• About
    • Which Energy Mix is this?
  • Climate News Network Archive
  • Contact
Celebrating our 1,000th edition. The climate news you need
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
No Result
View All Result
  FEATURED
Soaring Fertilizer Prices Could Deliver ‘Silver Lining’ For Emissions, But Farmers Struggle to Limit Use June 26, 2022
BREAKING: UN Nature Summit, the ‘Paris Conference for Biodiversity’, Moves to Montreal in December June 19, 2022
‘LET’S SUE BIG OIL’: Legal Team Launches Class Action Campaign for B.C. Municipalities June 17, 2022
‘It Could Have Been Any of Us’, Colleague Says, After Brazil Confirms Murders of Bruno Pereira, Dom Phillips June 17, 2022
Infrastructure Gap a ‘Life and Death’ Matter as Northern Canada Warms June 17, 2022
Next
Prev
Home Jurisdictions Canada

Green-Themed Christmas Pageant Triggers Outrage in Saskatchewan Oil Town

January 9, 2020
Reading time: 5 minutes
Primary Author: Gaye Taylor

Santa Goes Green/Facebook

Santa Goes Green/Facebook

15
SHARES
 

The angry backlash against a green-themed Christmas pageant at a small-town Saskatchewan public school revealed the fear-filled defensiveness produced by a precarious western Canadian fossil economy—while offering unsettling proof of the “social power” Big Oil holds over vulnerable people still dependent on the industry for a paycheque.

Having made the rounds in public schools across North America for the last 10 years, Santa Goes Green, the Musical may have seemed like an innocent choice to teachers at Oxbow Prairie Horizons public school, with songs like Recycle the Fruitcake certain to raise some laughs.

But oilpatch worker Mike Gunderman, whose daughter performed at the event, was not amused, registering his anger in a Facebook post that garnered more than 650 shares within a few short hours of its publication.

Invoking “the state of our industry,” Gunderman called the concert “a kick in the groin to those who are employed by it.” While stressing that his comments were not directed at the children, who “smiled and sang and had fun,” he insisted the theme of the concert was “the wrong message to send at the wrong time of the season,” especially given how much the oil and gas industry “is suffering right now”.

Particularly offensive to many of Gunderman’s online supporters was a song titled “Turn Off the Pump,” whose opening line urges listeners to “turn off the pump and plug in the sleigh,” noted public radio 650 CKOM Saskatoon. That the song goes on to celebrate the new-fangled sleigh as a Prius that runs at least part-time on “clean burning gas” was likely cold comfort to those in Oxbow, Saskatchewan, where local jobs depend on the pumpjacks remaining in operation.

Facing a torrent of criticism in the hours and days following the show, Oxbow school trustees were quick to insist that no offence had been intended, and especially that there had been no political agenda at work behind the scenes, CBC reports. Board Chair Audrey Trombley said the Santa Goes Green score—which also included songs titled The Greenhouse Effect and Power to the People—had been chosen because the music is up-tempo with a fun rhythm, and thus enjoyable for kids.

Trombley said the school division is “very supportive” of the oil and gas industry and expressed particular appreciation for “the work being done by the industry in the province”.

The speed and force with which the board jumped to assert good will towards Big Oil raised flags with University of Regina geography and environmental studies professor Emily Eaton, co-author of a recent paper for the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives titled Crude Lessons: Fossil Fuel Industry Influence on Environmental Education in Saskatchewan. She told CBC the board’s rapid acceleration into damage control showed just how much “social power” the fossil industry wields in the province, a transparently political assertion of influence she said many educators find troubling.

The teachers she interviewed for her study “are always trying to find a balance between teaching the effects of the oil and gas industry without being too critical,” Eaton added. “They’re all very much afraid of the broader power the industry has in their communities and the influence that has on parents.”

Alberta’s teachers may likewise be feeling a chill in the wake of several recent incidents where social studies curriculum completely in line with established provincial standards ignited controversy. A week before the Oxbow incident, a school in Blackfalds, Alberta was forced to cancel its Christmas dance, and call the RCMP, after parents began issuing threatening social media posts about a Grade 4 social studies assignment. The teacher had instructed students to view, then critically analyse two videos on the tar sands/oil sands, one from the province and one from Greenpeace. In another case, the provincial education minister agreed that a Grade 10 social studies test was “anti-oil and gas,” and therefore inappropriate for the curriculum.

“I’ve taught Grade 10 social studies more than a dozen times,” wrote Cochrane-based teacher Brianna Sharpe in response. “These test questions correspond with the curriculum, which requires students to explore multiple perspectives on issues such as resource development and to identify points of view.” She added that the current curriculum was created in 2005 by then-premier Ralph Klein’s Conservative government, whose administration understood that “schools should prepare citizens to think critically and identify bias when they vote, consume media, and discuss controversial issues.”

