Rebel News Podcast - Medical Assistance in Death and Young, Depressed People with Climate Change Anxiety

00:00:00.000 Hello Rebels, you're listening to a free audio-only recording of my weekly Wednesday night show,

00:00:05.040 The Gun Show. Tonight my guest is Michelle Sterling from Friends of Science and we are

00:00:09.740 talking about a whole host of things including the push to depopulate the world to save us from

00:00:21.260 some sort of climate catastrophe. Now if you like listening to the show then I promise you're going

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00:01:22.760 Cancel culture climate change and medical assistance in dying. How do all these things

00:01:38.120 tie in together? Stay tuned and find out. I'm Sheila Gunn-Reed and you're watching The Gunn Show.

00:01:52.760 In 2018 a lawyer set himself on fire in a New York park to protest climate change. Now according

00:02:09.340 to the BBC article at the time a suicide note was found nearby and the deceased one David Buckle

00:02:16.080 wrote that he had immolated himself using fossil fuel to symbolize what he said was the damage that

00:02:23.900 human beings were doing to the earth. Buckle said that most people now breathed bad air and died

00:02:32.760 prematurely. Now to quote his suicide note directly he wrote pollution ravages our planet oozing

00:02:41.000 in habitability via air soil water and weather. My early death by fossil fuel reflects what we are

00:02:48.360 doing to ourselves. This is not new as many have chosen to live a life based on the view that no other

00:02:54.240 action can most meaningfully address the harm they see. Buckle's death in 2018 was indeed tragic.

00:03:03.800 A result I would suggest of the hopelessness and helplessness coupled with the sense of urgency

00:03:11.400 peddled by the climate change movement. You see I think it's creating dangerous anxiety

00:03:17.760 invulnerable sensitive people and now with medical assistance in death easier than ever to get especially

00:03:26.600 for young depressed people. I think it's going to become an easy way out for people who are suffering

00:03:34.120 this climate anxiety that society has infected them with and who are repeatedly told that humans are

00:03:41.280 an invasive species on the planet. Joining me tonight to discuss this very important issue from a very

00:03:47.800 personal perspective is my friend Michelle Sterling from Friends of Science but she's also joining me

00:03:54.300 to talk about a few other things as well including her very recent presentation at Danny Hozak's

00:04:02.060 Freedom Talk event in Lloydminster in an interview that we recorded yesterday morning and now this is

00:04:10.360 where future Sheila, me right now, corrects past Sheila's mistakes. In talking with Michelle yesterday

00:04:17.640 morning I said it was a virtual event, Danny Hozak's event, but it actually wasn't quite. Danny was

00:04:24.020 able to find a venue in Lloydminster that would host his event, so keep that in mind when you're

00:04:29.780 listening to me or watching me screw up that one detail in about 20 seconds from now. Take a listen.

00:04:37.700 Joining me now is my friend Michelle Sterling from Friends of Science and first of all there's a ton of

00:04:58.720 things that we need to talk about. There's so many things both on you know just climate change issues, political

00:05:04.620 issues, taxation issues, cancel culture, which more and more Friends of Science is becoming a victim of

00:05:11.280 and also the new medical assistance in dying legislation. Michelle has a very personal anecdote

00:05:17.820 that she would like to share. But first Michelle, I guess it would be, was it last week in the weekend

00:05:23.740 before our friend Danny Hozak hosted another Freedom Talk event, this one was virtual, but you had a talk

00:05:31.020 there about the carbon tax and how paying taxes to the government isn't going to change the weather.

00:05:39.180 Fancy that as an idea. Well in the virtual talk I talked about the the mandate of the Minister of

00:05:47.600 Climate Change and Environment. He has two mandate letters, Jonathan Wilkinson, and in in both of them

00:05:53.700 the Prime Minister acknowledged that we should use the best available science and evidence and that we

00:06:00.900 remain committed to evidence-based decision making that takes into consideration the impacts of policies

00:06:07.060 on all Canadians. So those are two really key points and it also notes in the letter from 2019 that

00:06:18.020 that that the Minister must be, you know, have humility and continue to acknowledge mistakes when we make them.

