Advertisement 1

Fortney: Celebrity activism in oilsands debate here to stay

Article content

James Cameron called it a “black eye” for Canada. Leonardo DiCaprio was so critical that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau asked him to tone it down, and Jane Fonda said her visit made her “skin crawl.”

Still, when it comes to the recent spate of celebrity thrashings of Alberta’s oilsands, Canadian-born superstar Neil Young’s 2013 outburst topped them all: “What I saw was a devastating environmental catastrophe … Fort McMurray looks like Hiroshima.”

Advertisement 2
Story continues below
Article content

For the first 40 years of the oilsands’ existence, the response was largely muted, other than the constant hum of machinery and equipment as billions of barrels of synthetic crude oil were produced.

Article content

Environmentalists have been vocal critics almost from the start, but the conversations and debates over the decades hardly resonated outside our provincial and national boundaries.

Hollywood film director James Cameron tours an area on the Syncrude oil sands mine called Bill’s Lake, reclaimed in the 1990s.
Hollywood film director James Cameron tours an area on the Syncrude oil sands mine called Bill’s Lake, reclaimed in the 1990s.  Photo by Shaughn Butts /Calgary Herald

All that changed seven years ago, when Cameron, a Canadian-born Hollywood film director hot off the heels of his blockbuster movie Avatar, turned his attention to the industry.

Alberta’s then-premier Ed Stelmach reacted with what was described as “quiet diplomacy,” hosting the director for a tour in a helicopter high above Fort McMurray. “His views on Alberta, like them or not, will be listened to by many,” said Stelmach of Cameron.

“Don’t live in denial. This thing is big,” Cameron told Canadians. “You guys are going to be in the centre of the spotlight here. It’s going to be a world spotlight.”

Cameron’s comments were prophetic, at least when it came to his fellow celebrities turning their attention northward.

Article content
Advertisement 3
Story continues below
Article content

Since his visit, Oscar-winning actor DiCaprio and Fonda — a celebrity who was known for activism back in the day when she was more famous for being Henry Fonda’s daughter than a star in her own right — have paid visits. Neil Young and 1990s film star Daryl Hannah have met with members of the Chipewyan Prairie First Nation and Athabasca Chipewyan, while actor-director Robert Redford has also spoken out the environmental impacts of oilsands development.

Some say blame it on the 1,600 oil-covered ducks in a tailings pond in April 2008, photos of which were published around the world and became for so many the iconic image of all that was wrong.

A duck is cleaned of oil at the Wildlife Rehabilitation Society of Edmonton on 127 St. near Ellerslie Rd. on Wednesday afternoon after being transported from the Syncrude tailings pond at their tar sands site near Fort McMurray after being caught in the slick.
A duck is cleaned of oil at the Wildlife Rehabilitation Society of Edmonton on 127 St. near Ellerslie Rd. on Wednesday afternoon after being transported from the Syncrude tailings pond at their tar sands site near Fort McMurray after being caught in the slick. Edmonton Sun Photo by Jordan Verlage Special to The Sun

Duane Bratt, though, points to the truck. “It raised the consciousness, both in a positive way and a negative way,” says Bratt, a political scientist with Mount Royal University, referring to the 180-tonne yellow dump truck that in 2006 was parked on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.

“It was meant to give people a sense of how large an infrastructure project it was,” says Bratt of former Alberta energy minister Murray Smith’s idea to make the four-metre high Caterpillar 7FF hauler the centrepiece of Alberta’s exhibit that summer at the Smithsonian Folklife Festival.

Advertisement 4
Story continues below
Article content
Photo of a giant cargo truck similar to those used in Alberta’s oil sands fields is parked on the National Mall in Washington, D.C on June 26, 2006.
Photo of a giant cargo truck similar to those used in Alberta’s oil sands fields is parked on the National Mall in Washington, D.C on June 26, 2006.  Photo by Sheldon Alberts (CanWest) /Calgary Herald

“It was intended to advertise Alberta’s capacity to provide crude,” he says. “Instead, people were horrified.”

It was then only a matter of time before some of the entertainment world’s biggest names joined the environmental movement.

“You get a pile-on effect, where it becomes the destination to show off your environmental creds,” says Bratt of the numerous celebrity visits since James Cameron’s tour in 2010. “It’s a lot easier to tour the oilsands than it is to go to Nigeria or Saudi Arabia.”

Still, the reach and loyal following many celebrities enjoy can indeed impact the public’s discourse.

Recommended from Editorial
  1. Special Section: Oilsands @ 50
  2. Steel workers hook cables from giant 300-tonne cranes to an 80-tonne module at the Cenovus Energy Christina Lake SAGD oilsands facility near Conklin, Alta., 120 kilometres south of Fort McMurray, Alta. on August 28, 2013.
    Sticky, tar-like bitumen has fuelled a wild ride for Canadian workers
  3. In this historical image from 1996, Anne McLellan, then PM Jean Chretien, Eric Newell and Pat Black raise their hands after the Declaration of Opportunity was signed by 18 oil players in a launching of the Syncrude 21 expansion project.
    When the oilsands hit pay dirt
  4. The Great Canadian Oil Sands project started out with grand speeches predicting incredible wealth from unlocking Canada's massive oilsands resource, delivered to a crowd of about 600 VIPs on a cold and overcast September day in 1967. Officials with the Great Canadian Oil Sands project speak to attendees at the official opening in this Sept. 30, 1967 photo.
    Triumph over challenges gave rise to Alberta's oilsands

“You can’t just dismiss them,” says Samantha Thrift, a professor of feminist media studies at the University of Calgary, whose expertise includes the subject of celebrity activism. “They can mobilize their fan base around the things they believe in, something that social media has made more powerful now than ever before.”

Advertisement 5
Story continues below
Article content

Still, woe to the Hollywood star who hasn’t done his or her homework before weighing in.

“The public will recognize when maybe a celebrity hasn’t done the research,” says Thrift, pointing to the widespread mockery of DiCaprio who, when filming The Revenant in southern Alberta, described the regular chinook warming wind as a “scary” example of the effects of climate change.

US actor Leonardo DiCaprio (L) and US director Fisher Stevens stand on stage during the Paris premiere of the documentary film “Before the Flood” on October 17, 2016 at the Theatre du Chatelet in Paris.
US actor Leonardo DiCaprio (L) and US director Fisher Stevens stand on stage during the Paris premiere of the documentary film “Before the Flood” on October 17, 2016 at the Theatre du Chatelet in Paris. Photo by CHRISTOPHE ARCHAMBAULT /AFP/Getty Images

“The public is more savvy than given credit for,” says Thrift of the growing number of entertainers weighing in on a wide variety of issues. “They can tell when a celebrity is serious or when it’s just facilitating their own brand identity.”

Whatever the impact of a celebrity endorsement or critique, Duane Bratt says one thing is certain: they’re not going away anytime soon, as the debates around the oilsands and the pipelines transporting their product continue. “The environment is a hot topic,” he says, “and Alberta’s oilsands is a very powerful symbol of that.

“But we need to respond to those celebrities, because people pay attention when they speak.”

vfortney@postmedia.com

Twitter.com/valfortney

Article content
Comments
You must be logged in to join the discussion or read more comments.
Join the Conversation

Postmedia is committed to maintaining a lively but civil forum for discussion. Please keep comments relevant and respectful. Comments may take up to an hour to appear on the site. You will receive an email if there is a reply to your comment, an update to a thread you follow or if a user you follow comments. Visit our Community Guidelines for more information.

Latest National Stories
    This Week in Flyers