[QatzelOk]

Yesterday, I read this article about Fort McMurray, Alberta, written by a journalist who lived there temporarily.

For those who've never heard of the place, Fort McMurray is a company town built on top of Alberta's currently-shelved Tar Sands production area, and is known in Canada as a good place to earn 100k with a high school diploma.

The author posits, in the article, that the town seems to have been created for people who want as little education as possible, and to maximize their consumption.

He lists some reasons for his conclusion: The town is full of pick-ups. Virtually everyone is obese. The family he stays with order pizza or fried chicken every night. Drug/alcohol abuse and casual prostitution are everywhere. There are more car dealerships than community organizations, libraries and schools put together.

This got me thinking: isn't this what the promise of America itself is? Learn as little as possible and then work in a polluting industry of some kind of gorge on Pizza and Fried Chicken? Drive a pimped out pickup to Walmart and feel the pride? Drink away the empty moments between sensory stimulation and consumption events?

Isn't "America" (the concept) just one giant Fort Mac? Have most Western people been trained to desire as little knowledge as possible with maximum consumption?


Fort McMurray today

[Hong Wu]

Basically yes, and it only gets sadder if you consider that the alternative may be even worse.

[Zagadka]

What'll blow your mind is that you don't need to choose between opposite extremes.

[Godstud]

Shameless, Qatzelok. Using a tragedy to push your fucked up agenda.

What Qatzelok will fail to tell you is that most of the workers who lived in Fort Macmurray worked in the oilfield. They are the equivalent of migrant workers(many from other provinces) who are only living there on a temporary basis.

Fort McMurray is a multicultural community, attracting people from all corners of Canada and the world. Generally, moves to Fort McMurray have increased in the last decade.[61] Still, Albertans make up almost half the number of migrants to Fort McMurray, followed by 17% of people originating from the province of Newfoundland and Labrador.[62] A report in 1986 noted that 13.8% of Fort McMurray's population was from Newfoundland.

The people have a lot of money, because they work very hard for it. If you've worked in the oilfield, as I have, you'd know this. Qatzelok has not, so he thinks it's money gained thru mundane means(like teaching, etc.), and not extremely hard work, that's often taxing, and often has extremely long hours where you are away from family for long periods.

You don't have much community when your work force isn't coming home on a daily basis, and a good many of the inhabitants are single people. You don't have it much after a fire decimates most of the city, either.

This old joke sheds some light on this:

What's the capital of Newfoundland?

Fort McMurray.

[QatzelOk]

Basically yes, and it only gets sadder if you consider that the alternative may be even worse.

What is the alternative - Getting more educated and consuming less?

Why is our working class restricted to immoral and destructive grunt work like Tar Sand deployment?
And why do North Americans have so little regard for education or community?

Fort Mac is basically a totally suburban 'living zone' full of transient profiteers. Again, echoes of America? Mercenaries who don't care what harm they're doing in the grander scheme of things?

What's the capital of Newfoundland?
Fort McMurray.

Newfoundlanders genocided the Beothuks and then went on to wipe out their cod fisheries . What chance does 'the environment' have against this kind of (non) culture?

-----

For balance, here is a pro-Fort Mac video that features an Albertan right-wing media personality interviewing an articulate 'local' at a Bumper-to-Bumper.


[youtube]1U1ZoTqNp-w[/youtube]

[Hong Wu]

What'll blow your mind is that you don't need to choose between opposite extremes.

Maybe you can tell us what your better alternative is instead of making snarky comments.

[Godstud]

Why is our working class restricted to immoral and destructive grunt work like Tar Sand deployment?

It's neither of those things. You're trolling.

And why do North Americans have so little regard for education or community?

Why do you? One person's OPINION piece, doesn't mean it's fact. But hey, why would you let facts get in the way of your petty little hate-on, right?

Newfoundlanders genocided the Beothuks and then went on to wipe out their cod fisheries . What chance does 'the environment' have against this kind of (non) culture?

Back on trolling again... Just because you don't like the culture, because it's not FRENCH-Canadian(same culture really), doesn't mean it doesn't have one.

[QatzelOk]

What'll blow your mind is that you don't need to choose between opposite extremes.

I'm not promoting an extreme of anything.

But when you look at Fort Mac, you can see how extreme North American consumption is. And, you can see the level of blissful ignorance is required to maintain this suicidal level of hyperconsumption.

You can also see the tragic results of ignorance and hyperconsumption there, as well as in the more reactionary and emotional posts in this thread. We have a large number of adults who think like young, spoiled children. They need constant entertainment (positive, uncritical thoughts only) and are too lazy to question where their treats really come from.