00:06:26.100 Canadians do not expect us to be perfect. They expect us to be diligent, honest, open and sincere in our efforts to serve

00:06:33.780 the public interest. And in the rest of my talk I go on to show that the best available science shows that we reached

00:06:42.020 peak carbon in 2019. And that doesn't mean there won't be any more emissions, but it does mean that we're

00:06:49.380 not on any kind of catastrophic trend. And the problem is that there's this set of scenarios that's been used

00:06:59.460 over and over again in the climate world called representative concentration pathways, RCP. And so there's like the

00:07:08.980 RCP 8.5, there's 6.0, 4.5, and 2.6. And this is the one that people keep saying is the business as usual one,

00:07:20.820 which is not true. And Roger Pielke Jr. and Justin Ritchie out of BC have done an analysis of thousands of

00:07:29.620 papers on Google Scholar showing that this catastrophic scenario is the one most referred to. But in fact the

00:07:37.860 reality is that our emissions is more down here already. This is the track that we're on. And the very problematic part of this,

00:07:48.500 and this is also associated with my conversation later about MAID, is these other scenarios, they're not comparable to this,

00:07:57.460 because these other scenarios have 3 billion fewer people in the equation, which might lead some people to think that we should

00:08:07.380 depopulate the earth to save the planet. I want you to think very, very carefully about that, everyone, because this is what the

00:08:17.380 finance community is looking at. This is what banks are looking at. This is what pension funds are looking at. And they want to get down here to net zero. And

00:08:27.380 zero. And that means for some of those people, they think more people should be gone from this planet.

00:08:37.380 And really, when these people say more people should be gone from this planet, they don't mean them, their friends, their yachting

00:08:45.380 buddies, they mean people like you and me.

00:08:47.380 Well, you know, people have become dispensable now that sort of the great reset viewpoint that artificial intelligence will take over that people will be redundant, that all these jobs will disappear because robots can do them.

00:09:03.380 And that, you know, and that, you know, and that, you know, many of the people who we all value, the people we love, who may be

00:09:11.380 difficult people, they may be in difficult circumstances, they may be elderly, they may have dementia, they might be vulnerable people, they might be quite sick.

00:09:23.380 So, you know, these kind of mechanical computations about who should be on the planet would say, theoretically, they should not be on the planet, they're just useless consumers of material goods that the elite would prefer for themselves.

00:09:43.380 So there are very, very deep philosophical and religious and spiritual issues associated now with climate change, and with the great reset.

00:09:55.380 You know, I'm glad that you use the word religious, because there's a certain religious fervor that comes along with the proponents of limiting the amount of people who are allowed to be born and who are allowed to live on the face of the earth.

00:10:12.380 To deal with climate change, because it does have its own very distinct set of values that are incompatible with mine, that's for sure.

00:10:21.380 And, you know, we are treated as human beings, by, you know, that that side of the argument, as though we are an invasive species doing something terrible to the earth, by producing carbon dioxide, which takes me to Bill C12,

00:10:41.380 which you talked about a little bit in your talk at Freedom Talk, because that's the pursuit of net zero emissions.

00:10:50.380 And it's going to be legislated now instead of just a goal.

00:10:55.380 And we're not seeing a lot of pushback from the conservative side of the aisle on this.

00:11:00.380 In fact, a lot of the language we see, Erin O'Toole, using this net zero language also.

00:11:07.380 Yes, well, Bill C12 is something that's been promoted by the major environmental law groups in Canada and environmental groups.

00:11:18.380 The main groups behind it are CANRAC, which is a group, a network of over 100 ENGOs in Canada and unions.

00:11:29.380 Equitair, Pembina Institute, Ecojustice and West Coast Environmental Law.

00:11:36.380 In addition to the people behind it, there's a letter from 28 law professors from various universities.

00:11:43.380 Five of those professors are from the U of C, who have been promoting this climate accountability law.

00:11:50.380 And so that's what Bill C12 is really all about is trying to force the government to make a law that they have to meet these targets.

00:11:59.380 Now, the rationale for this is that over the past 30 years, Canada has not met any of its proposed Kyoto or Paris Agreement targets.

00:12:09.380 And there's quite a good reason for that. First of all, there is no technology that would allow us to go to net zero.

00:12:18.380 But in the meantime, we've increased our population 37 percent in that time.

00:12:25.380 But you'll find that we're pretty much flat lined in terms of growth of greenhouse gas emissions.

00:12:32.380 So that's actually a good thing. Like people should be rejoicing and saying, wow, look at that 37 percent more people who need transportation, a house, food, heating in winter, lighting so that they can read and do their zoom calls.

00:12:47.380 And yet we hardly grew any emissions whatsoever. We must be way more efficient in Canada. Fantastic.

00:12:54.380 But no, they want to impose this law. And this will, first of all, will allow the government to then justify the horribly intrusive and detrimental laws and implications that would come from this law.

00:13:13.380 Because they'd say, oh, well, if we don't make you people poor, then we're going to be in court with these law ENGOs. 0.98

00:13:21.380 And it also is kind of like expanded ambulance chasing for these ENGOs.

00:13:28.380 You know, it gives them complete opportunity to take the government or perhaps any individual or company to court any day of the week saying, well, no, no, no, you know, you didn't meet your climate accountability requirements.

00:13:41.380 Therefore, we're going to sue you. So the ultimate in ENGO ambulance chasing.

00:13:48.380 But I discussed some of the practical outcomes of this at Freedom Talk.

