Talk:British Columbia general election, 2005/Archive 1

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Liberal Colouration

Hey all. Had a bundle of fun with everyone Canadian federal election, 2004— we really broke new ground in terms of depth and breadth of online election coverage. I'm looking forward to seeing where this article goes.

Anyway, wouldn't be an election article without a great colour debate. The BC Liberals are currently "lightcoral," which is the same colour as we've widely implemented for the federal party. I'm not so keen on it re-appearing here, most generally because it just plain feels wrong to have Campbell sporting the same colours as the party of Trudeau. Wikipedia's article on the British Columbia Liberal Party seems very much to have reached a consensus behind the notion that the BC Liberals are currently a party of the right, with as much or more in common with the federal Conservatives as the federal Libs. It seems that our internal graphical shorthand should likewise remind our readers that these Liberals are a unique fish, not to be lumped in with any of the more traditional parties.

FWIW, the BC Liberals' own marketing generally plays up the blue half of their colourscheme over the red... back in 2001, I can remember their own internal graphics shown at their election night HQ depicting their electoral wins as "blue" rather than "red", likewise, at their recent party convention at Whistler the place was largely decked out in blue. The election signs in 2001 were also mostly blue, IIRC.

Anyhoo, curious if there's anyone else sharing my squeamishness about the lightcoral. As far as alternatives go, we could just pick a different reddish/pinkish shade, swing things over to the blue side of the spectrum (I'd likewise avoid the federal tories' "cornflowerblue") or split the difference and have a purple, a purply-red, or a purply-blue.

Thoughts on this most-pressing of topics? -The Tom 05:54, 30 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I dont mind having it changed to blue if you can prove to me that that is what the major networks will be using. I tried to highlight the differences by putting "BC" in front of Liberals btw. Earl Andrew 07:06, 30 Dec 2004 (UTC)

TV news stuck with red back in 2001. I imagine the major networks will be having a similar debate as this one around the conference table, but not for another four months. ;) Here're some swatches for discussion's sake:

lightcoral

rosybrown

tomato

darksalmon

palevioletred

orchid

plum

mediumpurple

lightsteelblue

dodgerblue

lightblue

Unity's colour can be pushed in a few directions to make room, if necessary... lighter, into the turquoise ranges, or into the greens, for instance

The Tom 21:02, 30 Dec 2004 (UTC)

okay... experimented a bit, didn't like what I got, so I went and grabbed some graphical stuff from the Liberals, played with the levels keeping the overall tone roughly the same, and stopped when I got.

#99AAFF

So that's my personal pick—"Howe Street Periwinkle." Hits the correct blue spectra that the BC Libs use, has a fair hint of warmth in it to represent the red portion of the BC Liberals (both graphically and ideologically ;)), and saturation-wise it works with the other party colours.

Let it never be said we don't overthink things on wikipedia. --The Tom 22:16, 30 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I must say, I like it. But I do want us to be consistent with the media, but this will do for now. :) Dont forget to change it here: Legislative_Assembly_of_British_Columbia as wellEarl Andrew 22:53, 30 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Not to rain on the parade here but I think it'd be best to stick with "lightcoral" for the BC Liberals despite their right-of-centre ideology. Red is this the most predominent colour in their logo and "lightcolor" is still used for other provincial Liberal parties that are not tied to their federal cousins, I think most notably of Alberta. I am a card carrying, left-of-centre member of the Liberal Party of Canada and don't consider the BC Liberals to be "Liberals" and take great pains to explain to people who don't follow politics as closely that they are not a comparable party. Despite that, most members of the Liberal Party of Canada in British Columbia belong to the BC Liberal party and though they take great pains to always call themselves "BC Liberals" they still keep the red (as do the networks). I say we change it back to "lightcoral" until we see someone else do otherwise, to change it unilaterally without seeing the party or the media doing so first would seem to me to border on original research. - Jord 03:22, 2 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Further to my note above, after examining the BC NDP website I really think we should switch back to the old standby "lightcoral".

