“Cunning” was admittedly my initial thought when I drove by this sign on a quiet light industrial street in Fort St. John, British Columbia. It was my first out-of-town trip for a position I recently started with Northern Health that focused on better understanding and managing the health impacts associated with resource development. I was in town to meet with our northeast team to get a better understanding of the concerns associated with several major industrial projects proposed in the area.

Reflecting back now, it was likely because I had just spent several years working on construction, pipeline and industrial projects, that the sign did not invoke the same initial reaction in me that it would today. As a young female working and needing to fit into these largely male-dominated, hyper masculine work environments, I had become accustomed to these types of “jokes”.

However, as I laid in my hotel room that night, I could not get the sign out of my mind. In my new role, I had been reading up on the various health impacts associated with resource development. This included the importance of the socio-economic aspects in determining health outcomes, how these can be shaped by resource development and how negative impacts manifest inequitably across genders, race, cultures, age and social status. At the time, I had not yet learned about the term “intersectionality” and the importance of taking an intersectional lens when understanding the complex and inequitable forms of discrimination, power dynamics and impacts perpetuated by resource extraction (MacDonald and Dobrowolsky, 2020). Nevertheless, I could not stop thinking about the messages conveyed by the sign and the (what I now know to be) intersectional impacts it was having. What was it telling women who may have otherwise applied for these positions? What was it telling men who worked in camps but did not relate to their partners in this way? What was it telling society about the relationship between men and women or the kind of people that should or do work in camps? What culture was it perpetuating, what were its societal and political costs and how did it relate to the gendered health impacts we see materialize? With these questions still circulating, I took a detour to my morning meeting so that I could take the photo.

Since that time, this photo has been my (virtual) companion as I advanced in my career in the areas where health and industry intersect. It has been a grounding reminder when proponents assure me that their project will not have gendered or intersectional impacts. It has driven me to better understand, communicate and manage these impacts and it has made appearances in most of my professional presentations when I describe the complex, nuanced and inequitable interactions between health and resource development. It has also spurred on many conversations with diverse audiences.

To me, this photo exemplifies how resource extraction continues to perpetuate traditional patriarchal notions of gender roles, advances toxic and hegemonic, sometimes violent, masculinities and leads to intersectional socioeconomic and health impacts. The photo clearly captures the industry’s outdated views on gender relations and aligns itself with what Fraser (2020) terms the “breadwinner” and “family wage” model in which a heterosexual male is the main income earner for the family, supporting his homemaker wife. According to Fraser, this model is “wildly askew of post-industrial realities” and depicts obsolete gender relations (p 11).

The photo also depicts the toxic masculinity cultures that are still prevalent in industrial camps, which perpetuate a narrow and constrained notion of what it means to be a man. It is a notion grounded on dominance and oppression and with close ties to violence (Grant and MacDonald, 2020). Furthermore, it illustrates how the impacts and benefits of resource developments manifest unjustly across different populations. To me, this photo reminds me of the current feminist and gendered issues still very prevalent in resource development and the efforts needed to advance the feminist agenda in these settings.