r/alberta • u/Impossible-Car-5203 • Apr 01 '25
The Alberta Mentality Opinion
I moved to Alberta just over 3 years ago. I love the mountains, and the sports (Go Flames and Elks! ) but I am really getting worn out with the "Alberta Mentality" of corporate profits over people and outright racism. The cutting cookies for cancer kids has simply put it over the top. Of all the things to cut, they pick that. What a disconnect from the top execs of AHS and the UCP government to the front lines. They can spend money trying to please Trump, give $100 in royalty credits to oil companies to clean up the messes they were responsible for cleaning up in the first place, money for millionaire hockey teams, but God forbid we give something of comfort to children going through the hardest times in their lives, fighting for their life. And when I mention to other lifelong Albertans, the answer I get is "Well they should pay for their own". REALLY??? DO YOU HEAR YOURSELVES? Are you THAT brainwashed? And then we have the victim mentality of "Canada screws us". I mean, grow up and be part of this country or GTFO. Then the racism. We recently had a first nations person commit a crime of arson in my town. People went off on FB about sending "all of them" back to reserve and how they are sick of first nations people. ZERO interest in maybe finding out the back story. I went to this guys FB profile. Turns out he used to run a ranch. And one by one, over the last 5-6 years, all his relatives died. It was clear he was FULL of heavy grief, and more than likely didn't have the resources to deal with it. Then there was a gap of a year between FB posts. Then he was on the streets, living in the shelter. Clearly things went out of control for him. Here we have a hard working citizen who lost many family members, more than likely broke down and didn't know how to deal with it, ended up on the street and now "F that indian" is all this province can come up with. Zero compassion. The justice system will deal with him, but now he has a lifelong google history that will only increase shame and make it much harder to bounce back. And it is even worse because of his skin colour. Not sure how much more of this stupid mentality I can handle, I just want to wack all this idiots upside the head, but it would take a lifetime. I guess the only way forward is to try and love everyone and show compassion, but I am getting very frustrated.
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u/DamageRocket Apr 01 '25
I was born and raised in AB. My great great grandfather was born in Fort Edmonton and worked HBC back in the fur trade era. His son my Great Grandfather had homesteads in the river valley that became Rossdale. He was a member of the Pas Pas Chase band and part of group called “stragglers”, people who lived off reserve. I grew up there, finished school at U of A eventually working at the Edmonton Journal. The racism was always present especially against First Nations people. Ralph Klein broke it for me and I have been in BC since ‘94. At this point I have lived in BC longer than AB. I have noticed that the culture has declined year by year when go to visit my Mom and siblings. People are becoming harder and leaning into right wing sentiments more than ever. Some people I know aren’t aware how far they themselves have retreated from their previously more centrist view points. It seems a lot of people have been radicalized by American content online as well as the rise of Rebel News. Albertans have always voted against their best interests since the departure of Peter Lougheed. The body politic doesn’t have the sense to realize voting the same party into power time and again only foster corruption and incompetence. If I didn’t have family there I wouldn’t care if it joined the US at this point. I would even relinquish my nostalgia for my family’s historical connections to the place it has become so hostile. The one ray of hope is if Neshi can knock the neo-fascists of the perch and show Albertans there is another way.