00:13:55.380 And these come from Robert Lyman, who was a public servant for 27 years and a diplomat for 10 years.

00:14:02.380 And some of the things that Robert indicated would happen, the Canadian dollar might go to 60 cents.

00:14:09.380 The cost of a house would have $100,000 added to it.

00:14:15.380 The price of diesel, gasoline, propane would double or triple.

00:14:21.380 Electricity prices would double or triple.

00:14:24.380 There would be more blackouts and brownouts. 1.00

00:14:27.380 Life would become pretty much intolerable for ordinary people.

00:14:32.380 Very, very expensive.

00:14:35.380 And there would be mass migration from Alberta because most of the oil and gas production in Canada would have to be shut down.

00:14:44.380 As would all of the big manufacturing industries like steel, cement, any of these, some of the mining industries.

00:14:54.380 So it's ironic that on the one hand, we have Minister Reagan saying, oh, look, we're going to be a world leader in mining, which is a very intensive emissions operation.

00:15:07.380 And on the other hand, trying to implement this law that would basically shut down all mining.

00:15:12.380 So, you know, that's kind of a long diatribe on my part, but it's a very serious bill with serious implications.

00:15:21.380 And the Paris Agreement is entirely voluntary.

00:15:24.380 We are doing this to ourselves.

00:15:26.380 You know, it is an act of national suicide, actually.

00:15:30.380 Well, and that's the thing.

00:15:33.380 It was voluntary, but this looks to legislate it into law, really, and put hard targets on things.

00:15:39.380 And so I know what the Liberals are all about.

00:15:43.380 I expect the Conservatives to sort of stand in the way of all those things.

00:15:47.380 So when back when the vote was whipped by the Conservative Party for them to support the Paris Accord, I was outraged at the time.

00:16:00.380 And they said, oh, no, no, Sheila, don't worry.

00:16:02.380 These are simply voluntary targets.

00:16:06.380 Yeah, they were at the time.

00:16:08.380 But now how do you oppose them when they're written into law, when you stood up and whipped your caucus into supporting them when they were just voluntary targets?

00:16:16.380 You can't have it both ways.

00:16:18.380 Either you agree with these targets or you don't.

00:16:21.380 And it sounds to me like they do.

00:16:23.380 And ultimately, at the end of the day, as you rightly point out, it is Alberta, as it always tends to be, that ends up on the receiving end of these bad ideas. 0.85

00:16:32.380 Well, we'll have the biggest hit from them.

00:16:35.380 But honestly, you know, Robert Lyman has another report about Climate and Rural Canada that was issued a couple of years ago.

00:16:42.380 And he talks about the Aluminier factory in Quebec and two other big operations there.

00:16:52.380 There's an iron ore operation, which I don't remember the name.

00:16:55.380 Anyway, I can send you that information.

00:16:58.380 And those will be hit, too.

00:17:00.380 And these are our operations and industries that serve a very large community of rural workers who won't have jobs and there won't be other options for them.

00:17:15.380 So it's going to hit Alberta worst, partly because we're landlocked, partly because oil and gas is a big sector, partly because agriculture is a big sector.

00:17:26.380 And, but it's going to hit everything in Canada.

00:17:31.380 And for no benefit.

00:17:32.380 You know, that's another thing that I showed in my presentation, that if, this is from Bjorn Lomberg, if all of the countries met all of their targets, you know, the resulting reduction in warming would be 17 one hundredths of a degree Celsius.

00:17:50.380 And it would cost one to two trillion dollars a year.

00:17:54.380 So, obviously, this is just a money laundering scheme for green cronies and has really nothing to do with the environment and everything to do with turning you into a carbon surf.

00:18:07.380 You know, that's something I really feel like I should put on a t-shirt.

00:18:13.380 It's carbon surf.

00:18:15.380 Yeah.

00:18:16.380 Something that maybe friends of science should consider.

00:18:19.380 We have a video and report.

00:18:24.380 It's slightly outdated, but still the principles are true, called carbon kleptomania.

00:18:29.380 Because as we've seen already, once you implement a carbon tax, government just can't keep its hands off it.

00:18:37.380 And there's ever more reasons why they can come up with, oh, well, we know, we know we said it would never go above fifty dollars, but now it's going to go up to one hundred and seventy.

00:18:47.380 And there's nothing you can do about it because we're the government.

00:18:50.380 Yeah.

00:18:51.380 Yeah.

00:18:52.380 Although, you know, if we go back to the minister's mandate, it says that he should use the best available science and evidence.

00:18:59.380 And we found, I just showed you that actually they've been on the wrong track using this RCP 8.5 as business as usual.

00:19:07.380 He also says in the mandate letter that we should make, you know, be willing to admit our mistakes and that we have to defend the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and consider the impact on all Canadians.

00:19:20.380 So, you know, that's not being done.

