Reflecting on his long struggle against South African apartheid, Nelson Mandela said, “One effect of sustained conflict is to narrow our vision of what is possible. Time and again, conflicts are resolved through shifts that were unimaginable at the start.”
The Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline expansion is not apartheid — let’s get that off the table right away. It’s a pipeline. But in its sustained, divisive nature, in the way in brings up hard constitutional questions and emotional responses while deepening political entrenchment, the very debate over the pipeline is worth considering in its own light.
“Debate” might (Read more…) even be the right word at this point. When one side is being arrested for opposition while the other is worried about their ability to operate within the basic Canadian principles of peace, order and good government, this has become something deeper and less flexible than a debate.