Harper's careless wild salmon play

Timothy Gillespie — Mon, 24 Aug 2015 18:12:01 +0000

“I realize it was a mistake, but it expresses the carelessness of this government toward Pacific salmon. It reeks of the Conservatives supporting Atlantic salmon. It was a Freudian slip … when you say what you actually think.”

VANCOUVER -- An Atlantic salmon photo has been removed from the Conservative party website and replaced with one that looks more like a Pacific chinook, but B.C. supporters of wild salmon remain aghast at the mix-up.

“I think my reaction is like a lot of people’s in B.C.,” said Gerald Amos, a Haisla elder in Kitimat who works with Friends of Wild Salmon, a broad coalition. “It looked out of touch with respect to our coasts. It heightens our cynicism.”

On Friday, Conservative Leader Stephen Harper was in the riding of North Island-Powell River to announce that, if re-elected, his government would spend $15 million restoring wild salmon habitats in the lower Harrison River.

He then tweeted a photo of a salmon leaping upstream, its body in mid-air with all of its markings clear for everyone to see. It wasn’t long before sharp eyes caught the poster-salmon’s black spots around the gills, a giveaway that it was an Atlantic salmon.

In fact, a photographer based in northern England had taken the stock photo. He told the Ottawa Citizen the fish wasn’t even Canadian and he had snapped it in England’s Northumberland county.

B.C. environmentalist Alexandra Morton took to Twitter: “This is a fricking ATLANTIC SALMON!!! Guess he is telling us it is over for Pacific salmon! Unbelievable!!! When he talks about protecting salmon in B.C. — he means farmed Atlantic salmon. This would be funny if it wasn’t so serious for B.C.”

She later issued a press release on behalf of the Pacific Coast Wild Salmon Society and told The Vancouver Sun: “I realize it was a mistake, but it expresses the carelessness of this government toward Pacific salmon. It reeks of the Conservatives supporting Atlantic salmon. It was a Freudian slip … when you say what you actually think.”

“Perhaps if Harper hadn’t fired or muzzled all of his scientists, they could have helped him get this right.”

Before long, the offending salmon was switched to one that looks more like it could be a Pacific one, darker like a chinook, Amos said. “But if they couldn’t get that straight, we should all be worried.”

It’s not the first stock image faux pas. Earlier, a tweet from the pmharper account touting the value of an adoption tax credit featured a stock image of a family in a park. But they all actually live in Seattle and a photographer snapped the scene of family joy in Slovenia.

from the Victoria Sun

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Harper's careless wild salmon play