00:19:23.380 And I think that we should call the minister to account on these very elements that are in his mandate letters from the prime minister.

00:19:32.380 I agree with you.

00:19:33.380 But then who holds him to account?

00:19:35.380 Justin Trudeau?

00:19:36.380 I mean, really?

00:19:38.380 Well, it's the prime minister's letter.

00:19:40.380 Yes.

00:19:41.380 So we should hold them both to account.

00:19:42.380 Definitely.

00:19:43.380 I agree with you.

00:19:44.380 You mentioned Robert Lyman once already, but as you rightly point out, while the Western world pursues net zero economies, the developing world is developing.

00:20:00.380 And that is a very carbon intensive thing.

00:20:03.380 And I'm glad that they're developing.

00:20:05.380 And Robert Lyman's new report, The Real World of Greenhouse Gas Emissions, rightly points out that 60% of the world population is from a developing nation where they are completely ignoring Paris targets.

00:20:21.380 And I'm happy they are because I think everybody should live in some form of health and prosperity.

00:20:27.380 Yes.

00:20:28.380 Well, his latest report is called When Giants Arise.

00:20:32.380 And then you read the subtitle, which is correct, that, you know, the giants are really South Asia, that being China, all of the smaller nations associated with the Asian region, and India.

00:20:45.380 And I believe in Robert Lyman's report, promises versus performance, up to 2019, China's emissions had grown 28%, and India's had grown 69%.

00:21:02.380 So, you know, there's massive growth in these areas where they have, you know, a couple of billion people, most of whom don't have central heating, central lighting, central sanitation facilities, pumped water.

00:21:18.380 So, these nations are not going to stand by and play climate change bingo, you know, with the West, they're going to forge ahead and create their own new societies.

00:21:31.380 While we, you know, dicker with each other about whether or not we're going to impose a carbon tax here or a climate accountability law there.

00:21:40.380 So, we'll be crushed and broke, and they will be surging ahead, because they are giants, and we are nothing.

00:21:50.380 So, this actually makes the whole climate conversation totally absurd.

00:21:55.380 Just the report, you see how absurd it all is.

00:21:59.380 Right.

00:22:00.380 It's been over half of the world's population is saying, no, no thanks to these ideas.

00:22:06.380 How do we just say, okay, well, we're just going to shut down our economies and hope that that's enough to offset the immense growth that's happening in the developing world? 1.00

00:22:18.380 It doesn't make any sense.

00:22:19.380 Right.

00:22:20.380 And some people might say, well, no, you know, China and India were signed on to the Paris Agreement.

00:22:25.380 So did other countries.

00:22:26.380 That's true.

00:22:27.380 They did.

00:22:28.380 And why?

00:22:29.380 Because the West said to them, you know what?

00:22:30.380 They got you a check every year for $100 billion from our pockets to you with no accountability.

00:22:37.380 You can do anything you want with it.

00:22:39.380 And again, this is kind of a money laundering scheme, because what the actual idea is that, okay, we'll give you money, but you buy our wind turbines.

00:22:47.380 You know, actually, the late Professor Dr. Istan Marco wrote a great post one time, which is on our blog in French and English, where he compared it to a climate trade fair.

00:23:01.380 That's what all these cops are about.

00:23:04.380 So, you know, you go to the cop, the conference of the parties, the climate conference, and Germany, for instance, would say, boy, India, you should really get into renewables.

00:23:16.380 And India says, well, we don't have any money.

00:23:18.380 And they go, well, we'll give you $2 billion, but you have to buy our wind farm.

00:23:24.380 You know, so this is what it's like.

00:23:27.380 It's this horse trading, money laundering thing that does nothing for the climate.

00:23:32.380 And, you know, it's just scaring people to death here in terms of children and many of the climate activists, you know, they're terrified that the world will end when it's really this commercial transaction happening in the background.

00:23:46.380 Terrible.

00:23:47.380 And I think we've seen the end sustainability of green energy when it runs up against Mother Nature unfolding in Texas.

00:23:58.380 When Texas got swamped with a snowstorm, they lost power, they lost heating.

00:24:05.380 Grocery stores were losing enormous amounts of food, even if you could get to food, because the electricity was down and their freezers were failing.

00:24:16.380 And from what I understand, a lot of that had to do with not Texas policies, because they're obviously pro-energy.

00:24:24.380 But during the Obama years, green energy companies were incentivized to build onto the grid.

00:24:31.380 And it made the grid unreliable, as we've seen in Texas.

00:24:34.380 Now, on a day-to-day basis, you don't necessarily, when things are good, it's good.

00:24:41.380 But that's not when you really need electricity.

00:24:44.380 You need it when things are bad and it failed there.

00:24:47.380 That's right.

00:24:48.380 And, well, first of all, Texas had the most subsidies ever for wind.

