Image from scienceuncensored.ca
Do you hear that sound………………………?
What, you don’t hear anything?
Well, it’s not surprising, because that sound – or lack thereof – is just an Environment Canada (EC) Scientist hard at work. What; you thought Environment Canada Scientists were extinct – victims of overzealous harvesting by the Federal Government?
Happily, that is not the case. A few isolated populations of EC and DFO scientists are hanging on to their jobs in fragmented office habitats scattered across the country. And the silence – well, you can’t hear them cos’ they have Duct tape firmly clamped across their mouths.
It’s for their own protection really – and yours, because if they contradicted some pet government doctrine, well, that might confuse you, or make the government look like they were wrong about something.
And we couldn’t have that!
OK, so they don’t literally have Duct tape across their mouths, but they do have secrecy-minded gatekeepers between them and the public, and “minders” shadowing them at conferences. And they are increasingly hemmed in by rules about who they can or can’t talk to, whether they can publish their work in a timely manner, and even whether they can apply for grants. Continue reading
