This past summer a new ‘grassroots’ organization came out swinging punches at conventional oil producers, pulling the gay community into the politics of the Canadian oil sands. Declaring that the oil developed in Canada is ethically superior to oil produced in places like Saudi Arabia or Venezuela, the EthicalOil.org campaign has not held back on its criticism of conventional oil producing countries. To make it’s point it launched a series of ads depicting horrific human rights violations in contrast to Canadian "rights", one of which was the hanging of two teenage Iranian boys accused of being gay.

Originally the brainchild of Ezra Levant, Sun TV right wing pundit, and author of Ethical Oil: The case for Canada’s Oil Sands, EthicalOil.org has morphed into a blog turned public relations machine run by conservative agitator Alykhan Velshi. Velshi recently took up the position having retired from working as director of communications for conservative minister of citizenship and immigration, Jason Kenny.

According to their web site, "EthicalOil.org has become an online community that empowers people to become grassroots community activists on the front-lines of the campaign for EthicalOil.org."  They stake out their moral high ground by stating, "Countries that produce EthicalOil.org protect the rights of women, workers, indigenous peoples and other minorities including gays and lesbians. Conflict Oil regimes, by contrast, oppress their citizens and operate in secret with no accountability to voters, the press or independent judiciaries."

Despite the fact that many of the rights listed by EthicalOil.org have been problematic for the current federal government, under the Conservatives, to uphold and ideologically defend, Canadians are privileged to have such freedoms. This fact should not give any industry free license to exploit these rights to market any product without having shown some concrete examples of directly contributing to the protection thereof. Causality should be the minimum requirement for making such claims.

EthicalOil.org should be of particular concern to any supporter of the GBLTQ community. It has been a long and hard fight to achieve equal rights in Canada, and Canada’s oil sands have had nothing to do with it. Further, there are millions of gay people worldwide who currently face discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identification and to rally behind EthicalOil.org would only do them a disservice.

The ad featuring the picture of two Iranian boys hanged on July 19, 2005 is a reminder of how cruel the world can be. We should also remember that it was only 42 years ago that homosexuality was a crime in Canada, roughly the same period when the oil sands began to be developed.

Coincidentally, it was the day after this hanging, July 20th, 2005, that Bill-C38, The Civil Marriage Act received royal assent thereby allowing gay marriage in Canada.

While these boys were being buried, Canadian queers were only just experiencing equality for the first time. There are still many fronts that GLBTQ people in Canada are fighting on: hate crimes and recognition of the transgender community top that list.  While dramatic, the ad does not tell the full story. EthicalOil.org presents only what suited its message, leaving out some important distinctions.

For instance, one glaring hypocrisy that exists behind EthicalOil.org is that its biggest proponents have been the largest barrier to gay rights in Canada. A few searches on the Internet turn up that EthicalOil.org is very much associated with people connected to the Conservative parties of Alberta and Canada.

Only one MP in all of Alberta voted in favor of Bill-C38. Jim Prentice was only one of three Conservative MPs in all of Canada to support gay marriage. For Velshi, who worked for the Conservative party, it is a stretch to claim that their government has work hard to protect rights for the GLBTQ community.

The Alberta Government also threatened to use Section 33 of the Charter to block the Supreme Court from reading in sexual orientation into its protected rights. It never happened, but even the threat of using it displayed an unjustified animosity. As the oil sands biggest advocate, it is hard to reconcile EthicalOil.org’s argument that Alberta has actively protected the rights of the GLBTQ community.

Knowing who is behind this campaign is a signal that the whole EthicalOil.org is a last resort. Almost every public relations angle has been used to defend oil sands; jobs, the economy, green technology and reclamation. Nothing has worked, and as criticism continues to grow, the spin-doctors have turned to ethics.

When asked about the EthicalOil.org campaign, Helen Kennedy, Executive Director for Equality for Gays and Lesbians Everywhere (EGALE), was surprised to see the EthicalOil.org "Pride" ads and questioned the ethics of even using such a campaign in the first place.