The Tar Sands of he Fort Mac employ the dogs of big corporations: trained to extract resources, kill foreigners abroad, and defend their master's hand at all times. That's what most of English Canada is composed of.

[Victoribus Spolia]

Shameless, Qatzelok. Using a tragedy to push your fucked up agenda.

What Qatzelok will fail to tell you is that most of the workers who lived in Fort Macmurray worked in the oilfield. They are the equivalent of migrant workers(many from other provinces) who are only living there on a temporary basis.

Fort McMurray is a multicultural community, attracting people from all corners of Canada and the world. Generally, moves to Fort McMurray have increased in the last decade.[61] Still, Albertans make up almost half the number of migrants to Fort McMurray, followed by 17% of people originating from the province of Newfoundland and Labrador.[62] A report in 1986 noted that 13.8% of Fort McMurray's population was from Newfoundland.

The people have a lot of money, because they work very hard for it. If you've worked in the oilfield, as I have, you'd know this. Qatzelok has not, so he thinks it's money gained thru mundane means(like teaching, etc.), and not extremely hard work, that's often taxing, and often has extremely long hours where you are away from family for long periods.

You don't have much community when your work force isn't coming home on a daily basis, and a good many of the inhabitants are single people. You don't have it much after a fire decimates most of the city, either.

This old joke sheds some light on this:

What's the capital of Newfoundland?

Fort McMurray.

Excellent. Fucking. Post.

Finally, something we agree on, I want to buy you a beer right NOW.

[Zagadka]

Maybe you can tell us what your better alternative is instead of making snarky comments.

"you consider that the alternative"

Maybe you misspoke. That should be "an alternative", not "the alternative". It isn't "laissez-faire capitalism or Soviet communism"

[MistyTiger]

Ummm right, just use one town in Canada and compare it to America in general....does not compute.

On the contrary, Americans who have a special certification or a degree, are better off and can consume more. By persuing more certifications, the goal in America is to maximize knowledge. It would suck if for instance, I hired an electrician who lacked enough education to know how to properly wire my house.

Studies show that those who study one of the STEM fields make more money on average than those with only a high school or arts education.

[QatzelOk]

Ummm right, just use one town in Canada and compare it to America in general....does not compute.

Here's the common link: in both cases, ignorant people are the desirable 'employee' because they will commit any kind of atrocity for cash. And, they will believe any kind of aburdity if it can make them rich.

North Americans couldn't have genocided so many nations without this wonderful 'mindset.'

...

Here's an interesting link to a story about a local Alberta politician who was black-listed for using the words 'karma' and 'climate change' in a tweet during the fires that preceded the floods. Notice how American some of the comments are. Empty pride and patriotism about... environmental vandalism.

[MistyTiger]

Here's the common link: in both cases, ignorant people are the desirable 'employee' because they will commit any kind of atrocity for cash. And, they will believe any kind of aburdity if it can make them rich.

North Americans couldn't have genocided so many nations without this wonderful 'mindset.'

I see your point, and ignorant people are hired around the world, not just America. But from the view of Accounting, the ignorant ones can botch up operations causing delays, payment issues and other events that could lead to financial ruin. At my last job, the idiots caused headaches and inconveniences and had the company not been so rich, heads would have been rolling down the hill.

[QatzelOk]

I see your point, and ignorant people are hired around the world, not just America. But from the view of Accounting, the ignorant ones can botch up operations causing delays, payment issues and other events that could lead to financial ruin. At my last job, the idiots caused headaches and inconveniences and had the company not been so rich, heads would have been rolling down the hill.

I'm not talking about their competence. There are a lot of hard-working, well-skilled hole-drillers and chemical-handlers in Fort Mac. But the level of social ignorance that was required to send people to destroy so much of the environment... is literally earth-destroying.

This social ignorance goes much deeper than some fumbling employee who can't drill a hole into the earth's crust properly. Here, we have a society that kills the world because it's too corrupt and greed-centered to improve itself. Rather than decentralizing political power and democraticizing the production process, backwards capitalist countries continue to use politically castrated working stiffs to do their evil work for them.

[Atlantis]

Maybe you can tell us what your better alternative is instead of making snarky comments.

The social market economy is a proven and successful model of society that has been pioneered for over a 100%. It combines the advantages of the market economy with a welfare state. It is used successfully to different degrees in many countries without having to resort to ideological blinkers. It's the greed of the ones and the narcissistic self-love of the others that prevent it in some places.