00:24:54.380 And those subsidies came from all taxpayers in the US.

00:25:01.380 And Texas also shut down three coal plants.

00:25:05.380 And, you know, you have to plan for the worst scenario and you have to have reserve power that's sufficient to stand those tests.

00:25:15.380 And a lot of things that had happened, they started electrifying, you know, decarbonizing homes and decarbonizing some of the pumps for some of the natural gas and such like by using electricity.

00:25:27.380 So, you know, when you have a power drop and a cold temperature moves in, you know, cold front moves in, of course, everyone's going to turn up their power and draw more electricity, which puts more strain on the grid.

00:25:40.380 And if you don't have those backup reserves of reliable power, dispatchable power, you know, power that you can turn up and say, okay, we need more coal power, we need more nuclear, we need more natural gas.

00:25:52.380 If you don't have that reserve available, then things fall apart.

00:25:59.380 And wind had been like actually a very great performer for Texas for a long time.

00:26:04.380 But there is a graph showing that there was a drop off of 40% wind, which was taken up by the natural gas supply right after that.

00:26:13.380 But that kind of immediate loss is very hard on grid stability.

00:26:19.380 And there are some reports saying that whatever the grid managers did at the time saved them from going to total blackout.

00:26:28.380 Like I think it's called a black start operation, very hard to get the grid back up again, if you ever encounter that. 1.00

00:26:35.380 So, you know, this is catastrophic for Western society to have that level of unreliability.

00:26:44.380 Yeah, yeah, in an energy rich state.

00:26:47.380 I think that's the scariest part is that's how, you know, like you would think, you know, something hits Texas, they're going to be fine.

00:26:55.380 But when you insert this unreliability into a completely reliable grid, I mean, the ramifications are devastating.

00:27:05.380 Yeah, well, you can look at Venezuela, a very similar thing happened there.

00:27:09.380 Yeah, they didn't keep their conventional power up to snuff.

00:27:12.380 They had problems with the anemia, or sorry, the anzo.

00:27:16.380 In the drop of water in the dam, they started losing energy, they started going to a four day week, three day week, because they didn't have enough electrical power, and then everything fell apart.

00:27:31.380 So, and that's one of those, that's the richest oil state in the world.

00:27:37.380 So, it can happen anywhere, it can happen here.

00:27:40.380 Now, you mentioned very briefly about this sort of fear and climate anxiety that people are experiencing, and we've seen articles written, I think in The Guardian and in some other places, about this growing climate anxiety in young children.

00:27:57.380 So, if it's festering in young children, obviously it's being transmitted to them, they're being infected by the adults around them.

00:28:04.380 And one of the things I like about the Friends of Science YouTube page is you sort of do things to alleviate the anxiety, telling people to step back, calm down, let's look at the facts, it's not as scary as it really is.

00:28:18.380 And you actually had a poster that was accepted to, I'll let you tell the whole story, but it was, you became a victim of cancel culture, because your poster that talked about this idea of anxiety and fear around the climate, it was squashed, and I guess it was because of the topic, I think.

00:28:43.380 Well, it's hard to know exactly why it was cancelled.

00:28:48.380 What happened is, last spring, the Canadian Mental Health Association for Alberta proposed a conference that would have been in November of this past year.

00:28:58.380 And it's about working together, and it was about workplace resiliency, it was about inclusion, it was about looking at people who might be feeling suicidal on the job, how to address that, providing some skills along the way.

00:29:14.080 So I proposed a topic that was about indoctrination and delegitimization about the Alberta, particularly the Alberta oil sands workforce and related supply chain, where, you know, people not only had a tremendous job loss in a very short period of time, and all the other socioeconomic conditions that go with that, which may be divorce, financial stress, bankruptcy, and sadly, suicide.

00:29:44.080 But they also are being delegitimized by the tar sands campaign, you know, the tar sands campaign is very successfully driven a rift between sort of the green people of Canada, and the real hands on energy workers of Canada.

00:30:02.560 So not only are they losing their jobs, they're continuing to be humiliated by people who call them, you know, dirty tar sands workers, or, you know, that's a retirement field, there's nobody uses fossil fuels anymore, when the evidence is completely to the contrary.

00:30:21.640 So that was the proposal that, you know, we should recognize that the tar sands campaign has layered this humiliation on top of these very real losses of jobs and such like.

00:30:34.920 So the, they didn't accept the option of a paper, but they did accept the option of a poster, and so I put together a poster, and it was accepted.

00:30:49.060 And the day before the conference, I looked online, there it was, there are five posters there, mine was the fifth, and the day of the conference, it was gone.

00:30:57.640 So I asked the organizer to please repost it.

00:31:02.940 There was silence for a while, and to her credit, she did write back and say, yes, there was some controversy about your poster, so we had to take it down.

