CALGARY — Recently, the heads of several Canadian oil and gas companies allowed the media to sit in on an emergency meeting concerning the growing problem with British Columbia. Oil tycoons admitted they are puzzled by British Columbians’ behaviour and are beginning to think there is something wrong with their Western neighbours — something dangerous.
Concerns over the Enbridge pipeline, the oil sands and oil tankers culminated in a series of high-profile protests across B.C. this month. Alberta-based oil companies were baffled by this seemingly irrational reaction.
“So there I was, sitting on the deck of my summer home in Kelowna, having a beer, when my neighbour walks by,” said the CEO of DrilCorp. “He says he’s a doctor, so I invite him for a beer. He accepts, and we start talking about work. It’s all going well until he mentions his greenhouse . . . well, I tell ya, I thought that was strange enough, but I let him go on. He starts rambling about how his house has no carbon footprint, how his water is heated with solar panels in the summer. Then he tells me he converted his truck to run on biodiesel. Well, I’ve never been so mad in my life. I told him to get the hell off my porch before I put a carbon footprint on his ass. He must have been one of those homeopathic doctors that give ya tree bark for a headache . . . no real doctor would act like that.”
Industry leaders were outraged when the CEO of PetroBerta said it wasn’t just hippies they had to worry about anymore. “I was at the University of British Columbia opening the new chemistry wing we funded when I heard one of these professors start shootin’ his mouth off about the tar sands. I tried tellin’ him the tar sands were creatin’ jobs and supportin’ communities. Then he came back at me with all these numbers and crazy talk about cancer. Sayin’ things like, ‘carcinogenics.’ Or something like that. Then this other professor starts talkin’ about that deal we have with the Chinese. Usin’ big words like ‘provincial sovereignty.’ I straight panicked. There I was, surrounded by madmen. Worst thing was: they ran the place! I two-stepped the hell back home in a hurry.”
The room was stunned into silence as the CEO of Tar Sands Unlimited made it clear that British Columbians weren’t just crazy; they were dangerous. “My son went off to the University of Victoria last year. Said he was gonna study Economics with a minor in Business. I was proud that one day he could follow his old man into business. He came back at Christmas. When I saw him at the arrival gate, I said to my wife, I said, ‘That ain’t my boy.’ He was wearin’ a wool poncho. He said it was made of dog hair.”
The room collectively shuddered in revulsion.
The CEO of Tar Sands Unlimited carried on. “Instead of cowboy boots, he was wearin’ gum boots. His hair had grown out, and he hadn’t shaved since September. He looked like a crab fisherman. I held my tongue till we got home. That’s when he told us he had switched into environmental studies. Well my wife, she started cryin’. I asked him what he expected to do with a degree in Environmental Studies. You know what he said? He said he didn’t care about the money; he just wanted to do some good in the world. These damn British Columbians took my boy from me. I’ll be pickled in vinegar if we’re just gonna sit here and accept that.”
The oil barons left the media room in silence, wiping silent, solitary tears from their cheeks. While nothing else has been announced since the meeting, it is reported that a Calgary fencing company sold nearly four million feet of chain link fence and barbed wire shortly after the press conference.
