SOUND OFF: Peters’ Tumbler Ridge commentary was misplaced, lazy

Feb 14, 2026 | 9:39 AM

HELLO CFJC AND JAMES PETERS,

I am a viewer who feels compelled to let you know how bizarre, misplaced and borderline offensive I found Mr. Peters’ “Two and Out” take today on the horror in Tumbler Ridge.

I am not the kind of Canadian who sneers at the United States in self-satisfaction and imagines that our country does not share many of its problems. In fact, I generally find such attitudes repugnant. Still, I was blown away by how divorced from the Canadian context Mr. Peters’ commentary was. Business as usual in BC and Canada has come to a crashing halt this week in response to what happened in Tumbler Ridge. The provincial throne speech has been cancelled. All parties in the Legislature are united in recognizing how profoundly tragic this incident is. Mr. Peters looks at this and emits a jaded sigh that “our” society is listless, selfish and paralyzed in the face of mass shootings.

No. That dysfunction is indeed a uniquely American problem. Republican politicians barely even try to pretend they care at this point, quite unlike the provincial and federal Conservatives have done this week. It is a slap in the face to British Columbians and Canadians to ascribe such attitudes to us. I’m astonished that Mr. Peters glosses over what are by far the two biggest issues at hand in this tragedy – based, at least, on what we know at present – namely mental illness and gun possession. I simply do not see any larger societal malaise at play in our country about incidents like these.

Moreover, Mr. Peters laments a “routine” and “scripted” response to mass shootings. It seems to me that he is in fact the one guilty of such a rote and lazy response. Otherwise, should his commentary not have engaged with the particular shock and horror felt by a country where such events are mercifully rare? His monologue could have been delivered by any American journalist on a local TV channel addressing the latest massacre their viewers are trying to cope with.