Transition Culture

An Evolving Exploration into the Head, Heart and Hands of Energy Descent

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14 Jan 2010

A Short Film about what Transition Calgary are up to

Thought you might like this… only 3 minutes but a nice flavour of what Transition looks like in Calgary.

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3 Comments

T. B.
15 Jan 2:19pm

In terms of the mainstream context out there –

The riding office of the Prime Minister of Canada is in Calgary, and a more oil industry -friendly faction of his party has had ongoing ties to that area of the country.

Calgary is in the province of Alberta, which is relatively bound up with oil (e.g. the tar sands, which are out there). In terms of the culture and so on over in Alberta: comparisons sometimes are drawn with Texas.

So Transition accomplishments out in Alberta may prove relatively difficult, and relatively important.

T. B.
15 Jan 2:32pm

(By the way –
The Prime Minister of this country definitely has strong Albertan oil patch ties — which I didn’t communicate well there.)

T. B.
15 Jan 2:47pm

It’s me again. As a Canadian (in Ontario, Canada), I keep ruminating on this relationship between Calgary and Transition.

In terms of more international context –

Here’s a recent post about UK activists who spread oil on a Canadian flag during the COP15 talks –
http://earthfirst.org.uk/actionreports/node/23518

Accuse me of going off on a tangent if you must, but there are major connections with Calgary and Alberta.

Before COP15, Monbiot was claiming that Canada is the greatest threat to world peace (without recognizing the extent to which Canada is integrated into the U.S.). During COP15, the Yes Men and the Climate Debt Agents targetted Canada. And Canada got the most Fossil of the Day nominations, and….. I could add to the list by getting into what happened in the streets of Copenhagen at protests. On the other side of these conflicts: I’ll repeat that the links with mainstream Alberta have been important.

In the meantime, the Transitioners in Calgary have been chipping away at some of the status quo out there.

(Comparisons with a hypothetical Transition group in Saudi Arabia would be appropriate in some ways…. but inappropriate in other ways.)