00:31:10.400 And, and I thought, you know, honest to God, they don't know that thousands of people in Alberta, who work in this industry, are suffering deeply, not only from job loss, but from being ostracized.

00:31:25.840 And being ostracized on false claims, in addition, of climate change.

00:31:32.000 You know, Bill McGibbon just had an interview with Linda Solomon Wood of the National Observer, and he called the oil sands a carbon bomb, which is baloney.

00:31:43.980 And Bill McGibbon's not an engineer, he's not a geoscientist, he's not a scientist or a climate scientist of any kind.

00:31:50.580 He's an activist who's been funded by the Rockefellers, and they're running, if you've read the Nemeth reports, they're, you know, part and parcel of this huge anti-fossil fuel movement in the world, transnational progressive movement.

00:32:08.220 But they have no idea how the world works, the world runs on energy.

00:32:14.240 And so, you know, it was really a shock to me, that an organization that proposes to help people, to alleviate the suffering of people who may be suicidal, who are suffering bankruptcy, who are being humiliated or bullied by the world, which Alberta is, and who claim to be inclusive, cut me out.

00:32:38.240 When I was defending the people of Alberta, I think it's really, actually, I think it's sick.

00:32:44.960 I think that they need help.

00:32:46.900 It's true.

00:32:48.120 I mean, we've all heard stories about the devastation in the Alberta coal mines, the, you know, the grief of the workers, knowing that their jobs are ending simply because of a government policy.

00:33:02.660 We've seen the spikes in suicides in towns like Hannah, and, you know, to completely cut them out of the equation, because the industry they work for has been demonized, the way you rightly point out, how does that help them?

00:33:16.580 If that's truly your concern, is to help people having mental health challenges and suicide, how does it help them if you completely disregard their suffering based on the jobs that they do?

00:33:29.400 Right. And this goes back to a book by Maria Hoda and her colleagues back in the 1930s called Marienthal, which was a town in Austria.

00:33:41.020 You know, this kind of socioeconomic research on job loss goes back to that time when she went to this town of Marienthal where the entire town, it was a factory town, the entire town lost their jobs.

00:33:54.100 And she and her colleagues studied the effects of this on the population, it was devastating.

00:34:01.040 And that's the same kind of thing that many Albertans experience today.

00:34:05.920 And it's not just within the family that lost the job, you know, it's the whole extended families, the children, it's when children go to school, and they're mocked and, and accused of being planet killers, because their parents work in oil or gas or oil sands.

00:34:21.160 You know, this is a terrible, terrible thing that's happening to a great province and a great people.

00:34:28.000 Well, I think that's a great place for us to move into, I guess, a personal story that you shared with me that you're willing to share with everybody else.

00:34:36.580 And that is with regard to medical assistance in dying.

00:34:40.860 That's the latest Bill C-7.

00:34:43.860 And the liberals have shoehorned a bunch of really terrible things into this legislation.

00:34:50.080 People with mental illness can now seek medical assistance in dying.

00:34:54.540 It sounds like minors now can seek this without the consent of their parents, very little family involvement.

00:35:03.800 And you have a personal story about this.

00:35:06.780 And so, you know, when we were talking off camera, I found your concerns very compelling, because this is something that your family has gone through.

00:35:16.220 Yes, my late brother, Glenn Sterling, was a very well-known chiropractor in Alberta and British Columbia.

00:35:25.320 And he was a health and fitness buff all his life.

00:35:31.500 He was a marathon runner, ultra marathon runner.

00:35:35.520 He helped thousands of people to have better health.

00:35:40.120 And in 2016, he had been working overseas and he returned home.

00:35:45.640 And we knew that there was something wrong with him.

00:35:50.020 He often would fall down.

00:35:51.980 He looked like he had a stroke.

00:35:54.340 You know, he was quite impassive in his face.

00:35:59.940 But we didn't know what was wrong.

00:36:01.500 So he went through a number of tests and we found that he was suffering from what's called PSP, parasupranuclear palsy, a progressive parasupranuclear palsy, which is a very aggressive form of Parkinson's, a cousin of Parkinson's.

00:36:21.480 So, at the time, medical assistance in dying or MAID, as it's called, had just become part of the legislation in Alberta.

00:36:33.180 And he ultimately opted for that.

00:36:37.200 But before that, I want to say that Alberta Health Services offered him the best care ever.

00:36:43.900 They gave him a very, probably a 12-week program, I think it was, at the Schumer Center, where they taught him some balance techniques.

00:36:55.880 They worked with him on, like, occupational therapy.

00:36:59.900 They had a social worker there who met with him and with the family members to try and help him address these issues of declining health.

00:37:11.320 But ultimately, he just didn't want to go on.

00:37:13.900 He was falling down more and more.

00:37:15.560 It became, oh, we had also great, great neuroscientists and doctors at the Foothills Hospital.

