It was heartening to read in the Sooke News Mirror about the local youth who are organizing a “Love Your Planet” awareness event and all of the school kids preparing an assortment of Earth Day activities over the week.
One cannot help but wonder, though, what effect the strategically prominenced piece in the same paper by Tom Fletcher titled “Environmentalism for Dummies” might have had on their enthusiasm to save the planet. Mr. Fletcher, in perfect Earth Day grinch style, attempts to deconstruct a bevy of EvilDoer environmental groups while suggesting that farmed salmon are healthier than wild salmon, that the tar sands (creating tailing ponds the size of England and growing) have been unfairly maligned and that protecting the Great Bear Rainforest was the work of a U.S. based “eco-scare industry” conspiracy. That ought to nip all that pesky environmental awareness in the bud.
If Mr. Fletcher would like to pursue his apparent interest in discovering the truth behind environmental tall tales, perhaps he should do his next book report on Andrew Nikiforuk’s Tar Sands: Dirty Oil and the Future of a Continent or investigative journalist Greg Palast’s fun read Vulture’s Picnic.
Jo Phillips
Sooke