The disappearing of community

AI, Content Assembly, and the New Colonialists

“An interesting fact about political culture in Newfoundland & Labrador,” political scientist Alex Marland wrote last week on Twitter. “Historically almost nobody, including the official opposition and news media, publicly voices concern about the province's high unemployment rate compared to the rest of Canada. Why?”

Marland didn’t just mistakenly type something. In a couple of other comments, Marland explained he was

[t]rying to understand why politicians and the media in [Newfoundland and Labrador politics don’t talk about high unemployment. What explains the silence?

My point is that NL politicians and media seem to gloss over that the province routinely has the highest unemployment % in Canada. In other provinces, critics would scream about it. Why not here?

It is true that politicians don’t talk about high unemployment today. Not just politicians. Since 2003, the opinion-leading classes - politicians, government bureaucrats, business people, news media, university academics including political scientists - aren’t interested in unemployment or much else in Newfoundland and Labrador that isn’t on the northeast Avalon or controlled from there.

After all, in St. John’s unemployment is 5.9%. Not a problem. You want a job, you can find one. Everywhere else in Newfoundland and Labrador, the rate is 14.5%. Normally, that would be a huge issue but as we explained on Monday, we are in a new phase of local politics.

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