Juno News - December 02, 2021


Do the BC pipeline protesters speak for Indigenous peoples？


Episode Stats

Length

3 minutes

Words per Minute

188.6842

Word Count

717

Sentence Count

1

Hate Speech Sentences

2


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 we've got protests and activism happening in canada once again in british columbia against
00:00:10.480 a pipeline project where some first nations people are saying we don't want this project to be built
00:00:15.840 they're protesting against it this is looking like two years ago all over again where a very
00:00:21.760 similar situation happened but there was i think one positive one silver lining to what happened
00:00:27.360 when this occurred two years ago that well i really hope can recur again now so what we have
00:00:33.040 going on is we have a number of indigenous persons and their allies saying we're against
00:00:37.600 this pipeline project but the chiefs in that community who are against it are predominantly
00:00:42.960 the unelected hereditary chiefs and you've got a lot of elected members the majority of them saying
00:00:48.720 we support this project and a lot of people from the communities who support it now those nuances
00:00:54.160 weren't initially clear two years ago when this issue first rose to the forefront and unfortunately
00:01:00.160 what materialized in the press and the way people talked about the issue was a was a sort of us
00:01:05.120 versus them this very sort of binary dynamic where people said oh look we've got first nations people
00:01:11.200 indigenous people blocking railroads again and and obstructing resource projects oh look this is a
00:01:16.800 thing that first nations people do this isn't good for the broader economy at large and the us versus
00:01:22.000 them thing start to materialize but then when it became clear that the issue was more nuanced and
00:01:28.560 and come on the us versus them thing it's not healthy nobody wants it it doesn't help us move forward
00:01:33.600 when the nuances became clearer i think more people across the country realized hold on a second
00:01:40.240 the issue is more nuanced than this and there's there's a lot of folks in these communities who are saying
00:01:44.880 yes we want resource projects we want development in general because we want prosperity in our communities
00:01:50.960 we want to get the same sorts of projects going that other neighborhoods have we want jobs for
00:01:55.600 ourselves for our children we want opportunities we want strong communities strong education systems
00:02:00.560 and people looked at this and they thought no no no this is not us versus them at all this is this is
00:02:05.920 we because we have shared interests i mean these are people saying exactly the same things as we're
00:02:10.800 saying about our community and i saw a real kind of forging together of interests and i saw i saw people
00:02:17.600 really seeing themselves or at least their own aspirations in what they were seeing some of
00:02:22.320 these people in these communities these first nations communities call for i thought it was
00:02:26.240 really healthy that the us versus them was was going away and people were beginning to go yeah
00:02:31.680 let's start rooting for these communities more and i thought that was a really positive element to how
00:02:37.040 we start to discuss that issue because yes there are some people there against these projects but a lot
00:02:41.200 of people who are in support of them for reasons that deserve being heard ellis ross he's a former
00:02:47.040 chief of the heisland nation he's now running for the bc liberal leadership he was writing a piece in
00:02:51.280 the national post recently saying that leonardo dicaprio hey movie star guy don't just appropriate
00:02:57.200 this issue for your own ends don't claim you're speaking for all indigenous peoples please
00:03:01.520 look at the nuances of the issue because there's a whole lot of us who are in support of all of
00:03:06.160 that and i wish a lot of people sort of jumping on the bandwagon with this issue did appreciate
00:03:11.280 those nuances because i think it really helps us come together on these issues or at least
00:03:16.640 appreciate more various different dynamics going on in these neighborhoods it gets us away from the us
00:03:22.240 versus them and i think allows us to do more to really root for the success and prosperity of
00:03:27.600 everybody in these first nations communities so i saw that happening two years ago and i really hope and
00:03:33.200 i think people are seeing it this time because they're more aware of the nuances and and i think
00:03:38.000 that can only be a good thing