The "Liberal" in their logo is clearly red while the picture of the province is blue. This is likely due largely to the fact that blue is the predominent colour of the BC flag. A look at the [www.bc.ndp.ca NDP website] shows that it is also predominently blue. Though we tend to think of red as a "left" colour, one only needs to look south of the border to see the hard-right "red states" of the Republicans. Red seems to still be the colour of choice for the BC Liberals and we should reflect that here. I am going to change back to "lightcoral". I commend you for the work and effort you put into finding a good colour The Tom, I liked it but I think we need to go to "lightcoral" to a) reflect the official colour of the BC Liberals and b) not confuse those less politically astute readers of the article who will expect "Liberals" to be red. -- Jord 01:27, 6 Jan 2005 (UTC)

All fair points, and I certainly won't raise a fuss either way. Couple of thoughts, though:

• Firstly, one of my reasons for changing the colour was specifically for the benefit of said "less politically astute readers." I think it's more important to communicate to them instantly that Federal Liberal =/= BC Liberal than to communicate that BC Liberal == That pink party. Colours are visual shorthand, and it's important to portray this election to readers—the majority who may be relatively familiar with Canadian politics but not BC politics—as a ideologically-polarized and vitriol-heavy battle between the left and the right, not a squishy consensus-dominated tiff between the left and the centre-left. You can make the BC Liberals lime green if you want; this isn't really a blue/red debate but rather a lightcoral/not-lightcoral debate.
• While there's a little bit more square footage of red in the BC Liberals logo than blue, blue is dominant everywhere else. The caucus site is thoroughly blue, as were the election signs last time around. While their current site is largely white, which touches of dark red and light blue, the previous version was all-blue. More notably, the Citizens' Assembly on Electoral Reform report (printed by the Ministry of the Attorney General) landed in my mailbox the other day, complete with a pie chart on assorted electoral outcomes and seat divisions that depicted the Liberals as blue and the NDP as orange.
• To nitpick, I take some issue with the "most federal Liberals are also BC Liberals" comment. As the point is made in in the Liberal Party of Canada article, both the Alberta and Ontario Liberal Parties, while independent from the feds, are ideologically close and share memberships quite closely, so using lightcoral for them makes sense. As a card-carrying federal Liberal in the BC interior (a rare breed, and to be fair, nobody ever sent me a card) I know of zero political overlap between the Campbell support base and the tiny rump of federal Liberal support out here. While there's certainly some crossover in the Lower Mainland (Mark Marrissen & crew), I'll bet dollars to donuts that Tory MPs James Moore, Gurmant Grewal, John Reynolds and John Cummins will vote BC Liberal and FedLib MPs David Anderson, Ujjal Dosanjh, Stephen Owen and Hedy Fry will not, and that most of their respective supporters will follow suit.

Anyway, for shits and giggles I may ask around various folks closer to the powers that be than I am who might be able to weigh in on this most-pressing of issues. Thanks again to all. - The Tom 05:15, 6 Jan 2005 (UTC)

First, I want to apologize for having editted this without consensus, I thought that there had been some due to there being no comment to my Jan 2 remark above suggesting that we change back to "lightcoral". I also want to clarify any confusion taken from my remarks. I am under no illusion that the BC Liberal Party is a party of the centre-right and that it is dominated by elements of the federal Conservative Party. However, I would also point out that, as an active member of the Liberal Party of Canada, my colleagues from BC are all supporters (though many begrudgingly) of the BC Liberals. Rank-and-file federal Liberal voters may not necessarily be BC Liberal voters but, for the most part, card-carrying federal Liberal members, if they belong to any provincial party, belong to the BC Liberals. Moreover, though you point to the Mark Merrisan / Christy Clark folks you might also note that BC Liberal cabinet minister Gulzar Cheema ran for the federal Liberals in the 2004 election. - Jord 14:17, 6 Jan 2005 (UTC)

"Greens"

Though the term "Greens" is often used in Australia, I've never heard a commentator in Canada refer to someone as "Greens Leader" or the like, "Green Party" seems to be the term of choice in Canada not "Greens". You might see members of the Green Party called "the Greens" and maybe the leader called "leader of the Greens" but I don't think the style "Greens Leader" or "Greens candidate" would be used, either "Green Party" or the singular "Green" seems a better fit. Thoughts? - Jord 03:27, 2 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Agreed. That said, Greens : Green Party :: New Democrats : NDP :: BC Liberals : LPBC -The Tom 07:23, 2 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Archive?

I'd liked to archive some of the stuff on here due to the size of the talk page and the fact that there will likely be plenty of more talk as we approach the election. Any objections? - Jord 18:31, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)