00:37:22.560 So he was falling down more and more.

00:37:24.600 He was very humiliated because his gait was quite staggered.

00:37:28.080 His speech was slurred.

00:37:29.320 So often he would get kicked out of the store because they thought that he was drunk when he was not.

00:37:34.100 And he couldn't even defend himself because he couldn't speak properly anymore.

00:37:38.300 So he opted for MAID.

00:37:40.660 He requested MAID.

00:37:42.160 But that was no guarantee that he would get it.

00:37:45.880 So we had to go through many counseling sessions with social workers, with psychologists, with the physician who agreed to assist him in dying.

00:37:58.860 And all along the way, the intent was to help him live.

00:38:04.360 The intent was to verify whether or not he actually really wanted this or was he being coerced in some way or could he find another way forward?

00:38:13.960 They all wanted to help him live, is my point.

00:38:16.700 And once the system had concluded a number of these meetings, many of these meetings, you know, they recognized it.

00:38:26.800 No, he actually really didn't want to live like this anymore.

00:38:29.780 And they granted him the medical assistance in dying, and they gave him a very, very dignified death.

00:38:37.280 And I was there with him.

00:38:44.200 And I have to say it's somewhat contrary to the human desire.

00:38:52.380 You always want someone to live.

00:38:53.860 But I understood that he wanted to die.

00:38:57.180 And my concern now is that in a time of COVID, when people are very lonely and isolated, when they can't actually go and meet with physicians and all these counselors, when we're strapped for cash,

00:39:12.540 when many people are now being deemed to be quite inconvenient by the medical system, I'm not saying the health care providers, but say the insurance companies, pension plans, the people who have to pay the tab.

00:39:28.140 I think that it will just be a very convenient way to push people off a cliff.

00:39:32.980 And they'll never have the kind of care and attention that my brother had.

00:39:36.060 And that's my concern, is that, you know, we really don't have the money to do that kind of detailed work with people anymore.

00:39:45.340 So I can imagine in a nursing home where someone will say, well, we have Jazzercise next week on Tuesday.

00:39:52.520 And oh, by the way, the doctor's coming in to do MAID on Thursday.

00:39:55.920 Would you like me to sign you up?

00:39:58.260 I mean, that sounds very crass and cruel.

00:40:00.440 But when you look at what's happened in Belgium and Holland, where medical assistance in dying has become quite accessible,

00:40:10.740 I was telling you the story that Rachel Aviv wrote in The New Yorker called The Death Treatment.

00:40:16.600 And it's about how this woman who was probably in her 60s, empty nester, and had suffered from mild depression all her life, but had been functional and no huge suffering.

00:40:32.920 Somehow she encountered a therapist who convinced her that she should do herself in and take medical assistance in dying.

00:40:40.300 The family was not brought in to talk with her.

00:40:42.640 The son got an email saying, by the way, you know, your mom's dead, and here's why.

00:40:50.280 After the fact, of course.

00:40:52.520 So it's a very slippery slope.

00:40:55.240 I think it's a terrible, terrible initiative.

00:40:58.800 And, you know, we just celebrated or celebrated, we just recognized death of vulnerable persons by their caregivers about two weeks ago.

00:41:09.360 So just imagine now with MAID, where someone who's in a position where they have few finances, little social support, little health care support, could very easily coerce a vulnerable person into making this choice.

00:41:26.480 You know, Michelle, you've never shared that story with me before, but it sure does explain the tone of some of the videos over on the Friends of Science Facebook page or on the YouTube page where you are telling people, calm down.

00:41:44.380 It's not that bad.

00:41:45.680 The world isn't going to end.

00:42:15.660 Because I think there are people out there who are doing great work to help people during their darkest times.

00:42:23.080 And I think for many people, right now is their darkest time.

00:42:27.020 Yes, it is.

00:42:27.800 There's joblessness.

00:42:28.900 There's isolation.

00:42:30.020 We've heard stories of grandparents who are isolated in these facilities opting for MAID because they're so isolated and alone.

00:42:39.980 And it's just, you know, I think there are people working hard every day, hearing the stories of people on the other end of a suicide hotline.

00:42:49.540 Why aren't we trying to help people in their darkest times instead of agreeing that there is no better days ahead?

00:42:56.500 I think it's just a terrible message to send to society.

00:42:59.060 Right, and, you know, there is a Quebec politician who has even suggested within the past year that, you know, if people are concerned about climate change, then they should take themselves out.

00:43:10.760 You know, they should have the right to this kind of medical assistance in dying.

00:43:15.760 Like, that's absurd.

00:43:16.760 That's horrible.

00:43:17.460 Because now we have a generation of children who've been, you know, beaten on the head that you don't have a future, only 12 years left.

00:43:26.260 That's baloney.

