Thursday, February 14, 2008

A Purely Hypothetical Situation

Remember this scene from The Empire Strikes Back? You know the one, the famous lightsaber duel between Luke & his daddy, that jerk Darth Vader. This is where D. Vader separates Luke's hand from the rest of his arm & then tries to lure him over to the Dark Side .. or else, die! "If you only knew the POWAAAH of the Daaahk Side!" ..



Now, I'd like to sketch out a simple analogy, a purely hypothetical scenario based on that famous scene. Darth Vader & the Dark Side, in this case, will represent BC's Big Biz & Development coalition, comprised of the Campbell Admininstration, the resource extraction industries, the Energy Lobby, hydro developers & of course, their guiding doctrine -- Bill 30.

And then there's Luke Skywalker, that plucky kid fighting the good fight. Let's say that he represents a fictional member of the BC kayaking community who, let's just say for the sake of a good yarn, is known far & wide for pioneering many of the now-classic rivers in Western Canada. Perhaps this totally fictional character organized the early opposition to the destruction of watersheds in the Whistler-Squamish area (also fictional). He's a long-time, some would say "legendary", penniless kayaker & ski bum .. but he's The Man, somehow the Chosen One (or self-appointed one?) who's job it is to lightsaber the hell outta the bad guys ..

So anyway, the stage is set. And we all know how the story goes right? Luke, fighting to keep BC's precious water resources in the hands of the public, gets handed some blows early on -- he loses the Rutherford. Then the Ashlu. He's battered & demoralized .. & then "OUCH! You cut off my hand off, man! Now I'm pissed!" He fights back with a furious vengeance & ends up blowing D. Vader's cover, exposing the ugly truth beneath the mask .. & all is good in the end for him, his hot sister, & all the people of the Alliance.

Well, WHAT IF ... instead of staying true to his values & his role as champion for the rivers & the Alliance ... what if BC's "Luke Skywalker" instead actually caves-in to the alluring power of the Dark Side? What if we learned that, in the end, Luke's life was spared, he didn't lightsaber the hell outta Darth Vader, & that he's now actually ON DADDY'S PAYROLL?



But that would never happen! Right?

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

A hypothetical answer ...

Perhaps, Luke, realizing that Bill 30 left few options open, as has been suggested on this site and others, for local opposition decided the only fight left was from within.

You know, when Luke goes to face the Emperor. Maybe this inside fight will cause DV to throw the Emperor down the ... the ... whatever that thing was, and then DV's helmet will have to be revealed to show the ugly truth?

Anonymous said...

Hypothetical answer to hypothetical answer:

Perhaps, Luke thought that he will change things from inside (highly improbable), however his plan would take something about couple centuries to be successful. He was shipped to one of the periphery part of empire for slave work. He will be stuck there until the battle is over.

Luke Skywalker at this point betrayed BC's river and creeks. Hopefully he will not cause more harm.

Anonymous said...

Anonymous #2, you are accusing, not hypothesizing ... care to share some facts or basis? (of course, just another hypothetical question)

#3

Anonymous said...

This is very interesting. "Luke" did fall off the face of the Earth and went from being the Ashlu's biggest fan to completely silent in the last year of the Ashlu battle. Why no Ashlu Fest last year? He has basically disappeared from the scene altogether.

- Anonymous#4

Anonymous said...

This is truly puzzling: If Luke was never lured by money before, why now? If he really is trying to bring about change to the system 'from within', what would be the harm of continuing to associate with a few close kayaking friends (and why wouldn't he want to, even in secret - we all look the same on the river)? If Luke truly has abandoned his values, why go work 'for da man' (i.e., the complete OPPOSITE of those values) - why not just move to Nebraska and never kayak again? Luke, if you're reading this blog: Come 'on man, either come back to the good side, or at least have the cahones to tell your buddies WHY you bailed.

Anonymous said...

There was a semi-interesting story about Darth Vader this morning on NPR

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=19141349

Coincidence?

Anonymous said...

Now I don't know many details about star wars, but from what I see it would be better if DV at least did things in the open, took the mask off per se... Fights are never good places to be and although they are necessary I guess, the best part of them is what gets accomplished in the end. Maybe Luke could take some advice from Dorothy and Toto and make friends with those he meets on his path ...

Anonymous said...

This Star Wars analogy is hilarious. My comment is that 'Luke' has done only good things for the rivers so get off his back.

My issue with this is that there were many other great people in Luke's army which just got abused and left out by Luke (playing jedi-mind-tricks on etc) and as a result, they lost their will to fight. That was the same thing that happened in his 'old colony' of Tatooine In the end, why didn't he keep his close buddies in the loop; which close buddies would you be referring to exactly?

Anonymous said...

Fantastic analogy.

I guess now that Luke has decided which side he is on, can the rest of the Alliance get back together once again in unison and fight the good fight ?

Hopefully Luke's disappearance will rid the area of a slightly oppressive leadership and allow the community to re-build ?

I am so excited about this years Ashlu festival, long live BC kayaking :-)


May the force be with you all.

Ben Holzman said...

Star Wars analogy aside why is there no Ashlu fest anymore? I went in 2006 and had an awesome time. Who cares if Ledcor is there, I assume we can still drive up there right? Hell maybe the road is even better.