That’s not a joke – some Dogwood staff are from Alberta, we love our family and friends in Alberta and we love visiting Alberta. A few of us even cheer for the Oilers.

But something very strange is happening next door, as Alberta inches closer to a referendum on whether to leave Canada.

Someone, or something, has started creating AI-generated propaganda encouraging Albertans to vote Leave – with one video shared thousands of times already.

The store in the video selling affordable groceries is fake. The big houses are fake. The little blonde children and empty city streets are fake. But real people clearly find this computer-generated utopia compelling.

Much has been written about how difficult it would be for a landlocked country of five million people to go it alone. The obvious solution, already promoted by some Alberta separatists, would be to join the United States.

That would be a disaster for B.C. Transmission lines, rail lines, highways and flight routes link us to the rest of Canada through Alberta. How would it work if our province was suddenly encircled by U.S. territory?

Meanwhile, Alberta premier Danielle Smith is pushing for more oil and gas pipelines through B.C. Her corporate backers want limitless fossil fuel extraction with no laws or policies getting in the way – but they also want a coastline.

Trying to appease separatist forces by fast-tracking more pipelines is not the answer. Our leaders should pause these negotiations until we know the outcome of the referendum.

But given the stakes of Alberta separation for all of us, people in B.C. may need to engage in the referendum campaign. We have something more powerful than AI-generated mind poison: our real and genuine love for our family members, neighbours and friends.