Travis Davis, spokesperson for the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP) took a more supportive view saying that because the oil does in fact come from Canada, and Canada does have these protections, it is fair to say that oil from Canada is more ethical. Davis did note that EthicalOil.org does not officially represent the 100 plus CAPP members involved in the production of the oil sands, rather it is limited to the resource itself. This is a small but important distinction because without oil companies to extract the oil from the oil sands, it would stay in the ground.

Canadian oil is not as ethical as EthicalOil.org would like you to believe. For the gay community, the EthicalOil.org argument stops on the south side of the rainbow, and yes there is a pot of gold there. Notorious oil barons, the Koch brothers of Wichita, Kansas, are major players in the oil sands. Koch Industries refines a substantial portion of the oil sands from Canada in the United States.

The Koch brothers contributed millions of dollars to the conservative movement in the United States, and are currently supporting homophobic politicians such as Tea Party darling, Michelle Bachmann in her bid to become President of the United States.

Bachmann openly attacks the gay community on a regular basis. She has equated being gay with being an abuse victim, being an act of evil, and as having a disorder. A big target for Bachmann has been the public school system, which she sees as a vehicle of homosexual recruitment. The area that Bachmann represents in the United States Congress has come under fire for the staggering number of gay teens that have killed themselves. Critics have pointed to Bachmann’s anti-gay rhetoric as a possible link to the high rates of suicides.

You also should consider Marcus Bachmann, Michelle Bachmann’s husband. He runs a clinic in suburban Minnesota that’s specializes in "praying the gay away". He has also proclaimed that homosexuals are barbarians. Having the Koch brothers support Michele Bachmann, even indirectly, with any of the avails of the oil sands, means that somebody out there who attacks all gay people is being supported by EthicalOil.org.

Even if you consider the Bachmann example to be too far removed, the EthicalOil.org argument is flawed in two other profound ways. The campaign fails to mention that many of the countries listed as having offended human rights, also have their resources produced by some of the very same companies that operate in the oil sands.

EthicalOil.org also does not highlight that Canada maintains trade relationships with many of the offending countries.  So it begs the question, why should potential consumers of Canada’s oil sands be compelled by an ethical argument that hasn’t even persuaded oil sands producers or the Government of Canada to turn their backs on these oppressive countries?

Recently, Suncor president Rick George, faced many questions over the involvement of Suncor in Syria, another country where homosexuality is prohibited by law. It was an awkward position for George to be in considering that Syrian President Bashar Assad, has made every effort to silence dissent. Since spring of this year, over 2000 protesters have been killed by government troops. While Suncor cannot be held responsible for such atrocities, they do profit from their operations there.

Suncor is not alone. Other oil sands players operate all over the world, in democracies and dictatorships alike. Wherever there is oil to be found, ethics is most always trumped by the bottom line. Take for example China. Both Petro-china and China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) are major investors in the oil sands, by the tune of billions or dollars, yet queers in China face severe state sanctioned discrimination.

China is noticeably absent from the list of EthicalOil.orgs offenders. Until 2001 being gay was considered by China to be an official mental illness. Even today the gay community there faces many hurdles with state sanctioned discrimination.

Then you have Canada. Canada holds many trade relationships with rights offenders identified by EthicalOil.org. In 2010 imports and exports from Saudi Arabia totaled $3 billion dollars. Even in Iran, where the two teenage boys were hanged, there has been trade. In 2009 merchandise trade between Canada and Iran was $158 million dollars. It seems that although some of the most repressive regimes offend our ethical values as Canadians they nonetheless represent an important part of our economy and therefore it becomes permissible to trade with them regardless of their human rights violations.

If EthicalOil.org was truly concerned about human rights violations, it could lobby oppressive governments like Amnesty International or Avvaz do. It could also use the donations it is soliciting to help people in oppressive countries. But it won’t. This is where the real modus operandi of EthicalOil.org is apparent; ethics are important to EthicalOil.org in so far as they can distract from the environmental criticism that the oil sands face.

It has never been about human rights. It’s been about taking control of the message. So it doesn’t matter if consumers buy their oil from Canada, it will not make those oppressing nations any less oppressive. Sadly, the GLBTQ community in Canada has been drawn into the debate. Hopefully the campaign will fizzle out soon enough and we can go about our business once again.

