Modern Environmental Movement Mayhem
What if I was to say that I am critical of the modern environmental movement? Some would say “That's outrageous! After all who would be against preserving the earth?” I didn't say that I was against preserving the earth. I said I was critical of the modern environmental movement, key word “modern.” By that I mean the environmental movement of the last ten years, which is responsible for promoting the over-regulating of many areas of peoples lives. I am critical of it only because it has gone too far. I believe in the kind of conservation that involves practicing recycling. However the modern environmental movement has gone way beyond this and is responsible for influencing governments to impose many regulations on the practices of businesses and the practices of individuals within society as well as corporations. Canada is rich in natural resources and this potentially could pull our country out of all of our financial troubles. However, the government frequently blocks such initiatives. Consider the following cancelled natural resource projects.
$1.5 billion Ajax Copper Mine in B.C. – Cancelled
$20 billion Teck Frontier Oilsands mine in Alberta – Cancelled
$4.4 billion Black Thor Chromite mine in Ontario – Cancelled
$340 million Matoush Uranium mine in Quebec – Cancelled
$15 billion Energy East Pipeline from Alberta to New Brunswick –
Cancelled (taken from https://www.iedm.org/e-book-life-after-covid-whats-next-for-canada/)
Cancelling projects in Canada does not stop multinational companies from doing business. It just means that they won't do business with us. In February of 2020 the mining giant Teck Resources gave up on fighting for approval for their proposed $20 billion oil sands project. Instead Russia announced that same year a new oil project in the Arctic that is seven times larger than the cancelled oil sands project. (see https://www.iedm.org/e-book-life-after-covid-whats-next-for-canada/)
Many people today feel that such regulation constitutes the striping away of basic rights and freedoms and only drives up their own cost of living. It also gives governments excuses to impose new taxes such as carbon taxes. In challenging times such as we live in today the governments of our world should be doing what they can to free up people to use all of the resources that they can to support themselves and their families. Freeing people up means cutting back on laws, regulations, taxes etc. People are resourceful and would naturally find ways to support themselves and their families if only governments were not imposing so many controls, over-extracting from the public and over-reaching into the lives of their citizens. What is the justification given for this overreach? In many cases we are told that the reason for regulation is environmental conservation. Governments go further and say that we must act now to save our planet, leading us to believe we are in a state of environmental emergency. Governments go further and say that we are destroying the world and irreversibly over-warming the planet through our production of carbon emissions and greenhouse gasses. The bigger the emergency the more control needs to taken away from everyday people. The emergency message is pushed not only by the government but by the media and the education system.
Not everyone accepts this narrative. This subpage is here to scrutinize these claims.
Shawn Stevens