And yet, writes Globe and Mail columnist Robyn Urback, those inclined to roll their eyes at the “puerility” of the Grade 4 social studies dust-up should hesitate before judging parents angered by what they felt was anti-oil propaganda dressed up as education:

“In small towns such as Blackfalds, where oil and gas is the dominant industry by number of jobs and where the dip in oil prices resulted in an absolute economic pummeling, it’s not hard to see why bringing Greenpeace into the classroom would elicit such an emotional (if also irrational) reaction,” she says.

Noting that “oil and gas in these regions is as much an identity as an employer,” Urback adds, “of course these parents were going to blow their tops.”

After empathizing with the parents in Cochrane, and with people like Mike Gunderman who likely just wanted to chill out before scenes of an old-school sleigh super-powered by nothing more than children’s wishes, Urback advises that armchair pundits and politicians hearken to the ever-deepening, highly volatile frustration of one particular demographic: young men in Western Canada who came of age during the oilpatch boom, expected to build their lives around the industry, and now face sky-high unemployment.

With a jobless rate of 19.4% in November 2019, she says, “young men in Alberta are doing worse than their peers in other provinces, worse than their female peers, and significantly worse than their parents. They’re old enough to remember when dropping out of school for oil meant a six-figure salary—but too young to actually reap the benefits. They likely don’t have the experience nor the education to fall back on, now that a lucrative job in oil is anything but a guarantee.”

The fear that uncertainty fosters will only fester, writes Urback, in young men who feel themselves trapped between a federal government that “can’t even muster the word ‘oil’ in its Throne Speech,” and a provincial government whose solution to the crisis is a “war room” vowing to smother any and all criticism of the fossil industry.



in Canada, Climate Denial & Greenwashing, Demographics, Energy Politics, Jobs & Training, Media, Messaging, & Public Opinion, Oil & Gas, Sub-National Governments, Tar Sands / Oil Sands

The latest climate news and analysis, direct to your inbox

Subscribe

Related Posts

David/flickr
United States

U.S. Supreme Court Expected to Gut Emission Controls as Climate Scientists Petition for Plan B

June 26, 2022
580
pxhere
Environmental Justice

Environmental Racism Bill Passes Second Reading in House of Commons

June 26, 2022
79
Graco/Facebook
Food Security

Soaring Fertilizer Prices Could Deliver ‘Silver Lining’ For Emissions, But Farmers Struggle to Limit Use

June 27, 2022
116

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

I agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy.

Trending Stories

David/flickr

U.S. Supreme Court Expected to Gut Emission Controls as Climate Scientists Petition for Plan B

June 26, 2022
580
Graco/Facebook

Soaring Fertilizer Prices Could Deliver ‘Silver Lining’ For Emissions, But Farmers Struggle to Limit Use

June 27, 2022
116
Konrad Summers/Kern West Oil Museum via Wikimedia Commons

Imperial Oil Backs Lithium Recovery Project in Alberta’s Leduc Oilfield

June 26, 2022
97
pxhere

Environmental Racism Bill Passes Second Reading in House of Commons

June 26, 2022
79
stockvault

Animal Agriculture Could Reduce Future Pandemic Risk, UK Researchers Say

June 26, 2022
73
Gustavo Petro Urrego/flickr

Colombia’s President-Elect Has ‘Ambitious’ Plans to Halt Amazon Deforestation

June 26, 2022
67

Recent Posts

Adam E. Moreira/wikimedia commons

Suspend Transit Fares, Not Gas Tax, Climate Advocates Urge Biden

June 26, 2022
55
moerschy / Pixabay

Pandemic Drives Up Support for Climate Action, Pessimism About Elected Leaders

June 26, 2022
27
hellomike/flickr

No Public Input as Canada Finalizes Climate Plan for Airlines

June 27, 2022
37
Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung Southeast Asia/wikimedia commons

Japan, Korea Sell Vietnam on Gas Amid Crackdown on Climate Activists

June 26, 2022
22
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Featured_picture_candidates/Barrow_Offshore_Wind_Farm

Global Offshore Wind Pipeline Doubles to 846 Gigawatts

June 26, 2022
38
TAFE SA TONSLEY/Flickr

U.S. Renewables Industries Scramble to Reuse, Recycle Before Waste Volumes Skyrocket

June 26, 2022
63
Next Post
DeSmog Canada/flickr

UN Human Rights Panel Calls for Pause on Trans Mountain, Site C, Coastal GasLink

The Energy Mix

Copyright 2022 © Smarter Shift Inc. and Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

Navigate Site

  • About
  • Contact
  • Privacy Policy and Copyright
  • Cookie Policy

Follow Us

No Result
View All Result
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities

Copyright 2022 © Smarter Shift Inc. and Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

Manage Cookie Consent
To provide the best experiences, we use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us to process data such as browsing behaviour or unique IDs on this site. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Manage options Manage services Manage vendors Read more about these purposes
View preferences
{title} {title} {title}