It has been encouraging to see Whistler youth step up where Whistler adults still fear to tread, in both the Black Lives Matter rally recently and the past climate change rally. What remains to be seen is exactly how much this will galvanize their parents and community... or alternatively result [in condescending behaviour from others and being ostracized for] even trying.
One way to find out: Vail Resorts, the most powerful and influential employer in the Sea to Sky corridor has yet to publicly, actively and deliberately disavow the Republican Party of the United States, arguably the single most obstructive force in the world today against progress in both climate change and racial equality. Not only is the company silent, it financially contributes to the Republican Party, in stark contradiction to its stated beliefs.
Vail Resorts is not alone, of course. Facebook is also mangling logic and reason in a similar amoral supplication to the Trump Republicans, yet there at least there are some indications of a grumbling discontent within the actual culture and employees of Facebook.
The thin tenuous leadership of Twitter on this front is in the balance. Imagine if Mark Zuckerberg threw his considerable weight in with Twitter. Imagine if Vail Resorts threw their considerable weight in with Aspen Snowmass.
Is snow sport culture capable of anything remotely similar to even the vague grubbing of Facebook culture?
Now is a good time to find out. Or as Vail Resorts does with Jeremy Jones and POW, the adults will be content to let a handful of children lead where they simply won't rather than can't.
Bruce Kay // Powell River