This past summer a new ‘grassroots’ organization came out swinging punches at conventional oil producers, pulling the gay community into the politics of the Canadian oil sands. Declaring that the oil developed in Canada is ethically superior to oil produced in places like Saudi Arabia or Venezuela, the EthicalOil.org campaign has not held back on its criticism of conventional oil producing countries. To make it’s point it launched a series of ads depicting horrific human rights violations in contrast to Canadian "rights", one of which was the hanging of two teenage Iranian boys accused of being gay.

Originally the brainchild of Ezra Levant, Sun TV right wing pundit, and author of EthicalOil.org: The case for Canada’s Oil Sands, EthicalOil.org has morphed into a blog turned public relations machine run by conservative agitator Alykhan Velshi. Velshi recently took up the position having retired from working as director of communications for conservative minister of citizenship and immigration, Jason Kenny.

According to their web site, "EthicalOil.org has become an online community that empowers people to become grassroots community activists on the front-lines of the campaign for EthicalOil.org."  They stake out their moral high ground by stating, "Countries that produce EthicalOil.org protect the rights of women, workers, indigenous peoples and other minorities including gays and lesbians. Conflict Oil regimes, by contrast, oppress their citizens and operate in secret with no accountability to voters, the press or independent judiciaries."

Despite the fact that many of the rights listed by EthicalOil.org have been problematic for the current federal government, under the Conservatives, to uphold and ideologically defend, Canadians are privileged to have such freedoms. This fact should not give any industry free license to exploit these rights to market any product without having shown some concrete examples of directly contributing to the protection thereof. Causality should be the minimum requirement for making such claims.

EthicalOil.org should be of particular concern to any supporter of the GBLTQ community. It has been a long and hard fight to achieve equal rights in Canada, and Canada’s oil sands have had nothing to do with it. Further, there are millions of gay people worldwide who currently face discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identification and to rally behind EthicalOil.org would only do them a disservice.

The ad featuring the picture of two Iranian boys hanged on July 19, 2005 is a reminder of how cruel the world can be. We should also remember that it was only 42 years ago that homosexuality was a crime in Canada, roughly the same period when the oil sands began to be developed.

Coincidentally, it was the day after this hanging, July 20th, 2005, that Bill-C38, The Civil Marriage Act received royal assent thereby allowing gay marriage in Canada.

While these boys were being buried, Canadian queers were only just experiencing equality for the first time. There are still many fronts that GLBTQ people in Canada are fighting on: hate crimes and recognition of the transgender community top that list.  While dramatic, the ad does not tell the full story. EthicalOil.org presents only what suited its message, leaving out some important distinctions.

For instance, one glaring hypocrisy that exists behind EthicalOil.org is that its biggest proponents have been the largest barrier to gay rights in Canada. A few searches on the Internet turn up that EthicalOil.org is very much associated with people connected to the Conservative parties of Alberta and Canada.

Only one MP in all of Alberta voted in favor of Bill-C38. Jim Prentice was only one of three Conservative MPs in all of Canada to support gay marriage. For Velshi, who worked for the Conservative party, it is a stretch to claim that their government has work hard to protect rights for the GLBTQ community.

The Alberta Government also threatened to use Section 33 of the Charter to block the Supreme Court from reading in sexual orientation into its protected rights. It never happened, but even the threat of using it displayed an unjustified animosity. As the oil sands biggest advocate, it is hard to reconcile EthicalOil.org’s argument that Alberta has actively protected the rights of the GLBTQ community.

Knowing who is behind this campaign is a signal that the whole EthicalOil.org is a last resort. Almost every public relations angle has been used to defend oil sands; jobs, the economy, green technology and reclamation. Nothing has worked, and as criticism continues to grow, the spin-doctors have turned to ethics.

When asked about the EthicalOil.org campaign, Helen Kennedy, Executive Director for Equality for Gays and Lesbians Everywhere (EGALE), was surprised to see the EthicalOil.org "Pride" ads and questioned the ethics of even using such a campaign in the first place.

