Whose Ocean? Whose Wild Salmon?

Kim Petersen
August 6,2009
The Dissident Voice

Do people hold the power? If so, then why do capitalists, corporations, and their shareholders grab ever more of the wealth that used to belong to the people? Why do the forests, resources, ocean, and the wildlife become commodified or controlled by corporations?

The British Columbia capital, Victoria,¹ there is only one local corporate newspaper. In the Sunday edition of the ever diminishing Times Colonistnewspaper, there appeared an advertisement very much unlike the standard ad that attempts to persuade a person based on its slickness, celebrity worship, or appeal to prurient senses. The ad was a full-page letter on the back of the A section entitled in bold: “BC speak now or forever lose your fish!” It is a rationally based appeal and is replete with footnotes to peer-review science journals and annual reports.

Addressed to the people of BC, it begins, “I am no longer certain that you want wild salmon, because every level of government that you have elected seems against them.” The biologist Alexandra Morton, who has been waging a battle against the deleterious effects of salmon farming on the wild salmon population, questions why voters opt for a government unconcerned with the plight of the wild salmon. British Columbians, by dint of their voting preferences, might be viewed as oblivious to the destruction of their five native salmon stocks.

Read the full article in The Dissident Voice

See the ad referred to in this article.