Read on Twitter
Thanks Stephen. In my first career as a print journalist in Alberta, immediately upon arriving here, I discovered how afraid everyone is to speak up, stand up and be counted. It is a fear ingrained in the Alberta culture that comes from 43 years of 1-party rule. #abed #ableg 1/ https://twitter.com/sandersonshpk/status/1264218277066051585
People were being treated unjustly by their government but were afraid to be quoted by a reporter because that would make them a target, they would lose funding, lose jobs, loose capital infrastructure projects. Not much has changed in the decades since, the fear is palpable. /2
I know this because I also succumbed to the fear and shut my mouth about most things because as a single mom with 3 kids to support, I needed my job and a future. This is why I apologized to my shool division for speaking out, but make no mistake it is for them I speak. #abed /3
And what kind of a system is it it that people who are elected by their constituents, trustees like me, are afraid to speak out, afraid to call out the government on the manufactured results of endless panel reports that seek to undermine our public institutions? #ableg /4
All you and I can do, Stephen, is lead the way and protect Alberta’s children from this fear. We must educate them to question, to be fair and just, and to speak truth to power. This I why I became a school trustee and I have found my voice again. #abed #ableg