Travis Davis, spokesperson for the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP) took a more supportive view saying that because the oil does in fact come from Canada, and Canada does have these protections, it is fair to say that oil from Canada is more ethical. Davis did note that EthicalOil.org does not officially represent the 100 plus CAPP members involved in the production of the oil sands, rather it is limited to the resource itself. This is a small but important distinction because without oil companies to extract the oil from the oil sands, it would stay in the ground.

Canadian oil is not as ethical as EthicalOil.org would like you to believe. For the gay community, the EthicalOil.org argument stops on the south side of the rainbow, and yes there is a pot of gold there. Notorious oil barons, the Koch brothers of Wichita, Kansas, are major players in the oil sands. Koch Industries refines a substantial portion of the oil sands from Canada in the United States.

The Koch brothers contributed millions of dollars to the conservative movement in the United States, and are currently supporting homophobic politicians such as Tea Party darling, Michelle Bachmann in her bid to become President of the United States.

Bachmann openly attacks the gay community on a regular basis. She has equated being gay with being an abuse victim, being an act of evil, and as having a disorder. A big target for Bachmann has been the public school system, which she sees as a vehicle of homosexual recruitment. The area that Bachmann represents in the United States Congress has come under fire for the staggering number of gay teens that have killed themselves. Critics have pointed to Bachmann’s anti-gay rhetoric as a possible link to the high rates of suicides.

You also should consider Marcus Bachmann, Michelle Bachmann’s husband. He runs a clinic in suburban Minnesota that’s specializes in "praying the gay away". He has also proclaimed that homosexuals are barbarians. Having the Koch brothers support Michele Bachmann, even indirectly, with any of the avails of the oil sands, means that somebody out there who attacks all gay people is being supported by EthicalOil.org.

Even if you consider the Bachmann example to be too far removed, the EthicalOil.org argument is flawed in two other profound ways. The campaign fails to mention that many of the countries listed as having offended human rights, also have their resources produced by some of the very same companies that operate in the oil sands.

EthicalOil.org also does not highlight that Canada maintains trade relationships with many of the offending countries.  So it begs the question, why should potential consumers of Canada’s oil sands be compelled by an ethical argument that hasn’t even persuaded oil sands producers or the Government of Canada to turn their backs on these oppressive countries?

Recently, Suncor president Rick George, faced many questions over the involvement of Suncor in Syria, another country where homosexuality is prohibited by law. It was an awkward position for George to be in considering that Syrian President Bashar Assad, has made every effort to silence dissent. Since spring of this year, over 2000 protesters have been killed by government troops. While Suncor cannot be held responsible for such atrocities, they do profit from their operations there.

Suncor is not alone. Other oil sands players operate all over the world, in democracies and dictatorships alike. Wherever there is oil to be found, ethics is most always trumped by the bottom line. Take for example China. Both Petro-china and China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) are major investors in the oil sands, by the tune of billions or dollars, yet queers in China face severe state sanctioned discrimination.

China is noticeably absent from the list of EthicalOil.orgs offenders. Until 2001 being gay was considered by China to be an official mental illness. Even today the gay community there faces many hurdles with state sanctioned discrimination.

Then you have Canada. Canada holds many trade relationships with rights offenders identified by EthicalOil.org. In 2010 imports and exports from Saudi Arabia totaled $3 billion dollars. Even in Iran, where the two teenage boys were hanged, there has been trade. In 2009 merchandise trade between Canada and Iran was $158 million dollars. It seems that although some of the most repressive regimes offend our ethical values as Canadians they nonetheless represent an important part of our economy and therefore it becomes permissible to trade with them regardless of their human rights violations.

If EthicalOil.org was truly concerned about human rights violations, it could lobby oppressive governments like Amnesty International or Avvaz do. It could also use the donations it is soliciting to help people in oppressive countries. But it won’t. This is where the real modus operandi of EthicalOil.org is apparent; ethics are important to EthicalOil.org in so far as they can distract from the environmental criticism that the oil sands face.

It has never been about human rights. It’s been about taking control of the message. So it doesn’t matter if consumers buy their oil from Canada, it will not make those oppressing nations any less oppressive. Sadly, the GLBTQ community in Canada has been drawn into the debate. Hopefully the campaign will fizzle out soon enough and we can go about our business once again.