The following letter to the editor was sent to the Chilliwack Times and Chilliwack Progress in response to their erroneous media coverage of last week’s educational flag display at the Chilliwack Museum.
Re: Pro-life flag display at Chilliwack Museum
As the organizers of last Saturday’s educational event, we would like to clarify that we followed all the rules the City of Chilliwack set before us. We were given written permission from the Director of Corporate Services to proceed with our event. It was only a day before the event was to take place that the city tried to prevent it from happening without giving reasons or citing any potential bylaw infraction. We can only assume that it was because of the message.
The flag display took place on the Chilliwack Museum grounds of which the cenotaph is a part of. The location was chosen because of its high visibility and exposure to foot traffic. While many connections could aptly be made between the cenotaph (which incidentally means “a monument erected in honour of a person or group of people whose remains are elsewhere”) that was not the reason we chose this location.
We hope Veterans and citizens of the City of Chilliwack understand that our intention was never to connect our display to Remembrance Day. If in the process of drawing attention to the fact that 100,000 Canadians do not experience the same freedom as everybody who witnessed the display we offended any Veterans, we sincerely apologize.
On behalf of the local organizers,
Emily van Brederode and Mike Schouten