why it is eco-colonialism, as others are left to bear the brunt for undisturbed American energy consumption.
Their depiction of Alberta as “the environmental South Africa of the Western Hemisphere” is particularly offensive in this context. It is not only hyperbole, it is deeply insulting to the civil rights movement in South Africa. It is appropriating that struggle, and trivializing it. The comparison smacks of a young researcher, directed by organizational fund-raisers, to use Google to find any kind of emotional hook. While at least Alberta is not equated with Nazis Germany or Stalin, at least not yet, the link to apartheid is deeply offensive for South Africans, never mind Albertans.
The attempt to cash in on the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is also problematic. The comparison of bird deaths in the oil sands tailings ponds and in Gulf of Mexico acts to trivialize the ecological disaster in the Gulf.
If the intent is to make the oil sands look worse through the comparison, the result is to minimize the environmental impact of the Gulf spill. If the tailings pond death of 1600 ducks is placed on the same level as the Gulf spill, then the Gulf spill becomes at worst a minor incident, easily forgotten.
Now admittedly, policy debates are unavoidably contentious, but there is usually a reasonable degree of civility. Participants recognize a shared commitment to the public good, albeit variously defined, and opponents are treated with a modicum of respect.
However, the call for a tourism boycott breaks any notion of civility. It is all about blaming others and coddling a sense of complacency in the US. This galling hypocrisy would not be out of place in the colonial outposts of the 19th century, when our betters muttered over their iced drinks about the scandalous behavior of the natives.
Dr. Roger Gibbins is President and CEO of the Canada West Foundation.