Tragedy, disaster, difficulty. These things bring out the best and the worst in people. There is a wild fire raging in Fort McMurray right now. The whole city, around 88,000 people, is evacuated and a lot of the city has been burned to the ground. Many residents fled, rather than evacuated, many with only the shirts on their backs, some on foot because there was too much traffic for everyone to get out safely. Amazingly everyone was evacuated safely, sadly 2 people died in a car crash once they had made their way to safety.
As the days pass things are still uncertain. The fire is still burning out of control, the weather forecast is for hot, dry and windy. The city itself is located in a isolated area. There is only one access road, it goes north to oilsands operations and camps, and a few small communities, it goes south to Edmonton, which is over 400 km away. Many people evacuated north to get away from the fire, today they will be convoyed back through the city, through the heart of the fire and on their way to Edmonton or Calgary where there are more resources to support them.
In many cases this has brought out the best in people. Random people loading their trucks in Edmonton with gas, water, food, diapers etc... and driving up the highway to the people who were stranded because they ran out of gas. The gas station in Wandering River (2ish hours south of Fort McMurray) walking the line-up to make sure people had enough gas to make it to the station to fill up, people picking people up on the side of the road to give them a lift etc etc... Small communities taking in as many people as they can, some only to be evacuated themselves the next day. I have seen this spirit in other disasters in Alberta. This is a province of "can-do". This reaction makes me proud, and brings tears to my eyes.
The disaster has also brought out the worst in some people. A year ago Alberta elected an NDP government, after decades of Conservatives. Many people in this province do not like this government. People are taking this opportunity to send horrible tweets etc to the Premier blaming her for everything under the sun, including this fire. Ok, so since when does the government control the weather? The winter was dry and warm, spring came early along with hot, dry and windy weather.
The oilsands are, in some areas, a controversial industry. People (and one an Alberta politician) have posted on social media saying this fire is karma for the oilsands industry. This makes me sick. So often the reasoning behind not wanting the oilsands is that the industry is bad for the environment, which in turn is bad for people. So, how do you say this out of one side of your mouth and then, almost, rejoice when people lost everything, including major portions of the city where they live.
Honestly, it is unfathomable to me that people would use a tragic disaster to spout such hateful rhetoric.
How is that caring about people? What ever happened to compassion, empathy, understanding that people are people? What ever happened to respect? To me, this is important components of making the world a better place, and without them, nothing you say or do under the guise of making things better has very much meaning to me.
And so to those who are doing their utmost to help, I thank and salute you. To those who are showing their true colours, I have nothing to say.
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