00:43:27.200 That's just not true at all. 1.00

00:43:29.120 Again, it's going back to your stupid, you know, RCP 8.5, we're all going to die graph. 1.00

00:43:35.660 And the reality is down here. 1.00

00:43:38.040 This is the reality.

00:43:39.340 We're not going to get there.

00:43:40.720 So, you know, you have children who already, and young adults who already face many challenges in life.

00:43:49.060 Thinking of this dystopian future, you know, why even go on?

00:43:55.700 Because if I'm not going to get to be an adult, because I only have 12 years left, why not end it all now?

00:44:00.660 Well, you know, the way that this bill is written and the way the slippery slope is, some of these kids might end up being victims of this bill.

00:44:09.080 So, you know, and I mean, a case like my brother's, where somebody is obviously terminally ill, and they're not going to be able to be helped.

00:44:19.940 You know, there are many people who would say, well, that's a fair choice.

00:44:25.860 You know, others would reject it because of faith reasons.

00:44:30.640 But I think that it can be valid, because I know that my brother didn't want to go on.

00:44:35.920 But honestly, for a young person, you know, to be caught in this drama of a dystopian future, and God forbid that Greta ever becomes like the Pied Piper of Hamlet.

00:44:48.660 You know, this is what I foresee as the risk to society.

00:44:52.260 It's a dark place to end the show, Michelle, but you are trying to shine a light on where all of this goes, this idea of humans as this invasive species that the world is going to end.

00:45:06.680 You do a lot to break that down and calm some of those fears and anxiety.

00:45:12.280 So, how do people support the very important work that you're doing to take the hysteria out of the conversation?

00:45:23.160 Well, on Friends of Science's main website, there is a membership and a donate button.

00:45:28.880 You can also share any of our videos or our reports on your social media.

00:45:34.340 We're on all social media except TikTok, so maybe we'll be there one day.

00:45:43.380 But, you know, just a pitch in, and we don't want you to agree with us.

00:45:49.220 We want you to be willing to open the debate.

00:45:52.460 That's it.

00:45:52.900 We're looking for open civil debate and full cost benefit analysis.

00:45:57.300 And we're looking for the minister to actually stand by his mandate, according to these letters, that uses evidence-based decision-making to take into consideration the impacts of policies on all Canadians and fully defend the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

00:46:15.580 And that Canadians do not expect us to be perfect, they expect us to be diligent, honest, open, and sincere in our efforts to serve the public interest.

00:46:27.680 So, I think that we should hold the minister and the prime minister to account on those things.

00:46:34.180 I do too, Michelle.

00:46:35.280 Michelle, I'm sorry to leave on such a sad note, but, again, I think it is such important work that you're doing to inject facts into this conversation that is so overwhelmed by gloom and doom and anxiety and fear.

00:46:53.100 Michelle, we'll have you back on the show again real soon.

00:46:55.740 I can send you our climate song, which came from Europe, and it offers a cheerful note.

00:47:03.140 So, maybe you can put that at the end of the show.

00:47:05.280 I would love that.

00:47:06.400 Thank you so much, Michelle.

00:47:07.980 Thank you, Gina.

00:47:08.600 Thank you.

00:47:35.280 tuning in in

00:47:37.280 No one's fool.

00:47:43.200 So be on the right team. 0.73

00:47:45.240 Don't go away the mainstream.

00:47:47.600 Hey! 0.99

00:47:49.660 When searching the truth.

00:47:51.400 Changing your mind

00:47:54.760 And be that one for the future

00:47:58.240 Hey, hey, you can change your mind

00:48:03.240 And find out what's really going on

00:48:08.400 Hey, we'll be fine

00:48:11.920 Don't swim in the sea of confusion

00:48:15.580 Hey, hey, so don't be scared

00:48:20.640 Don't think just an illusion

00:48:24.820 Hey, hey

00:48:28.320 La-na-na-na 0.99

00:48:30.560 La-na-na-na-na 0.99

00:48:33.520 La-na-na-na 0.99

00:48:37.120 La-na-na-na 0.99

00:48:39.320 La-na-na-na 0.99

00:48:50.640 Thanks everybody for hanging in there

00:48:54.680 And I realize the show today went a little longer than it normally does

00:48:59.280 But I thought that it was very important to hear Michelle's very personal perspective on medical assistance in dying having gone through the entire process from beginning to end in the past with her brother.

00:49:14.380 I worry that people with anxiety, this anxiety that society has infected them with, are not going to get the real help that they need to go on.

00:49:26.860 Well, everybody, that's the show for tonight. Thank you so much for tuning in. I'll see everybody back here or maybe not back here in the same time next week.

00:49:37.740 And remember, don't let the government tell you that you've had too much to think.

Rebel News Podcast - March 18, 2021

Medical Assistance in Death and Young, Depressed People with Climate Change Anxiety

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